Reasons to share

This is a great blog post about why and how we should and can share what is happening in our classrooms.  Worth a read. 

http://langwitches.org/blog/2014/12/21/3-reasons-why-you-should-share-and-3-things-what-you-can-do-to-share/

Chrome Extensions

Chrome Extensions are useful tools to add to your Chrome browser.

Using Chrome as your browser, go to your Chrome Store.

Once here you can find all kinds of great tools.  You can also personalise your Google Chrome page by choosing from a number of themes.  Go ahead and try them - you can easily change between any of them with a click.  

Here are some great extensions to add to your Chrome:

Synergyse Training - this extension is added to your Google Apps, so that anytime you are in a google app (document, spreadsheet, draw, presentation, forms) it will appear.  If you have any questions or need a tutorial on any aspect of the app, you can click on it.

 What is looks like when you search for it in the Google Store.

The icon on your Google app.

Some of the many tips provided.

Another excellent one that I use all the time is the URL shortener. Search for Google URL shortener extension in the Chrome Web Store.

This extension goes onto your toolbar.  When you want to share a url address and you don't want to have it looking like a long, convoluted line of letters, numbers, symbols, you can click on this extension and it provides a nice, short url for you to use. 

Those are just two of hundreds of extensions you can choose from.  There is one that changes anything on your screen to a different language.  One that reads what's on your screen out loud to you.  One that shows your calendar with one click.  One for twitter, pinterest, and other social media.  The list is endless.  Have fun exploring and if you come across any that are really useful, be sure to share!

Good reads

A couple of great articles I found on my Twitter feed

21 Characteristics of 21st Century Learners

The Benefits of Students Teaching Students Through Online Video

School Visits

Today some of our Board and staff visited Hobsonville Point Primary School and Hobsonville Point Secondary School.  It was exciting to see this beautiful, developing part of Auckland with with these two new innovative MLE schools.  The collaborative approach to teaching and planning among staff, plus the way planning is shared with students and parents was interesting for our staff to reflect on and challenge our thinking.   Click on the photo below to view some photos from our visit.

Finalist!!

I am excited to be a finalist in Interface Magazine's Best Class Blog category for my 2014 classroom blog, Mrs Nichol's Acorns.   I started this blog for the 2014 school year to share my Year One students' learning and the daily activities in our classroom. My personal inquiry this year was how to make the use of ICT purposeful in the classroom. I have used my classroom blog and this PD blog as part of my inquiry. It's been a great year of learning! 

Voting is open until 19 November, so please click on this link to go vote.  Thanks!

Combining the old and the new

When working with a new student who is also a beginning writer, I had her use the classroom flannel boards to create a story. I then photographed her pictures, put them into Write About This Quick Write and typed her story for her. This has allowed for her story to be recorded and shared with others. I printed her picture and story so she was able to take home something on her first day of school in NZ. 

Google Draw

This is an excellent Google Draw tutorial by Mark Keenan.

Click >> Here<< to go to Mark's blog and watch his tutorial.

Purposeful use of ICT

What do we do once we have all the bells and whistles of ICT - TV's, Apple TV, desktop computers, laptops, chromebooks, ipads, GAFE, 1:1 ?

It is so important to not only have ICT but to purposefully use it!

The Year 6 classes put ICT to use for them.  Read this post from Room 14.

More apps for writing inspiration

Use Epic Citadel as a location to tell your story from.  Look through this world. Screen shot your scene. 

Use Skitch to draw, label, brainstorm, plan. 

Popplet. Use to brainstorm ideas. Add pictures, words.

Writing Challenge for Kids. Timed writing challenge. 

Things to think about. A possible alternative to Young Thinkers??

Story Spark. 

Type drawing. Present your story with words becoming art. 

Wordfoto. Use a photo and the words overlay onto it. Need light parts in the picture for words to show up in. 

Presenter: Paula Jamieson 

http://goo.gl/GK4IUK

Augmented Reality

Learning about augmented reality and how to use it to inspire writing. 

Starter Kete

Connected Educator Month has provided a Starter Kete to help you with learning more about all of the ways you can connect and network in our digital generation.


