The woes of a sixth grade reading teacher...

Well, I hate to be fickle, but Blackboard, you're really sucking the life out of me right now!  I know my last post I sang your praises but right now, a day after the second big post was due, I am really feeling some hostility toward you.  I have received e-mails from parents and students alike saying they can't get the site to work- more likely they are not going about navigating it properly and students who come to me in tears because their work didn't save since they didn't follow all the right steps.  I really thought that by now kids would know how to copy and paste a document, how to designate a specific folder to save their work in, how to log on to the internet.  What's all this research stating that today's kindergartners could teach the adults of the world a thing or two about technology?  My kids are tech dense.  Some of them have figured it out, others want to be coddled every step of the way.  Be independent, figure it out, learn your own way!  For now I stand over their should listing the next step in a monotone voice as they passively go through the motions.  I will need to revisit this in class on Monday.  

Blackboard, I love you!

So I'll admit it, I once knocked it, once turned my nose up to it, but now I am head over heels in love with blackboard. I have got my site going and let me tell you, its really something. Check it out when you have some time: visit blackboard.columbia.k12.mo.us and sign in as guessaccess, password: guest. You can see some of my student's work by clicking on the button "Post Overview Here" (I simplified this function because it was getting to be a constant question of the kiddies').

My big project this weekend has been preparing for my upcoming book groups. We're looking at the theme of oppression and social injustice in history- sounds uplifting, right? I've found fiction books covering south African apartheid, the Holocaust, the Civil Rights Movement, Migrant Farmers, and Japanese Internment Camps. covering so many conflicts= major need for background knowledge, which I myself have little of. So I secured some computer lab time to help students get familiar with the issues in thier novels.

Knowing now that you can't just send kids loose in a computer lab to "research" (Otherwise you end up with 250 pages on J Lo streaming out of the library printer while the librarian gives dirty looks as she tries desperately to stop the madness your student has caused). I wanted to create a webquest, which esentially would be a webpage linked to other websites that have information that I felt could be useful to my students. Well, a webquest was a bit more than I bargained for when I realized I needed to know code writing to create one. Then it dawned on me, why not just link these sites to my Blackboard? I spent this morning searching resources and linking them to my site. I have to admit that when I click on the hypertext and it links me right to the National Holocaut Museum site I get giddy. Technology, you are something else! It might have been one small step for you but it was a giant leap for me.

Today, I feel accomplished!