Author: Jacqui

On Feb. 5, 2020, World Read Aloud Day celebrates the pure joy of oral reading with kids of all ages. Created by LitWorld, past years have found over 1 million people in 100 countries joining together to enjoy the power and wonder of reading aloud in groups or individually, at school or home, and discovering what it means to listen to a story told through the voice of another. For many, this is a rare opportunity to hear the passion of a well-told story and fall in love with tales where hearing them reaches listeners on a level nothing else can. Think back to your experiences. You probably sat with an adult, in their lap or curled up in bed. The way they mimicked the voices in the story, built drama, and enthused with you over the story and characters made you want to read more stories like that on your own. This is a favorite activity not just for pre-readers, but beginning and accomplished readers because it’s not about reading the book; it’s about experiencing it through the eyes of a storyteller.

Somehow, as lives for both the adults and children have gotten busier, as digital devices have taken over, as parents turned to TVs or iPads to babysit kids while they do something else, we’ve gotten away from this most companionable of activities. World Read Aloud Day is an opportunity to get back to it.

Importance of reading aloud

There is no more powerful way to develop a love of reading than being read to. Hearing pronunciations, decoding words in context, experiencing the development and completion of a well-plotted story as though you were there are reason enough to read aloud but there’s more. Reading in general and reading aloud specifically is positively correlated to literacy and success in school. It builds foundational learning skills, introduces and reinforces vocabulary, and provides a joyful activity that’s mostly free, cooperative, and often collaborative. Did you know reading aloud:

(more…)

Before becoming a teacher, I didn’t understand why the 100th day of school was a big deal. At first, I thought it had to do with finding something exciting about the dreariness of post-Christmas January but when I counted school days from Labor Day to the hundred-day mark (skipping weekends, two weeks at Christmas and a week at Thanksgiving), that put me in the second week of February. Some colleagues say the 100th Day is a rich teachable moment that revolves around math. One efriend told me it occurs about the time when most kindergarten curricula cover how to count to 100. Others tell me it’s simply a milestone, important to young children and passe to olders.

How to celebrate

Turns out, the reason doesn’t really matter because celebrating isn’t a problem with kids. They love parties. So I decided to accommodate the 100th Day fever by wrapping it in learning. Here are thirteen activities I like that blend learning into a celebration of the 100th Day of School:

Geography

As a class, come up with two locations in each state, to total 100. One will be oriented around geography and one around history (such as “Kansas became a state January 29, 1861”). Include a brief description and a picture and then share the collection with parents and schoolmates in the class newsletter or another vehicle.

History

Research what happened the hundredth year of your home country’s existence.  What was the country like a hundred years ago? What caused it to change? Who was president? What has been invented since then? Divide the class into groups so the project can be completed in one class period. Then, have everyone copy their information to a digital magazine (like you can create in Canva or Adobe) and share it with everyone.

(more…)

There’s always been something mystical about people in technical professions–engineering, science, mathematics. They talk animatedly about plate tectonics, debate the structure of mathematical functions, even smile at the mention of calculus. The teaching profession has their own version of these individuals, called ‘technology teachers’. They used to be stuffed in a corner of the school where most teachers could pretend they didn’t exist, that what they did was for ‘some other educator in an alternate dimension’.

That all changed when technology swept across the academic landscape like a firestorm:

• iPads became the device of choice in the classroom
• Class screens became more norm than abnorm(al)
• Technology in the classroom changed from ‘nice to have’ to ‘must have’
• 1:1 became a realistic goal
• Students researched online as often as in the library
• Students began spending as much time in a digital neighborhood as their home town
• Textbooks morphed into resources rather than bibles

Today, teachers who don’t use technology are an endangered species. Often, they’re too young to retire, so they get a digital map from a colleague to that place where they’ve been told they’ll find help–from a person variously called the ‘tech teacher’, ‘integration specialist’, or ‘tech coordinator’.

As they enter the room, they figure the person they’re looking for must be the one who looks up as they enter, fingers flying across the keyboard, never pausing and never slowing even as she smiles and says, ‘Hi!’.

Before you ask your question, I have a short list of signs that will help you have a more positive experience when you confront this big-brained Sheldon-look-like:

• You can’t scare them (in fact, even Admin and politics don’t frighten them). They’re techies. Try kindness instead.
• Patience and tech are oxymorons. Know that going in.
• Bring food. Techies often forget to eat, or ate everything in their snack stash and need more.
• Some days, tech looks a lot like work. Distract them with an interesting problem.
• Start the encounter with a discussion on Dr. Who, Minecraft, or Big Bang Theory. Find a clever tie-in to your topic.
• Understand that tech teachers often think trying to teach teachers to tech is like solving the Riemann Hypothesis (many consider it impossible). Bone up on basics before the Meeting.
• Life after the 100th crashed computer is what Oprah might call a life-defining moment. If that just happened as you walked through the door, turn around and come back another time.
• Understanding a techie who’s in the zone is like understanding the meaning of life. Again–leave the room; come back later.

