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Showing posts from February, 2012

iPads in Education - App Suggestion Candy Count

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Candy count (Currently Free) Basics : Users play with candy - sorting it by color, counting the sorted item, then making comparisons (most, least, more, fewer) and ordering them. Educational Use : This can be used with young students to learn color sorting, counting and basic comparisons using "candy" in this app. It's very easy to use, colorful and appealing to children. Drawbacks in Education : The app does have connections to FaceBook and Twitter, which can be a drawback with young students...they can easily accidentally leave the app when touching those buttons.

Five Friday Finds - February 24, 2012

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Here are this week's Five Friday Finds!   Remember the beauty in sharing and collaborating.... Have a great weekend :-) General Megans' (luv2teach) Pinterest Ok, I'm not a Pinterest user, but this teacher has organized examples of lots of ideas for the classroom onto 91 boards - worth checking out if you are looking for ideas. ELA TES A great site for finding English teaching resources; put together by a network of teachers. Math 2D Geometry Shapes Game Elementary game for children to test their geometry vocabulary.  Uses both text & audio to ask them to select a certain shape. Science NASA - Station Spacewalk Game Interaction simulations of actual space walks conducting repair work in space. Social Studies Toporopa "Train your brain" with European geography.  A variety of tools here.

Five Friday Finds - February 17

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Here are this week's Five Friday Finds!  Remember, we are all smarter when we collaborate. Everyone have a great weekend... Art/Math/Social Studies Sistine Chapel Students can study the Sistine Chapel from the comforts of home in this 3-dimensional rendering. The room can be rotated in all directions, and zoomed in and out for varying perspectives. ELA Vocabulary Pinball Players can learn new vocabulary while playing pinball by getting the ball to hit the letters that make up the current word. Math Numberlines Create electronic number lines to use with your class - has colored squares you can use to cover some of the numbers in the sequence to check for knowledge. Science Build a Body Learn about body systems and their placement within the human body using this interactive site, which includes information about major body organs. Social Studies Toporopa Learn or review European geography & facts online

iPads in Education - App Suggestion ScreenChomp

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ScreenChomp   (Currently Free) Basics: Record your explanation along with your "markings" on the device at the same time.  Called a "doodling board," you use some simple drawing tools to explain or bring to life a problem or picture.  You can start with either a blank screen or a picture from your Photo Library.  The recordings are uploaded to "the cloud," and give you access to a url link you can use to either email out or post to a site for easy access; you can also download the video as a mp4 file for editing or local storage. Educational Use: Teachers and students can easily create short tutorials, sample problems, diagrams with explanations, etc that can be shared with each other.  As a teacher, this can be used to help reinforce concepts taught OR (if a student created the material) to check for learning.  As a student, I could have a site to go to if I need to revisit the material and I can view it at my own pace as many time as needed.  A

Five Friday Finds - February 10, 2012

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Here are this week's Five Friday Finds.  As always, share with others and enjoy! General FlipSnack Upload your pdfs to create a flipping book for free!  You can then share on your website with embed code. ELA Reading Bear Site created by WatchKnowLearn to help teach/learn readings by teaching phonics.  There are 50 lessons planned (not all are created yet), and the site is targeted to kids ages 4-7.  It is free, but does require a login.  Math Yummy Math "We provide teachers and students with mathematics relevant to our world today …" A blog created by an instructional math coach and retired math teacher to bring the real world into math Science Sea and Sky "Sea and Sky is a personal Web site dedicated to sharing the Splendors of the Sea and the Wonders of the Universe." Social Studies My Learning "Learning with Libraries, Museums and Archives." UK site created as a resource for teachers. 

iPads in Education - App Suggestion iTunes U

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 iTunes U (Currently Free)   Basics: iTunes U has LOTS of curriculum material created by educators categorized by subject area, submitting institution, and grade level.  All the material is vetted through the submitting organizations, mostly Colleges, Universities and K-12 Education groups.  There is a Beyond Campus area that also has materials from museums, libraries (think Library of Congress!), and other educationally minded organizations.  Best of all - all material is available for  FREE . Educational Use: iTunes U is all about education as a majority of the information has been created by educational institutions.  Find the material needed to introduce, reinforce or supplement topics you are teaching about.  If you are in a situation where your students have the devices, as a teacher you can now push out the material you choose within iTunes U to the student devices using a common Apple Account (as long as students leave it logged into that account... Please note:

iPads in Education - App Suggestion iBooks

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iBooks (Currently Free) Basics : Yes, you can buy eBooks from the Store within iBooks, but you can also add your own materials (pdf and epub formats), and add materials garnered from other places on the web.  The highlighting, note taking, built in dictionary, and bookmarking make it an interactive experience without defacing an actual book. Educational Use:   I have heard of many students with certain reading problems that can read better using iBooks as they can increase and change the font, and even change it from black text on white to Sepia or white on black.  The ability for teachers to share their materials with students on the mobile device is nice; however, when teachers make their materials ePub format it is huge as it adds the functionality of the interactive pieces.  The interactive features make it a great way to teach students how to take good notes that have meaning for them, and that are tied to the actual material the notes are about.  I also know of an E

Five Friday Finds - February 3, 2012

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So, this week's Five Friday Finds definitely have an Elementary flavor to them, though most have applications for K-12.  As so many of the content specific sites (but not all!) are tailored to middle/high school, I thought it might be nice to pop this week's items in there.   As always, feel free to share with others as we are all smarter through collaboration!  Have a great weekend. Free Online Sign up Sheet SignApp Now Create free and easy sign-up sheets online, no account needed.  Share the url with those you want to fill out the sheet.  You can easily download the file created. Celebrating the 100th Day of School   100th Day of School Activities, lesson plans, websites and other ideas for the 100th day of school. Children's Music Nancy Stewart's Children's Music site Nancy has lots of resources on her site, this link takes you to her Song of the Month.  Each month she provides a new song for download FREE - includes "audio file, she

Favorite Apps: Ease into 5K

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Part of my job in working with technology is trying out both iOS and Android apps for their uses in education.  While it is fun to play with the kids' apps, it's also nice to find some that are useful personally.  Here's a running program app I use lots that is available for both iOS and Android. Some background: My oldest son started showing an interest in running several years ago.  He decided he wanted to run in some 5Ks.  Knowing I'd be the one to take him,  I figured I may as well get back in shape and run in the races too as long as I'd be there. Hence, one of my favorite "health" apps became Ease into 5K by Bluefin  Software (formally the app was called C25K).  They now have a whole series of apps, but Ease into 5K is the one that I used when I started running again two years ago. (This was after about a 10 year hiatus.) As a running program (plan), I liked it as it follows the  Couch to 5K running plan . This running plan eases yo