Here are a few Web 2.0 Applications and some tidbits about each from Mr. Larry Ferlazzo himself:

Video Conferencing
1. Appear.in this is a super-simple video conferencing site for up to eight people, allows for screen share and does not require registration just a link for each room. 

3. When do you have time to find new instructional technology practices and resources?

1. Today we talked about many recording apps and websites such as: www.recordmp3.org, Garage Band, Audacity and QuickVoice etc. Which of these recording mediums are you most comfortable with and the most likely to use in the future? Why?

2. How do you see yourself expanding your audiobooks/read aloud library in your classroom or using audio QR codes?

3. Is there anything you would like to know more about?

This summer in Tech Academy, we have focused on several items:

    1. Building a strong PLN (we can never learn enough)

    2. Overcoming barriers when infusing technology

    3. What is a flipped classroom?

    4. Creating an infused lesson using a web app for students to present new knowledge

    5. Maintaining a teacher blog

    6. Using Google Docs

It has been an excellent week of training. I learned right along with the teachers as they shared new resources they found each day while spending time developing their PLNs. I was also very intrigued with the solutions that the teachers found on how to overcome barriers to infusing technology. The teachers this week have filled their teacher tool boxes with many useful resources as they transformed their classrooms into 21st Century learning environments!

Teachers that attend from July 14-17, please reflect upon the week in a comment below. Also include answers to the following questions for me in your comment:

1. In Tech Academy, we used several web apps such as GoSoapBox.com, Answer Garden, Blogger, Google Docs, Kahoot, etc. Which of these web apps are you most excited about implementing in your classroom?

2. How do you see students using the web app you selected in #1 to enhance your curriculum?

3. What level(s) of Bloom's Digital Taxonomy can be reached using this tool? Why? How?

 development, I don't want to learn about technology". Every time I would hear her vent a little part of me would be crushed because I knew how  fabulous of a teacher she was and the thought that this new technology was spoiling her year made me uneasy. I would try my hardest to explain how it was "easy" if she just would give it a chance or that the technology she was using was great she just needed to "up the level" some more but she refused and her last year in the classroom was her worst year.

Well... fast forward 3 years later and my sassy mother law is a retired teacher that substitutes two times a week and a few weeks ago she sent me a text that said "Taught kinder today and oh my, I turned on the computer and the SmartBoard and when to Youtube and we watched StoryBots and the kiddos love it. Thanks" Let me just tell you, I am so proud of her! My mother in law has also recently signed up for a Pinterest account, is active on Facebook, purchases gifts online and is a proud owner of a Smart Phone she has become quite the techy retiree. So what was it that changed her fear of technology? I think honestly she felt pressure but, when she realized that technology is a TOOL and not a replacement for her she was able to have fun with technology and allow it to engage her and her students.

Education is always changing and as educators it is our job to help students prepare for their future. Today's technology will help our students complete everyday tasks and aid them in becoming lifelong learners. There are always issues in education but is technology really an issue that should push teachers out of the classroom and cause so much distress? Less than 60 years ago schools were segregated... that seems like a much bigger issue than giving students tools to investigate problems, have a forum for sharing their ideas and developing worldly ideas. We must support our teachers during this transformation of learning but teachers also need to take chances and be willing  to change...

In Digital Leadership Academy for CISD we have been asked to give ourselves a grade for the ISTE Standards for Coaches  by using the NETS Profiency Rating  I am my worst critic, I have found myself being extremely harsh when assessing myself, I believe that right now I have earned a D: Beginning .  

As I step into my new role as Elementary Technology Coach I am having to evaluate where I am today and envision where I would like to be in the future, may that be tomorrow, next month or 3 years from now. I know that when making a plan you must always "Plan with the end in mind" but in complete honesty, is there really an end goal for technology integration? In order for me to help my colleagues I have to evaluate what knowledge I have and what knowledge I need to gain in order to be a leader for my teachers.

In what areas do I need to grow in order to be an effective technology coach for my teachers? 

