POST #3: Share a resource

The resource I selected is BookFlix  http://bkflix.grolier.com/  I looked at a few of the other resources, but really liked this site and how it is set up. As a Preschool Teacher with students ages 4-5, BookFlix fits well with different topics we cover and has a lot of resources to engage students and plan lessons.

I went the BookFlix site and clicked on the category Animals and Nature. I found a book pair Dot the Fire Dog and A Very Busy Firehouse. I would use the fiction and non-fiction books to teach vocabulary and fire safety concepts. The site offers interactive games as well as links to other sites to extend learning and locate other resources. I would use the stories with the whole class on our Promethean Board to provide information about firefighters and fire safety. I would introduce vocabulary and use the books to start discussion. With small groups, we could use the Puzzler activities to teach and reinforce vocabulary and story sequence.

The pairing of the non-fiction with fiction also allows for introducing the concepts of real and make believe in literature. The Meet the Author section would lend itself to teaching about what an author does.

  As a substitute teacher, I might not have access to my school's AEA password and ID, but as a mom I plan on getting it from at lease one elementary school and one high school, so hopefully I will be able to work my way around that!
  At this point, due to limitations in lesson planning as a substitute, the first section I plan on introducing to my high school freshman is Soundzabound and its tutorial.  He loves working on Power Point when giving presentations, and I think this would be a great starting point to expand the creativity of his projects.

http://www.soundzabound.com/tutorials/website

Not being able to access the AEA resources makes this assignment a bit difficult. Perhaps in the future you might consider adding a temporary username and pass code for 24-hour use for those of us who are hoping to sub or teach again sometime soon. Meanwhile I'll improvise--something I remember doing quite often in the classroom depending on where the lesson plan took us for that day...

I was quite taken with TeachingBooks.net. Whether I was teaching journalism or English, reading and writing were essential skills. From literature to composition as a topic area, I always found that students were almost more interested in the author than they were in the work--that people factor, I guess. TeachingBooks.net provides a great way to introduce students to the author--even down to pronouncing the author's name correctly. If I taught in a school where every student had a computer, I'd be flipping Khan Academy-style by having the homework be researching the author on TeachingBooks.net--and any other AEA sites they might find informative--and arriving in class ready to discuss that author's style, tone and success in telling a story. I'd have students try writing a blog post in that writer's style and from that writer's point of view. We'd do a peer-to-peer review of the posts and talk about the different takes each student had on the writer's style and how difficult it is to write in any style but one's own. Then I'd have students rewrite the post purely in their own voice. I'd read the posts, and together we'd try to guess who wrote each post, then get the student author's perspective on what they wrote. Just a start on what's possible using the AEA resources...

As a substitute ESL teacher I have to choose a resource that I feel would benefit the ESL students from ages 5 to 18 whether they are on the beginning or advanced level. I need a resource that could interest children of all ages and on all levels. Since I have no access to AEA online resources, I only can suggest what I would access for the ESL students if possible. I would choose an online resource that would  improve their language skills, through listening and reading. I would like to use Book FLIX to give the 2nd language learner the opportunity to listen to the words being read the same time they are reading along. Having the words being highlighted as they are spoken is a great boost for the second language students. This will help them increase their vocabulary while enjoying a story chosen for their age level, interest level, and language level. This is a great online resource for the ESL student.

I am working toward sub re-certification and do not have the necessary access to complete this item. So let’s just see where this takes me….I was pleasantly surprised to find that I could at least pull up this database by simply going to the AEA Online home page http://www.iowaaeaonline.org and clicking on Teen Health and Wellness in the orange list, left sidebar.
And here we are http://www.teenhealthandwellness.com! (why do I feel like a hacker?)

