Graduation is over

Yesterday was our GMU graduation, and after the Pomp and Circumstance, the wonderful adress, the degrees and awards and then POOF! it's all done. What next? Can I really be done with all of the lesson plans, portfolio, Thursday night classes? What will I do now? Going back to cleaning the house and ironing is not rewarding, Thursday night tv doesn't interest me at all, and my reading is now very educational in nature. Maybe I can continue the Ender's Game series, or look for more books by authors we read in class. I'll miss you all and good luck in your part of the world of education!

Podcasting

I've been using both garage band and audacity and I'm really enjoying them both. I like the editing capabilities of audacity, placing the clips of music exactly where you want them to begin. I'm finding this fits well with my own class work, now to adapt it to the classroom! Podcast lesson plan next!

Flip vidoes with Kindergarten

Well I have completed my unit on weather with our Kindergarten class and they really got into the Flip video's. They also loved making a Thunder cake, it was just like a cooking show with a completely baked cake ready just as we placed our cake in the oven. So we had two cakes in two days, they really Loved that!
As for the videos well we most assuredly have some children that need to be on the stage! Actors abound at Appletree. No reservations here. Overall the unit was a great success and weather is now our favorite topic. I'm not sure we'll ever get beyond it this year every week they have more to say about what has been predicted and what the weather will be in the future.
Here's a Kindergarten excerpt:


second boy:



last child:

More on Podcasting

I was very hesitant in working with Audacity, whereas using Garage Band that comes on the Mac was a breeze. I think I just need to get used to all the differences between the two and settle on one (Garage Band) to learn for my students then practice with Audacity to show them later. The podcast we completed in class was not as easy as it sounds but I was impressed with how some of my classmates interpreted the directions. Truly, I need to lighten up a bit and not take everything so seriously, I'd have a lot more fun anyway!

Podcasting

I love the title, PODcasting right off of Apple's ipod! Well after reading All about podcasting I'm ready to try it out. After all I have beautiful new mac's all equipped to go for it immediately. Now I just have to come up with content, I was thinking of our Wed letter published every wed to parent's e-mail. Maybe we could have the oldest students and our teachers read a section into a podcast and have the parent's subscribe. We have a large amount of space on our server for serving up this kind of content. Once I work out all the security issues like who can access and from where we should be set to go.
After listening to Radio WillowWeb, I think it is a possibility. Also from my itunes account I already subscribed to podcasts of my favorite NPR shows that I tend to miss when initially broadcast but I added even more from the education part of itunes. There is so much out there, and so little time!

Digital video

I haven't had a chance to play with editing the video once created and moved to the computer. But I have worked with editing in the camera and it's really easy. I am attempting weather reports using the camera with Kindergarteners next week. I can't wait to see how they do, and if they can even hold the camera straight. This should be exciting......or crazy, stay tuned.

Lesson plan based on blogging

This is a link I found from Diigo about creating lesson plans based on blogging and how to best use it in a classroom. This talks mainly about grade 3 and up with blogs but it is an interesting resource. http://langwitches.org/blog/2008/12/23/blogging-with-elementary-school-students/
Let me know what you think.........