2012 to 2013

December is always a crazy month for me. If you have read my profile, you will notice that I am a music teacher so December naturally has a holiday program. It definitely consumes most of my energy! I haven't been totally absent from my tech world so I had to get in one last post before the year ends. This post does not come necessarily from an educational search but it does have classroom applications also.

I was looking for a way to send a video message that my elderly mother could open and see without actually downloading a video. I also wanted it to be private and most of all FREE. I did a little looking around and of course one of my first searches for great web tools is with Richard Byrne's Free Technology for Teachers. I am always forever grateful to people like him who take the time and energy to do extensive research on web tools. I trust the sites he recommends and his thoughts on classroom applications.

My search led me to Kincast. Yeah, his post was over a year ago, but I didn't need something like this a year ago! And yes, like most web 2.0 tools, I believe they have changed since Mr. Byrne first wrote about them. However, Kincast offers a way to upload or record directly videos of any size that you can share privately. For my purposes, which is to share videos with family, this is perfect. The free version gives you unlimited sharing and 30 minutes of cloud storage. There are paid versions, monthly and yearly,  that offer more storage and other options. People that you share with do not need an account or password to view your videos (again I needed EASY for my mother) and only need to click on a link in their email.

File size for uploading is 4GB per video. In the free version, once you hit the 30 min limit, they will ask you if you want to upgrade. If you choose to stay on the free version, they will delete your oldest videos to make room for your new one. You can also delete videos whenever you want. Kincast has a great HELP page with FAQs.

For the classroom, Kincast could be an easy way for teachers to share student videos privately with their parents. Even though the site is private, please note that the site is not intended for use by anyone under age 13 and their privacy policy states that you must be 18 to create an account. This is an important factor for teachers and I remind you to always check the privacy policies of websites if you intend to use them with your students. You should also be aware of your school district's internet policies.

Happy New Year!

Missing November and Differentiantor, Respondo! and Byrdseed

Oops- looks like I missed November all together. Well my new job has been slightly demanding. I had a performance with third and fourth graders on November 16th, which went quite well I might add, and I have another coming up for Christmas on the 11th of December. Needless to say I have been extra busy and it seems to be consuming a lot of my time. I know, excuses, excuses. What can I say? I'm really not a slacker ☺

So I had created a Google site to help my new staff find some easy ways to integrate technology and to learn some tech tips. They haven't had much at this school although there are some teachers who are all over it and want more and more. I was looking for sites for integrating technology in the literature classroom and came across an interesting site called the Differentiator. The initial site I got this link from was Web English Teacher, a site I will need to return to on my quest for literature and technology links. Moving on-

Differentiator comes from a site call Byrdseed. Differntiator helps you re-evaluate and re-design assessments. It is a great tool and you really need to see it and try it to fully understand how it works. When you first go to the site you will see an example that once you click on it you will be given option to edit with the categories of Thinking Skill, Content, Resources and Product. Playing around I came up with this one:
Students will define the rules of composition using a website and create a chart in groups of two.
Not really the best example but I just wanted to see what I could do.

And since we are on a site linked from Byrdseed, we ought to look at Respondo! while we are at it.
With a similar looking front page, users click to edit and give your students a creative literature response question. Again, I think it is a nice tool that will get you thinking about some fresh ways of looking at things.

Byrdseed, by the way, is a "place dedicated to differentiating instruction for high level learners". Many of the ideas are not necessarily technology integrated but hands-on activities. There are some wonderful ideas that are worth your time exploring if you are looking for new ways to engage your students.