With the start of the fourth six weeks of school we begin to yearn for Spring and warmer weather. Valentine's Day is only a few weeks away. Over the upcoming weeks we will be celebrating Black History Month, Asian New Year, Valentine's Day and several other important events. There are several ways technology can be integrated into activities for  the upcoming weeks.

     Many of our applications, such as Pixie 2, Kidspiration and Timeline have excellent templates, and are a   

wonderful resouce for integrating technology into the curriculum. In addition to these wonderful resources, many teachers are guiding their students in creating Blogs and Wikis. Gaggle has an easy to use blogging feature. It is an excellent resource for teachers who are unfamiliar with blogging. Teachers who are familiar with blogs and wikis can create free accounts with sites such as PB Works, BlogSpot and Wiki Spaces. Once the teacher has created an account, pages can be created for each student to post information from a research project. Students can not only add information collected from research, but can also add photos, links to maps, web sites, Google Earth tours, and photos.

     A wiki or a blog can be a wonderful way for students to demonstrate their knowledge of a specific topic. For example, students could create wiki about a famous African American or about a tradition of Asian Americans. Students could use the digital camera to take photos of a math concept such as patterns or fractions they see around the school, and create a wiki to post the photos and explain the concept.

L.B. Johnson News

Most teachers at LBJ have completed three hours of Gaggle training. The students are using the e-mail in a variety of ways. Third grade teachers are working obtain e-pals for their students. The students will correspond with other third grade students via Gaggle e-mail, to compare and contrast their school, culture, and various other topics of interest.

Fifth grade teachers are eagerly awaiting their Promethean Boards. Plans are being made for implementing them into the curriculum. 

Milam News

Students in Ms. Marich's GT class are creating Wikis for a research project. Each student is researching an enigma, and creating a Wiki with information they collected in their research. They will be including links to Google Earth tours on their Wikis. A link will be posted as soon as they have completed the project.

Upcoming Events and Dates

Audacity:

Some teachers at Marshall and Milam have received training in Audacity. Training for Audacity will continue at these schools over the next few weeks.

Audacity training will begin at LBJ mid-February. 

Upcoming Training Sessions:

Wikis, Google Docs/Dates TBA