Think Technology is NOT for Your Subject??

With so many technology tools available these days, it is important for teachers to get out there to explore and play with what is available until they find the perfect fit for teaching style, content needs, technology skill level, and purpose.

So many times, teachers think that THEIR subject or grade level is just not a good fit for technology, but there is something for everyone if you just look! Take "Art", for example. What can we do with technology in art? Our teacher, Mrs. Spivey found Artsonia to be the perfect website for her subject. In Artsonia, she can create student accounts, upload pictures of her students' projects, and even sell items that have the students' artwork printed on them!

To see our students' work on Artsonia, just go to the website, find the box to select a school by name, and type the word "Eustace". You will then see the link to the Middle School art work, and Mrs. Spivey has uploaded 472 student works that can be viewed and enjoyed by everyone! Parent permission is required to post work, and the students' full names are not used.

A link to the Artsonia site is also included on the Middle School webpage for easy-to-remember access. I hope you pop in to view our students' art work on Artsonia! I also hope it makes you wonder how technology could be used for YOUR subject......

Help!! What do my students really know?

It happens to every teacher! You have made your best effort to teach a concept to your students but are still experiencing that "Ferris Bueller" effect: "Anyone, anyone?". You can almost hear the crickets in the room. But...(of course!), technology can help!

This past week, Mr. Rowley was working with students to master the basics of Newton's Laws of Motion amid Red Ribbon Week, football games, pep rallies, and Fun Fridays complete with Halloween costumes! That's some tough competition. So, he decided to see if they could transfer any of Newton's Laws to real-life experiences and had students create presentations to describe the basics of these laws in action. Good times! 

Enjoy a short presentation of one of these projects!

Technology Can Help!

Our campus will be competing in Academic U.I.L. this year! I haven't been involved with academic competition as a teacher in 13 years, and although the events remain much the same, the way materials and information are shared with districts has changed dramatically with the advances in technology.

 In homage to this trend, it is fitting to incorporate technology into the way our students prepare for these events as well, so a website dedicated to housing our Academic U.I.L. resources has been created and shared with some of our teams. Having online access for independent practice will be a tremendous asset for our students!

If you have resources for your event, let me know so they can be added to our UIL Resource site!

Student can easily find the site by visiting the Middle School page on the Eustace website. The link is found under "Some Useful Links".

What do you do with 5 iPads?

The Middle School is fortunate to have a small set of iPads for exclusive use on our campus, but teachers often find themselves wondering: what can I possibly do with only 5 iPads in a class of 25 (or more)? There are creative solutions for use, however, and several teachers at EMS have found ways to utilize this technology with great results, moving from traditional large, group instruction to small group centers/learning stations and projects.

This past week, Mrs. Schwartz' 6th grade reading class practiced figurative language and vocabulary building in a learning station where students could work in pairs. Kudos to teachers for shaking things up in class, moving the desks around, and making things happen!

Have an idea, site, or an app that plays well in small groups? Let me know! We are ready to sync and go!

Middle School You Tube Channel

If you look at the way students are using technology personally, video plays a huge part in everything they do! From silly to serious, they capture as much as they can to share with friends. Middle School is trying to capitalize on this fascination by starting up our own You Tube Channel!  We currently only have two videos playing, but, in time, I believe that this number will grow. As always, permissions are a critical step in placing these projects online, but don't let that stand in the way. Our students seemed motivated enough by the idea of making their "hit" on You Tube, that we are seeing independent projects pop up around the school....sometimes a little low on content, but it is a start!

What would you like to see on our You Tube channel? Teachers can make it happen!

Here is a taste of EustaceMS You Tube:

Student Prezi

During the first six weeks, Mrs. Taylor's 6th grade Science class was given the assignment to research an element and create a presentation of their choice to share the information. Many wonderful products were completed using Google presentation and Prezi, but this was a class favorite.

I hope you enjoy and that it inspires you to find out what your students can create!

Elements on Prezi

Audacity: An "Auld" Tool Made New

This month, we had Tech Tuesday training available during teachers' conferences. This same session was also made available district-wide after school in hopes that this combination will offer more flexible technology training for our teachers.

Anyway, the focus of the training this month was Audacity. This is a totally free and totally awesome program that basically offers the user a recording studio right on their computer, and it is so easy to use.
In the training, teachers learned the three basic steps:

• record, 
• export, 
• and share!

This program was immediately put to use by many of our teachers. One of the more popular ideas is to use the program to record oral tests for our students with special needs. Other ideas include leaving instructions for students with the substitute, creating audio books, having students practice reading fluency, emailing to students, and embedding into teacher blogs and websites. Recordings can even be created on your iPhone and converted for use in Audacity.

If you have an idea for using Audacity, please let me know, or if you would like help in learning to use this great tool, please contact me. It's as easy as record, export, and share!

Need  help in downloading the three components for Audacity?

McDonald's Moodle Magic

Resources added to Moodle are
saved to use again each year!

Moodle is a tool that has been available to our teachers for some time now, and Coach McDonald has made the most of this tool in her recent project with the 8th grade Health classes. Students used the netbooks to access links through their Moodle class to research food and nutrition and utilize the online calculators to determine their BMI and personal metabolic rate.

Do you know YOUR metabolic rate or BMI? Technology has certainly made this personal and valuable information readily available to everyone!

Find out what Coach McDonald's students discovered by trying it yourself!

BMI Calculator
Resting Metabolic Rate
How many calories do I need each day?
How many calories do you burn?

Great Start to the School Year!

Believe it or not, we are already starting the second week of the 2nd six weeks! Time flies!

We have gotten off to a great start this year with many teachers already using Google docs. In 6th grade, Mrs. Schwartz' reading class researched great Olympians from the past, writing about them in Google docs. Mrs. Burns' students started "My Personal Goals", a writing project in Google docs that will be revisited at the end of the year when students will evaluate their achievements. In 7th grade, Mrs. Harsey completed her first Google docs project as students crafted their first essays of the year and shared them for editing.

In other tech news, Mr. Carpenter introduced his 7th grade math students to WolframAlpha, opening up a world of after-school help for his students. In 8th grade, Mr. Rowley's students used PowerPoint to create timelines on the history of the atomic model.

Thank you to these great teachers for getting our year in technology off to a great start!!