SmartBoard in the classroom

A teacher has multiple responsibilities that can easily become overwhelming. Lesson plans, grading, enrichment activities are all time consuming that potentially can take away from student's learning opportunity.  Fortunately, the Smartboard program allows a teacher to cut time consuming planning in half.  It organizes programs such as matching games, erase and reveal, and many others that can teach or provide enrichment for any area of study.

With the advantage of Smartboard technology, lesson planning can be completed in less amount of time and possibly more organized.  With the variety of programs such as matching games, pull tab quizzes, and diagrams, different presentations can be taught at different angles all learning styles.  

To ensure students are actually learning the material, measuring their comprehension is quick and simple.  Quizzes, surveys, or enrichment activities can be graded with Responders given to each student and scored under each child's account.  This alleviates the time consuming process of grading and recording individual papers. Smartboard does the dirty work so the more time can be spent on lesson planning. 

Overall, Smartboard can make the teachers workload much lighter and more convenient.  Less time spent on a better education.  ;) 

Google Custom Search Engine

Saturday, October 2, 2010

Google Custom Search

Google Custom Search is a feature provided by Google to allow anyone to create their own search engine.  It prioritizes and reflects the hosts expertise and interests by allowing them to include websites that pertain to the subject(s) their GCS has been created for. It is very user friendly and anyone is able to create their own custom search.  Educators, parents, employers are able to restrict information that is either unproductive, inappropriate, or to keep students "on track" when researching particular topics. Educators are able to use a GCS when assigning a research project and easier to track information sources and plagiarism,  employers can restrict employees from surfing facebook or myspace while on the clock, and parents can sensor inappropriate sites and create a GCS that is age appropriate.  Although some of these options may sound negative, it is actually a very useful as you can create a search engine that pertains to all of your own specific interests that others can search within as well.  


To learn more about the different learning needs of students, this search engine may be of some help as it provides definitions and ideas for lessons. 
Learning Needs Search Engine

Flickr.com

Monday, September 27, 2010

Flickr.com

Flickr.com, a safe and easily controlled website for and by the users to share pictures among others. Used in the classroom, it can be a wonderful learning tool as a class can post their own photos, learn from others, and teachers can plan activities/research from the website.  (For example, have students create a wordless slide show of the seasons). 
Autumn Chiltern