Children's Miracle Network - Extra Life 2013

The time has come once again for one of the coolest donation events for kids, the Children's Miracle Network Extra Life!

This year, my fellow co-workers and I mark the third year we have participated in this event.  In 2012, we set a goal of raising $800.00.  We ended up raising $1,300!  Every penny of the donations we receive go to the Children's Miracle Network, we do not gain financially.

What is Extra Life?

Here's a great info-graphic about this event:




My Team

My fellow co-workers and I are gathering our efforts once again this year to raise as much donations as possible for kids in need.  The actual gaming day this year will be November 2nd, 2013 - a day in which we will be playing video games up to 24 hours.  We can actually start prior to this date, as long as we have accumulated 24 hours worth of gaming by the end of November 2nd.  This year, we are setting our goal at $1000.  With your help, we can easily reach our goal and beyond.  At the very least, please consider making any kind of donation to our team.  Even a donation as little as $1 will make a difference in a child's life.

You can donate to our team by clicking on the Extra Life widget on the right side of this blog or you can donate by going to my donation page.    

Want to learn more about Extra Life?  Here are more resources:

Extra Life Website

Back to School Tech Part 2: Livebinders

If you are looking to get into Educational Technology this year, Livebinders is the best place to start.  From a personal standpoint, Livebinders is where I started my journal in professional development in education and Dducational Technology after I graduated college.  To say that Livebinders opened my world to all kinds of educators and new ways to learn would be a understatement.  Here's a brief look at this awesome tool:

Livebinders - collect and share resources

Livebinders can be your one central source to collect resources, share resources, and collaborate with other educators and technology enthusiasts.  You can collect web addresses, documents,  photos and many other things in your Livebinder.  You can create a specific Livebinder for any purpose that you have interest in and want to share with others or you can choose to create a private one and keep it personal.     

For example, I've been a member of Livebinders since 2011.  Since that time, I've collected and shared multiple resources like Evernote, Study Blue, Social Studies topics and many other categories.  Here's some of my Livebinders:

Livebinders - collaborate and reflect with other educators

As I previously stated, Livebinders is where I started getting involved in professional development with other educators in educational technology.  As I started watching how other people were using Livebinders and sharing them on Twitter, I became increasingly eager to become involved.  One of my very good Twitter friends, Jen Petras (@jenpetras), one day asked if I would collaborate with her on a Livebinder over Cyberbullying.  Over the course of a few weeks, we were able to gather and collect resources into one Livebinder.  Here's where it is today:

Cyber Bullying

What is great about this is that I live in Texas and she lives in Ohio - two people who live in different states collaborating with each other.  Just imagine if all educators and students took advantage of this opportunity!

Why Livebinders?

I can not speak of Livebinders highly enough.  There a ton of reasons to use Livebinders and incorporate it in your classroom or personal life.  It's free, it's extremely easy to use, you will meet some amazing people and the list goes on.  One thing, however, stands out for me and that's the creators.  Tina and Barbara (@livebinders) provide the best support I've ever experienced with anything related to technology.  They love to share other's Livebinders and love to hear how what they created is making a difference.  They also are happy to provide you tech support in case you need assistance.  I once needed to correct a error on my username on my account so I sent them a Twitter message and it had been completed within a couple of hours - proof that they care for their customers.

I've previously told Tina and Barbara that "Livebinders have changed the face of education"...I firmly believe this has rung true.

Want more Livebinders info?  Here are some more resources:

My other blog posts about Livebinders:  http://engagedwithtech.blogspot.com/search/label/livebinders#.Ujz6OYZwqSo

Livebinders website: www.livebinders.com

Back to School Tech Part 1: Classroom Architect

Believe it or not, the first day back to school is just around the corner!  To kick off another year of learning, here is the first post of many with educational technology resources for educators and students to use.  

Classroom Architect

Classroom Architect, an excellent tool from 4teachers.org, helps you to setup a floor plan for your classroom.

  

With Classroom Architect, you can create a visual of how you want your classroom setup and then print or save your floor plan for future use.  Here's an example of how you can use Classroom Architech:

You can set the dimensions of your classroom, use objects such as: rugs, desks, tables, shelves, TV stands, and computer desks, and use the drawing tool to draw anything else you may need.  

This will come in handy when you first get into the classroom and start deciding how you will best setup your classroom to optimize your learning goals - which is something the website address as well.  The article, Environments that Promote Learning, talks about best practices to use when setting up your classroom and also provides helpful tips.

As we start the school year, I would like to wish all of the educators out there the best of luck!  You are the toughest and most dedicated professionals in this country today.  Thanks to you, the lives of many students will be changed for the better this year!  

Need more resources?  Feel free to visit my Livebinder page for many other useful tools by going to the "My Livebinders" tab on this blog.    

Evernote for Educators wins Top 10 Livebinders!

During this year's Livebinders Top 10 contest, Evernote for Educators was voted as one of the Top 10 winners!

