Blog post 19: Using video for teaching and learning

http://ed.ted.com/on/INLeBp90

My lesson is based on the four types of sentences. We have been reviewing these kind of sentences since the beginning of the year, but my students still have trouble identifying them. I went through a lot of videos and most of them were boring and monotonous. They mainly had someone speaking and dictating, which is something I could do. This is something I could do! I was finally able to find a catchy song to go with it. 

I loved this website! My computers are finally working so I know I can use this in my classroom. 

After reviewing this website I concluded I could use this awesome tool in the following ways: 

1.  Professional Development- In the near future I want to apply to be a SCEI coach. The SCEI coach assists in the training of teachers and serves as a facilitator to them. I would use TED ED to show videos for staff development. This year, in my campus, they are going big in implementing centers for each subject area. For newer teachers like me, I love the idea and find it very easy to implement. I see it as a win win situation for everyone. Unfortunately, the older teachers do not believe so and are very apprehensive in implementing centers. The number one reason to why is that they don't know how to implement it. I am a visual learner, and I believe I could use this resource to show the teachers videos on whatever they are having issues with like centers, guided reading, calendar time, etc. I think this would be a great resource. 

2. Center mini-lesson - I am not 5 years old but my attention span I believe is much worst than theirs. I easily get bored and have to be moving, which is why I love to do centers in my classroom. I teach 2nd grade and many times I find it very difficult to have all 22 kids attention. I can produce a lesson in TED ED and have them listen to it and complete each section in the classroom computers during center time.  Since technology is everything for kids now, they will be engaged. I will definitely try out the lesson I made using TED ED in my centers ( types of sentences) since I know they have trouble identifying each type. 

3.  Student project- In our second grade classroom, for social studies, we are learning about the branches of government. Students love you tube, so I would split the class into groups of 3 and have them each do a presentation with the 3 types of government branches. One group would be legislative, one executive, and the last one judicial. I would take them to the computer lab every day for 45 minutes to research the you tube video to answer the questions previously provided. They would be responsible for making their lesson based on the teachers criteria. Students would have about 3 weeks to complete the project. 

Blog Post 18- Uses of Google Photos

Before this class, I had never heard of Google photos. I was only aware of the iCloud for the iPhone 6, and refused to back any pictures up. I was very paranoid about anyone hacking into my account so I ended losing a lot of photos. This is an excellent resource that I had no idea that existed! I absolutely loved it. The way that I would implement it in the classroom are as follows: 

1. Use Google photos instead of anchor charts. Our campus is very big on creating anchor charts for the students for each subject. During walkthroughs that is something that they are constantly on the lookout for. As I have mentioned previously, I am trying to go paperless and adding anchor charts will not help with this goal. Instead of creating anchor charts and posting them on the wall (at the end I find it more overwhelming than helpful having so many papers surrounding you) I would bring up the picture of the anchor chart on the interactive white board. These past two weeks we have been learning about 2d and 3d shapes. I have created about 3 anchor charts for them, taking up a lot of space. Instead of having my classroom looked clutter, I can post up the pictures during the math block, so students could reference back to it. 

2. In 2nd grade my students struggle a lot with parts of speech. They often get confused with a noun and an adjective or a verb and adverb. In my classroom I like to relate my lessons to real life, so I believe my students could benefit by having me post pictures every day as a warm up. I could put up the picture on the interactive white board and they could use adjectives and verbs to describe the picture. They would be practicing with the parts of speech as well as their sentences. They would be much more engaged if the pictures portrayed real life.

3. I would aim this lesson for the upper grades. I am a strong believer that students learn better if they feel empowered.  Instead of being students, they will switch to being the teacher. I would provide each team of 2 students a topic they should research and have them create an album or collage about the person being studied. In the album though, they would have to also write captions, present it to the class, and share the hyperlink to the album. 

4. I think that as a parent anything that your child does is important. As teachers, unfortunately, we spent a great majority of time with them and many times see them more than their parents. I would use Google photos to create an online album for parents to see pictures of what their kids are doing. I would also use Google photos to create a collage of all the students pictures. I would then distribute them to the parents at the end of the year. I am definitely going to try to implement it this as soon as possible. 

Overall, I believe this was a great tool to use! 

