Week 6: Pinterest

www.pinterest.com/bagonzalez05

This weeks Pinterest readings have been really helpful in understanding the whole pinning frenzy.   Up until a few months 
ago I had not experienced what Pinterest was but once I started playing with it I was hooked!  I have used it to 
find lesson plans, instructional video of how to cook recipes and many arts and crafts ideas.  The webinar exposed me 
to what more Pinterest can be.  I have to try to pin  differently by having the pin button ready to pin at any given moment.
I really appreciate the fact that the company had a specific section dedicated to given acknowledgements and given 
credit where credit is due when you import a picture or pin from other sites.   The Pinterest side where educators 
have a library of resources will be really helpful when looking for specially geared subject matter.  For the older
students in middle school it would be great to create a board and share with other students.  Students can create not
only educational boards but also boards about their hobbies and we can get an inside view of what interests and
 motivates them.  Maybe a list of books that they would like to read or places they would like to visit.  These would
be great topics for them to write about during class and get them excited about writing.  The Pinterest app is wonderful
to have on my phone and the fact that others can invite me to their own boards is also good because we can share
 our different pins with other colleagues. This website is very helpful in our everyday lives and best of all is easy to 
maneuver and use it. And I really appreciate that!!!   

Blog post 3: Evernote Page: Bertha Gonzalez

This weeks assignment was very challenging for me!!! I probably saw the video about 4 times to try to understand it.  Unfortunately I was not able to submit by Fridays deadline but nevertheless  I had to post this.  Attached you will hopefully find information about my Evernote.  It is about how students can do research and keep their notes and information on Evernote.  https://www.evernote.com/l/AkEO7NvL3CtMi4M8zm0BwMorrarLiAzaRx4

This weeks articles on Feedly have exposed me to the many technology instructional websites and ways of blogging.  The thousands of resources available online is a bit intimidating when trying to seek a specific subject or area of interest.  As I looked thru the many choices of adding to my Feedly, I came across  an eye catching website:   Free Technology for Teachers.  As I viewed the contents I found that there many connections that I could be able to integrate in the classroom for example the creative page of Pixton.  In this webpage you can create a comic strip or even a small book by customizing your images from what is available.  This program takes you step by step in creating a comic scenery with backgrounds and scenery's and one of a kind individual that you custom make to your specifications.  This would be a great hands on tool to have students create their own storyline and getting them interested in writing.  Students can display their creativity and own writing they can then share with their  fellow students.  Pixton is free for the very basic creations but is a paid website to upgrade to  the more complex features.  This program is worth trying in the classroom to see if students would be interested in this form of writing.  Although anything revolving around technology will surely engage the students into producing quality work.
As I continued to surf thru my selected sources of information I came across the Leadership-Getting Smart article.  The article within about Project Based Learning (PBL) which is about teaching students to learn thru hands on high quality projects that reflect their academic ideas and express their findings thru projects.  The students projects contain attributes that involve college and career readiness which many experts advise we should be directing our students towards.  The PBL produce lifelong learners and teaches students to think critically and solve complex problems.  This is an aspect I have been trying to find out more about to try to integrate in the my classroom.  Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be enough time thru out the day to try to integrate something new, but it is worth the time to take a very closer look at PBL's.
This experience with Feedly has been a very positive learning experience for me.  I know that I will continue to use the sites to research the articles contained and learn more about the different sites I selected.

The Guide to the Classroom Blog was very interesting!  The possibilities about the use of blogging is infinite with possibilities.  I would use this blog page to contact parents and distribute information about our classroom.  I can keep them informed about student's assignment due dates, distribute important parent meetings dates and be able to communicate about current events.  My only concern would be that not all parents or students families might have internet access or computers at home.  So that would be a challenge to communicate with all my student's parents.

The option of blogging discussions with my students sounds fabulous!!!  I would assign reading novel assignments  and my students and I could be able to  discus the readings and have two way conversations.  I really think that the students would really enjoy to respond via email about our classroom assignments.  That would be an encouragement option for them to read the novel in order for them to be able to respond via email to other classmates and maybe other classes in the building.  Creating e-pals with other schools and student  would also be an attractive option to increase reading participation in the classroom.  Like the article mentioned this would give the shy/quite students in class feel more comfortable about speaking or participating in conversations since maybe in class they do not feel at ease.  The blog would give them the opportunity to express themselves thru text since they would be able to reflect on their response instead of quickly answering questions in the classroom.

The demonstration aspect of blogging would open many opportunities for students to showcase their creativity.  I think that maybe a good example of students using this feature would be to demonstrate their findings about their science projects or other research based assignments.  Students would be able to showcase their academic digit portfolio about their findings and other classmates can view and learn from their fellow classmates.  Students can share ideas with each other and collaborate for group projects from the comfort of their homes.  I feel the possibilities are endless with this new technology forum that will make students authors and publishers of their own work.