Techie Tuesday: Technology Tip for the Newbie Blogger

Hello, all! I am linking up at Technology Tailgate for

Yesterday I wanted to link up with Monday Made It hosted by 4th Grade Frolics. I had tweaked some word work games and created some homework menus and wanted to share them. I inserted the links for all of my shared google documents and thought-Wow that looks blah! I decided it would look better with pictures of my documents but wasn't sure how to do that. I new they need to be jpg format to insert them to my post, but wasn't sure how to do that. After a bit of searching I discovered how to convert PDFs to JPGs.  Here are the steps:

1. Download your google document as a pdf. Go to File: Download as: PDF

2. Find an online PDF converter.  I used pdf2jpg.net.

3. Click on Choose a PDF file and find the file you wish to convert. Open the file and then click the Convert PDF to JPG button. 

3. Click download and then proceed to insert your newly created JPG document.  

I also learned as I was putting together this post that hitting command+shift+3 will take a screenshot! You learn something new everyday! Have a great Tuesday!

Technology Projects

I have taken on 2 major technology projects this summer. 

1. Scanning all my classroom library books into booksource classroom organizer:

This is a program where you can use your smart phone or tablet to scan the bar codes of your books and they will be entered into a database on the web. The database can be accessed from any computer. Students search for the book they are checking out by it's name or author in the database and then check it out on the computer. In order to be able to scan the books you have to install the booksource classroom organizer app on your smart phone or tablet. Did I mention that this is free!

So far so good.  I have one box of books left to scan.  I really hope this will make it a bit easier to keep track of my classroom library books. I will let you know how it is working once we get into the swing of things in my classroom.

2. Changing all my bookmarks to Diigo:

Diigo is an app that you can use to organize your internet bookmarks.  One of the features I like about it is that you can mark web articles as read later. So if you want to read them but don't necessarily need to bookmark the page, you can easily access them. You can also highlight things on your bookmark pages and you can type notes on a sticky note on your bookmark pages. Not only do you bookmark your pages but you also give them tags or labels. Then when you are just sure you had a web page bookmarked on how to use a book to teaching good endings, but can't remember the page name, you can search Diigo for various tags or labels to see what you find.  

Have any of you tried either of these sites? I would love feedback on them or suggestions of technology you would recommend!

To Newsletter or Not?

Every year I debate on rather I am doing a classroom newsletter or relying strictly on my website to keep parents informed.  I am already having this debate. One issue is the creating of a fun layout that does not take forever to create or require me to purchase expensive software. 

I may have found the answer to the issue of how to create a fun and interesting newsletter after attending the Southwest Iowa Google Summit. It is called Lucidpress Layout and Design. It is found at the Chrome Web Store under apps.  

It seems to be a very user friendly way to create a newsletter. Once you have created your letter you have a lot of choices on how you are going to share it. 

You can publish it on the web.  I find this a great option since we are not allowed to print color copies in our building. This way you can make it as fun and colorful as you want and still have people see it. 

You can also share it through the Lucidpress software or you can download it as a pdf and share it through google docs or Doctopus or gClass folders.  

You can also print a hard copy, so that you can send it home with each of the students.  

Here is a practice page I created to experiment with:

http://pub.lucidpress.com/caf341d4-58dc-4ab5-9b8c-a82373edc192/

Feel free to comment if you still create a newsletter and if you do how do you create and share it. If you don't how do you communicate with your families?

Taking On a Challenge

I found this on twitter:

Powering Up on EdTech This Summer: The 7 Day Challenge

and decided to give it a try.  Here is what I have accomplished so far:

Challenge #1:  Go on a Blog Bender- Done that and continuing to do that.  Found this interesting site, as one place to start checking out blogs:  Teach Make A Difference  Started my own blog several years ago and then just stopped, so I am trying to pick back up again.  

Challenge #2:
I attended Building the Collaborative Classroom Best Practices in Reading and Writing conference.  At this conference I attend six different breakout sessions over a 2 day period.

Day 1 was focused on best practices for teaching reading.
The first session was Getting Started with the Making Meaning Program.  This is the reading comprehension program our district is adapting this fall.  This session was a great introduction to the materials we will be using.
The second session I attending was about small group reading instruction. This session provided me with a good solid review of everything I have read so far about small group instruction.
The thirds session I attended was about conferring during reader's workshop.  I love the basic structure the presenter shared with us to guide us through a conference.  1. Listen-Have them read to you.  2. Think/Decide- What am I going to teach? 3. Teach 4. Try- What skill am I going to challenge them to try during their reading time?

Day 2 was focused on best practices for teaching reading.
The first session I attended was about about assessments in the writing classroom.  I came away with 2 important things from this session. 1 it is very important to not only assess the final product, but to consider the rough draft. You can learn a lot about a writer from this part of the writing process. I also learned that it very important to focus on the data to justify the grade. Sometimes we as teachers get caught up in I know this student can do this, they must of had a bad day.  We need to focus on the data we have and assess it.
The second session I attended was conferring in a writing workshop.  I was excited to see that you can apply the same simple structure that we learned about yesterday in the reading conferring session to a writing conference. Two basic pieces of information that I walked away with were: that conferring allows for differentiation and published pieces will have some developmentally appropriate errors. Conventions are only 1/7 of the 6 +1 traits of writing, so do not over focus on them.
The third session I attending was Getting Started with the Being a Writer Program.  This is the writing program our district is adapting this fall.  I am excited to see that it teachings writing by using quality trade books to model it and it encourages learns to learn about the writing process from writers.  This session was a great introduction to the materials.

I am attending Southwest Iowa Google Summit at the end of June. This conference focuses on integrating technology into the classroom. I will let you know how it goes!