Evernote for Educators

I wanted to thank everyone so much for voting for this Livebinder.  I truly hope you have been able to use this Livebinder for any resource you might need for Evernote.  Rest assured, I will continue to update this Livebinder as much as possible.

Also, congrats to all the other winners and nominees for this year's contest!  Here's the Livebinder of all the Livebinders that won and were nominated this year:

LiveBinder Top 10 2013 Nominees and Winners!

Evernote for the Social Studies: Part 7 - Evernote Food

In this seventh installment of my Evernote for the Social Studies blog posts, we will take a look at Evernote Food - a fun and interesting app to capture, cataloged, and learn about recipes and all types of food.

What is Evernote Food?

Evernote Food (available for IOS and Android) allows you to build your own collection of recipes, take snap-shots and notes of meals, and search for restaurants in your area.  While some schools have restrictions on bringing food into the classroom, it may not be possible to have a "food day" to learn about what foods come from different continents and cultures.  From the teacher's perspective, it would be just as simple to get some pictures of different meals that are enjoyed across the globe and present a Powerpoint presentation over it.  This, however, leads to little or no engagement.

Learning and Engaging with Evernote Food

When I was student teaching, I had a wide variety of students from different cultures and ethnic backgrounds.  Some came dressed every day to class with traditional clothing and was pleased to share some activities they do in their culture.  Even though we may not realize it sometimes, the best source of information is not always the internet - it is our own students in our classrooms!  With Evernote Food, students can now share what meals they have that are specific with their culture.

Evernote Food Home Page

Accessing the Evernote Food app from their IOS or Android device, students can explore recipes, create their own cookbook of their own recipes or recipes that they have clipped, explore restaurants, and access their "my meals" section where they have saved images and information on meals they have previously eaten.

With Evernote Food, students engage in the learning process by doing their own research and sharing what they have found.  Going back to the idea of having students capture their own meals that may offer a look into different cultures, Evernote Food makes that process quick and simple.

When you create a "new meal" in Evernote Food, it provides this easy to use template.  You can choose to create a meal title, select the place which it was taken, type of cuisine, and create a tag for better organization in your Evernote account.  You can also input notes and snap shots regarding the meal into the same template.  This would work extremely well if it is shared in class or if the student shares it on the class website or blog - the explanation is already done in the template itself so students can begin reading about it as soon as they see it.

The great part about this is that you can also choose to share this meal information by coping the URL to it and sharing it that way, or you can share by posting to Facebook, Twitter, or Google +.  The unique URL would work especially nice because you could have your students copy the URL to their meal and submitting it to a designed Google Form or blog post.  And of course, once the student shares the meal either on a social media network or by simple URL, other students and teachers can save that information into their own Evernote account.

As a side note, once you have created the new meal, it automatically saves it into your default folder in your Evernote account.

Here's an example of what a finished meal template looks like:

Conclusion

Evernote Food provides many ways students can interact and engage in learning that they may not have given much thought to before.  The main reason to use any technology like this is for the students to engage with what they are learning and with each other.  Students must be able to share what they have learned with their fellow classmates and teachers.  With Evernote Food, if you ever decide to have your students do projects over certain cultures or countries, let them go out and experience it and capture whatever it is that they are doing.  Whether it be traditional meals, dances or songs, students need to capture that moment and share among their peers.

If you would like more information about Evernote or Skitch, please visit my Livebinder, Evernote for Educators:

 

Evernote for Educators

5 Excellent Note Taking Apps

Thanks to technology, notes that are taken during class, on field trips, and during experiments are more interactive and engaging.  No longer do notes contain paragraph after paragraph after paragraph of text that mean only something when it comes time to study for tests.  Notes are now much more interactive and have much more meaning.   Notes contain pictures, video, sound clips and website links - all of which can enhance the learning.  If you are looking to get your students, or yourself, started with taking digital notes, here are 5 excellent note taking apps that are worth a try:

Google Keep (Android, Chrome Web App) 

Google Keep - a note taking app released by Google earlier this year - is a simple and easy to access note taking app.  Students can quickly launch this app from their Android device and begin taking notes on the fly.  They can also attach pictures and audio or insert text or check-lists. From their mobile device, students can also share their notes via email, Facebook, Twitter or on Google +.  One of the features that makes Google Keep unique is the ability to change the color of the note itself.  Students could utilize this feature to organize their notes - i.e. blue notes are history, yellow notes are math, etc.    

Catch Notes (IOS, Android)

Catch Notes - a note taking app with many features - is also a tool that students can use in the classroom.  Catch allows students to take notes on their IOS and Android devices - while being able to attach pictures, video recordings and even set reminders.  The ability to set reminders on notes is a awesome part of Catch - no more forgetting homework prior to running out the door before heading to school or forgetting certain project deadlines.  Whenever you set a reminder on a note, you will get a alert on your mobile device (I tested this by creating a note on my Nook HD + and my standard alert tone came on letting me know of the reminder from the note).  With Catch, you can also create "spaces" (also referred to as "streams") which you can organize your notes into.  With each space you can invite collaborators to comment on notes, update checklists, and create new notes within the "space".  Free accounts are limited to 5 spaces and 250 MB of storage.  

