Talking SMARTBoards & Much More!

Sharing an interesting site that has been talked about by several people called- Tar Heel Reader . I think I first learned of this site from the amazing Paul Hamilton over on his blog Free Resources from the NET for Every Learner. Tar Heal Reader offers a collection of free, easy to read and accessible books in several different topics. Each book can be speech enabled- the speech controls are on the left of the screen on the title page.  These books can be downloaded in PowerPoint, Impress or Flash format.  This site also gives you the option to write your own book (you need to register for a free account to access this feature). The books present well on the SMARTBoard and also work well for those students who require switch access. ENJOY!

I am finally reading the Tweets from the NECC this year- there were so many great resources shared.   Five Card Flickr is one site that I found to be quite interesting. It reminds me somewhat of PicLits, which I wrote about in January, since both incorporate pictures to inspire creative writing skills.  You are dealt a set of random images from Flickr and asked to pick five, one from each set.  The next step is to create/write a story depicting the images.  This activity can be a fun, inspiring way to motivate students to write.  For a class project you could use the SMART Board when picking the photos and have students write individual essays and then compare and contrast. ENJOY!

I stumbled across this great site that has intrigued me, called One Word .  The premise is simple– when you click the go button one word will appear on the screen and you have 60 seconds to write about the word.  This would be a very nice, fun, engaging activity to motivate students to practice writing skills.  As the site states “don’t think. just write.”

I also wanted to mention another site that I find to be very interesting and that is Save The Words.  The premise is that you chose a word to “adopt” and ultimately “save”.  You click on one of the words that appears on the screen and anther text box will appear with it’s definition, a sentence using the word and the option for you to adopt the word.  Very clever!!!  I know a Middle School ELA teacher who visits this site once a week with her classes to help increase their vocabulary awareness.  She assigns extra credit if students actually adopt words and incorporate these words into their writing assignments– how cooool!!! ENJOY!

The Plurals Girls is a fun game on FunBrain.com that reinforces identifying plurals.  “Twin sisters Pearl and Flora lost their friends in the bubble machine. Help them get their friends out by choosing the correct plural form of the given word.”With each correct answer a friend appears from the bubble machine. 8 correct answers ends the game. There are two difficulty levels for each game.  The multiple choice options work well with the SMARTBoard since the game gives you two answers and you simply touch your answer.  With the fill in the blank options you need to type/spell your answers.  You could utilize the SMART On-Screen Keyboard to type the answers, as long as the cursor is in the answer box.

So if you need a game to reinforce/practice plurals head on over and introduce yourself to The Plural Girls, Pearl and Flora, they’re sure to make you smile- ENJOY!

I learned of an interesting word visualization site that I wanted to share called Wordsift. In some ways it reminds me a little of Wordle in that it allows you to copy and paste text to create a word cloud of the 50 most used words in the text, ordered alphabetically.   Wordsift also offers additional features, however, such as Google image results of the two most used words in the text, a word web (visual thesaurus) for the most frequently used word and it also displays the sentences in the text with the most frequently used word.  You can click on any of those sentences to see where it appears within the entire text. Here is a link to a great demo video explaining all of the features along with giving some classroom applications. There is no registration required and it is free to access, however there is no way to save your work. ENJOY!

 If you are a K-2 teachers and have not yet checked out GameGoo.com you MUST!  This site offers a plethora of free, engaging, fun educational games addressing early reading and language skills.  GameGoo is developed by Earobics a language and literacy software company.  Click on the Kids box to bring you to the GAME GOO section where you will find the games arranged from beginners (bottom) to advanced (top).  When you scroll your mouse over the various game icons a decsription of the game will appear in the upper right corner of the game section. Many of the games work well on the SMARTBoard (really fun!!).  The Fearless Freida games present well on the SMARTBoard, but they do require keyboarding.  And don’t forget to check out the FUN GOO section where they provide even more  options such as wallpaper goo, coloring goo, etc.  ENJOY!

Get your own virtual pet!

I have been collaborating with some SpEd teachers on strategies they could implement next year to motivate students to write descriptive essays. Enter virtual pets found at layoutcodez.net.  Students will ”adopt” their virtual pet, post it on the class wiki and write a descriptive essay introducing their pet to their classmates- FUN! Creating a virtual pet is a very simple and quick and process (colors can even be customized).  It took me a matter of minutes to “adopt” Larry my Lizard. The pets also comes complete with food and sound affects. The SMARTBoard will be used to present their work.  We also discuss the possibility of having each student create their own Voki at the start of school as a way to introduce themselves on the class blog. ENJOY!

Obe Hostetter over at the SMARTBoard Revolution Ning graciously shared some links to SMART Notebook files that support lessons for letter writing and the ReadWriteThink.org Letter Generator. The list was originally posted here. Thanks Obe! ENJOY!

1. http://www1.center.k12.mo.us/EDTECH/SB/templates/FriendLetterTemplate.notebook

2. http://www.lynnreedy.com/smartnotebook/friendlyletter.zip

3. http://community.teqsmart.org/download.php?view.445

4. http://www.education.smarttech.com/NR/rdonlyres/3B9A88DE-3CAD-4EAC-BB3F-1063734292F7/0/LetterWriting8US.xbk

I was asked by one of the SpEd teachers for a site that would reinforce the skills needed to write a letter so I shared the letter generator site from  ReadWriteThink.org. This activity reviews the parts of a letter and then allows students to write their own letter, giving them support along the way.  You must remember, though that work created can not be saved so students will need to start, finish and print the letter in one session. ENJOY!

Happy Saturday everyone! I was looking for some interactive ELA websites to use with one of our Kindergraten classes and found one from Northumberland NGfl, with 18 interactive nursery rhymes called Readalong Nursery Rhymes. Each of the rhymes can be read or sung, each has a sequencing activity that works great on the SMARTBoard and in addition, each rhyme has an acompanying range of other resources including SMART Notebook lessons.  ENJOY!