Google Photos Story

Once upon a time there was a little girl named Helen. It was time for her to write a letter to Santa since Christmas was near. She asked for a puppy, but her mom utterly refused. Helen was anxious all the month until finally Christmas Eve was here! Her and all her family went to her grandma's house. There she ate, danced, and had a lot of fun. It was finally midnight! Helen knew this was when Santa Claus came to town and brought many presents. Anxious she waited for the present. To her surprise, when she opened it, she found a new puppy!

https://goo.gl/photos/DpoGD7shzVwk9tpT9

Blog 16- Feedly Articles

As a parent and as an educator one of my biggest concerns is bullying. Unfortunately, this is very common in our society nowadays. One of the articles I chose was called "What Is Identity-Based Bullying—and How Can I Stop It?"-https://www.edutopia.org/article/what-is-identity-based-bullying-jinnie-spiegler

This article mentions a new kind of bullying: identity based. This new kind of bullying takes many forms such as:

•   Stigmatizing a student with a disability

•   Teasing an overweight teen about their body

•   Using homophobic language toward students who identify as gay, lesbian, or bisexual

•   Excluding a young person because they don’t conform to gender norms

•   Trying to pull off a Muslim student’s hijab

•   Sending a text message using a racial slur

•   Slut-shaming a young woman

According to research, unfortunately, the most common are racial comments and issues affecting gay, lesbian, and bisexual students. Each day, I have seen videos on Facebook where unfortunately young kids make racial slurs and believe they are higher than everyone else. If we want to make this world a better place for our kids we must teach them everyone is equal. WE must teach them to respect our differences. No one is better than anyone else on this Earth. The article also points out how we can prevent bullying in our schools. The three things the article recommends for us to do is: 


-       teach about identity and bias- teachers should have a culturally responsive classroom. All students must feel valued and part of this would be to recognize and appreciate everyone's culture. 


-       -be more approachable- according to the article many victims foo not tell any adults. 


-       -Help students learn and feel empowered to be allies- unfortunately most of the incidents occur while the teacher is not there ( on playground and cafeteria). Since students feel scared to tell the problem to an adult we should help the students help each other out. We should teach them to stand up against bullying. 

The second article I read was called :10 Innovative Learning Stations That Get Students Reading-
https://www.edutopia.org/article/10-innovative-learning-stations-get-students-reading-shelby-scoffield

As an educator, I am constantly looking for ways to update my practice. I cannot stand giving students a paper and pencil assignments, so I usually do quick 15 minute centers for each content's block. This article provides different ways to have students engaged in the reading. I loved how it shows us additional sources to have students think critically. It provides with ideas for centers and what tools we can use for each one:

-       Character Profiles:  Glogster 

-       Interview the Author: Snapchat 

-       Tone/Mood: Have students identify the tone or the mood in different passages throughout the text, and then have them record themselves reading quotes in that tone or in a way that evokes that mood.

-       Theme:  Google Drawings.

-       Movie Adaptation:  VideoNot.es 

-       Plot Development: Tiki-toki

-       The Bigger Picture: Newsela 

-        

Blog 15- LiveBinder

I loved this tool! This week we learned about polygons and next week we will be learning about 3d shapes. I based my binder on those two components. I attached sources to be used for the lessons. The link is:
http://www.livebinders.com/play/play?id=2114427

-        I absolutely loved this tool! I am trying to become paperless in my classroom since it creates such a mess in there! I make newsletters every week to make parents aware of the TEKS taught that week and any special events… by Wednesday I find at least 3 on the floor. This defeats the purpose since many parents probably do not even look at it. Instead I have resorted to uploading on to Class Dojo, the app I use to communicate with parents. This was the first paperless change I  made and now, with this tool, it will be the second. I would implement this the following ways:

-       Coming from kindergarten, I love having my students make crafts and do printables. Four years ago, when I first started teaching, I would make a master of each copy and store it in a manila folder. I would label the folder and put all the masters pertaining to that activity through there ( cvc words, addition, subtraction). I would then file it into a big black shelve we have. Half the time I lose the masters and are left without the activity the next year. Now instead of doing that, I can create binders for each subject area. In the binders I could create the different tabs for the TEKS we are teaching. On the subtabs I can arrange all the activities, videos, games, and assessments I’m going to use for each lesson. I have already created the binder for math, so I would just need 3 other ones. I love that I’m able to have everything there so I can open it from my work computer and portray any handouts in the whiteboard. I also have to forget about keeping at least one master! Wonderful idea!

-       Instead of giving out paper lesson plans (which I lose right away half the time), as a team we can create a binder for each subject. Whoever is in charge of that subject could add the lesson plans there and any additional resources we could use. As soon as I receive the lesson plans I look for activities for the concept being taught. Most of the time I make copies of the master for all the teachers in our grade level (7 in all) so that itself eats up a lot of paper. As I have previously said paper is a sacred possession in our school. Instead of wasting my paper I could upload any documents or videos that I use.

-       I would use these binders for 5^th grade students. I would split the class into groups of five and provide each group with a social studies figure they have to research. Each group would have to create a binder for their famous figure. In the binder,they should have 3 different tabs. In one tab they would have to upload pictures, in one videos, and in one they would have to create a set of question for other students to answer. The group will quiz their peers for understanding. Each team will be in charge of giving their peers all the information.