1. Be Visionary: My first priority is to create a curriculum that teachers will use to aid in their core curriculum and then use Easy Tech as a supplemental resource. I want my teachers to utilize their computer lab time in a way that will maximize student success. Teachers will help students use technology in context instead of isolation.
2. Teaching, Learning and Assessment: I need to model for my teachers through professional development (blogging, video tutorials, team meetings and one-on-one professional development) the best practices of technology to reach academic excellence.
3. Digital Age Learning Environments: Help educators cultivate a technology rich environment that is facilitated by 21st Century Educators.
4. Professional Development and Program Evaluation: Though professional development I need to model how technology should be infused in lessons and help create course for teachers that will allow them to grow their (Personal Learning Network) PLN.
5. Digital Citizenship: Bridge classroom management and digital citizenship. Create a forum for which educators can develop norms for which students can participate appropriately with other learners globally.
6. Content Knowledge and Professional Growth: Continue to grow and participate in my PLN in order to stay educated on the best teaching practices.

it was then my responsibility to type and merge each student list in order to create each students individual Tagul... this took hours. So this year I change it up with Google Docs. 

Here is how I did this project this year
Part 1: Create a Google Form...  Student Objective Survey Example
1. Go to drive.google.com and log in with your Google/Gmail Account  

2. Select "Create" orangish/redish tab and select "Form" 

3. Title your form "____________ Class Student Adjective Survey" and select a template

4. Type in your first question to say "Name" and then for "Question Type" select "text" then check the box that says "Required question" then select the blue "Done" 

5. Select "Add Item" type "Place a "check" next to FOUR of your most favorite colors:", for "Question Type" select "Check Box" and then type in a few colors for students to choose from. I listed Orange, Yellow, Lime Green, Green, Forest/Dark Green, Turquoise, Light Blue, Blue, Dark Blue, Purple, Pink, Red and Black. Check the box that says "Required question" then select the blue "Done"
6. Select "Add Item", leave the question blank and for the "Question Type" select "choose from list" now list the adjective that you would like your students to choose from, be sure they are all kind and the students know what they mean...I used this list to get me started from www.EnglishClub.com, once you have listed all the adjectives that you want select "Advanced Settings" and check "Shuffle option order" (this will prevent students from selecting the same adjectives over and over),  check the box that says "Required question" then select the blue "Done"
7. To save tons of time you are now going to duplicate the question from above (step 6) so that you don't have to type in the adjectives every time for each student. Hover over the question that you just created and in the top right corner you will see 3 icons appear, the first one is a Pencil (Edit), the second looks like Two Pieces of Paper (Duplicate) and the third is a Trashcan (Delete). You want to select the second icon that is the Two Pieces of Paper so that you duplicate the question. You are going to want to duplicate the question so that it equals the number of students you have.
8. Now go through each of these questions that you duplicated and make the "Question" each of your students names.
9. Go to "Send Form" top right corner of the page in blue, copy and paste the link and post it to your class website or somewhere so that students can easily click the link and take the survey themselves...

Part 2: Look at your results from Google Form and Creating the Tagul
1. Once everyone is done complete the survey log back into your Google Drive and click on "____________ Class Student Adjective Survey (Responses)" and something will come up that looks like a Excel Spreadsheet.
2. It was important to my partner teach and myself that each students Tagul  had some of the same items listed so we went in and inserted 5 rows and typed in both of our names, 5th Grade, AVCato and 2013-2014 and then copy and pasted into each students name column.
3. Go to www.tagul.com and "Sign Up" and then "Log In"
4. Select "CREATE NEW CLOUD" (you are now going to start making your clouds for each student) for "Cloud Name" type the students name
5. Select "Import Text" "Select All" and Delete what is listed, go the Google Spreadsheet and select your first students column including their name, "Copy" and then "Paste" it on the Tagul window you have open then select "Import Words"
6. Find their name and change it to be: Size: 100, Color: Black and “Select”, Angle: 45
7. Then go to the “Shapes” tab and hover over the square and select the “Customize” gear change the “Aspect ratio” to be as close as you can get to 1.35 (no big deal if it’s 1.29 – 1.39), select “Okay”
8. Click “Visualize” to make sure it looks okay
9. Click “ ü Save changes”
10. Go to the "Colors and Animations" tab and hover over the two colors arealdy there (blue and purple) and pres the "X" and then select the students favorite colors
11. Click “ ü Save changes”
12.Then go to the “Grab and Share” tab, on the “Raster image” select “PNG 1MP” and save in a folder in your documents or on your desktop
13. Then click the “My Clouds” tab to do the next students Tagul and repeat steps 4 - 12

