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Feb
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Today’s Snow Day morphed into today’s Professional Development day
Filed Under Behaviour Management, Blogging in and out of the Classroom
Today, Winter sent us another snow storm and another Snow Day. That’s two Snow Days in less than a week. Last Friday we had our first Snow Day and now again today.That must be a first! I can’t ever remember having that happen before. Most years we don’t even get one Snow Day let alone two in one week. I got the Snow Day phone call early this morning to tell me that the schools would be closed today given the weather. Take a look out my window in the photo above, and you’ll get a sense of what the day was like.Snow Day, great I thought. I can spend the day learning how to use some new- to- me software and work on my class blog. The software Voice Thread looks like it has lots of possibilities for engaging the reluctant writers in my class. I have to thank Kevin for telling me about Voice Thread, and I have to thank him for helping me understand how to use it. I was stuck and thought “now what?”. Then I though of Kevin. He has lots of patience. I know because I’ve tried it before. I sent Kevin an email asking for help, and he responded at once with a link to Chrissy’s site where she explained things so that even I could get it. Thanks Kevin. Thanks Chrissy. Why is it that once you know how to do something it seems so easy? I experience that a lot when I’m sitting in front of a computer.
As far as PD sessions go, I have to say it was a pretty good one. If I had one of those forms to fill out that you usually get at the end of PD sessions, I would have to rate the day excellent in all categories – if I do say so myself. Lunch was even really good-thanks to Kurt who has a passion for cooking and had his famous chicken soup simmering for hours on the stove-what better on a day like this.Now that I can use Voice Thread thanks to some help, I want to have my students use it in the classroom. If you have moment, take a peek at what I’ve done using Voice Thread in my class blog. It’s very basic because I haven’t learned to use all the bells and whistles yet. Students really like writing comments about the pictures and quotes that I’ve posted. Their comments are actually quite thoughtful. Students didn’t ask how many words they had to write. I haven’t had one complaint about writing thus far. I hear them laughing and commenting on what they’ve written. It’s nice to hear laughter.
There was a bit of confusion when I introduced the blog, but now everyone pretty well knows knows what they’re doing more or less. I guess when I introduce Voice Thread to the class there’ll be a bit of confusion, too. To try to minimize that, I’m going to introduce it in stages. First, I’ll show a few of my stronger students how to use the program , and then they can show other students how to use it. That’s what our Board does when it rolls out something new. I think the Board calls it “teachers teaching teachers”. Someone goes and gets trained on some new piece of software we have to use and then that person comes back and shows the rest of us- if there’s time.
Oh yes, before I forget, Voice Thread has a version for educators. That’s the one I signed up for. There’s some good ideas for the classroom on the site. I’ll take a closer look at those later. I also like the security features like having the option of going public or keeping the thread private, having or not having search engine access and allowing or not allowing comments. I’ve discussed the security options for our classroom blog with the students and most prefer to have the security of no search engine access and the comment moderation. As I get more comfortable with my students, I’l l open things up more. Right now I’m a bit hesitant, but I’m sure that’ll change as I get to know the students better and our classroom and blogging agreements of mutual respect, no put downs, attentive listening, appreciation and the right not to participate during class discussions get entrenched. I see that happening already. The kids are identifying put downs and instances of disrespect. I think that’s the first step because for some kids so much of the inappropriate behaviour is an unconscious habit. When I call them on it, the response I get is “What?”. First they have to know what’s appropriate in order to do it, and then once they start doing it I’ll can catch them doing “good” to reinforce that appropriate behaviour. That catching them doing good is part of the appreciation and mutual respect that I want to show my students. As Ken Weber wrote so many, many years ago The Teacher is the Key. I agree.
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9 Responses to “Today’s Snow Day morphed into today’s Professional Development day”
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Edublog Awards
Toronto Reading Council
Good luck!
Patience is key.
Kevin
Kevin,
Thanks- I guess a patient teacher is the key.
I’m excited to see your voicethreads but the link came up as a dead link.
Mathew,
Thanks for taking the time to tell me the link wasn’t working. I don’t know what happened. I redid it, and I checked it and it’s OK now.
Very cool. thanks for sharing.
Mathew,
You’re welcome. I hope the kids get excited about Voice Thread, too. I’d like to have my kids in my little grade nine math class create a slide show using Voice Thread, but I don’t have any computers in that class. I’ll have to look for a way around the problem. I’m sure if there’s a will, there’s a way and there is a will.
So glad to hear that my post was helpful! It made my day! You will thoroughly enjoy using VoiceThread. It would have to be my most favourite tool to use in the classroom!
Hi Elona,
Long time no ’see’!
I swung by your blog and love the entries you have created for the Ultimate Gift. I’m wondering…how would you feel about students from a class in Montreal commenting on the blog? Some of my kids saw the movie last week and some others will be viewing it either next week or mid-March, after our break. I think they’d get a kick out of reading what your students say and out of commenting alongside them.
What do you think?
Tracy
ps – I love using voicethread as well! It’s a fabulous tool! Here are a couple of threads:
http://voicethread.com/share/43024/
http://voicethread.com/share/58842/
Tracy,
What a great idea. Let’s do it.