11 Tools - Tools Reflection

1. What are your favorite tools you now have in your personal technology toolbox?
Love Photostory and all the image programs! I can easily see giving my students a composer or instrument and having them create a wonderful project (other than Powerpoint) to describe it to the class. Fun class project that might involve wikis (once I have grasped that concept). I also like the Jing tool. Can't wait to explore that one too to help in my communication with other teachers in the district.

2. How have you transfomed your thinking about the learning that will take place in your classroom? 11 Tools has got me motivated to bring more technology into the classroom and to hand it over to the kids. When technology first reached our classroom, it was something that the teacher did only to teach their lesson. Now, we need to transform our thinking that technology is something that can make our teaching and their learning easier and efficient.

3. Were there any unexpected outcomes from this program that surprised you?
I am still not a fan of blogging. When I did 23 Tools, it was a struggle. Still is something I'm not comfortable doing. I know how much I enjoyed 23 Tools so I was expecting to enjoy 11 Tools just as much...and I did!

11 Tools - #11

Was a little confused on what "digital citizenship" meant, but I think Cool Cat had the best explanation. I appreciated the fact that she included etiquette as a quality of digital citizenship. The lack of etiquette is already something I have seen at the elementary level as the kids discover Facebook and something I plan on continuing to emphasize. I would also like the students to fully grasp the understanding of what the internet is so they don't take everything by it's face value. I would like to teach my students how to research and authenticate the information on the internet by example in my teaching. I would also like them to be selective on their materials and not just take whatever pops up first. I would hope that I can model digital citizenship in my classroom better this year than I have in the past.

11 Tools - Tool #10

I am excited about the iPads that will be available for the MUSIC classroom - FINALLY we are seeing some new technology in our rooms!!! YEAH! I explored a drum making app as well as a metronome app. The drum app allowed you to choose percussion instruments and play them randomly. The metronome app showed you the numeric setting and provided an audible beat. I can easily see the kids trying to find the tempo or beat of a song and either playing along or figuring out its setting.

11 Tools - #9

I like Jing. I downloaded onto my home computer and can see many ways that it would be usable for home. As for my classroom, I can see using Jing when collaborating with another music teacher in the district or sharing written music quickly online.

I am familiar with Skype. Although I do not have the technology in my classroom (i.e, camera), I can see many uses such as linking with another classroom in the district who is practicing the same song so we can critique each other or perhaps, if able, link with another music classroom around the world and compare.

11 Tools - Tool # 8

(Tool #7 is still downloading after an hour and a half so I am moving on to 8)
"Sabre Dance" by Aram Khachaturian performed by Vanessa Mae (youtube.com)



"Hallelujah Chorus" by Handel performed by the "Monk Chorus" (some highschool..again youtube.com)


I use online videos ALL the time to show my students a real performance of a song, hear and see an instrument being played, see a performance, etc. These two videos were used when we did our listening unit at the end of the year. The students heard the piece first, then I provided them with a video either serious or entertaining for them to relate to the piece of music.

It is never ending to what you can find on the internet to support your lesson. I have a projector hooked up to my computer throughout the year (I am not fortunate to have an ActivBoard - attention School board!!!). Videos again support my foundation of teaching the whole learner.

11 Tools - #7

This is the Johnson Family trip to Destin last summer...



I could easily use photo story to create a music video of my choir's performance an in include pictures of our progression on learning the music. I would also use this as a way for students to illustrate their own feelings of a specific piece of music and then set it to the music as their own music video. This was one of my favorite tools! LOVE IT!

11 Tools - Tool #6

Wikis! Geez these drive me crazy! Have not completely grasped the concept probably because I haven't created one. Did visit the Kool Kat Teacher site and the 11 Tool Wikis on the SBISD site, but would probably need to just get hands on and develop one to see how it would work in my music classroom. I can imagine that it would be helpful in a group project where they were assigned a composer or instrument to investigate. Or perhaps if there was a way to download a piece of music onto a wiki site and have the kids evaluate a piece of music on their own time using the classroom computer. Hmm...more to come on that one.

11 Tools - Tool #4

I have alwasy hated having several copies of documents thrown around the server and never knowing which one was the most accurate. I LOVE LOVE the idea of Google docs and think it is essential in the upper grades. Unfortunately, don't see how much use I can get from it with my students since I do not have access to student computers, but I can definitely see how it can make my life better. As far as the Google Reader, I like the idea of condensing all my sites into one location. I tend to hop from page to page so it would save lots of time.

11 Tools - Tool #5

So I already new about del.icio.us so I decided to join Diingo. Pretty cool!!! Makes things SO much easier to go through and narrows down the options better than a simple google search. I added SFSKids which is an interactive website sponsored by the San Francisco Symphony. It has games and activities perfect for my elementary kids. I also checked out Songs for Teaching which is a good resource to provide classroom teachers with songs that can support their lessons. I always like to have a resource of songs available to support the core subjects. I used the tags "music education", "elementary music", "songs for elementary". This would be great when I am in the computer lab and I give the kids the link to my diingo account so they can have access to all the music information, games, and sites that they might even be able to use at home on their personal computer.

For some reason, this site is not allowing me to post a direct link using the "insert link" button so here are the addresses to both sites mentioned above:

www.sfskids.org/templates/home.asp?pageid=1
www.diigo.com/user/tbkmadre?domain=www.songsforteaching.com

11 Tools - #3

I love to use visuals in my classroom for all aspects of my teaching. I try to teach to the whole learner and for me as a child, I remember how seeing posters or pictures that supported the lesson helped me tremendously. These were easy to create and fun too!

11 Tools - Tool #2

1. What are your thoughts about building an online education community and participating in a PLN? Personally, I suck at keeping up with anything let alone a blog, but I am willing to give it a try. I like the idea of being able to bounce ideas off other colleagues as well as get some suggestions from the comfort of my laptop. Also, I have always sought out better ideas or innovative ways to teach things in my classroom and a PLN would be ideal to help in that situation.
2. What point stood out to you from the commenting advice? Keeping things "open" to encourage response and interaction.
3. What five blogs did you select for your comments?
Bacon's Bunch Blog Page, Beverly the Diva, places we will go, SarahQ, Songbird55

11 Tools - Tool #1

I had trouble remembering my login and password for my blog since being a mother of three young boys doesn't quite allow you much time to update a blog (but apparently, I have enough time to update my Facebook status, but that's another story). Looking forward to what 11 Tools can teach me.