C4T#1 Meet Vicki Davis

C4T#1 Comment#1

Today I met Vicki Davis, the Cool Cat Teacher. She has a soft spot in her heart for technology beginners and has included Tips For Beginners in her blog. Check it out!
Today's blog post contained an article written by Silvia Tolisano. The conversation between these global educators revealed an example of how story boarding and script writing enabled a class of fourth and fifth graders to help a poet publish his book of poems. Through the use of blogging and Twitter, Mrs. Tolisano was able to meet Mike Fisher a New York poet. Mrs. Tolisano then collaborated with him to have her fourth and fifth grade students create the illustrations for his ebook. The students had to imagine their audience as they created story boards. Story boards are a brain storming technique that allows students to imagine the who, what, when and where of their writing. This process was the spring board for their illustrations.

Mrs. Davis encouraged me to let go of my fear of technology. She believes that the purpose of a teacher is to give students a variety of options by which they can learn. Some students will use classroom resources, but others will use the technology available outside the class room such as Google, YouTube or other online tutorials. Students are not afraid of going viral or global, and I should not be afraid either.

C4T#1 Comment#2
It has been 2 weeks since my last post after visiting Vicki Davis at Cool Cat Teacher. But there has been lots of activity during those weeks. Today I listened to Vicki Davis, Thomas Murray, and Katrina Stevens discuss Exciting New Ways to Teach Writing With Digital Tools. They explained that digital tools equip teachers to teach students how to write for the 21st century audience because, as Tom Murray said, "Students used to write for their teacher and refrigerator. Now, they write for the world." They were able to point me toward tools that would engage students in the writing process, provide immediate feedback from teachers and students' real audience (on the Wed), and resulted in a paperless classroom. How snazzy does that sound?! A special message came through to me as I listened. This message addressed the fear of technology. Vicki commented that teachers not be afraid to share or get it wrong. How comforting that message is to me.
Here are a few of the tools the group mentioned. I am happy to say that I have installed Drop Box and am going to explore it further!!
Kid Blog
Class Tool
Drop Box
Scrivener
Kidspiration