Using Pinterest for teaching and learning

Pinterest provides many opportunities to gather valuable resources for teaching and learning. I have been a Pinterest user for several years. I tend to find resources for my girl scout troop such as badge requirements, ceremony ideas, and of course arts and craft ideas. Last year this changed when I started creating writing boards to organize templates for my teaching. I was pleasantly surprised in how much I learned about resources for learning as an educator this week.

I found an interesting blog through Pinterest about three steps to becoming an organized tweeter. I do not use Twitter very often because it has always seemed like a more social tool than educational tool. After reading the article though I may just include tweeting in my classroom this year. The limited amount of characters allowed per tweet will allow for students to provide specific succinct feedback to the topic at hand. In her blog, "Birds of a Feather Learn Together: 3 Steps to Becoming an Organized Tweeter" Patricia J. Brown provides valuable resources for organizing tweets so that anyone can follow their twitter feed with ease. One of these tools is called Hootsuite. I really like this tool because it also allows for the organization of other social media apps like Facebook. 

Another great tool the blogger discusses is Storify. Storify is a website that allows users to tell their story through social media apps. I think this is a great tool for my students because it can show them the image that they are presenting to the world. This is particularly important as they begin to apply for college. Sometimes my students do not realize that perception is reality. this experience can be a great tool for positive self promotion.

http://msedtechie.blogspot.com/2014/11/birds-of-feather-learn-together-3-steps.html?m=1

Another great tool I discovered through Pinterest Boards this week is Google Story Builder. This tool allows students to tell their own story. I think this technological tool could help my students introduce themselves to the class. Students have choices on the characters they add, the dialog, theme music, and best of all it is shareable. Students could share their link on a twitter feed or in our class Facebook private group. I have noticed the more I incorporate technology into my classroom the more ownership students have and the higher the participation is in the virtual and classroom setting.

http://www.educatorstechnology.com/2013/02/google-story-builder-easily-create.html

I will definitely be creating many more boards for teaching and learning. Happy pinning to you and to all a good night.

Pinterest Board

https://www.pinterest.com/utepstudent/educational-board/

Here is my Educational Board link to Pinterest. I love collaborating on Pinterest with friends for holiday parties and with my students for study skills. The think I hate about Pinterest, is it is like a blackhole, once I go in you will not hear from me for hours. So many Pins...so little time.

Evernote in the Classroom by Lois M. Galindo

Let’s be honest there are limitless possibilities to incorporating Evernote in the classroom. What an awesome tool for the 21^st century learning environment. This is a great tool for Delivering information to students. Evernote can also be used for collaboration on group projects. Evernote offers countless ways to distribute information to students. This tool also provides a very user friendly interface to demonstrate concepts in and out of the classroom.

In teaching my high school sophomores reading writing and study skills I would use Evernote help students create notebooks for their different assignments. This tool will help students organize their assignments by subject matter. In their writing Notebook they can save all of their journal entries and research papers. In their reading folders they can save their character analysis writings as well as their chapter summaries. In their Study skills Notebook they can save documents that teach them effective study habits as well as photos of ideal study spaces and schedules for studying.

One of the great features of Evernote is the ability to set alarms or reminders for the notes students place in their Notebooks. Students can schedule reminders days before due dates on their rubrics to ensure they are going to meet their due dates. They can also use this function to set goals and see if they are achieving them in a timely manner. I would use this in my classroom to help my students with their time management skills.

Evernote offers a unique opportunity to combine the use of photos, text and audio notes in the same notebook. I would have students create a vocabulary Notebook to place in their reading Notebook. Students can add a photo of the word, define the word in text, and make an audio note using the word in a sentence. Working with the vocabulary in multiple modalities will help students to remember and use novel words more effectively.

Evernote allows students to compile many different types of notes in their Notebooks. The option to share your Notebook with others lends Evernote to be an amazing collaboration tool. Students can share Notebooks with others in their group. This provides for a very accessible way for students to share information and make changes to group project fairly easily.

These are just a few ways I could see incorporating Evernote into my classroom, The possibilities for organizing lesson plans and content material would be a whole other blog.

