Technology Reflections

This time it’s two weeks with students. So far, so good! Most of my students and classes are really good. A few random kids who still do not understand that it’s rude to talk when someone else is talking, a few who will take negative attention over no attention and I always forget how young and needy the 6th graders are at the beginning of the year.

In Reading class we are reading Tangerine by Edward Bloor. This is probably the 4th year that I’ve taught this book and every year I learn more about it and like it even more! It’s always a slow start, but we’re getting through it. I’m supposed to do a book in about 4 weeks and then the LA teachers do a book in their class for the second half of the quarter. Luckily I only have one LA teacher to coordinate with and we are really flexible with each other. Also, she tends to read the book more in class and I tend to have the kids read more at home so that we can discuss in class. The idea is to not have the kids have to read too many books for homework. In addition to the books we read in class, they all have to be reading an independent book for our Reading Counts program.

The computer classes are going well. We’ve finished the Online Safety unit in all computer classes. 6th graders are making Wanted Posters for the WizzyWigs, characters from the Netsmartz curriculum that I use. I’ve moved onto teaching the 7th graders how to use Word more effectively and 8th graders are about to begin a Unit on Digital Photography.

I have decided NOT to use blogs in my classes this year. One overriding reason is the time and effort it takes me to set up all the accounts. In order to ensure safety, I created gmail emails for each of my students in 8th grade computers and reading classes – thats about 100 kids. Then I had to go create each of the blog accounts for them, because I had to keep the gmail email passwords private (I did the gmail+name trick so that all passwords and emails came to one gmail account that I had control over). This week I found a new tool that I am going to use – www.myhaikuclass.com While it does not have blog features, it does have a discussion area where the kids and I can have message board type discussions. It also allows students to upload assignments to me, which I think is cool! There is an email feature, but the teacher has to ENABLE the feature for students to email each other – I won’t be doing that for liability reasons, but I will be able to email the kids and they can respond to me. One other great feature is that the kids do not need to have an email address to sign up and I can have each kid sign up on their own through a special link. That will save me hours of time. I plan to use this program with 8th Grade Computers and Reading classes.