Miscellaneous Math Encounters

While researching I came upon some wonderful resources that are useful for all sorts of reasons.The first one I came across was Lure of Labyrinth. This is a great game (what kid does not like a game?) that is based on Pre-Algebra principles.

Students play a variety of games that have to do with patterns, proportions, fractions, ratios...it is endless.As the students become more involved the games get harder and levels higher. Not to mention that the whole game has a plot (to free imprisoned pets). I gave this to my high flying group and they were stuck to it like glue, one of my students went home and played all weekend desperate to solve the many puzzles.

IXL is another math site that I have introduced to parents who have needed a digital tutor for basic math skills. It is easy and fairly inexpensive to sign up a child and the parents can easily monitor their progress and time spent. I spoke with some of the lower grade teachers who use it more often and they really like the way it moves through the basics. I had a few students play it but they were bored by it fairly quickly. I do still recommend it to parents for the basics, it has helped some of my students catch up on some skills they should have had before entering fifth grade.

And last but not least, one of my very favorites... Mr. Nussbaum!

I use this a lot for reinforcing skills. It is very easy to find both games and tools on Mr. Nussbaum's site. He has so many different ways of teaching skills and concepts, he is really like an old friend....

Professional Learning Plan

Thursday at Noon.
So....  This is due in four days and I made this really COOL looking Glogster on my Glogster EDU account and logged in after spending a few hours on it and BAM-it was gone.  So here I am at my desk contemplating angry emails sent towards the Glogster people....
This here is a lesson in technology.  A nasty lesson that we sometimes learn.  I remember pressing the save button, I remember choosing save as a draft, but it is gone....  SO, I start again.  Hold this space for the next draft. I think I am not going to use Glogster.
On to Prezi....

Professional Learning Plan CEP 812 Catie Barber on Prezi

Here are some Guiding Questions about what I have learned.

What were some online resources that you found helpful?

I absolutely ADORE Cool Tools for Schools!  This website I constantly go back to in order to find specific online resources for my class.  My students use it to and I have incorporated lots of them into my constantly updated Literature Circle Blog...And from this class: Free Visual Tools... pure awesomeness...

What online communities were helpful?

I find it really hard to keep up with online communities.  i enjoyed getting to know MERLOT, but during 811 when submitting I found the whole process really laborious..  So I can't say I will be all over that.  I do keep up with Edutopia a lot, I enjoy the writing and the articles there.  For awhile I am going to be really happy to go back to reading the nytimes.com on a daily basis and catching up with new apps for my four year old...

What strategies do I find helpful for trying a new technology?

I find it very helpful to just play.  I like to play with things, find out how they work, I rarely look towards a tutorial at first, rather I play and then find answers to my specific problems.  I tend to dive right into technology, sometimes this is not good and I have learned not to jump in with my students, I need to be proficient first, although a lot of times it is my students who come in a say "Mrs. B., have you ever seen THIS??"

How does working with others support you in your own learning?

I enjoyed working with my group.  it was fun to actually get to know a few people rather than just know them as "posts".  I have found too that even though our project is over we are now still emailing each other to check our work, or just to be funny!  That said, if people do not participate in groups then it is really a burden on everyone else.   If it is required stuff then get it done!  Ranting and Raving over with...

How will you use this experience to support your own life long learning of technology?

It never stops, does it?  I will sue all these things and more, to be honest I am going to miss all this good learning time, I won't miss the stress much, but I loved the lesson, I will try and keep up on different communities.  Teaching in such a technology rich school does keep me on my toes and (fingers crossed) I may just be the next technology integrator...  who knows?  Anything is possible!

Part C-Implementation

Below you will find my podcast about how I am feeling with the project I accomplished.  I feel like this project has been a great exploration and it has proved to me that the resources out there are not scary or overwhelming an htat the enthusiasm it being the students are well worth the little bumps....

I am going to record some of my students and how they feel about Mathletics and Khans Academy.
Here is the Poll Everywhere about which one they like the best:

As you can see Mr. Nussbaum is in first (probably because the games are so enchanting!!) and Mathletics is number 2.  I don't think we used Gizmo enough, to be fair.  Khan Academy is great, but it is not as flexible as Mathletics.

WWP Part C- Mathletics

The third installment for my Wicked Problem project is..... Mathletics!
This tool has been purchased by our school for every student in it. I have used parts of it but I had not delved deeper into it until this project and I was completely surprised at the versatility it brought.
First of all there is a live Mathletics game that my students adore. When they play it it has several levels, level 1 starts out very easy (but I discovered I can turn off levels and push the kids beyond addition and subtraction!).
How does it work?
You can sign up your class, or school or as a family or individual. Then you get access as a teacher and can assign different lessons. The assignments always appear first on the students board. you can also create your own courses, so you can find all the lessons to begin your fractions unit so when you assign the students all the lessons are in one area. These courses are saved under a name of your choice so you can continue using them over the years.


