Web Based Tools

I was recently given a list of web based tools to look at. After exploring them, these are my top 5!

1. Typing Adventure- I really thought this game was fun! It is a great way to have students learn how to type. Even while I was playing it, I was questioning my typing skills. I found myself looking at the keyboard and making sure I knew where the keys were. It made me think about if I need to take a typing class and how many fingers I use to type.

 2. Kidblog- KidBlog seems like a great way for students to have a safe blog online. I like how it’s a class page and only the teacher and students in the class can see it. I also like how it can be shared with parents with a password. It would be great to use for creative writing and journal reflections. The only downside is students would probably have to be in a computer lab or have mobile laptops/iPads and not every school has those yet. This could be used as a home assignment but not every student has access to a computer and the internet at home.

3. Animoto- Animoto reminds me of a free version of iMovie. It has the same features like using pictures and videos to make movies and you can insert music in the movie as well. I like how it can be used on a variety of computers and platforms. The downside is you do have to pay to make videos longer than 30 seconds. Depending on how you use it in class it makes me wonder if it is more cost effective than iMovie. I think making movies using pictures, videos, and music is a great way for students to be creative while sharing their point of view on any subject matter.

4. Triptico- Holy guacamole, this app is AMAZING! I only tried the free version but there is so much you can do with it!! My favorites so far are the word magnets, order sorter, student group, pin board, and find ten . These tools would work great on a SMART Board because they are so interactive! Students can come up and do the activities. If you want more tools it's $80 a year for a school subscription and $24 a year for an individual subscription. A paid subscription gives you tools like match maker, word mix, bingo, and student selector. Some of these features can be done on a SMART Board but to be honest they seem easier to use on this app. The free app is pretty basic, but it has a lot to offer!

5. MindMeister- This tool was very simple to use. It's a great way to make basic mind maps if you do not have software like Inspiration. The key word is basic. If you want to make more complex designs, you are better off paying for software like Inspiration. If you want to make a basic graphic organizer than this tool is good to use. I can see younger students using this tool. An example is student can use the main bubble to thinking of a subject such as verbs and then in each bubble branching off from it are examples of verbs that the students come up with themselves. This could even be timed and then printed off and used as an assessment tool. It can also be a way to organize thoughts and printed off and saved in a notebook or taped on the wall.


 I really enjoyed playing around with these sites and apps. I was sad that some of the sites were down. I still want to use Triptico more. All in all it's good to look at new apps and sites that are available. Some might not be applicable to use in every classroom, but it is important as a teacher in Educational Technology to read up on what's new. I hope I can keep up with everything! There has to be an app for that, right? :)

Microsoft Excel

I have seen how Excel is great for graphs and for data. It can be great in the classroom to teach students graphing. Yet when I saw we were doing Excel, I cringed a little. My relationship with Excel has been very up and down. I have played around with it a couple of times. I do not really know how to use Excel and I haven't had much of a reason to use Excel. Also, most people I know do not know how to use Excel. 

I went into the tutorial not feeling confident. Of course the first steps are easy. I know how to open a new document. As I was going through the tutorial though I had to walk away and come back a few times. Simple things like cells were really bugging me.

It also took some time to learn how to make a graph. Simple things like learning how to change the data in the graph or labeling it took time. Mail merge is starting to make a little more sense but I am still not 100% sure if I will ever use it.

Another thing was that it was a challenge to try and make a crossword puzzle using Excel. I had never done that before so I was up to the challenge. Well, it was definitely a challenge. I eventually had to look for more tips online to help me figure out what I was doing. After an hour some things just suddenly clicked and I was having an A-HA moment.

The more I play around with Excel, the more comfortable I am with it. This can lead to a whole other topic on teachers and technology training that I will save for a rainy day (or since its the Fall Semester maybe a snowy day coming up soon).

I know I am not an Excel expert by any means. I think there is even more than can be done with it that I don't know about. I wonder if students would be willing to learn with me if I use it in a classroom. I also wonder if they would be able to understand it better than me and if they would find it easy to use. I will have to try it in my classroom one day and see what happens.

Microsoft Word

Even though I have been using Microsoft Word for years, I knew it had a lot of hidden features that I had yet to discover. I think part of it is that I never sat down and played with it. I just used it to type documents, flyers, brochures, posters, and papers I needed for school so I feel like I use it for everything. After looking at the new features and playing with it, most of them are very easy to learn. It is just about knowing where in Word they are and knowing that they are available to use. They really are very user friendly.

I was familiar with inserting links and making columns since I have used these features before. I have also used text boxes many, many times. Past professors have used the comments feature on my papers before, but I have never inserted comments in my own papers.

One of my favorite features that I have used is the citations feature. It really does help keep my works cited pages organized and presentable. Works cited pages are hard for many people. This really is an easy way to create a works cited or a resources page.

There are a lot of features that I can see writers, authors and publishers using. I also might be using some of these features later on when I write my thesis. I haven't used end-notes, footnotes, captions, cross references, or indexes in any of my writing yet. I might need to use these features in the future so I am glad I know how to do it. I also think the watermark feature is very cool. I have always liked this feature so that people cannot steal your ideas.

I did find the mail merge the most difficult to learn. It just seems like a lot of steps. I had to use "Preview Results" a lot so I knew what the actual letter looked like. If I was writing one letter, I think I could do it better without this feature. Yet if I am sending a massive amount of letters out, I would find this feature useful. But for now I do not think I will be using this feature.

Google Apps

I have been somewhat familiar with Google Apps. I have used the Drive to store documents, as well as creating shared documents that I have edited with colleagues. I think Google Docs is a great way to collaborate on a document. I love how you can see the revisions made on it as well as being able to have all the changes made on one document so that there are not multiples of it. I have just started using Drive and so far I like it. Converting documents to any format is a nice feature. I also like how I can save files wherever I am. It really is a portable flash-drive. I am also very familiar with Gmail because I have used it for years. It's fairly simple and what I like is how it organizes for me automatically.

 I still do not use the Calendar app and I have never used the Sites app. So far I haven't had the need for the Calendar app. The site app would be a great thing for classrooms if students all have their own Google accounts. It would be a great way to post schedules, homework, and to keep parents up-to-date. As for what age students should be getting a Google account, that could be a separate blog entry.

I have been learning how to use the apps on my iPad. So far it has been fairly easy. What I haven't decided on is if I like how to access the apps on an iPad. Each app is all under Google. There is no separate app for each. I might like separate apps, especially if I am only using one or two parts of Google Apps. It isn't hard to access, it just seems like too many steps to get there on the iPad.

I want to use the Calendar app more. I think it would help me be organized with school work and with personal appointments. I'm definitely sticking with Google Docs and Drive. What I want to see is how students in a classroom use Google Docs & Drive and what they think of it. Hopefully I can see it during my field work.