From the menu of topics in the left sidebar, I chose to explore Diversity, I see it in the workplace, and it’s the same in our schools. Our community has seen a huge influx of families from other countries, notably Africa and the Middle East. Many of these people are refugees, fleeing dangerous and impoverished conditions and leaving everything they knew behind. I have personally found it to be an enriching experience to study our new friends’ homelands and to hear their stories firsthand if they are willing to share it. Most are eager to do so, but you must ask and show them you are genuinely interested in them.

Oh, no…dead links. I’m stranded at the bus stop. But wait…Teen Health and Wellness has a sign-up button for a 30-day free trial. I signed up but cannot wait to proceed. In lieu of my pass code to get in, I’ll play this out like I have access, with a sample lesson plan.

Outside assignment, in the spirit of “flipping”: individually go to Teen Health and Wellness, the Diversity section. Browse the material and complete the worksheet which will be handed in. The worksheet will guide the student toward understanding what diversity is, why it is important, and the applications in their school.

Small group in-class assignment: discuss and come up with a working definition of “diversity” as it relates to different nationalities and cultures. What does “diversity” mean, why is it important, and what can we do to promote diversity at our school?

Follow-up assignment: identify a nationality / culture that is represented by students at our school. Using Culturegrams, research that country’s background, history and customs and be prepared to make a five-minute digital presentation. This assignment would need additional guidelines!

I’d love to see the result!

I found a great idea to make the classroom fun and exciting when studying a book.  This could be used at any level of education.  Younger students would have to guided more carefully.   http://www.teachingbooks.net    Select the Author & Book Resources.   Click on Meet-the-author.  Next click on the movies and slide show.  By using these links the students can better understand how and why the author wrote the way she or he did.  I think it puts a personal touch to a reading rather than just opening the book and flying through the pages.  Questions concerning the author's background could start discussions.  Similar relationships between the author's background and the student's background could encourage students not only in reading stories but also in writing stories.  As a substitute teacher, this is only an idea to be developed later.  I do now know what is available when I hopefully do get my own classroom with students to challenge.

Because I am renewing an expired substitute license, I don't have a school code to access many of the resources.  If I had been able to get there, I would have gone on culture grams and linked to the audio files of National Anthems.  I have always wanted to do a unit on national anthems of different countries, but ever since I traveled abroad on a choir tour in which our choir director completely misinterpreted the mood of another country's national anthem, I have been afraid of getting it wrong.  I wish I were able to play around a little more with the resources available.  

I am really excited to use Learn360 in the classroom and with small groups.   I am planning on using many of the Berenstain Bears videos.   To get to them, type "Berenstain Bears" in the search bar on Learn360.   A list of videos will come up.   There are so many different topics that are discussed in these videos such as: going to school, homework, manners, and personal responsibility.  I am planning on organizing all of the topics so I am fully aware of all of the topics that are available.  I love using videos like these with Kindergarten and 1st grade students to help teach a life skill.  Younger students need variety in instruction approaches and need to have a lot of movement in the instruction and not just talking at the students.  I think this will be great for me to go into classrooms for teachers who are seeing a need in their classroom, as well as, using this for small groups I facilitate.   I think these could also be used as options for part of indoor recess since the kiddos enjoy the videos, but will also be gaining knowledge from them.

The resource I use in my class is http://www.mission-us.org/

Mission is a website that has 3 interactive games.  I use the first 2 of the 3 games in my class.  The first game (Mission 1) is for Crown or Colony.  This game has the students make choices about whether they are loyalist or a patriot.  The time setting for this game is 1770s prior to the American Revolution.  The second game is Flight to Freedom.  In this game the students are running way on the Underground Railroad. These two game add to my student's understanding of both events.  The game play aspect of it really holds the interest of the students. The game that I don't play on Mission is Cheyenne Odyssey.  This game is about the Custer and the Native American conflicts that follow the Civil War.   I don't play this game because I only teach Social Studies though the Civil War.