(more…)

In these 169 tech-centric situations, you get an overview of pedagogy—the tech topics most important to your teaching—as well as practical strategies to address most classroom tech situations, how to scaffold these to learning, and where they provide the subtext to daily tech-infused education.

Today’s tip: Check History in Your Browser

Category: Internet

Q: How do I see where my kids/students have gone online?

A: Go to what’s called ‘history’–a list of all the websites whoever logged in under a particular user name went.  Here’s how you do it:

• In Firefox, Chrome, or IE, hold the Control key (Ctrl) and push H. That brings up a list of the sites visited by that profile.
• Select the time frame you’re interested in
• Chrome also lets you search other devices logged into Chrome.

If you find they went somewhere they shouldn’t, don’t over-react. Sometimes it happens by accident. Ask them about it. Watch their answer. Their body language will tell you as much as their words. You know your students. You’ll know if they are telling the truth.

Sign up for a new tip each week or buy the entire 169 Real-world Ways to Put Tech into Your Classroom.

(more…)

Every month, subscribers to our newsletter get a free/discounted resource to help their tech teaching. This month, take your pick:

January 15th-18th:

15% Discount Sitewide on

Structured Learning.net

Code: HAPPYHOLIDAY15

In these 169 tech-centric situations, you get an overview of pedagogy—the tech topics most important to your teaching—as well as practical strategies to address most classroom tech situations, how to scaffold these to learning, and where they provide the subtext to daily tech-infused education.

Today’s tip: My Pic’s a BMP and I need a JPG

Category: Images

Sub-category: Edit/Format

Q: My picture file is a .bmp and I need a .jpg. What do I do?

A: If you have an image you want to use, but it’s in the wrong format, open it in MS Paint (which comes FREE with Windows) or Photoshop and save-as a .jpg.

Another method: Take a screenshot and save that as a .jpg. See Tip #116 for how to take screenshots.

Sign up for a new tip each week or buy the entire 169 Real-world Ways to Put Tech into Your Classroom.

(more…)

Because AATT is a resource blog, we share lots of tips our group comes across in their daily teaching as well as materials shared by others we think you’d like. Some you agree with; others, not so much. Here’s a run-down on what you thought were the most valuable in 2019:

Top 10 Tech Tips

As a working technology teacher, I get hundreds of questions from parents about their home computers, how to do stuff, how to solve problems which I share with you. Here are the Top Ten tech tips from 2019. Between these ten, they had over 174,000 visitors during the year.

1. 16 Great Research Websites for Kids
2. 22 Websites and 4 Posters to Teach Mouse Skills
3. 11 Projects to Teach Digital Citizenship
4. Unplugged Activities
5. How to Create a Curriculum Map
6. 22 Digital Tools You Must Have in Your Classroom
7. 9 Good Collections of Videos for Education
8. 28 Unique Ideas for Publishing Student Work
9. How to Teach Mouse Skills to Pre-Keyboarders
10. Tech Tip #60: How to Add Shortcuts to the Desktop

(more…)

Throughout the year, I post websites and apps the Ask a Tech Teacher crew’s classes found useful, instructive, helpful in integrating technology into classroom lesson plans. Some, you agreed with us about; others not so much.

Here are the reviews you-all thought were the most helpful in efforts to weave tech into the classroom experience:

1. Quick Review of 7 Popular Math Programs
2. How to Use Google Drawings
3. 61 K-8 Hour of Code Suggestions–by Grade Level
4. 10 Tech Tools for Your Math Class
5. 4 Great Alternatives to Google Classroom
6. 11 Webtools That Make Images Talk
7. 6 Ways to Make Classroom Typing Fun
8. How to Use Google Sheets in the K-12 Classroom
9. Metaverse–Education Game-changer
10. 25 Websites for Poetry Month

Oh–would you mind adding me to your social media links? Here’s where you can find me:

Twitter:   @AskaTechTeacher

Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/kali.delamagente

Instagram: @AskaTechTeacher

Thanks! Have a wonderful 2020!

(more…)

Since we at Ask a Tech Teacher started this blog eight years ago, we’ve had almost 5.1 million views from visitors (about 10,000 follow us) to the 2,184 articles on integrating technology into the classroom. This includes tech tips, website/app reviews, tech-in-ed pedagogy, how-tos, videos, and more. We have regular features like:

• Weekly Websites and Tech Tips (sign up for the newsletter)
• Dear Otto Help Column
• Edtech Reviews
• Lesson plans

If you’ve just arrived at Ask a Tech Teacher, start here.

It always surprises us what readers find to be the most and least provocative. The latter is as likely to be a post one of us on the crew put heart and soul into, sure we were sharing Very Important Information, as the former. Talk about humility.

(more…)

I’ll be taking a few weeks off–until after the New Year–to edit/format my website, work on projects with a deadline, prioritize life, and wish my two adult military children could come home to visit. I may drop in on you-all as you enjoy your holidays, but mostly I’ll be regenerating.

I wish you a wonderful season, safe and filled with family.

See you shortly!

(more…)