I love infographics…

One of the biggest trends in marketing and publishing seems to be infographics.  They are bright, colorful, and make ordinary information seem exciting.  As a visual learner, I get it.  However, I see that more and more people/companies are using them who are obviously biased which makes it more important to talk to students about reputation and bias.

Kathy Schrock has a wonderful collection of resources on her site

I created my own infographic for classroom information that I have blown up  outside my door and smaller copies to give to students.  I used Piktochart to create mine.  I’m having my 7th grade students create them for a project.  They will be using either Piktochart or Infogr.am.

Have you created or had students create infographics?  How’d they turn out?

My Apologies…

I have to apologize for the hiatus.  We’ve had a tough summer.

My husband lost his teaching job, we moved into a new house, my father-in-law passed away, our son started college, we got a puppy, and I had mysterious trip to the ER.

However, the lessons we learn in trying times help us to be stronger people.We’ve learned to lean on each other and we’ve learned which people are really going to be there for us.  We’ve learned to enjoy life and to be patient with important decisions.  We’ve also tried to remember that change is good.

This blog has continued to be on my mind… as one of those things you know you need to get back to working on but struggle with while there’s too much going on around you.  I  hope to get helpful things up on a more regular basis now that things are mellowing out.

Thank you for your patience.

-T.J.

Joe’s Goals

I know there are lots of goal-setting complicated software out there, but this is a simple, easy goal-setting page that I currently use for my health goals.  It could be set up for your class goals, curriculum goals, student goals, etc.  You could also set it up with all of your class hours as a daily diary of what happened in each hour.  Students could use this to keep track of their goals.

New goals can be added and current goals can be removed.  You can also print reports, share goals, and view graphs based on your goals.

I have it set to be one of my Chrome startup pages and therefore quickly fill it out everyday.  If you want a ad-free version, you can for only $12 per year.

2012 MACUL Speaker Handouts & Presentations

 

 

 

 

Even if you didn’t have the privilege of attending the 2012 MACUL Conference in Grand Rapids, MI…you can still get some valuable information.

2012 MACUL Speaker Handouts/Sites

Also for a limited time you can watch some of the keynote and featured presentations.

2012 MACUL Keynote & Featured Presentations

 

MACUL 2012

http://www.macul.org/

Today begins the pre-conference workshops at MACUL (Michigan Association for Computer Users in Learning).

From their site…MACUL will host our 36th annual conference at DeVos Place in Grand Rapids.  Join 4,000 educators  from throughout Michigan, neighboring states, and Canada. Conference participants will learn about innovative, technology-related programs and have access to an extensive exhibit area which highlights hardware, software, computer-related materials, and other educational technologies.

There’s nothing better than educators gathering to learn from each other.

Blended Learning Infographic

Here is a very interesting infographic on blended learning from http://www.knewton.com/blended-learning/

Created by Knewton and Column Five Media

CX.com

CX.com is yet another online storage site that syncs to your computer.  So what’s different?  For a limited time, you can get 10GB for free… yes, I said free.  So go there and check it out.

 

https://www.cx.com/ 

 

Type Racer

http://play.typeracer.com/

Typeracer is typing practice that is fun.  My students enjoy racing others from around the world.  If you over over the other users, you can see where their from.

In class we treat racing like the Typing Olympics and race for our country.  Students enjoy the competition.

 

Edudemic’s 100 Best Web 2.0 Classroom Tools of 2011

Wordle of the list (from Edudemic)

If you’re interested in educational technology at all, you have to go check out Edudemic’s The 100 Best Web 2.0 Classroom Tools Chosen By You.

http://edudemic.com/2011/11/best-web-tools/

Enjoy.

Fun Teacher Tools for the Classroom

Barry Fun English…

http://www.barryfunenglish.com/tools.php

BarryFunEnglish’s site has some great free tools to use in your classroom.  My favorite is the Dartboard Student Selector (pictured).  Other tools include:  Stopwatch, Random Student Selector, English Name Maker, Automatic Spelling Quiz, and Scoreboard with Spinning Wheel.

For a small reasonable fee (1 month=$2.99, 6 months=$9.99,or 1 year=$14.99) you can become a member and have full access to worksheets and customizable PowerPoints.

Super Teacher Tools…

http://www.superteachertools.com/index.php#tools

Super Teacher Tools has some great classroom review games among other tools.  I really like their Speed Match Quiz Maker (pictured).  It allows you to enter vocab & meanings.  Students see how fast they can match meanings to terms.  Check out their other tools including: Classroom Jeopardy, Who Want to be a Millionaire, Board Game, Seating Chart, Group Maker, and Random Name Generator.  All require Flash and some can be downloaded for offline use.