Evernote (IOS, Android, Blackberry, Windows)

Evernote - a note taking app that showcases some of the best features out in the field today - is certainly something worth trying.  One of the aspects that makes Evernote great is the multiple platform that is supported on it.  Whether it be on IOS, Android, Blackberry or Windows, Evernote has you covered.  Students can easily create notes and organize them into different notebooks - i.e. history, economics, science, math, etc. - and have access to them whenever they need.  Students can attach pictures, files, videos and audio files - all from their smartphone, computer, or tablet.  Evernote also allows you to share notes and notebooks with classmates and colleagues via email, Facebook, Twitter and multiple other ways.  

Springpad (IOS, Android, Chrome) 

***Springpad shutdown in June 2014***

Springpad - yet another useful tool for the classroom - allows students to create notes and organize them in notebooks.  Unlike some other utilities, as of the writing of this blog post, there are no limits to notebooks or storage space you need.  What is unique about Springpad is that in each note you can "spring" different information.  You can simply type a quick note, attach photos, include a website link and several other items that Springpad has included as built-in categories such as: movies, tv shows, music, books, products, wine, recipe, scans (barcodes), tasks, checklists, events.  With this, you can easily create reading lists, movie and tv show lists appropriate for the classroom, checklists, etc and share with your students.  When you choose to share a note, it will generate a unique URL so you can post it anywhere you like.  

Fetchnotes (IOS, Android)

Fetchnotes - a quick and simple note taking app - allows you to organize your notes by using hastags.  There's not too many features other than this at this time.  However, if your students are needing something to quickly launch and type a note, they can do so with Fetchnotes and still access their notes via the fetchnotes website. With the ease of organization with the hashtags, students can quickly search through notes they've tagged.  This is a excellent app if you need jot things down really quick or even take notes while on the go.


All of these apps are well worth the time to look into.  Depending on what level of complexity you need the app to be will depend on which one will work best for you.  By the way, the best part of all these apps - they are free!

5 Free Nook Apps for Kids

The way teachers teach and the way students learn has changed over the last several years due to technology.  Instead of students seeing pictures of different landscapes across the world in a textbook, they are now touring those landscapes online with Google Earth.  Instead of teachers having their students put all their work into a folder or binder, they are now having their students create online portfolios to share with their fellow classmates, family and across the world.  

All of this comes with using technology in the classroom.  Whether it be with computers, smartphones or tablets, technology has changed how we teach and learn.  Recently, I picked up the Barnes and Noble Nook HD +.  Over the next few weeks, I'll be reviewing this device and providing more resources on how this device can engage our students and fellow teachers.  To begin, here is 5 free Nook (compatible with the Nook HD/HD+, Nook Color, Nook tablet) apps for kids:

Letter Paper

Letter Paper is a free app that allows kids, or even those learning to write for the first time, the opportunity to practice writing on their Nook.
The app provides the traditional practice writing lines for when kids are learning the basics of writing and differences between capitalized and non-capitalized letters.  With this app, students can practice their writing skills even when a pencil and paper is unavailable.





Learning Gems - Colors N Shapes

Learning Gems - Colors N Shapes is a free app available in the Nook store that lets kids learn shapes and colors in the form of a game.  The game has levels of difficulty, each getting gradually harder the further you get into the game.  Each level asks the player to click on the matching color or shape from the given color or shape displayed.  For example, the game will provide a picture of a triangle and the player must select a triangle from a selection of different shapes.  The game continues on in that fashion while adding in different shapes and colors.  

Math Racer  

Math Racer Addition is a fun math game for kids that requires the player to add different numbers.  At the beginning, the player gets to choose the color race car they want and choose the numbers that want to play with (1's, 2's, 3's, 4's, etc).  If the player chooses to play with 1's, the game will ask the player to do addition with 1's - i.e. 1+2, 1+3, 1+10, etc.  Each time the player gets the answer right, their race car advances to the "finish line".  It will track their score and time so that the player can keep track and try to beat their record.  

Memory Master Lite

Memory Master Lite is a free Nook app that helps kids with their memory skills using a simple card matching game.  The player can choose from 4 cards to start out with and go up 16 cards.

Alphabet Robots HD

Alphabet Robots HD is a another card matching game that helps kids recognize letters by sight and pronunciation.  This can be either a one player or two player game and has different levels of difficulty.  At the first level, it is a simple card matching game.  At the second level, the player matches the pronunciation of the letter (an audio file is one of the cards) to another card that is the letter of that pronounced letter.  With the addition of the audio pronunciation, the player learns how the letter is pronounced and what the letter looks like.



If you would like more resources over the Barnes & Noble Nook devices, please feel free to look at my new Livebinder, Nook for Educators:

Nook for Educators