Entry 9: NECC In Atlanta

I am sitting here in my hotel room in Atlanta typing this before going out to eat supper tonight. I don't have a lot of time, but I figured I would give a real quick update. So far I have gained a lot out of this conference. I went to session that had to do with the Baseball Hall Of Fame and how to use its resources (very interesting) and saw a great session on how to doing video editing better. I did go to a Second Life session today, but am still a little skeptical. Well I will update more when I get home tomorrow.

Entry 8: Google Earth

Today I spent the day at school presenting to various teachers about google earth. For those that have never played with it before, it is a great program that actually allows you to take virtual field trips with your class. You just have to type in an address and it will take you to a sattelite image of that location. The best part about this whole program is that it is a free download. It was great hearing new ideas from teachers about how you can use this program. You can click the link below to go to my webpage and see the powerpoint about how to use google earth. You will see how to find addresses, go on virtual tours, and even how to make your own virtual tours. As always enjoy and if you have any questions you can email me at jayweekly@gmail.com


Link To My Webpage And Powerpoint Notes

Entry 7: School Board Video

As well as being a special education teacher, I am also the broadcasting teacher in our building. What we do in the broadcasting class is broadcast the daily announcements live and also do a 15-20 minute Friday news magazine show. It is very time consuming, but I absolutely love it. We do everything using Adobe Premiere Pro and it never ceases to amaze me how quickly the students pick up on this high end video editing program. This year 4 of my broadcasting students took it upon themselves to do a school board video that was shown at a school board meeting to highlight our year. These students put in a lot of time and it really shows in the end. I was hesitant with their original plan, but in the end it came out really nice. I recently posted it on teacher tube and you can view it below. I will talk more about teacher tube at a later date.

Entry 6: Ipods Part 3

There was recently a story on a Kansas City news channel that talked about how Ipods shouldn't be used in schools. One of the guys I work with, who is on the cutting edge of using technology in his class, saw this and email the reporter from the show. He was interviewed on how he is using this technology and the link is below.

Link To Ipod Interview

Entry 5: Using Games To Study

Summertime is great because it gives me a chance to do some traveling and recharge my batteries. I actually just got back a few days ago from visiting my relatives in Iowa and it was great. I also did some work with my brother where we tore up a woman's whole front yard and then laid new sod down. Lets just say that after that I am glad that I became a teacher. My brother also came back with me and we had the chance to see my beloved Royals trounce the Cardinals 8-1 last night. It was great.

Well let me get down to business. A few years ago I noticed that my students were turning in all of their homework, but they were just completely bombing their tests. I began asking them what was going on and I came to find out that they either weren't studying because they thought it was boring or they weren't studying the right information. A few months later I stumbled on some amazing review games that I decided to start trying with the students. There were two game I started with: Jeopardy and Who Wants To Be A Millionaire. These are both powerpoint templates and literally all you have to do is type in the question and the correct answer. The jeopardy game can hold 20 questions and the millionaire game can hold 15 questions. What I started doing is getting a copy of a test that was coming up about a week ahead of time, see what material was going to be important for them to remember, and make a review game from there. I then email any special services student taking that test a copy of the review game and I also email it to their parents (if they have email). I began finding the students were doing better on the tests because the games were visually appealing making them want to study and it also showed them what they needed to study. Some parents even got into the act and made their own review games for their child and some students have even asked for copies of the template to make games. The best part about this whole concept is that the games are all free!!! That's right you pay no money at all.

At the current time I have the Jeopardy, Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, Home Run Derby, Hollywood Squares, and Deal Or No Deal template games. If you would like a copy of any of these please email me at jayweekly@gmail.com and I will be happy to email you any of these. You can also see what the games look like by clicking on my website below and then clicking on review games.

Next week I am going to do an inservice on using Google Earth in your classroom and will be going to NECC the week after. So keep looking back for more updates.

Direct Link To Review Games

The Ipod Experiment Part 2

In my last post I promised to put up an example of how we are using the Ipods and down below you will find it. This is a copy of the science semester test that the students took. It was 5 pages long and nearly 75 questions. This made it a whole lot easier when the test came because the students could work at their own pace and it freed us up to work with the students that were struggling on the test.

The Audio Version Of The Test

The Ipod Experiment

Last Friday our school was officially out for the summer. Like all good teachers I am taking a few days to decompress from the year, but I also have made a list of things that I would like to do. One of the things on the list is to devote more time to this blog. Hopefully this summer I will be able to write down all of my ideas and things I am doing in the classroom.





Let me talk a little bit about my entry for today. As most special education teachers can tell you we are always strapped for time with all the things we need to do. I always felt like I was neglecting the students because I wasn't able to give them all the modifications I should and I was always confused on what I could do to help my students learn the material better. Then one day I was sitting with the other special education teachers in my building and someone asked if there was a way we could incorporate Ipods to help students learn. That was when the switch went on and an idea was born.

Now I know there are going to be some skeptics out there about using Ipods in schools, but hear me out. Let me explain how we are using these devices:

• We are reading tests out loud to the students, so when it is time for them to take the tests they just put on the headphones and listen to the test in the classroom. So basically instead of having to read the test to 30 different students at 6 different times during the day, we only have to have one teacher read it once and then place it in the Ipods.
• We have many students that are in a CWC language arts class and when they are reading novels the students are expected to go home and read between 20-30 pages a night. For a child with a reading disability this is nearly impossible. What we have done is bought the audio versions of the novels and we then download the chapters that need to be read into their Ipods.
• We were finding that many students were not fully listening to teachers lectures. So we made a point of putting an Ipod in the science classes and audiotaping the lectures. Then during the school day if the students didn't seem to understand the assignment they could listen to the lecture again.
• Finally we also decided to do review sessions the day before the test. This is basically a special services teacher going over the study guide and then putting this review on the students Ipod. What better way to study for the test than to look at your study guide and also having someone explain it to you at the same time.

Right now out setup for this is pretty primitive. Our 3 LD teachers all have their own Ipod Nano's. This was bought for each of us through our special education budget. We were also worried about some students not having an Ipod, so we also used our building budget to purchase 3 Ipod Shuffles. At the beginning of next year we plan on purchasing 5 more. The results we have seen so far are really encouraging and we are hoping that next year this will really take off. As the summer rolls on I will show some examples of what we have done. If you have questions for me please email me at jayweekly@gmail.com