coLAR Mix and International Dot Day

Just had to share about a great activity that happened during the Digital Storytelling ACE program.  After we read Ish by Peter Reynolds and talked about International Dot Day, the students partnered to decorate a dot provided by the coLAR Mix app.  They opened the app on the iPad and hovered over their dots.  The dots came to life!  Spiraling spheres of various sizes entertained the students with music coming on and off.  That app is enthralling!

I'm trying to print the bird coloring page for the app as that looks even cooler.  

Building Rapport with the Distance Learner

Building rapport in distance education sounds a lot like building a physical classroom community and atmosphere, just with technology.  This reminds me of the SAMR model with the substitution enhancement.

Instead of sitting on the floor together in community circle, we could either type an introduction, share through a Google hangout or post an avatar with description.  

In watching my son take distance classes years ago in high school, this community building was not done.  It was very difficult to communicate with the teacher, so I also know how important viewing the teacher as approachable is.

Timely feedback, encouraging words, an understanding online countenance, and willingness to bend for emergencies are all vital in running a distance course.

Assignment for week 2 of How To Teach Online

First 2nd Saturday Showcase

Today I attended a great professional development led by my friends Annie and Jeanette!
http://edtech.springbranchisd.com/educationaltechnology/edtechnewsevents/tabid/7138/default.aspx

 They started with talking about the SAMR model with this video:



 We considered how to redefine, modify, augment or substitute stations with technology for the tradition pen and paper stations. Here are some suggestions.

 Encourage students to write and submit reviews and poetry to http://www.stonesoup.com/stone-soup-contributor-guideline/

 Have a website that is easily found outside of school. Annie uses the NHE campus website and her page is easily found by searching for Ms. Mitchell's website NHE 

http://nhe.springbranchisd.com/Curriculum/ThirdGrade/AnnieMitchell/tabid/30171/Default.aspx

Sign up the class for SumDog
http://www.sumdog.com/
In playing the games I've discovered some of it will be over the 2nd grader's math levels.  Sometimes I clicked on games and got the message that I didn't have access.  I am not very sure on this one.

For student created books, try http://epubbud.com/
This looked very exciting for publishing and consuming ebooks!

For allowing students to show what they know:

and

http://www.showme.com/

And my new friend, Sydnie, at Valley Oaks, suggested this for Singapore Math practice:
http://thesingaporemaths.com/
While there is no Primary 2, there is Primary 3. 

So, thanks for a fun Saturday morning!

Test for tomooc