I'm Back!

It's been quite a while (almost a year) since my last post... I kind of lost my fire, and got buried in teacher details... but I'm back! It's probably due to my most recent adventure. 

The last week in January was like my Christmas... that's right, I was at FETC (Florida Educational Technology Conference). I sat there, constantly getting my mind blown by the amazing ways I can use technology in my classroom. I am so very lucky this year... my students all have their own personal iPad 3's that their parents purchased for them. Crazy right?! I have been the laptop teacher for the past 4 years, and this year we decided to switch it up. I had no idea the implications of this great idea. I just thought it would make my class even cooler... Little did I know that I would basically be reinventing the wheel that I already had rolling pretty well. So with that said, FETC gave me a ton of easy ways that I can get my students working productively on their iPads.

A website that I have started using is infuselearning.com. It is amazing! Think of surveymonkey, but much easier to use. I can easily ask my students to write out how they would complete a math word problem.  I would just have them draw on their iPads using the infuselearning webpage, and turn in their drawings to me. I will get instantaneous feedback that I can post for the entire class!

Another app that I really loved was learning about Remind101. This app will allow me to text reminders to my students on their iPads without them getting my personal cell phone number. I could also use this with my students' parents!

The last app/ website that I really loved was Aurasma. I learned about this while I was at FETC 2012, but I could never really figure out how to utilize it in the classroom. This year it finally clicked! So what this app does is it will take any picture and make it "come to life" by presenting a moving picture on your phone. It sounds crazy, but click on the video below and see how it works! I've decided that I will use book covers that can be scanned. Then the person with the phone will see my student telling a summary of the book. Pretty sweet, huh?!