Tool # 9

Our students were born in the electronic era. Their world is a Technology World. All of these things are the tools they are going to use (and are using already) to interact with the rest of the world (i.e. E mail, eBooks, e files). We, as educators, are always thinking about the future of our students, building the foundation for their success, we need to start focusing in the technological advances and the way they can be beneficial to our students’ learning process.   Technology is a tool we should use to engage students to what they are learning, giving them the opportunity to practice and master the curriculum objectives

Adding this technology devices next year to the classroom will make centers even more attractive. It will bring variety to the way they learn and work on a specific objective. Students should definitely be held accountable for their work in a center/station. This way, as I stated earlier, they are responsible for staying on task, and practicing and mastering a specific objective. Having them turn in a product or reflection is a way the teachers can see progress too and work with the kids on their weaknesses.

I looked at some of the web sites and apps that are suggested in tool #9 and the SBISD data base. The ones that I visited are very interesting and will be very useful to complement the instruction given in the classroom. One of them is Tutpup, where students compete against students around the world on basic math and spelling. Once I got there, I tried the Math 101, where students practice their math facts and pick the level where they fill comfortable. There are 8 levels. I think for first graders levels 1 and 2 are the appropriate ones. As a teacher, you can create a class account and keep track on their progress.

The next web site I visited was Learning Games for Kids. It includes printable worksheets. In this one, there is a section where you can chose the content area you want to work with. I picked math (again), went to math games and selected first grade. If you look around in the screen, you will be able to see another section (IXL) with the grade levels. I selected first grade. There, you can see a list of skills first graders learn through the year and select the one matching your day’s objective.

One of the apps I liked was Coin Math. The students can practice identifying coins, counting coins, matching coins to the correct value, and even choosing the correct change to pay for a product. The other one was Story Kit, where students create an electronic story book by writing, editing, recording voice to “read” story, taking pictures to include in the story pages, etc. Is kind of like bookr, but here you can edit an already written story. You can see the product at any time because the ebook stays in the iPod touch.