I spent some time today working on the weebly website. I have included the link below. In general, I thought it was really easy to start the process - uploading pictures, creating pages within the site, loading content, etc. It seems like this would be way easier than I thought. I could definitely use this in my classroom by setting up a blog that the students could use to respond to journal questions or novel topics.
However, the free service doesn't really offer any of the tools I would need to use this in my classroom. A lot of those things are only included in the version you have to pay for. The benefit is that you get your own domain name and add-ons like multimedia tools. So if I wanted to post a video for my students to watch before a lesson and comment on it, I'd have to be using the upgraded version that costs like $40 or something...At this point, I want to learn a little more about the process before I invest in it.
Here's the link to my website:
http://mrdignansclassroom.weebly.com/
Friday, December 17, 2010
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
17 Things Part 2
CREATING A PRESENTATION:
Here is a presentation I made for Chapter 18 of Catching Fire for my English 10 class. I have also had my students create 2 google presentations over the course of this semester. Together, we have found quite a few things about google presentations to be tremendously helpful in the classroom.
First, the ability to link pictures, sounds, videos, etc. right off of google and onto the presentation is fantastic. There is no more saving files from websites and tracking them down. The files are automatically embedded within the project. Once I really got the hang of this I found the presentations to be really easy to be put together. In fact, I'd say this 6-slide presentation took me MAYBE 10 minutes. Though it's obviously not a very elaborate presentation, it definitely shows all the quick tools you have at your disposal with google presentations. The only thing that took some getting used to was NOT incorporating all of the power point "bells and whistles", though that is obviously a good thing.
Here's the Catching Fire presentation:
https://docs.google.com/present/edit?id=0AYOswwZVzq_HZGQ1djV2eDRfMThwdzR0cHRnMg&hl=en
Here is a presentation I made for Chapter 18 of Catching Fire for my English 10 class. I have also had my students create 2 google presentations over the course of this semester. Together, we have found quite a few things about google presentations to be tremendously helpful in the classroom.
First, the ability to link pictures, sounds, videos, etc. right off of google and onto the presentation is fantastic. There is no more saving files from websites and tracking them down. The files are automatically embedded within the project. Once I really got the hang of this I found the presentations to be really easy to be put together. In fact, I'd say this 6-slide presentation took me MAYBE 10 minutes. Though it's obviously not a very elaborate presentation, it definitely shows all the quick tools you have at your disposal with google presentations. The only thing that took some getting used to was NOT incorporating all of the power point "bells and whistles", though that is obviously a good thing.
Here's the Catching Fire presentation:
https://docs.google.com/present/edit?id=0AYOswwZVzq_HZGQ1djV2eDRfMThwdzR0cHRnMg&hl=en
17 Things Reflection
I have been using google docs now in my classroom for the past month or so. In general, I'm finding it to be really useful for both the students and me The students are finally catching on the idea that they don't have to go throught the process of working on something in class that they have to save, email to themselves, open at home, save, and re-send. They are finally catching on to the fact that this saves them all the steps and annoyances.
I'm finding it to be extremely helpful with formal essays. I have my students write much of their first essay in class. By having them type the documents as a google doc in our lab, I can monitor their progress as they are working. This has helped to eliminate a lot of "little mistakes" that my students often make. This also eliminates the potential problem of having a home printer that doesn't work or the tendency to forget to bring a paper in on the day it is due. I simply ask the students to share the document with me so they don't have to worry about forgetting things.
One other thing I'm trying with my students is an extra credit assignment through this blog. Some of my students will be reading Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins and responding to questions on this blog for extra credit. I'll let everyone know how that goes as we get more into the project.
Here is just one of the documents I created for my class. This is the extra credit assignment for the blog.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1P1Esq3clcHtXQhzEvkLyJjhXCLVxrSJ08RA-4DYIoZE/edit?hl=en#
I'm finding it to be extremely helpful with formal essays. I have my students write much of their first essay in class. By having them type the documents as a google doc in our lab, I can monitor their progress as they are working. This has helped to eliminate a lot of "little mistakes" that my students often make. This also eliminates the potential problem of having a home printer that doesn't work or the tendency to forget to bring a paper in on the day it is due. I simply ask the students to share the document with me so they don't have to worry about forgetting things.
One other thing I'm trying with my students is an extra credit assignment through this blog. Some of my students will be reading Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins and responding to questions on this blog for extra credit. I'll let everyone know how that goes as we get more into the project.
Here is just one of the documents I created for my class. This is the extra credit assignment for the blog.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1P1Esq3clcHtXQhzEvkLyJjhXCLVxrSJ08RA-4DYIoZE/edit?hl=en#
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