Wow! What a fun post! I had a great time looking at MANY ideas about multimedia use in the classroom. As I stated in my very first blog post-- I was a little nervous about making one. After posting and reading others, I've come to like it more and more. I believe that next year I will start on my own for my classroom. It's going to take time because after reading some like Mrs. Cassidy's Classroom Blog-- I've got a long way to go! Mrs. Cassidy's blog is incredible. She is a teacher in Canada. She documents different events in the day by including text, pictures, and video. She even has a page for every child where she loads pictures, movies, and copies of work of his/hers. I better to get to work on mine now!! (And keeping in mind the privacy forms/Internet posting form for each child). I believe by having a blog, parents would get more and more involved in their child's learning. How fun to log on everyday and see what your child did/learned?
Another great multimedia resources to use in the classroom is PCBOE. This is a website that contains teacher-made resources for the Storytown Harcourt reading series. It contains many different documents that can be incorporated into lessons, copies of spelling/vocabulary words to cut out, crossword puzzles, smartboard games, powerpoints, etc. I use this in my classroom on a daily basis! I love the smartboard games that go along with each lesson and the powerpoint presentations that go along as well. What a great (free) resource for those schools that use this particular reading series! :)
Lane -
ReplyDeleteI liked Ms. Cassidy's Classroom Blog. It was amazing to see all that she put in hers. It is such a good way to establish parent communication. I am like you. I was very nervous about setting up a blog when we first did ours, but now I enjoy it. I plan to use one with my class if I get a job this fall. Mine will not be nearly as elaborat as Ms. Cassidy's, but I figure I can start out simple and add to it as I go along. It will be a work in progress.
I think the PCBOE also sounds good. I used the Storytown Harcourt reading program in the classes I subbed in this year. Some of the teachers had lessons on their smartboards that I could use. I do not know if PCBOE is where the lessons came from, but I would assume that is the case. The lessons that I did with the smartboards kept the students engaged in the lesson and they all wanted turns. I think this would be a great multimedia tool for the classroom. It is also great that it is free!
Good job!
I looked at Mrs. Cassidy's blog when I was researching for this project. I think I spent about 45 minutes just looking around at everything on there! I wonder how much time it takes her to load everything. I think, like Amanda mentioned, that it will be a work in progress. Once we get our classroom blogs all set up, hopefully it will be a quick and easy thing to put up new information. I liked what you said about keeping in mind privacy and internet forms. I did not think about getting parents to sign those for the purposes of our blog! Good idea!
ReplyDeleteI LOVE PCBOE! I used it everyday in my classroom this past year! I would love to give all those teachers that put all of that together a huge hug! It was such a lifesaver to have everything from Harcourt already in a powerpoint for each day. It saved me so much time as a first year teacher! I have PCBOE as a direct link on my desktop because I use it so much!
In answer to your question on my blog, I teach a self-contained 3rd grade class!
Isn't it great as a first year teacher you see how you could be doing things. I look forward to having more confidence this year and not simply trying to survive. I think we would all love to have a blog like Mrs. Cassidy's! Also as a parent I would love to feel that involved in ny child's classroom because for those if you without children, they don't always keep us informed.
ReplyDeleteI too love pcboe!!! My biggest fear is for it to crash one day!!! My students loved playing the vocabulary matching games each week! I also printed out stuff from there that I used each day. I am thankful for teachers who share!!!!!!