Evernote Notebook Lois M. Galindo

This notebook is an example of how I can save information for my class instruction.

https://www.evernote.com/pub/lmwhite150/firstnotebook

feedly feedback by Lois M. Galindo

     I found an interesting read by the author of our textbook. Many times we think of ourselves as teachers but are we also learners? In his blog, titled “Cultures of Perpetual Learning, “Will Richards describes the culture that AT&T has created in their business that if you do not continue to learn and develop new skills you can and in many cases will be left behind. He provides evidence that employees at AT&T spend 8 to 10 hours of their week on honing new skills that will be applicable to their job. He describes a career lattice versus a career ladder. He goes on to explain that in the 21^st century workplace we must acquire new skills and abilities constantly so that we are considered valuable. This makes a lot of sense to me because how can you possible teach if you are unwilling to learn?

    The next reading I found helpful for educators is “Setting Classroom Expectations “ by Adam Gutierrez. Many times teachers make a list of rules and expect students to follow along like robots. In this article Gutierrez describes developing expectations fro students, parents, and the classroom as a whole. Gutierrez hits the nail on the head when he talks about having students actively participate in developing the classroom expectations. This is a skill I learned from girl scouts. Each class I had comes up with a Group Agreement. This is accomplished by asking the students open ended questions about what they expect to get out of the class. These expectations are then managed by discussing the curriculum that must be covered. Then students are able to add their goals into the curriculum as a group.  Once we know what we will be doing we discuss they ways we should interact in the classroom setting as individuals and as groups.

     Suggestions are given by all student. Suggestions that are agreed upon by the group are added to our group agreement. We discuss that the group agreement is a living document and nothing is set in stone. If students or the teacher have suggestions to add at a later time the suggestion is brought up, debated, and agreed to or not.

When we make students an active participant in their education they become lifelong learners and develop 21^st century skills they need to be successful in the workforce.

The other articles I found interesting discuss project based learning and the different ways of implementing this process in to your curriculum.

http://willrichardson.com/cultures-perpetual-learning/

http://www.edudemic.com/setting-classroom-expectations/

http://www.edutopia.org/article/celebrate-national-park-centennial-project-suzie-boss

http://www.edutopia.org/practice/wellbeing-developing-empathy-emotional-awareness-and-agency

http://www.edutopia.org/pdfs/stw/edutopia-stw-school21-well-being-progression.pdf

Journal Blogging by Lois M. Galindo

For my high school sophomore students enrolled in The Upward Bound program I would use Blogger for their English, Reading, Writing, and study skills course. The three purposes discussed in this week’s readings (distribution, discussion, and demonstration) can be demonstrated through blogging exercises in many ways.

I would use the blogger format for distribution by posting a calendar and syllabus on my blog so that students and parents are aware of due dates ahead of time and can use their time management skills to start assignments ahead of time so they are not late. Distributing due dates and assignment requirements ahead of time offers students flexibility in when they start their assignments. This also provides ample time for any questions the students may have about the assignment.

I would use the blogger format for demonstration y having students blog their Journal entries. I would put this practice in place by having students submit journal topics they are interested in writing about. I would then collect all responses and randomly select topics weekly. Students would have the opportunity to write their journals on the blog and include video and photos. Students could place video content rating the topic and the level of difficulty they had writing about it.

I would use the blogger format for discussion purposes by requiring students to respond to three classmate’s blogs. These classmates could be assigned by the teacher to have students who are strong in certain areas of writing assist their peers in becoming stronger writers. Students could also select the classmates they would like to respond to. Students could also use video or text to respond to their peer’s journal submissions. This process would provide for a rich opportunity for students to discuss their work and make improvements based on feedback from the teacher and peers.

Blogger provides a real time opportunity for students to create content, receive feedback, and maintain a portfolio of work for a particular class. This format is an invaluable tool that allows students to put personal touches on their writing, While at the same time receiving feedback from their teacher and peers from the classroom. Students can add pictures of what the writing reminds them of or makes them think about. Video can be added from YouTube about the subject matter or original content can be created by the student and posted on the blog. Blogging assignments provides students with real world skills that they can develop and use in the future.