Part 3: Print, Frame and Enjoy
1. Print in color as an 8x10.
2. Trim down to 8x10
3. Purchase 8x10 frames, I have always had the best luck at Dollar Tree
4. Before the students come into the classroom on the last day of school set them up on their desks and sit back and enjoy their reactions! 

WARNING: This is my most scattered post to date. 

I use this over the door shoe rack to store student headphones (we were able to get each student a pair from Dollar Tree as a motivation tool while doing STAAR review, they work well and have lasted for the past 2 months), BYOD (iPods, phones...) on Wednesdays and their class shirts so they are not lost at home.

When I was 9 years old my dad had a paid sabbatical (so unfortunate those rarely exists anymore) and at the time I never realized how fortunate I was as a child for my parents to take me and my two siblings on a ROAD trip, yes by car, from Austin to Boston one summer. During my first year of teaching,  I was always shocked when I taught a global concept (land forms, climates, weather, temperature, tides, seasons, food chains) and how many of my students had very little knowledge about what was the beyond their bubble of Fort Worth. I frequently found myself Google Searching images or scrambling to find a YouTube videos trying to show them things that they weren't fortunate to experience yet. I would show them an image and say , "This boys and girls is the Grand Canyon, it is located in Arizona and it covers 1,902 square miles" and they would nod their heads and I would stand there with my hands on my hips saying to myself "Yeah okay... you don't get it.. you just see a picture... you can't fully imagine how spectacular it is!" 

Well...This past year at TCEA  (Texas Computer Education Association) I went to a fantastic presentation (ShapeUp Your Geometry Lessons - Blaire Boghetich and Kristi Kellum) that presented  how you could use Google Earth to show students bird-eye views of famous landmarks and students could take measurements to calculate the perimeter and area. While I sat in the front row, they demonstrated the lesson: they typed in "Statue of Liberty" and then click on "Search" and the Earth started to rotate and it zoomed in on North Ameraica, then the United States, then the North East and then New York and then NYC I had an Oprah "Aha" moment... "I CAN TAKE MY STUDENTS EVERYWHERE!!!" Since TCEA I have used GoogleEarth at least once a week to take my students on virtual field trips and it has allowed them to make global connections. 

Student Samples: 

Do you know of any other mind map apps that are K-5th grade friendly? 

After studying ecosystems in science I would usually have my students sketch a food chain of their choice in their science journals and label each organism and classify its role and then have students come up to the document camera and share their food web/chain with the class. Well after some thoughts on how to Tech Up my lesson I decided to.. have students use Educreations to create their food webs/chains and then record themselves discussing how energy from the sun flows through organisms! This allowed me to assess the level of knowledge the students had obtained... were the able to take ownership of vocabulary and put terms in their own words or were they simply just reading the definitions?! After the students created their presentations we used Reflector to share each students presentation with the class! 

A few opinions and thoughts about Educations:

1. As a teacher go to http://www.educreations.com/ to set up an account and then a class 

2. Use the app it is much easier than the website to create 

3. Search of other teachers lesson, there are some great already created presentations/lessons! 

 Student work on display with QR Codes linked to their Educreations so other students to see and hear their work! 

Student Samples: 

This is outside my classroom so any student can access the deck with a QR scanner! 

Here the link to my decks on Quizlet: http://quizlet.com/subject/mrsbatchko/

Here is the link to our grade-level website with the Quizlet decks: http://avc.castleberryisd.net/staff_directory/5th_grade/science/vocabulary/

Here is my preferred QR Code Creator website: https://www.the-qrcode-generator.com/