  Being a substitute teacher, I do not have a username or password. A source I would use is Culture Grams. I am very interested in and enjoy learning about other cultures. I would use this as an assignment for students to choose a culture and give a report to the class. Students could use their own ancestry and cultural background. They may learn of some family traditions that came from a variety of different cultures. Culture Grams gives information on food, providing recipes, that stucents could bring a sample to share. Students could dress in the tradtional clothing. It could be a fun and educational assignment.  

I am really interested in what the Learn360 has to offer.  So I went to that resource and did a search for Jazz Music.  I do a Jazz and Blues unit in my Music Theory course as we look at the blues scale and jazz progressions.  I found a great  video on the Jazz Age (http://www.learn360.com/Search.aspx?SearchText=Jazz%20Music&lid=10980454)
I will be using this video as a great introduction to the Roaring 20's, the Jazz Age, and it's musicians.  Having the video will be a great way for the kids to hear some names and musical samples to the larger picture that is Jazz Music.  It is a relatively short video so it's just a nice intro and not too long or daunting.  I would probably use this with a projector in my classroom.  

I went to AEA online and selected Culturegrams, http://online.culturegrams.com/index.php.  I am planning ahead for teaching International Foods in our third term.  I have a diverse group of students with a variety of needs, abilities and yes, cultural backgrounds.  I am planning on having the students select a country and or culture and do a project and presentation.  They will do a powerpoint and make a dish and other artifact they learned about while searching this site. Depending on time and class make up I may expand this project to a festival type setting.  

I am a substitute and haven't had the chance or even know about many of these resources until I started this online course. Since I am geared toward lower elementary students I would incorporate the Teaching Books, BookFlX and Learning 360 in my classroom.  

I was looking for something seasonal. Using learn 360 the topic I chose was Thanksgiving. I went to lesson plans and the topic I followed was thanksgiving resources. There was a tab for short history-traditions-and making floats. The class will be sending a note home  so their parents can share with us the traditions they observe and we will share with the other classmates.  (if they do observe traditions)We will also be "making" a float in the room using helium balloons. The AP images resource was helpful with all types of pics. for the floats. We have an annual Thanksgiving meal at school so possibly we can share our float with the others at the meal. As I researched; the dates Thanksgiving was first observed was mentioned as well as Presidents involved. I think another activity to follow this will be to study the presidents involved (or presidents in general) and I looked at the Bookflix and noticed books with presidential info. and sure liked the pairing of books with fiction and non-fiction.

As a former full time elementary music teacher, I many times would find a book to read to my students, and then present a song that related to the story.  I think BookFLIX would be a great resource.  I have subbed at schools that use the resource.  http://teacher.scholastic.com/products/bookflixfreetrial/programoverview.htm
It works well with K-2 students, and they truly get excited when they learn the song too.  Now, as a substitute, in a general classroom, I could use it as an end of day "surprise".  Outcomes would be comprehension, and putting the book and song together to tell the complete story.  

In my previous post, I mentioned using teachingbooks.net for professional development with teachers.  I plan on using this website by helping them pick books to use in leveled reading by text complexity.  The rigor of the material we need to use needs to be amped up and identifying the text complexity will help teachers challenge students.  
This website will also help teachers find quality literature to use in their classrooms, either for a read aloud, leveled reading, or whole group reading. Teachers can also use this resource to find quality literature supporting other curricular areas as well.

