Technology in the classroom

1. Teaching With Technology

2. With so much technology available at the fingertips of
teachers, the classroom is a magical land of learning. Here
are three topics that will help any teacher interact technology
in the classroom.
To Learn about:
Ways to use Wordle
in the classroom
Click Here To Learn about:
Ways to Twitter in
the classroom
Click Here To Learn about:
Web 2.0Slide 9
Flashcards
Click Here

3. Wordle
What is Wordle?
Wordle is technology that is used in creating “word clouds”
from text that you provide. The clouds show the important
words that appear more frequently in the wording. There
are several different things you can do to make your clouds
personal. You can make it your own with different
fonts, layouts, and color schemes.
Here is an example of the wordle I
created from the text above. You will
notice that the words that are used more
often appear bigger in my wordle.

4. How to Use Wordle
1. Write some text, like an essay or an article.
2. Select all of the text and then copy it to the
clipboard.
3. Go to http://wordle.net.
4. Click on Create your own.
5. Paste the text.
6. Either use a screen capture program to obtain the
Wordle as a graphic Or save the Wordle in the public
gallery and use the code provided in your blog or
web page.
“I LOVE Wordle. I use it with children as young as kindergarten
age. I have first graders that use it to practice their spelling
words--they have to type the word as many times as there are
letters in the word. It is also a "teachable moment" to explain
to them that we must only use create--as inappropriate words
may be in the gallery. Third graders have used to realize how
often they use the same word in an essay. We also use it to
analyze things such as the national anthem, pledge of
allegiance, and the school's honor code.”
Posted by: Gail 6/20/2009 2:10 PM

5. The Top 5 Reasons to use Wordle in your
classroom:
•As a means of summarizing the content of an essay or other
piece of work.
•As a self-reflection, so that the student does not get carried
away and go off the point on their project.
•A resource for the teacher to be used as a means of
assessment.
•To summarize survey results.
•To illustrate one's work with a picture of some kind.

6. What is Twitter?
Twitter is a real-time information network that is controlled by people all over the
world. Twitter tells you what is happening across the globe immediately.
Why should I twitter?
•Communication
By only having 140 characters to communicate you can learn to discipline yourself by
becoming better at what you need to say with less meaningless words.
•Stay up-to-date with fellow teachers
Twitter can be like a effective staffroom meeting where teachers can interact with one
another by bouncing ideas, opinions and resources off of each other while in separate
locations.
•Local or Global following
Twitter allows educators to compare what’s happening in their school systems with other
school systems in the same state, country and internationally.

7. • Benjamin - 02/07/2010 If anyone is using Twitter in school
and would like to facilitate a live, online session about your
experience, see the following page:
Twitter keeps you informed
http://educators.supercoolschool.com/classes/657 Benjamin
with what matters most to
Principle of Educators 2.0
you today and helps you
discover what might matter to • ldinsdale - 09/23/2009 I agree that Twitter is an exciting tool
you most tomorrow. for schools and we have started to use it to communicate
with parents via our school website:
http://www.englishmartyrs.co.uk It has been well received
Twitter can even be used with and has really helped with mass communication within our
the weakest signals because school community. Challenges like Twitter being
of its simplicity. Users can banned/blocked within schools are overcome if you wish to
access Twitter on their pursue the use of such sites. As for using it with the
computers, video game children, time will tell, but seeing the benefit of it could lead
console or through their to using it to ask questions in light of research etc.
mobile phones. • lsimmons - 07/02/2009 Twittering sounds like a great idea.
Can you control who is in the group, or is it opened up to
You can use Twitter however anyone on the net.
you choose. Follow hundreds • Bob Houghton - 06/27/2009 With children and
of people., a few dozen adolescents, "Access Denied" in its numerous educational
people. You can post every forms morphs into breakaway literacies (See
hour or never. http://tinyurl.com/cyvqrm ) among those children growing
up in a digitally literate home. Reaching those on the other
side of the digital divide is a growing problem.

8. Different ways to use Twitter:
Twitter to promote your business
Watch a quick video on how to get started!
http://business.twitter.com/twitter101/starting#
Twitter on Your - Keep in close contact with other
teachers.
Twitter in the community- Keep the parents and
members of the community up to date with
Twitter in the classroom!

9. Web 2.0 Flashcards
What are Web flashcards?
Web Flashcards are similar to the old time flashcards that were used
before technology took over the classroom. Web flashcards allow the
student to study anytime, anywhere by using them with your cell
phone, PDA or IPod. There are also other activities to help you
study, such as, matching, crosswords, hangman and word scrambles.

10. Web Flashcards Websites
Here are some popular websites to make web flashcards:
Study Stack
http://www.studystack.com/
Flashcard db
http://flashcarddb.com/
Flashcard Exchange
http://www.flashcardexchange.com
Quizlet
http://quizlet.com/
Flashcard Machine 1+1=2
http://www.flashcardmachine.com/

11. Benefits of Web Flashcards:
•It can show you how much a student studies by giving you the study
results statistics so you could view how many cards they completed
as well as a simple pie chart indicating the number of right/wrong
answers.
•If a student does not have a computer at home to study, you can
print the flashcards so that no one will be left out of the web
flashcards.
•Students can create their own electronic study cards or they can
share with their peers while studying.
•You can project the flashcards on your interactive whiteboard;
Instantly, you have an interactive review lesson!

12. Conclusion
With all of the technology that is available to the world, a teacher can have any lesson plan
brought to life with the help of the internet. There are so many places a student can go
without even leaving the classroom.
I have touched on a few technologies that I find beneficial to any classroom at any age level.
Such as;
Wordle is a great tool to help students focus on the most important parts of an assignment.
Twitter can benefit teachers stay in the loop with the rest of the staff and the community.
Web 2.0 Flashcards are very beneficial to help students study for upcoming tests and
assignments. Flashcards have been used for many years and continue to be used but with
technology.
Work Cited
Walker, Laura. "Nine Reasons to Twitter in Schools." Techlearning.com <http://www.techlearning.com/aarticle/17340>.
Jenn Farr. "Create Web 2.0 Flashcards in a Flash!" Techlearning.com <http://www.techlearning.com/article/16896>.
Freeman, Terry. "Http://www.techlearning.com/blogs/20322." Web log post. Web.