Technology in the Classroom

An Adolescent Literacy Program: Hot Linked and Online
Presented by: Dr. Elaine Weber

In her presentation, Elaine explained how to use simple, free, easy–to-access technology to make your teaching more efficient and effective and get your students more engaged in learning.
Elaine began her presentation with a pictorial look at the timeline of “A Day In The Technological Life of an Adolescent”. She went on to share the ABC’s for a new way of instruction.
º Abundance of Information
º Better Access to Technology
º Changing Role of Teachers
1. Downloader
2. Uploader
3. Connector
When Elaine spoke about “Abundance” she recommended that we read A Whole New Mind. It was good to know that at Chets, a small group conducted a book study with this text in 2006 and at the beginning of the 2007 school year our entire faculty was given the book! Dr. Weber shared different ways that today’s teacher must be a “Downloader”. We must know how to use the internet to search for resources to impact instruction. We were so excited by all of the sites that she turned us on to. Many of them are accessed through www.protopage.com/assessmentsystem. This is a free website that Elaine says is easy to use with assessment, instruction, activities, podcasts, videos, and polls. Be sure to take a look at “Stack the Deck for Good Reading Comprehension”. This is a card game to use with students in the classroom. The photopage website will give you a link to slideshare to download the cards. Other interesting sites she shared were Grammar Girl and Teachertube. Dr. Weber showed us Lit2Go. If you visit this site you can pick a book title and find a read aloud of the text. We learned more about Voicethread and its capabilities.

Dr. Weber’s next focus in her presentation was the importance of the teacher as a connector. Blogging is the way to go! She asked us to share about our Live From The Creek blog. We look forward to seeing the results of our blog. It is interesting to read the comments that were already written.