Unplugged...for now

Wow. I am in a haze of excitement and disbelief. This Wednesday I was name the 2014 West Virginia Teacher of the Year. I am honored and humbled...and on the verge of tears every thirty minutes because it has been such an incredible journey to this point in my life.

Between my travels to Germany this summer and preparing to be a finalist for state teacher of the year, I have not been able to post on the TechKNOW Classroom as much as I would like...and it's about to get a little crazier as I learn how to balance this role with my 5th grade class. I know that I want to remember every part of this upcoming year, so if you would like to follow me on my teacher of the year blog, that is where I will be sharing my experiences and reflections.

I have also been at work on another web project, Be the Difference WV. I am interviewing teachers in Berkeley County about their classrooms and why they entered the profession. You can view my Youtube channel at this link.

Thank you for reading the TechKNOW classroom - I will be back, and hope that through my new role I am able to bring you more knowledge and resources to use in your classroom.

ING Unsung Heroes

Well, between packing my classroom up for the summer and some super, humbling accolades that I received, June went by in a blink. I know you are probably now in full on summer mode, but while you have the time off to think, consider applying for the ING Unsung Heroes award. Each year ING selects 100 teachers (about two from each state) to receive $2,000 for a classroom project, based on your written application and how you plan to use the funding. Once you are selected to receive the $2,000, you are eligible to be consider for the top three awards (3rd place is an additional $5,000, 2nd place another $12,000, and first place is $25,000)! It's a great honor to have your project selected and a chance to secure funding to do some wonderful activities in your class or school.
The application isn't due until April 30, 2014, but once the school year starts, things get so topsy-turvy busy that you end up having to forgo extra things like grants. Starting this year, it appears that you will be doing the application online instead of mailing it in. If you want to check out my past grant writing tips click here for the link. Take a look at it - you may just come up with a great summertime idea!
http://ing.us/about-ing/citizenship/childrens-education/ing-unsung-heroes
http://techknowclassroom.blogspot.com/search/label/grant%20writing

Transatlantic Outreach Program

Crawling, crawling to the finish! I know you are all busy and probably won't have time to read this until school is out, but I wanted to share some information about the Transatlantic Outreach Program (TOP)  with you. Normally, I don't post about events or sites until I experience it for myself and personally give it a thumbs up, but since this involved travel I thought you would like to look at it now so you can think about it for next year. This is a program for social studies educators K-12 (you need to teach social studies in some capacity to participate) to learn about Germany. I first learned about this program about six years ago from another teacher in West Virginia who had attended and shared her experience. In July (there are groups of teachers attending from June to August), I will be learning about Germany's school system, culture, and history for two weeks. I'm a little hesitant to be so far from home, but I have high hopes that I am going to bring back some amazing experiences for the teachers and students in my area. We will be touring much of Germany, beginning in Frankfurt and ending in Berlin.

To participate, there is an application process involving letters of recommendation, a resume, and essay questions. About 100 teachers are selected to go each year (last year I was on the wait list - but I reapplied this year). While I am in Germany, you can follow my experience on my new blog "A Mountaineer in Germany." I will try to post throughout my travels, but if I can't due to lack of Internet connection, I will post starting July 20th. I feel silly posting this when it's not even the end of May, but things can get busy lightning quick. I hope you'll read about my experiences and it ends up being something you consider doing next year!

http://www.goethe.de/ins/us/lp/prj/top/enindex.htm?wt_sc=top
www.amountaineeringermany.blogspot.com

Symbaloo

So between facilitating online courses and teaching, I've kind of let my techKNOW classroom collect dust. I do have some very exciting news to report though! In July, I will be traveling with the Transatlantic Outreach program to learn about the culture and school system in Germany! I am excited to have the opportunity to share this experience with you and my students! I will definately be posting some techKNOW projects using some of the tools featured on my blog once I return.

This time of the year is a whirlwind - so thankful for spring break. It's almost time to close up shop for the summer...and start thinking about next year (oh yes, you are!). One thing on my summer to do list is to organize all of the bookmarks that I have on my Portaportal, a free web tool that lets you place all of the websites you use with your class in one place. All you have to do is give the students your guest access name, and they can click on the links you post on your page - no more worries about having students type in the wrong web address over and over! You can organize your links into subject folders and then subfolders. It's been a great resource to connect my students quickly to the web for the past few years.

Once I started using Edmodo, however, I found myself just posting the links right to our class page for my students to use in "real time" when I needed them to access something for practice or to work on a project. I would use my Portaportal to locate the links (many that now need to be replaced), but it was less of a resource for my class and more so for me.

And now...I have been introduced to Symbaloo. It's as if Portaportal just got a facelift. Instead of making folders to organize your links, you create "Webmixes," which are essentially tabbed pages of related links you create. What I like best about Symbaloo is the visual appeal (the webmix pages remind me of apps icons on an iPad). In place of text, a tile is created every time you add a web link. If the website doesn't bring up its own visual for the time, Symbaloo has ones you can choose from. This would be very appealing to younger students who can't read yet, as they could be directed to click on a certain color tile or image.

As a teacher you can create a free Symbaloo account; from making my own account and playing around with it, I don't feel that purchasing a plan is necessary (your students just won't be able to have accounts under yours...and you won't get a personalized URL). With your education account, you can choose to make your webmixes private or public. There are already public webmixes, so if your class is doing a project and you want links on a specific subject, you can search for ones on Symbaloo and share it with your class (check all the links for yourself first).

This is how I plan to use Symbaloo in the fall. I am going to post webmixes for given subjects to our Edmodo class page so they can access the links for projects and class time in the computer lab. To do this, you click "share" on the desired webmix on Symbaloo, then after selecting whether to make your webmix public or private, it will give you a link. Post or embed this link on Edmodo for your class to access! There is also a free app for Symbaloo (for Apple and Android); it's meant for a phone or smaller mobil device, but you can enlarge it - but it will only orient longways.

I'm looking forward to updating my links for next year using this - maybe we will be sharing webmixes in the next few months!

www.symbalooedu.com