Thursday, July 12, 2007

Blogging, Wikis, & Toys

I'm excited and overwhelmed at the same time. I still love blogging, but the wikis are cool too. I lke the idea of having a class wiki and assigning a different student to update it each day. Parents could log on and see what was covered in class.
I just read the article on using cell phones in the classroom. I was so excited until that nasty little "copyright" word showed up. I have attended MRA conferences in the past and they always have excellent authors talk about their work. I have thought it would be wonderfully motivating for my students if they could hear James Howe or Christopher Paul Curtis read their own books. Recording one of these presentations and posting it on my blog would be great. I knew before I read the "C" word that these authors charge lots of money to talk to groups and recording their presentation probably would not be kosher. I bet some of them would be agreeable to reading a short little excerpt if you asked though. I also liked the suggestion of allowing students to read stories and post them or recording audio books. Mary Bigler from EMU suggested recording yourself everytime you read aloud to your class and then having those tapes and books available to your students in a listening center. This takes the idea one step farther and allows them access to those stories at home where they can be shared with their parents and siblings too.

1 comment:

Liz Kolb, Ph.D. said...

Oh I really like the idea of hearing the authors speak! And since you probably have a cell phone with you at all times, you don't have to remember to bring a recording device. I'm sure some of them would be agreeable. There is also a place in Gabcast that would allow for private posting (so that only your students/parents) could hear the audio posts. That might be a nice option for your idea.