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Podcasts and Teaching

Podcasts are a wonderful differentiated learning instruction tool for the visual and audio learners. Not only do podcasts have audio but some podcasts even incorporate visuals as well. Searching for podcasts relating to social studies education, I found a wonderful website called The Educational Podcast Network that has numerous podcasts for almost all subjects. One podcast I found to be extremely valuable is the section that has Great Speeches in History. We learn about so many great speeches made by presidents, civil rights leaders, etc. but never get to hear what they sounded like. Reading a speech and hearing a speech with emotion and voice behind it can give two entirely different messages. One such podcast, The Gettysburg Address allows readers to hear the speech that President Lincoln gave. Almost every social studies class will talk, read and discuss this speech but never get to hear it. The same occurs with the Martin Luther Kind, Jr. speech " I had a Dream...," all students study it but not all get to experience it as listeners. Having students re-enact a great speech in history through a podcast could be a very creative way for students to experience different periods in history or even having students create their own famous speech as well. Podcasts are a great way to differentiate instruction for both learners and the teacher as well.

ePaLs

The ePaLs website has to be one of the most amazing educational tools available to teachers all over the world. As a program that allows teachers and students from all over the world to connect with one another as penpals, or sharing lesson plans, etc., it serves as one of the best global cooperation websites I have accessed in a long time. As a social studies teacher, being able to connect with other students and teachers from other parts of the world at the click of a button is invaluable. After exploring through the website, the vast amount of ideas came splurging into my head on how I could use this tool in my classroom. First and foremost, the ability to be penpals with other students from around the world is most important. Assigning my students penpals and requiring weekly or biweekly correspondence would definitly be something I would do in my classroom. Students will be required to ask them questions about their culture, daily life, family life and student life. As learning about culture is at the root of social studies, this could open the doors of opportunities for all my students. Another great idea would be to connect with another classroom from a different country and learn how they understand and get taught about certain world events that occurred in history, such as WWI or WWII. Having students realize that not everyone is taught or undertand historical events the same, it may open their minds to a less ethnocentric understanding of the world. Having students work together on a "global project" of some sort together could open the doors to the global cooperation that we all strive for as teachers. It would be every teachers dream to be connecting with a classroom on the other side of the world and have all their students working on a project together to present to their parents, school and even community.

Using the VoyCabulary website could be a great tool to use in conjunction with the ePals website. I am sure that vocabulary is sure to get in the way of some communication between the students. If students use their correspondence through GoogleDocs and have their communications translated into the language of their webpal, they will be able to have easier communcation with one another. Students will not only be learning about culture and other parts of the world, but they will be incorporating reading, writing, spelling, grammer and learning how to use a dictionary, thesaurus, etc. The opportunities are endless and it seems that according to many teacher posts on the website that that are numerous other teachers out there willing to connect with U.S. classrooms. I certainly can not wait to use this in my classroom!!!!

Internet Videos in the Classroom

Incorporating the use of Internet videos in the classroom can be a great addition to any lesson plan, especially for the visual learners. The Internet is just filled with thousands of educational videos just waiting to be used in the classroom by students and teachers. One of the videos that I chose was "How to write a bibliography" from the YouTube website. Having students write historical papers requires the use of outside reading sources and a lot of research. I find the hardest part for students is writing the bibiography at the end of the paper. Many students do not even really know what it is and why they have to do it. This quick video to show my students in class really breaks it down and makes it very easy to understand. Not only will I as the teacher explain to them what it is in class and do examples with them together, but I will also show them this video for other learners in my class. Not all students learn the same and incorporating short video snipits like this in my classroom can enhance any learning environment.

Flickr

Using Flickr in the history classroom has some of most greatest advantages. Often times, history teachers want to take students back into history so that they can put themselves back into the shoes of time. As I was sorting through numerous photos on Flickr, I searched for many historical places that we learn about in history. I could not believe how many photos came up of places and people we learn about in history. Using these photos, history teachers are able to really show their students what these places look like back in time...and even what they look like now. I was searching photos of the Oregon Trail for a podcast I was creating in another class and came up with so many photos that I used in my project. Flickr is a great tool to find photos of people and places that the textbook might not show.

Another use for Flickr would be allowing students to display places where they have gone and/or visited. If we are discussing the geography of the Grand Canyon or the Rocky Mountains, it could be a great tool for students to upload their photos and share them with the class if they have visited such places. Lastly, using Flickr to start discussion or interpret images is another great way to get students engaged in other things besides just text. The power of images is often times more powerful than text. Seeings images of the Great Depression often times has more of an affect on students than just reading about it.

Bookr

As a first time user of Bookr, I thought it was an extremely easy and user-friendly tool to definitly use within the classroom. This tool could be used for a variety of subject areas and topics in any classroom. Having students create their own Bookr would be a great opportunity for them to use both images and text to interpret poems, history, science terms, etc. The opportunities are endless for students using Bookr as it is a very easy tool to use, even for students in younger grade levels. I have created a very short Bookr about the history of Thanksgiving that could be used as a very simple example of how to use the tool. Here is the link so check it out!

Using Twitter for Professional Development

The advent of Twitter and microblogging programs alike have begun to revolutionize the way people today communicate with one another. With real-time status updates and near instant responses from people all over the world, communication and dialogue is forever changing. According to Gabriela Grosseck and Carmen Holotescu (Can we use Twitter for Educational Activities?) only half of Twitter users are considered active members by posting within the last month. Depsite this fact, they give numerous opportunities for educators to use Twitter for communication and professional development.

After venturing through numerous educators Tweets and Twitter accounts, I find that many of them post numerous articles that may be interesting or relevant to education. Since many schools have dedicated professional development days throughout the school year for its teachers, having teachers come well prepared to these days is extremely important for full advantage of these days. By having teachers assigned to specific topics they will be discussing on these days, teachers can be asked to use Twitter beforehand to find relevant articles and/or teacher experiences to bring with them on their professional development days. Teachers can then share the information and experiences that they found in order to take full advantage of the time they have collaborating with each other. Not only can they use the information that they find during professional development days, but throughout the entire school year for not only themselves but their department as well.

Another use of Twitter can be a communication dialogue between the teachers themselves. Each teacher can be required to make a Twitter account for school use only and follow all the other teachers within the school. Teachers can then communicate daily about things that happened within their classroom, daily school events and even reminders. It could even be used as a social networking for the teachers themselves to get to know other teachers within the school and read about what other teachers are doing in their classrooms that day. By allowing only the other teachers in the school to view their pages, it could begin to develop dialogue that might otherwise might not happen on its own.