Click on this LINK to find a 31 day list of activities you can do to become more digitally savvy.

Voice to text iPad app

  i am practicing writing a post using i voice voice to text recognition app  this will be a good app for children who have a hard time writing or typing  it does seem to have difficulty with punctuation and you need to add that manually .  i would try using this with the student and see what happens .  after i finish my post i can upload it copy the text and put it onto my blog .  let's see if it works 

It worked!!  Will just need to be edited for punctuation. 

ivoice. iPad app. 

InstaweatherPro app

I am using the InstaweatherPro app in my Year One class with the iPad.  The children work in partners to independently post about the day's weather.  Together they take a photo outside (they must include the sky) using the iPad. They save the photo to the camera roll and then use the Blogger app to upload the photo into our class blog, add a title and labels.  It's been a great addition to our elearning in the classroom.  The children are learning how to take a good photograph and it also creates great conversation about the weather, forecasting, how it affects our planned activities, etc.  The children love it and can't wait for their turn to come up!

Blogging on whatever is handy

Children are so tech savvy theses days. They used my iPhone to take a photo and then write a blog together. I love it! (and you have to admit, it is pretty cute to see 6 year olds working away on an iphone)  Here is the blog post that they wrote together.

iPad tips and tricks

A few notes from Monday's PLC

1. Getting your ipad onto Apple TV.
ios6 - double click your home button, scroll the bottom line until your find the AirPlay icon
ios7 - slide up from the bottom of your ipad to show AirPlay icon
- choose the room you're in.  The password is the same as the room identity.

2.  Save battery life by having your ipad go to sleep.
Go into settings.  General.  Auto-lock.  Make sure it is set for a time and not 'Never'.

3.  Close an app to go to home screen.
Touch all five fingers on the screen and bring together.  This closes the app and brings you to the home screen.

4.  Move between open apps.
Touch four fingers to home screen and swipe left or right.

5.  Clean up apps that are open in the background
Double click home key to reveal apps.  Swipe up to close each one.

6.  Delete apps.
Press and hold on an app icon until it wiggles.  Click on the x that appears to delete.  If you've accidentally deleted one you still want, it can be restored from the Apps store.

7.  Make folders, rename them.
When you have the apps wiggling, you can move them around your screen and between screens.  You can drag them on top of each other to create folders.  You can click a folder to rename it or to remove an app from it by dragging it back onto desktop.

8.  Taking a screen shot.
Simultaneously press the home key and the power button.  Screen shot is saved in Photo gallery.

Apple TV settings

Does your Apple TV go to sleep in the middle of a lesson?  Does the screen saver come on when you've left something on the screen for the children to copy?  Are you in the middle of a presentation and Apple TV kicks you off because it's gone into sleep mode?

Here is one way to fix those problems.

Click on your Apple TV remote Menu button.  This screen should come up.  Use the direction button to go to the Settings icon.

Scroll to Screen Saver:

Click on the center button of your remote to change the time for your screen saver.  It is defaulted at 5 minutes (which goes by very quickly!)  Change to the desired time.

From this screen you can also change the photos that come up for the screen saver, if you want to.

Hope that helps!

iMovie iPad App

Rebekah has written some great notes to help you with creating an iMovie using your ipad.  

Go to this link to view them.  HERE

Putting a google calendar icon on your iPad or iPhone

This is one way to put a link to your Google Calendar onto the home page of your ipad or iphone.

There is an actual app you can use but I personally don't like the layout of the calendar in that app so I have done mine this way.  This gives you the same view that you would see on your laptop.

Go to 'Safari' on your device and search for Google Calendar.

Enter your school email address and password for your GAFE accounts.  This will bring you to your own Google Calendar.  It should show up in 'Desktop' view.  If it doesn't just scroll to the bottom of the calendar and choose 'Desktop' view.  

Next: See the little box with the arrow pointing up in the top left corner?  Click on that.

