Tuesday, May 18, 2010

Chimamanda Adichie speaks on culture and writing

A friend sent me the link to this speech on TED. It took me a long time to get to it, but was totally worth watching. Food for thought for writers and teachers, especially on how we see our students (the danger for us as teachers of reducing our students and their families to "single stories") as well as how our students see themselves as writers. I became curious about Adichie's writing and checked out Purple Hibiscus: now I'm eager to read more of her work.

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Photobooth: another reason why schools should use Macs


I'm lucky to be working with school that has a Mac laptop cart. A technology teacher showed me how he's using Photobooth with students: you basically use your Mac to snap an image of yourself or make a short movie. You can really play around with your photo images using different effects. I liked an image that a student created of himself in a digital story using an effect called "Pop Art," so I decided to make one at the office with Eileen's help: wow! So cool! Looks like an album cover! Eileen also showed me how to make a movie using Photobooth, which I had seen on other blogs:


So easy and versatile-- so many classroom uses!!! This is elementary to Mac users, but as a recent convert I continue to be blown away.

Saturday, May 8, 2010

Meowla

More talking cats from Solana! She immediately asks to post to the blog after she creates a voki. This makes me think about authentic writing and what that means for today's student.

Wednesday, May 5, 2010

Real Cool Cat

K-1 students I've worked with are fascinated by the flip cams, but like Solana, often just want to record themselves making silly faces. Since pre-school, Solana has loved using the flip cam to record songs she has learned at school. (See "real cool cat" example below. Still having shaky cam issues!) I'd like to try using the flip cams with students to record them singing songs or reciting poetry.