Nings

I was really confused about Nings when I first learned about them. I watched a few YouTube videos about them and found this one very helpful and worth watching.

Nasa Before PowerPoint

This is my favorite tweet of the week from History in Pictures that I am following on Twitter. I am not a big technology fan (although I must admit it is growing on me a bit). Not sure if any of the students I will teach in the future will even know what a chalkboard and chalk is and this would be fun to show them. I can remember being excited to get my turn to clean the chalkboard with water and a sponge when I was in school. This photo is entitled "Nasa Before PowerPoint"

Google Forms

This week in the US History blog that I am following, there was a great slideshow presentation entitled "80 Ways to use Google Forms in the Classroom." Having just learned about Google Forms for the first time in my INTC 2610 class, I found it very timely! It was almost like hearing a word you have never heard before and then all of a sudden you are hearing it everywhere. If you watch the entire slideshow, there are actually 81 ways. Some of them were very unique and I will definitely refer back to this presentation when I am a teacher. http://ushistoryeducatorblog.blogspot.com/2014/03/80-ways-to-use-google-forms-in-classroom.html

I admit it...I was wrong...I like Twitter!

I am completely new to Twitter. At first I was confused as to why you would want to follow someone you don't even know. Facebook I can understand. These are photos and thoughts of my friends. Some of my Facebook friends I have not seen since high school over 20 years ago. For me it is really cool to see photos of their children, hear about their jobs and say hello to them. After following a few people on Twitter for the last week, I can see how it would be useful to me. I am following History in Pictures @HistoryInPix and I totally love it. I will continue to use Twitter for this reason alone. There are some really great photos that are tweeted every day and I love history. Being able to get a visual helps refresh my memory on my history facts as well. For example here is a photo that was tweeted today of Al Capone's cell at Eastern State Penitentiary. I thought it was really cool and I want to show my 6 year old son. He is fascinated with Al Capone stories and prisons so I know he will love it.

Snagit for Google Chrome

This week in my US History teachers blog someone posted a video about Snagit. Snagit was just released just released by Google and the really cool part about it is that it has a screencasting feature. I thought that this was perfect timing because we are learning about screencasting in INTC 2610. Every time you capture a picture with Snagit, you can share it and Google deposits the picture in your Google drive. Check out this video. )

PDF converter

In the US History blog I am following, a teacher named Ken blogged this week about how he has been using a free website called pdftoword.com to convert PDF files to a Word document. He mentions that this can also be done using Google Drive but that he finds pdftoword.com to be better. https://www.pdftoword.com/

Visual graphic in my environment

I am currently the owner of a small fitness business. This is a visual graphic that I use on my fitness facebook page when I am cancelling a class or adding a class. I never gave it much thought until we started discussing visual graphics in INTC 2610 class. This is the graphic that I use most often. I like it because it is simple but I think that it captures attention and prompts my clients to read further.

Flipped Classroom

During class we learned about "Flipped Classroom". Flipped Classroom is a form of blended learning in which students learn new content online by watching video lectures at home. What used to be homework is now done in class with teachers offering more personalized guidance and interaction with students instead of lecturing. As a teacher I have mixed feelings about flipped classroom. I think it would work great for students who have the discipline to carve the time out to watch the lesson. As a parent of a gifted student in the public school system I think the idea is great. My son John masters math concepts quickly and would benefit from the personal attention and ability to advance at a more accelerated rate. I also think it would be great as a parent to view the lesson myself and understand how to assist my child if he needed it. When asked from a student perspective, John was not a fan of the idea. He thought it sounded like more work, although he agreed that sometimes it would be nice to get ahead.