The EdTechie: Volume 1 Issue 2
“Teach for the world students live in.” -Mrs. Lemmo
Tech Tool Spotlight: Book Creator (bookcreator.com)
Book Creator is open-ended, creative and cross curriculum. Create your own teaching resources or have your students take the reins. Combine text, images, audio and video to create:
- Interactive stories
- Digital portfolios
- Research journals
- Poetry books
- Science reports
- Instruction manuals
- ‘About Me’ books
- Comic adventures
Using Book Creator in the classroom:
- Publish to an authentic audience
- Engage reluctant writers
- Demonstrate understanding
- Promote collaboration
50 ways to use Book Creator in your classroom (see linked item below)
Website Spotlight: Hooda Math (hoodamath.com)
Free math games for learning addition, multiplication, telling time, geometry for 1st grade, 2nd grade, 3rd grade, Grade 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and High School. Hooda Math offers over 700 Math Games.
Classroom Pages: The idea of a teacher approved games page has long been requested. All that needs to be done, is a teacher registers for an account. Then when the teacher logs in at class.hoodamath.com they can select which games they want to appear on their page. They are also given a code, that students can use to "log in" to the teacher's page.
* I use this site a lot in class for Escape Games. Escape Games are challenging and have a variety of puzzles, even including arithmetic problems. Every escape game is a puzzle itself, which makes learning adventurous.
Brain Breaks
Book Spotlight
Follow the Moon Home: A Tale of One Idea, Twenty Kids, and a Hundred Sea Turtles
by Philippe Cousteau
Acclaimed activist Philippe Cousteau and renowned author Deborah Hopkinson team up to offer a story of the powerful difference young people can make in the world. Meet Viv, who has a new home and a new school by the sea, and follow her as she finds her way in a new place and helps bring together a whole community to save the sea turtles of the South Carolina coast. (source: Amazon)
Grades 4-6:
The Safest Lie by Angela Cerrito
Nine-year-old Anna Bauman is one of the Jewish children who Jolanta (code name for the real-life World War II Resistance spy Irena Sendler) smuggles out of the Warsaw ghetto. Anna, given a new name and false papers, must keep her true identity secret, first at a Catholic orphanage and then with a foster family. Ironically, she discovers that the most difficult part isn't remembering her new identity, but trying not to forget the old one. Anna's story, suspenseful and deeply moving, sheds light on yet another aspect of the Holocaust: rescued children who lost not only their loved ones, but their very identities and Jewish heritage. (Source: Amazon)
Grades 6-9:
Greeting from Witness Protection! by Jake Burt
The marshals are looking for the perfect girl to join a mother, father, and son on the run from the nation’s most notorious criminals. After all, the bad guys are searching for a family with one kid, not two, and adding a streetwise girl who knows a little something about hiding things may be just what the marshals need. Nicki swears she can keep the Trevor family safe, but to do so she’ll have to dodge hitmen, cyberbullies, and the specter of standardized testing, all while maintaining her marshal-mandated B-minus average. As she barely balances the responsibilities of her new identity, Nicki learns that the biggest threats to her family’s security might not lurk on the road from New York to North Carolina, but rather in her own past. (Source: Amazon)
High School:
Grendel’s Guide to Love and War by A. E Kaplan
Staff PD:
Tap, Click, Read: Growing Readers in a World of Screens
by Lisa Guernsey
A guide to promoting literacy in the digital age: With young children gaining access to a dizzying array of games, videos, and other digital media, will they ever learn to read? The answer is yes—if they are surrounded by adults who know how to help and if they are introduced to media designed to promote literacy, instead of undermining it. Tap, Click, Read gives educators and parents the tools and information they need to help children grow into strong, passionate readers who are skilled at using media and technology of all kinds—print, digital, and everything in between. (Source Google Books)
Assistive Technology Spotlight
Bookshare
Bookshare is an invaluable resource for many students with IEPs for LD or VI. It is a service that allows students to access digital versions of textbooks, novels, and many other books needed for school. This is a good time of the year to either help students get an account, or update a student’s account. Visit Bookshare.org today and see what they have to offer! *Mrs. Lemmo can help you get it going also.
Teacher Self Care
Mrs. Lemmo EdTech
EdTech Badges: whemsedtechbadges.weebly.com
WHEMS Future Ready Pd: whemspd.weebly.com
Striving to build a generation of young people with the skills, knowledge, and understanding to succeed in college, careers, and community, upstanding digital citizens and learners. Working to provide support to school personnel and Curriculum in integrating technology into the activities of the school to improve instruction and student achievement.
Email: mrslemmo@gmail.com
Website: www.lemmopd.weebly.com
Location: 4001 Alto Road, Baltimore, MD, USA
Phone: 443-648-5530
Facebook: facebook.com/MrsLemmoEdTech
Twitter: @JessicaLemmo