Four Favorite Blogs!

My first favorite and recommendation is clutterfreeclassroom. For all of you organization obsessed like myself this blog is a must. Every weekday morning she posts a new idea on how to organize the little things around your classroom, in innovative cheap ways. My favorite is the following blog, diy-seating-with-storage, because I have had the same idea to use in my own future classroom. Only with egg crates and cushions. I am all about making the classroom neat yet functional and this blogger is right up my ally with her doable ideas, I believe many of my future teacher friends would agree. Also it is a good blog because she posts frequently and the blog is easy to read through. 

 

Photo Courtesy of clutterfreeclassroom 

My second recommendation would be lifeinfirstgrade1. This blogger/teacher gives out so many great activity/lesson ideas that are actually usable within the classroom. Her blog is clean, easy to read and if you plan on teaching the first grade you can learn a lot from her or some of her recommended first grade blogs. When we went over what it means to be a good blog just a few weeks ago some of the major items that we pointed out were; do they post frequently (and yes she does), is it easy to follow(and yes it is), is the blog relevant to its title (yes it is) and my own thing is does it give you recommendations to other blogs. She has all of these qualifications plus I enjoy her sense of humor that you pick up on as you read. My blog of choice to sell you on this blogger is classroom-decorating-day-nine, my reasoning is simple. I love the bees, its actually a theme I want to do in my own classroom, and I love how she has everything organized (on her day off I mind you!). 

Button Courtesy of lifeinfirstgrade1 My third  blog is creatingandteaching, this blog is filled with ideas of items to create for your classroom. This blog however is aimed towards younger students, in particular pre-k or maybe kindergarten. Her students are ages 3 and 4 but have autism. I love that her blog is something different. Often times you will see blogs on simply teaching a kindergarten class or first grade and so on but  hers is the first that I have stumbled upon that focuses on how she teaches her young students with autism. I feel like this is simply just a good blog to take a peek at whether you are educating those students or not because it has some really interesting ideas. One that really caught my eye was her dental-health-mini-unit, never have I seen a unit on dental health and this looked like a cute fun way to teach it to the younger students.  Button Courtesy of creatingandteaching
My fourth and final, since I already had three and stumbled across this last one, is seusstastic. This is a favorite simply because I am obsessed with Dr. Suess and he will be a part of my classroom! This blog is written by another Suess obsessed or as she calls herself, obsuessed. Her blog is right up my ally, I love all of the Dr.Suess ideas that she has, its sad Dr. Suess week only comes around once a year she has so many ideas. My favorite blog of hers is a week full of Dr. Suess activites of course, seusstastic-seuss-week-freebies, and they are free. Nothing beats a good free idea. Better yet, she has a direct link to her Teachers Notebook shop, includes videos and unit ideas. Love it!  Heres her link: teachersnotebook *As a small side note I just wanted you to know that all these blogs I found from Pinterest because I am forever looking at teaching ideas and so forth from Pinterst. My addiction has really come in handy because I follow so many education blogs!

IPad's in the Classroom

Before taking into account all of the different ways an iPad can help a child within a classroom I assumed it didn't belong in the classroom. After doing a little research and watching my nephews with kindles and iPod's I believe that these technological tools can be really helpful to children. Technology can be really helpful for all students but especially students who have special needs. The advantage of an iPad is that it is large enough for students to handle, being about the size of a piece of paper, and it can hold a multiple of applications to aid in the learning process.
                                 

Photo credit to gcasserotti via compfight

One example of this assisting a student is a child with down syndrome, from the article Special Ed. Pupils Find Learning Tool in iPad Applications. In this article written by Nirvi Shah, the child has difficulty communicating with others. This communication barrier makes it difficult for her to communicate with her peers and her teachers, without communication they have a barrier between them and are unable to connect. With the app Proloquo2Go she is able to select pictures to communicate with peers.
Another example is a test that was done with high school students with special needs in the article written by James Basham. These students were first given a math test on paper and then that same test on the iPad. It was discovered that when the students completed the problems on the iPad they finished more questions in less time because they were more engaged. My take on this would be that because a paper test is very frustrating and just the sight of the paper test can give a student anxiety. By giving the child the iPad to complete the problems that anxiety is taken away, an iPad is looked at as fun and games. This is actually a plus in the education setting because you are getting real results from students with the test anxiety.
Finally, the apps that can be accessed on the iPad are simple to find and easy to access. If a school has a bunch of iPads logged onto one account they all can have the same applications so that all students can access these tools. Accessibility and expense is important. In younger schools it is important to have a tool that is easily accessed by a student on their own but is not expensive to purchase. Another plus with the applications is they are constantly being updated. New apps come out all the time that these students can use as they grow. In the long run this is much less expensive then the tools that are bought to suit the needs of various students. For example a student who is hard of hearing or a student who has trouble with sight. On this one tool you can access text to speech or expand the lettering so that it is easier to read. This is found on one tool where as it would take two separate tools to help these students. Some schools have debated whether this is an option that they should be thinking hard about and bringing into their classrooms according to the article written by John Waters.

Photo Credit to barrett.discovery via Compfight

In  my own experience with my nephews I find that iPod's and kindles are a great addition in our house. My nephew at two has already mastered electronic puzzles and is working on matching games. His favorite are the Amazing Shape Puzzles on the iPod. With this puzzle he has to put together the pieces and in the end it has the name of the puzzle and it reads the name. For example when he puts together an eagle, he finishes the puzzle and then a little guy comes onto the screen with a chalkboard that reads eagle and he reads the word aloud. This has taught my nephew many different animals, letters, colors and he even likes putting together continents. These are not only very educational games but peace keepers. I am now a believer that an iPad could be a great addition to my classroom.
Citations:
James Basham, et al. "A Comparison Of Ipads And Worksheets On Math Skills Of High School Students With Emotional Disturbance." Behavioral Disorders37.4 (2012): 232-243. ERIC. Web. 17 Feb. 2013
Shah, Nirvi. "Special Education Pupils Find Learning Tool In Ipad Applications." Education Week 30.22 (2011): 1,. ERIC. Web. 17 Feb. 2013.
Waters, John K. "Enter The Ipad (Or Not?)." T.H.E. Journal 37.6 (2010): 38-40,. ERIC. Web. 17 Feb. 2013.

Educational Quote/ Twitter

Photo Courtesy of pinksherbet via Compfight

Twitter Follows:

             teachingwthsoul: I choose to follow teachingwthsoul because she references to many different areas that might appeal to teachers. She tweets often and from a quick skim through you can see that they are about education. She has a lot of information or references to using technology in education. 

             mbteach: I choose to follow mbteach because she gives out a lot of information in her tweets about technology in the classroom. She brings it to reality, she is also very willing to answer questions that other educators or parents may have about this technology. 

Blogging 101

I was looking through all of my blogs today and came across this one in my news feed. All of you in my Tech Ed  class might find it interesting since we are all beginning our own blogs! The blogger is a published author who has been blogging for roughly four years, it has a little bit about her in the beginning.

 http://whatsfordinner-momwhatsfordinner.blogspot.com/2013/02/blogging-etiquette-and-how-to-market.html