CellPhones-ERubin-final2012. iPads (or other devices) and Literature Circles – co-starring Edmodo. CC Licensed Literature Circles have been around forever. Done well, the strategy is an effective way of engaging children in reading, while teaching them specific skills and behaviours we use when immersing ourselves in a text. With clear foci during the instructional part of the Literature Circle session, teachers can direct children to use these strategies to improve their comprehension and how they respond to text.
One of my main concerns ( and the concerns of many I have worked with in implementing Literature Circles) is monitoring the independent reading and meetings as well as the work done by children in between sessions. Technology can play a big part in this and can also be used to enhance, simply and streamline the whole process. This is where the iPad comes in. ( I’ve been neglecting the star of Mr G Online for a while as I’ve been reflecting on education overall). Coveritlive chapter discussion embedded in Edmodo Edmodo. Cellphones in School: Contraband or a Classroom Tool.
Text messaging has become one the fastest and most popular forms of communication. Just a few years ago, cell phones were seen as the newest teenage addiction. Today, however, they can be an important classroom tool, although some schools regard them as disruptive, distracting, and have implemented policies that prohibit using them on school grounds. Most parents are okay with cell phone use, the students are more than okay with cell phone use, yet schools have adopted zero tolerance policies.
The reality is that students still use cell phones in school even if they are banned. Some teachers worry that cellphones will increase cheating, lead to sexting, decrease use of proper grammar, and be a distraction to learning. Increasing costs and disappearing school funding has made updating technology often impossible and even basic school supplies dwindle. I polled my students to discover that 95% of my 8th graders owned a cell phone and 55% had smart phones. Four Ways to Use Cell Phones in the Classroom.
I’ll be the first to admit that I was once a skeptic about the use of cell phones for learning in the classroom. It wasn’t until I researched various methods and creative applications that I began accepting the idea. One of biggest quarrels I had with students using cell phones is the potential of their already-short attention spans becoming distracted by a device that is predominantly used in the “outside world.” But, I’ve come to the realization that students can theoretically become preoccupied by anything. Cell phones aren’t the only culprit of interruption! In fact, using innovative, mobile technology in lesson plans can actually preserve their minds from becoming uninterested and stale. It even has the potential of bringing a creative and stimulating aspect that many other tools cannot.
Image from iStock Have students text you (the teacher) a sentence using a vocabulary word correctly. Blogging the Mobile Learning Revolution as it Happens [#mLearning] | The Mobile Learning Revolution Blog. It has been roughly two months since I left Adobe and I could not be happier with every aspect of my life. People ask me all the time what I’m going to do next and for the most part I say I still don’t know exactly, and then in a more serious note, I say that things are becoming more clear every day. I am going through this great exploratory phase where I embrace every opportunity that comes my way. I’m learning a great deal of new things and meeting great, supportive people along the way. From everything I’m doing and Blogging about, there are certain topics that I’m clearly more passionate about.
One of those topics is this mobile thing we are witnessing. There’s no denying that we are in the midst of a mobile revolution that requires new ways of thinking about developing content and about meeting the ever-growing expectations we have as mobile users. This revolution needs new leaders and innovators, as well as new tools (or at least highly customized versions of existing ones).