        I am a Para-Educator, so I do not get to choose what site or subject to study daily. I have looked up information on line for the teacher.
       I personally like Online 360 learning, I find it helps grade school Students with special needs and others. They can take online courses at their own pace, than a traditionally-paced classroom. It is best to use this study at least 2 hrs. a week, web based information to enhance their learning skills.
        It enhances independent learning, builds their confidence, motives the students in their thinking skills and problem solving.
        Most computers already have scholastic  booked marked and then you go to 360 learning. Choose age level, and then choose whether you are working on math, language, or reading this week. It keeps score for you, most of it is competition with yourself. You play the skilled games at least 3 times to try to beat your score, which helps the student improve themselves in the subject they are working on, whether it is math, reading, science, history and language etc. The students find it very entertaining in many ways. They read articles about what is happening in the world, play educational games, build their self esteem, share with other students on how well they did or what they just read about.
        Teachers do have in class audio books for students. In the books there are levels and percentages that are recorded for each student.
        I am quite amazed in all the learning technology students have for learning anything in the world at their fingertips.
       Let's say we are studying in a group in the classroom about bullying, harassment, internet bullying etc..
       You would go to Iowaaeaonline.org. (soon there will be universal login for all services) To activate this site you will need a username and password that you can get from the teacher or Librarian. Now you would be able to choose what area you would like to find information in. To the left is an orange box, and you just click on the words Learn360. Url site http://www.learn360.com/Default.aspx?Pageid=37121 You may choose videos on a subject you want to teach that week. Go to the box in right hand corner to archive resources popular. At the bottom of the page is where I found a subject that has a list of videos, clips, and text to show In your classroom for that day or week. example Internet Bullying:
{HYPERLINK "http://www.learn360.com/ShowVideo.aspx?ID=512833"}
 Just copy and click on the site you want to teach. There is so much to find for the teachers and student by using iowaaaeaonline.org.  then use search and advance search to find your topic.

Upper elementary students often study endangered species…either as a separate topic or as part of a more systemic study of world environment/ecosystems.  In the Gale Resources is a database called Kids InfoBits.  I want students to be able to search for and locate information on the topic of “Endangered Species” in a variety of formats and a variety of lexile/reading levels.  I would direct students to enter “Endangered Species” in the Search box.  The resources are divided by format:  Books, Pictures, Magazines, News.   Students can search these formats by the following criteria:  Relevance, Title, Date, Content Level.  Next to the titles are colored symbols (green, yellow, red) that indicate the level of reading difficulty.  In the Pictures area are several graphs comparing Endangered Species in the U.S. and the World.    In the News sections are news articles submitted by UPI NewsTrack and newspapers.    When students access various articles and images, I want them to learn how to: Print; Email; Save; Share via Social Media Sites; Bookmark; Download;  Cite; Highlight/Take Notes.  They will also read and review the vocabulary words often located at the end of an article as well as the additional resources on the same topic.  

I have navigated the databases from Iowa AEA Online. I located the Learn360 database. I previously had a sign on name and password. I have used this resource many times to show videos in my classroom. You can do a trial period, or you can have the AEA give you the code for your school district. After you receive the code, you will be able to sign in and choose a password. If your school district does not have a code, you will need to purchase it.

To access the website, you just type in learn360.com.

When I get signed onto Learn360. I like to do a basic search for my topic. If the results produce large numbers, I change some of the settings on the left side, such as: subject area, grade, and format.

I will be utilizing this resource to show a video to my 8th grade students. We have been discussing anger: what it looks like and what if feels like. I will be showing the students the video entitled: Anger, Rage and You. My overall student outcomes that this resource will deliver include: sources of anger and how to handle it.

By engaging my students in this activity, I hope to help them solve their problems with anger and perhaps assist their friends who may be having some negative experiences handling their anger.

I have used Khan Academy in the past, particularly in the areas of Math and Language Arts in the GED classroom setting.  I go to Khan through u-tube.  I do not have an account set up with AEA, I don't know what the log-in information for IHCC.  I will check on this after completion of this course.

khanacademy.org is a site I use to introduce, practice, or review with students in math topics.  Students are on different levels as they enter the class.  I like to use Khan Academy because there is a vast resource of math topics from learning multiplication and division problems, pre-algebra and geometry and any topic in between. The student is able to access their own tutor on any topic they wish to pursue.  Reinforces previous teaching, allows students to work at their own pace, re-play if need to, and master skills needed to pass the math portion of GED/HiSet final exam.

This resource allows students to progress and master skills in a vast number of math and language arts
topics.  The advantages are to be able to move at their own pace, repeat content, and bring questions to me that need more explanation, if needed.