Voting Made Easy

With the election fast approaching some of you may still not know who to vote for.  You are also trying to explain all of the ads that are on T.V. to your students.  I just found a great website that will hopefully help you figure out who to vote for as well as help your students learn about the current candidates running for office.  VoteEasy is a neat little tool that will let you choose the state that you want to work with and then it will show you who is running for office.  You can click on the pictures of the individuals to learn more about them.  You can also choose the issues that you are concerned with and learn more about the issues.  Once the issue is selected you can answer how you feel about that issue and VoteEasy tells you which candidate shares your views.  Even if you don't want to use this with your students you can help yourself choose who to vote for.

How does this apply to the classroom?
This can be used to inform your students about the different candidates.  You can view the candidates and then have a mock election within your classroom.  Just be weary that some of the issues may be controversial.  The more that we can inform our students the more likely they will get out there and vote.

Great Math Manipulatives

Math Open Reference is a great website for showing geometry figures on the Promethean Board. With this website you can choose from three different categories Plane Geometry, Coordinate Geometry, and Solid Geometry.  Within the categories there are several manipulative activities that you can choose to show.  Each of the manipulative activities can be used to introduce the concept and also as an interactive lesson that the students can control.  If you don't mind the occasional ads on website this is a great place to visit.  Your students will get a lot out of seeing and controlling the manipulatives.  With these tools you will be able to help your students to focus in on the activities as well as retain the information.

Math Open Reference

Dropbox

It seems like the more that we use technology the more that we start to rely on it.  This is a good thing especially when everything is working properly but we have all been there when something goes wrong and the technology doesn't work the way that we want it to.  Recently I found a free and easy to use program that will help you back up your files so that if your computer does go down you can still access your files from any other computer.  Dropbox is a free service that allows you to have 2 GB of space out on the web for free.  All you have to do is download a quick application which will place a folder on your desktop that is connected to your Dropbox account. Place any file in this folder and it is automatically uploaded to your Dropbox account.  Now you can access your files from the folder on your computer or from the website itself on any computer that has web access.  Just imagine how useful this could be.  You create something at home, place it in your Dropbox account and it is ready for you the next day at school.  We have all had that scare when our computer isn't working properly and we are told to back up our files.  With Dropbox they are already there and we just have to log onto any computer to access the files that we backed up and we never miss a beat.  Do you have an iPhone or Droid?  Dropbox has an app for that as well.  Give it a try, I am sure you will see the benefits some day.

Activotes and BrainPop

The Activote Quiz is now integrated into BrainPop!

BrainPop has just released a great new feature for use with the Activotes.  Do you remember opening BrainPop and then opening ActivInspire to use the Activotes with BrainPop?  With the new add-in you can choose Activote Quiz from the list of options and be off and running.  Now the teacher can focus more on giving the quiz and less on going back and forth between ActivInspire and BrainPop.  Click here for the instructions on how to use it and click here for the download itself.  Once it is set up you don't have to worry about it again.  Trust me, it will be well worth your time to use this add-in.

Internet Safety Lessons

Welcome Back! We hope you had a restful summer and are excited to start a new year. I'm writing this blog following our beginning of the year Inservice. I just wanted to say that I am so impressed at how well D70 teachers have embraced technology and made it part of their effective teacher toolbox. I'm sure our students are appreciating the way our technology initiative is changing the way they learn.
Since Internet Safety is a topic that is relevant to all users--no matter what age and an important part of the 21 Century Skills students need to succeed, I thought this site called Internet Safety and You might be useful to you.




It offers guidance for students, teachers, and parents using Garfield the cat and his cast of comic strip characters to get across some important information. Topics include Online Safety, Cyberbullying, Fact or Opinion, and Forms of Media. There are videos along with opportunities for students to use the drag and drop features to draw conclusions and discover the correct way to use the Internet. I especially like that these lessons can apply to students in kindergarten all the way through 8th grade and beyond. You might think of using it during the first couple weeks of school as routines are established. It can also be used as a good discussion starter.

• Go to Helpful Hints to find the Activotes and Brainpop Guide covered in the Inservice
  

Back To School Reminders Re: your Promethean Boards

Be sure to try out boards before class to work out any glitches
email Clare corndoff@district.org or Shad sglenn@district70.org with any problems

Plug in board calibrate

Check for ActivInspire Updates. Go to Configure and then select Check for Updates option

Clean projector filter using compressed air