What do I like about Mathletics:

• You can create groups for your students if you want to level them which is perfect for my class because I have some real high flyers.
• You can choose courses from all over the world, one day you might choose the Japanese curriculum and the next California which exposes the students to many different styles of teaching. I think the more styles and methods the students get, the more likely they are to find a way they understand.
• The students create their avatar and get points to purchase outfits, backgrounds, etc. This is great novelty for them and they really enjoy it.
• The Live Matheltics game is great, when the kids start playing there is a world map that moves around pointing to different countries, they are then paired with one or several students from anywhere in the world and they play against them. you should hear the shouts "I have a guy from South Africa!" I have a guy from Qatar!".
• There are a variety of reports that you can print for your students as well as certificates when they have high achievements.
• For each lesson the students do there are a variety of ways they can access help and there is always a movie with demonstration problems if they are stuck.
• They have lots of workbooks that can be printed out in pdf for extra work or reinforcement.
  

Some of the odd things:

• It is hard to get to know this program, there are tutorials but one has to mess around and play with it before you really get (and I am not exactly sure I am there yet!).
• The search engine for finding lessons can be clumsy.
• A few more standardized tests would be great for practice, i hate to teach to the test but getting kids used to testing is important.

In summation:

This is a wonderful program, the best I have seen so far. it has just about everything you need as a teacher and the positives are far more than the negatives. The students very much enjoyed their homework and I have very little accessing their results. This is an excellent tool to help reinforce mathematics,especially if the curriculum you are using is sparse.

Data Visualization Lab

For this lab I explored tools from this website that were new to me. I found some fun new tools and had a great time exploring them.

The first and most fun was Audioboo. This site really takes the hassle of publishing a podcast and makes it take about two seconds. Once you sign up for an account then you simply start making recordings. I downloaded the app for my iPhone and made the following recording in about five minutes. Grandma is going to be just a wee bit excited about this one!

Here is sample of an Audioboo of my son Brodi singing the Itsy Bitsy Spider :).

The second site I explored was called Open Clip Art. The reason behind this was to show my students. they too often rely on Google Images to find images for projects despite my constant reminders to use sources that allow for free use. This Is a great site, however it is not completely kid friendly. on the very first page there are a few new pictures that use the f-word as the title. Unfortunately this would cause for major hilarity, shock and perhaps even peats of the bad words.... So unless the edit language I don't recommend giving this to elementary students. Otherwise it has a lot of incredible clip art to use, so for teachers it is a great way to find interesting and free clip art!

The third site I explored was 1001 fonts...

This is a massive site chock full of fonts. The reason I went to this site was that I honestly did not know how to install a font onto my computer. Well this site makes it incredibly easy, and all of a sudden I was going crazy installing fonts left and right. My classroom newsletter looked like I had hired a printing firm.

Part B-Storyboard and script

Hello!

Things have been just slightly hectic in my life... First I get kicked out of my class for notnpaing tuition on time because MSU did not give me waiver for some insurance they require you to buy even thoug I am fully insured by my full time teaching job... Then my friend gives birth, but her husband is away, so I was surrogate daddy during labor, needless to say I am now officially convinced that adopted was the best route for me, and I am a god mother! Now I have taken the train to meet the family in the Polish mountains for a ski holiday (a place called Szczyrk, try saying that...) and I brought my iPad but am having a pickle of a time getting it to work with Google docs. So, here is my storyboard, I am linking this to my partner Jenns website where you will be able to view it. I think it is pretty great! Now when we make the tutorial it will be easy peasy (as my four year old likes to say)... I just got back from a morning ski and it is time to relax a bit before hitting up the spa...

Here is the link to Jenn'S fabulous post where you can view the entire storyboard.

Cell Phones in the Classroom

Eeek! What a subject! I am completely bamboozled while I try to read through the lab in our CEP812 class. Cell phones in 5th grade would be a distraction... Hands down (at least in my room). Our school has a strict policy for elementary students that cell phones stay in the locker (mostly this is prevent them from losing them....). the one time I have used cell phoens is as timers. I know that sounds odd but sometimes when we need to time something then I pull out my iPhone and the kids run and get their cells.

That said, I move onto other portable devices.

KINDLES! Yeah! Our school has a wonderful reading program called Golden Dragon, where they read a specific amount of books and get to go to a great party. All the books they pick are incredible, but the added twist was this year they could check out Kindles! With parent permission my 5th graders have excitedly received an email and been able to go pick up their Kindle from the library that is filled with all the Golden Dragon books! Amazing! What was even better was how many of them came back from Christmas break with their very own Kindle... From this teachers point of view, anything we can do to have them read more and feel excited about it, then let's do it!

We also have "Playaway's" in the library which are little mp3 players that contain one book for the kids to listen to. This is particularly popular with the ELL population at our school.
iPads are all around our school now. We just got a new iPad cart which is great, I have yet to check it out as the list to do so is incredibly long and my kids all have their own lap top, so I don't want to get overly greedy, but that guilt will pass soon!!
Flip cameras are great. My kids love to post movies they make and we have a great video project called "Day int he Life" where the kids make movies of one day int heir life and then edit them using Movie Maker. it is a beloved 5th grade project that may get thrown out as we are heading towards the Common Core and it is hard to battle to fit the project into our new standards... pity... Flip cameras are very easy to use, the one problem I tend to have with them is the sound can be not great. But we are getting quite adept at voice overs...
I am planning on trying to use Poll Everywhere with my kids next week. I was thinking of asking them which program they like the best of the ones we are trying for my Wicked Problem Project.