Clickers

I am so excited that my district was able to purchase a set of Clickers for my school!! For those of you who do not know, Clickers is a program that allows students to answer questions projected onto the board through a remote control device. The program will save their answers for you to later review. It's so cool!

What's great, is that the kids think it's "so cool" too! It's bringing 21st century technology right into my classroom! What I also love about them is that rather than calling on one student to answer a question, this records EVERY students answer!

Another awesome function is the reports section. Under reports, you can get actual percentage grades for report cards among many other types of reports. Another function is that you can print out individualized study guides for each student based on questions that they got wrong.

This is such an exciting addition to my classroom!! I can't wait to use them more often!

Website

How do you utilize your classroom website in the classroom?

I use my classroom website as an online classroom. I find it to be one of the best tools that I use to communicate with my students' parents. On it, I put homework assignments, book report assignments, as well as useful links to help students with the skills we are learning in spelling, math, reading, science, and and social studies.

I also put a parent resources page on my site, to help parents who may be struggling with their child. Whether it be with homework, learning or attention issues, or just tips to raising a good student-- they can find it there.

Finally, I wanted to make sure that I gave back. There is a teacher resources page where I share good websites and ideas that can maybe help other teachers out there.

I decided to use a teacherweb, but may decide to be more creative this summer when I have more time to look into it!

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween, EduBloggers!!

Halloween is one of the biggest perks to teaching elementary school, don't you think? You get a chance to see all your little friends come dressed up in their fantasy worlds. Lots of clowns, power rangers, supermen, rockstars, and Obamas ready to parade in the infinite circle around the poop-ridden fields behind the school. Fun, yes?

I, this year, was a clown. Not so original, but I have never been a clown before- so it was a first for me!!

And, why is it, that Halloween is the only function that you will see EVERY SINGLE parent of the children in your class? Academic days... back to school night.. conferences... eh.. but-- HALLOWEEN??? SIGN ME UP!!!!!!!!!!!!

Website

Hello, fellow bloggers out there.

I wanted to share a new website with you-- www.starfall.com.

Check it out.. my students went on it today and had a blast.

Computers

Teachers, I have learned something new today. In computers. YES, me. I am SO excited!!!

I dutifully took my students to computer class this morning. They immediately began typing away on their typing program. I started to make my rounds to make sure they were using those dear home-row keys, when the computer teacher called me over. She then showed me how to turn off the auto-format when making a table.

O---M---G!!!

Now, many of you may be thinking WHO CARES??!! And you may also be wondering why I think that this is blog-worthy... Well, my friends, I ask you-- have you ever found yourself cursing at the computer while typing your spelling words into a table... backspacing with every word to fix the auto-corrected capital letter?

Well-- if you have... let me make you just as excited as I am. It's a little trick called:

FORMAT--- CHANGE CASE...

Oh, how I love learning new things...

Don't Rain on My Parade!!!

This has been such a terrible week for me. And it's only Wednesday. Did you ever just have someone come and rain on your parade?

A co-worker and I have been working really hard on a current fund-raiser for our school. It's going over REALLY well, and we have been super excited about it. Rightfully so, right? We have brought many learning resources into our school as well as a lot of much needed technology. To say that we were excited and proud of ourselves is an understatement.

Then comes the rain. And when it rains in my school-- it pours. There are certain teachers of the "older" generation who are so closed-minded. Why can't they be more receptive to new ideas. I understand that change is not easy-- but it's needed, ESPECIALLY in education, where trends change more than anywhere else in the world.

It's put such a sour taste in our mouths. We feel like we should stop doing anything extra for the school. Which is not what we want (nor what we will do...), because the children will be missing out-- and they are the ones that we are all there for, after all.

And it's only Wednesday.

First Day of School

The first day of school was FABULOUS. My little friends filed in as expected with their shiny new backpacks and perfect new hairdos. They angelically sat at their freshly made desks and dutifully listened to every word I said.

First day bliss.

But... would I be a terrible teacher if I said that I am not in love with them yet? I miss my old friends. I see them in other teachers' lines, and I want to yank them out and bring them back to mine. I miss their wiggling in the seats, their calling out, their laughter, their perfect handwriting-- I miss it all about them! The good and the bad!

It's normal, though. The mourning period will last a while... and my new shiny class will have a just as special spot in my heart.