Thanks for the technology class

Thank you very much to Miss Anna, Dr. Chris and Dr. Ryan. My students are so excited about the edu.20 portal, our greenthumb wiki and our very own blogsite. I have learned so much and my teaching becomes more enjoyable. I am still learning much as I explore on my own, thanks a million for your inspiration!

Links for digital movies

As some people showed some interest in the website for the digital movie online, here goes the link to the website:

http://www.dfilm.com/live/moviemaker.html ( it can be sent my email)

Also, there is another one you can try:

http://www.zimmertwins.com

About the minisaga, it's a short text with 50 words only that has introduction, body and conclusion. I usually ask my students to think about their lives and choose one object that they can compare their life to. After the writing process, they have to get their text in the shape of the object they wrote about( concrete poetry).

I hope it helped.

Isabel

Our last day

Today was our last day! Our special thanks to Anna and Ryan that provided us with delicious waffles! We are going to miss the interesting classes and friendly environment.
Thanks to the amazing work of Chris, Ryan and Anna.
Isabel

Good websites for English Teachers

Hi all,

If you want to get information on the teaching strategies applied in your English classroom, the following websites may help you meet the students' needs in class. http://www.effortlessenglishclub.com
http://www.esl.about.com
http://www.teachingenglishgames.com
Hopefully they will help you.

Resources for Science

Here is another great website for science teachers - www.visionlearning.com. There are complete modules for each subject that includes the reference text which would guide the teacher in setting the content framework of the lesson. It is also a rich information source for the students as well. For every module there is a quiz for formative assessment. There are also several links such as research articles [mostly from google scholar], power point presentations, science news and other websites that teachers and students can explore for enrichment activities.

Learning Materials from VOA

http;/www.voanews.com is a good website for teachers, especially English teachers who want to provide learning materials for their students. In this website, teachers can find many interesting topics for reading activities in classroom as well as listening sources. Also, teachers can download the listening texts and provide interactive learning for the students through Idiom dictionary, Wordbook, EFL Teaching Community, etc.

Magnificent Google Earth Experience

Coming here in the United States as an ILEP Fellow offers me a lot of magnificent experiences such as meeting people and later establishing strong bonds with them, observing and teaching in an American classroom, and learning brand new things from my university classes (Educational Assessment, ILEP Seminar, International Education and Digital Classroom). As a teacher, who is a digital neophyte, I appreciate my technology class because I learned so many things from my classmates and professors Dr. Chris Peters, Dr. Ryan Visser and Ms. Ana Baldwin. What amazes me so far is the value of educational websites and applications to improve the teaching-learning processes. I would like to single out the functionality of Google Earth because I thought that it only presents the places of the world and their capital cities. However, as I engrossed myself in exploration activities, I discovered the wonders it can do to make my classroom activities more interactive and engaging for the students. As a stranger to this "newfound digital world", I am motivated to make myself more comfortable with technology and embrace its principles with the ardent hope of making myself a digital native before coming back to my country.

To cite a very concrete example, I am attaching here the maps of the Research Site where my students conducted their scientific research on Rehabilitation Continues: Copper Uptake and Survival of Leguminous Plants in Suyoc Mine Waste Dumpsite of Manila Mining Corporation, Placer, Surigao del Norte, Philippines. Image 1 is the map made the students for almost two weeks using the MAP INFO Professional v.8.5 software under license to Mines and Geo-Sciences Bureau while Image 2 is the site map that I did using Google Earth in less than five (5) minutes.

Memorable moments

I had a great surprise today when we returned to Edwards Middle School. There were cards made by the students I worked with some weeks ago. I was really happy to see that we could learn from each other . I will take all those kinds words as reward as I know that it is exactly why teaching is so important: building knowledge ,and changing minds and hearts.



Also, we got lovely cards from Mrs Sheila Martins ( Ira's Partner Teacher) thanking us for the presentation to the 6th graders. Actually, it was such a nice moment and It was nice to learn that students got curious to research more about Brazil.
Indeed, two memorable moments we will take with love to our countries!
Isabel

Learning Style

What is your learning style? Find out on this site http://http://www.edutopia.org/multiple-intelligences-learning-styles-quiz

Internship Reflection

What an experience at Seneca Middle School ! It is a completely different educational system. Here every teacher is free to select whatever he wants to teach as long as he follows the South Carolina Curriculum Standards as established by the State Department of Education. In my school, periods last for about 45 min. on Monday and Tuesday, but 90 min. for the rest of the week. I like this, because it gives the teacher and students the chance to cover a lot, using different activities. In the Cat's class period, which lasts for 30 min with classes just for boys or girls, they learn social and moral values. To motivate and encourage students, teachers have the SMS Wildcats cards, that are given to clever students to have privileges within the school.

To link between the subjects, students learn about the Greek myth in their social studies periods, so my partner teachers have selected "The Lightning Thief" novel, which is related to the Greek Myth to cover the "types of fiction and nonfiction standard" . They design various activities that reflect students' understanding of the events and, at the same time, follow the standards. One of the activities I like most  is "The Hermes Herald" newspaper, in which students create a newspaper/newsletter based on events in the novel.The Publisher program  is used in this activity. Each student is part of the following departments:
* Lead story reporter.
* Ask Aphrodite advice column.
* Astrology department.
* Editorial staff.
* Advertising department.
The teacher is the editor-in-chief and arranges meetings to see what each department has come up with. Consequently, all the time students write, read, proofread and edit. This is really a good project that develops the reading and writing skills. My partner teachers are creative and use the internet a lot