This will give you options of what to do with this webpage.  Choose 'Ad to Home Screen'.  This will place an icon on the home screen of your ipad or iphone.  It's not a 'pretty' icon but, hey it works.  :D 

 

Walah! You now have easy one touch access to your Google calendar.

My favourite Thing is..... By Anna

 i Like to play with my friends. their

 names are Charlotte and London .On the silver monkey bars we can swing on them.They are very steady. They are also vey big. We can swing on them and do flips too.I am learning to go onto the top of the monkey bars. BY ANNA

(A blog post photographed and written independently by a Year One student using an iPad)

eLearning snapshot

Today I walked through a few rooms and saw some great use of the ICT we have in our school.

Year 3 used their iPads to research what they could make for our technology walk through. They shared their findings on the classroom TV by linking their iPads to the TV through Apple TV. 

Year 5 students were using the Show Me app on their iPads during maths to show their learning of fractions. 

Year 6 students were using Chromebooks and laptops to work on a collaborative project using Google Presentation. 

Year 1 students were using the Blogger app on their iPads to write blog posts for their classroom blog. 

Soccer field

 I  like soccer because I'm good and  I got  into the rep team.  I got a coat to show that we're in the rep team too and we're going to have a tournament.  I am versing my friend Nathan and he is in Bucklands Beach rep team and i think that he will win and i think i will win too.  By Albie

(A blog post photographed and written independently by a Year One student)

Blogging with Year Four students

Working with Year Four students today teaching them how to blog on the iPads. 

Linking Student Blogs to Your Blog

If you wish to link your students' blogs to your classroom blog you can do so with one of the gadgets.  This gadget will put links to each of your student's blogs on the front page of your blog.  As your students write a post, it will feed a snapshot of it to your blog.  This is beneficial for people who read your blog to be able to view what your students are learning and sharing.

Go to the blogger dashboard.

Go to Layout.

Click on 'Add a Gadget'

Choose 'Blog List'

Title your Blog List.  Choose how you want the blogs sorted and what you want shown.  Add your students' blogs by clicking on 'Add a blog to your list' and then enter the URL for the blog. Continue until you've added all of your class blogs.  Save when done.  Your students' blogs should now be visible on your classroom blog page.

Blogging with Year 3 students

Today 3 children from each Year 3 class came to learn how to blog on their iPads. They will take their new knowledge back to their classrooms to teach others. 

Creating Another Blog

Now that you have one blog up and going, many people are interested and ready to start a second blog, whether it be for their own personal inquiry as a place to gather evidence and information, or if it is to be a blog for a club that you are leading.

Go to your google account and click on the square of 9 dots.  

Click on 'More' and go to 'Blogger'.  

Click on 'New Blog' 

 

Choose a name for your new blog and a web address. If this is to be your private Professional Development blog, you may even like to use your full name.  As it will only be viewable by the select people you choose, no one will be able to access it unless you give them permission.  After you have created your new blog with your new URL, it is time to change the settings.  

To change the privacy go to Blogger Dashboard > Settings > Basic > Permissions > Blog Readers - Edit

There are three options for who your blog readers can be.  Decide which setting you'd like.  For it to be completely private, except for those you invite, choose the bottom setting: 'Private - Only these readers'.  This is where you will add the email addresses of those you want to allow permission to view.  You may need to go back here at a later date to allow others access.

Don't forget to change your other settings:  time zone, sharing on google+.  Click on the phrase to link to a previous post for instructions.

Adding Pages to Your Blog

To add pages to your blog go to your dashboard and click on Pages in the left column.  Then click on 'New Page'.

Give your new page a title and 'Publish'.  Repeat this process until you have all the pages that you want.

Next go to Layout.  Choose 'Add Gadget' and then select 'Pages' 

Once you've added this gadget you can arrange and rearrange the order of your pages as you see fit.

You can also choose to have the list down the side of your blog or across the top to display as tabs by going back to layout and dragging the gadget up to a long horizontal 'add gadget' area or to a small, side 'add gadget' area.

These would be the basic steps that would be unique to setting up a second blog, a private blog, and adding pages.  The other parts of blogging would be the same - posting, photos, links, template.

Have fun!