Got a job. Finally. I feel like I’ve been job searching forever. But I did manage to get hired BEFORE the first day of school, so that’s a step up from last time. I will be a 6th grade Language Arts/Social Studies teacher in a working class (read: same demographic as Brooklyn, but not as urban) district in South Jersey. I’m not too disappointed that it’s not a library job, although it will make doing my field experience next semester something torturous. My school has AMAZING resources though. The superintendent asked me if I would take my students into Second Life during my interview. I was a little flustered by that question, but at least I had the experience of having been in SL, and knowing what kind of things really can be done there. I told her I would need to become more comfortable with it but I was definitely in favor of it. She seemed to like that response – I got the job, right? My last principal wouldn’t know what SL was if her life depended on it – it’s going to be such a different experience! So anyway, my school has a smartboard in every classroom, my desktop computer is connected to both my smartboard (which has the projector in the ceiling so it doesn’t take up space!), and a television that is mounted in the front corner of my classroom. There are laptop carts which you can check out, which is all fine and good, but there are also iPod carts, where you can check out 80g video iPods for the students to use. I am so excited. I am actually going to have the opportunity to USE everything I just learned this semester! I’m not sure yet how to incorporate the iPods into instruction, but you can be certain there will be podcasts involved. I’m wondering about the transfer of information to the iPods, and wouldn’t that get cumbersome, and is there going to be one computer that has iTunes installed and all the updating/transferring will have to be done through that computer. I guess I will learn as I go!
August 8, 2007 at 9:23 pm |
I am a freelance reporter working on a story for MSN.com about how the use of technology affects student work. You’ve posted some great insights on this blog, and I was wondering if you could answer a few questions for the story. Please contact me as soon as possible at the email address provided.
August 9, 2007 at 12:57 pm |
Create MATHCASTS with your students. Mathcasts are basically screen recordings that capture their live written work on the interactive whiteboard along with their voice as they explain their reasoning and turn this into a movie. MATH movie + screenCAST= MATHCAST. My students use our Hitachi Starboard in my classroom but your SMARTboard has built-in screen recording capabilities as well. SMART will also allow you to install their software on your student computers so that students can use them to create movies if you equip them with graphics tablets (Wacom tablets start at $99) and headsets with microphones. Their movies can be produced and distributed in a variety of formats such as wmv, flash, or for video iPod using Camtasia Studio (awesome software!). I happen to teach high school math but I have created mathcasts with students as young as 2nd grade.
If you’d like to learn more about mathcasts in my classroom, please visit the Mathcasts page on my blog at http://pattyoflynn.edublogs.org where I’ve posted links to some student and teacher projects and to other resources on the web. I’m entering year 3 of mathcasts in my own classroom and have received a $10,000 Qwest Foundation Learning Technology Grant to expand this project, so I’m looking forward to a great year! Tim Fahlberg’s site at http://math247.jot.com is a great resource too.
August 16, 2007 at 2:40 pm |
I know I said congratulations on Twitter but congratulations here too. It’s really exciting that you are going to be in a location where your skills and interests will be put to good use. I’d love to know how things go. Maybe you can be a guest visitor via skype in 460 later in the year.