Tool #6- Wiki-what??

A wiki is the bulletin board of technology. Wikis can be used as class projects where a theme is added to throughout the nine weeks. Students learn about a particular subject and then add facts and figures to their wiki or to a class wiki. It can also be used for small group projects. Students can each work independently and work on their wiki as a group. This is especially great for students who are involved in many after school activities or for students that have to work.

It can also be a great way for teachers to communicate with parents. If a party is coming up and she needs to coordinate who will bring what. Teachers can also use wikis to help students teach each other. Students can research a subject and create wikis. The teacher can then use these wikis to supplement her teaching thereby having greater students interest and investment.

Tool #5- Social Bookmarking

Social bookmarking is an easy way to share links with other people. I joined Diigo and quickly began following people who were teachers. I found two great websites using some tags such as education, technology, and classroom. The first site I found was Wikipedia in the Classroom and it features many ideas to use Wikipedia responsibly in the classroom. The other website is another link to connect to other great websites. Best Websites for Learning and Teaching is a website put together by school librarians and it features the best sites that they feel are good resources for teachers. This one I quickly added to my list of tags since I found it very useful.

In the classroom social bookmarking is a great way to share some required or suggested reading with students and parents. It is also a way for students to share reading that they found interesting with the teacher as well as with each other.

Tool #4-To share or not to Share

Google Docs is an amazing application. You can create documents and they are at your reach at all times. They are a great source for mobile technology since a lot of smart phones do support Google Docs but not Word. It is a great way to share notes with students and also a way for students to share notes with each other. You can also make your documents public or keep them private. The program is user friendly and with a few clicks you are done.

Google Reader is also an amazing resource. There is no longer a need for multiple windows so you can get your information. Everything you subscribe to is condensed into one page without all of the fuss of avatars and picture schemes. This would be of great value both in the school so teachers can communicate with each other and between the teacher and the students so students can communicate with the teacher. Students can open up their reader and have instant access to all of the information that their teachers have posted online. They can go back to old notes and also share information with each other.

Both of these resources offer multiple varieties to share information both with students at home and also between teachers at school.

Tool #3

These image generators are a great tool for the classroom. They can be used as an introduction of myself as a teacher to the students and parents. They can also be used by students to show their peers what things are important to them.