Bookr

Bookr allows people to use pictures to make a "virtual book".  As an extension from the map activity mentioned in the blog below I could use Bookr as the final part to the students project.  THey could create a book using pictures of the geographical features of the place/country they were exploring.  They could find pictures using creative commons or possibly share photos with the students that collaborated with via internet.  We could also use the "virtual book" to make a classroom story of all the countries explored by the class.  It could be a way to tie everyones project together and end a unit.  It would be cool to have a classroom book like this to share with other school employees.  It would be a great tool to use to show the principal what they class had been working on and learned.  

ePaLs

ePaLs is a collaborative site that allows teachers to connect their classrooms around the world. While navigating ePaLs I was most intrigued by the focus areas and project tabs.  These tabs allowed me to pick a specific area that I wanted to focus on and explore.  Instead of having to go through a bunch of resources to find what I wanted, I could click on a topic and automatically be searching only information that fit my interests.  I also like the project based tab because it offered a lot of different classroom activities.  Again, it broke projects down into categories based on interests and listed multiple projects for each one.  The project that I liked was exploring different types of maps.  I could use this activity in my classroom when discussing maps and geography.  This project allows students to connect and collaborate with other students around the world.  I also like the fact that this project is truly inquiry based.  Students are investigating and collaborating to find information instead of being given the information by the teacher.  Overall, ePaLs has a lot to offer any teacher. 

Money Magic

I am very excited that I found the Money Magic game.  I will be teaching my second graders how to count coins later in the year and this is a perfect game to incorporate into the unit.  It is fun and educational at the same time.  I know my students will enjoy all aspects of the video, such as the bright colors, the characters voice, the music, and the game.  I am very happy that I found this tool and I will be checking back in the future for more Money Magic videos. 

Big Huge Labs

Big Huge Labs is a tool that allows one to create many projects. I navigated my way around this site to see everything it had to offer, which was a lot. The most interesting thing that I found and played around with was creating a jigsaw puzzle. I inserted that same picture of the starfish that I used in my blog to talk about Flickr. As I stated before, Flickr can be used to find photos to go along with a lesson. The jigsaw application at Big Huge Labs could be used as an extension activity. It would be a fun activity that would incorporate the photos from the unit being studied. If one were teaching a lesson on the different types of frogs, they could design puzzles that incorporated the different types and have students identify the name of each frog after completing the puzzle. It is educational and fun at the same time. This is just one way to use this application in the classroom but there are many more.

Flickr

I found this image using Flickr. Flickr is a great tool that one could use in the classroom. It gives teachers and students access to more pictures that one could ever dream of. I was able to find pictures of Italy, a place I dream of going to someday. It also allows you to find fascinating pictures that one may not see everyday, such as the starfish above or the a picture of a blue frog I found while navigating Flickr. It also is an awesome way to save photos on the Internet so one can always have them. They can't get lost or damaged because they are saved on the Internet.
This would be a great tool in the classroom because it offers unlimited resources of pictures. I'm sure one could find pictures for just about any topic they are covering in class. Also as a class, teachers and students could save photos of classroom projects, field trips, guest speakers, etc. and use Flickr to store them. All students could access the pictures at home with their parents to share what they have been doing in school. It is a great way to communicate with parents!

Microblogging

   Microblogging is a very useful tool that an be used for many purposes.  Some may use it for purely social reasons, whereas others use it for job and personal development.  As an educator, I find microblogging very useful to collaborate with other professionals to share ideas, research, resources, etc.  Grosseck and Holotescu describe uses for Twitter in the classroom in the article Can We Twitter FOr Educational Activities? Some of the uses of Twitter in the classroom mentioned in the article include: building a classroom community, exploring collaborative writing, and collaborating across schools.   Twenty-Seven Interesting Ways to Use Twitter in the Classroom also offers a lot of great teaching tips for utilizing Twitter in the classroom. Opportunities are endless! You and your students will enjoy the all the possibilities made available to you if you use Twitter in your classroom.  Don't hesitate, start Twittering today!

Wordmagnets

Upon my search for RSS feeds I cam across Revising Short Texts and Sytax on IWB. The name of the blog where you can find this post is Nik's Learning Technology Blog. I found this blog to be very helpful.  This blog gives me access to wordmagnets which would be a great tool in the classroom.  There are so many ways that wordmagnets could be used in the classroom to help children grow in their reading and writing skills.  I can already see how I could use this in my classroom and how it would engage my students.  It is an awesome resource!