Not Thinking Outside the Box

I've come across an issue using the Promethean. I've gotten used to it being in my classroom, I've grown accustomed to using it in every part of my routine and have found as many daily uses as possible. And while my students always scramble to be the one writing or moving things around, I really haven't made my flipcharts that interactive. I think, for the most part, I've been using ActivInspire as a PowerPoint replacement. I've treated it like PowerPoint and used it just like PowerPoint, but with an easier way to move information around the board. And sure, PowerPoint can be interactive if you put the time and effort into it. However, ActivInspire is so easy to make interactive that it's just ridiculous not to. I just don't think I've made my flipcharts as interactive as can be.

I think back to our last science unit on the phases of the Moon. Tina, who has had a Promethean in her room all year, found a great flipchart on Promethean Planet and converted it to PowerPoint for those less fortunate to use. I spent time going through and adding some of the interactive content through PowerPoint. This particular flipchart used the "erase and reveal" tool as it asked questions and showed great pictures. Now that I've had the chance to sort through all the ActivInspire resources, I've also found that the flipchart took advantage of some of the pictures already available instead of searching for new ones. Had I a Promethean in my room during this unit, I would have had the students come up and "reveal" the answers and draw on the charts as we went through. I need to incorporate that into my lessons now. I need more student driven flipcharts that encourage student participation in a variety of ways. I need things that fit into my routine that don't feel routine. The students will know how to use the board in different ways, but it will be different all the time.

Guess I'll get started on our soil unit and some more entertaining EOG practice. Any ideas?

Getting Tech-Savvy

I am nerdily excited to announce I found out that Promethean Planet has an Iphone application (for free!) and is also on Facebook. Take a look at some of the things you can do:

There is a page for the latest resources, like this "Plants" flipchart that would be great for our upcoming science unit.

I haven't found the application to be that useful yet since I can access all of this information from their website and the resources are limited. I can't create flipcharts on my phone and if I am going to be working with ActivInspire or Promethean Planet I am on my laptop anyway. But, if I'm thinking of something on the go and want to know if there's a resource out there, I can search for it. I can take the blog, discussion forums, and other information with me wherever I go and flip through at my leisure. Maybe this application will come in handy for something soon.

While searching the website for more information, I saw that Promethean Planet had a fan page on Facebook too. I fanned the page and now status updates appear in my news feed. The neat thing about that is even though they are not always applicable to my classroom or curriculum, they are new ideas and sometimes inspire new ideas in me. A recent update was about the Ghengis Khan resource pack from the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. We are studying biographies right now, so what a neat exhibit for students to see virtually from our board. And, even if I don't download that resource pack, I can see if there are other museum resource packs available with biographies a bit more applicable to my students. I searched and found no others from museums, but I did find a flipchart on Paul Revere that looks really nice. It will work great with the reading comprehension practice I was going to give my students tomorrow. Now that I have fanned Promethean Planet I'll be sure to be in on the latest news and resources and I will have inspiration for new ideas all on one page.

And, since I can access Facebook and Promethean Planet from my Iphone, these things are literally at my fingertips.

Placing Video in Your Flipcharts

Tonight I've been playing around in ActivInspire creating a flipchart on summarizing to use this week. I wanted to spice it up and played around with backgrounds (Go to "Resource Browser", there are AMAZING things there) and font. I even wanted to insert a video. I found one on Discovery Education, downloaded the clip and then imported it into my flipchart.
Like this:
Insert --> Media --> Choose Media to Insert

I have the video set up as a full screen right now that will begin playing when I click to the page. I have seen other flipcharts where you can click on an icon and then pull up the video in a new, smaller screen. (I don't know how to do that yet. But I will find out.)

I knew there were backgrounds and charts in the Resource Browser, but I took the time to flip through each folder today to find the hidden gems inside. I found ready made charts and graphic organizers, diagrams like a skeleton and flower anatomy (perfect for our upcoming science unit), grid paper and number lines (which I have used for geometry and fractions), game boards, and fun, swirly background I used in my flipchart today.

I was also bored with some of the color choices for the background and pen ink. I decided to right click on a color I was bored with and a color screen popped up. I could replace it with a different color, or click on the color picker for more options. I am excited to change things up just a bit.

I have a bunch of new ideas already for my flipcharts and they definitely include resources from the Resource Browser. I'll let you know what I do soon.

New Ideas

I am definitely using my board on a daily basis. Word study sorts and games, interactive websites, math lessons, and pretty much anything else we would work out on the board, etc... It has increased some enthusiasm, and being able to use the shapes and lines has been great for math. Without it, I don't think the students would have understood fractions on a number line quite as well. I have used the same things in different ways over the last few weeks, but I'd like some new ideas. How do you use the Promethean in your classroom?

Creating Flipcharts for Math

On Monday's teacher workday I was planning instruction for math. I love using the EnVisions Interactive Activities at the beginning of each lesson. I often use the activity as is, change it to fit my needs, or combine it with other activities. Until now I had been reading the word problems that often accompany the activities out loud to the kids, writing them on the board, or typing them up to use with the projector. Since getting the Promethean, I have been opening ActivInspire and using the screen to work out the problems and let students share answers and pictures for their word problems. Finally, it donned on me. Why am I not combining what I am doing? The last two days I have typed the word problems and directions into a flipchart, leaving room to work out the problems. We can flip through the pages, share answers, and I don't have to hold the book or transfer between programs. So easy!

Also, http://www.professorgarfield.org was awesome today. It's an interactive website we used for inferencing. The "Reading Ring" was great and really kept the kids thinking. It didn't hurt that there was a lot going on all around the screen and the game was a reading boxing match. I couldn't keep them in their seats during this lesson, but I definitely didn't want to.

Word Study

I pulled up http://www.spellingcity.com yesterday during our word study time. I had already entered in and saved our list for the week. I pulled it up and found games we could play as a class. We played Unscramble and MatchIt. Needless to say, the kids loved it and fully participated hoping they could get a turn to go up to the board. In this anxious time waiting for spring break and warm weather, I'll do anything to keep kids motivated and get them to pay attention. It was a lively 15 minutes and requires only that I remember to save my list each week. Awesome.

For Beginners...

Over the last three weeks that I have been using my Promethean Board, I've made sure to use it every day. Here are some of the easiest ways I have begun to incorporate the board into my room:

1. Interactive Websites: Since our school uses First In Math, this has been a great way to show students how to use the site, play games, reinforce concepts and get kids excited to play on their own. Using it on the Promethean means that students can come up and play on the board and take turns while everyone is able to see what is going on. I even used the Know and Show games to review geometry questions for their math test. On our recent Math Literacy Night I put up First In Math for students to play as they came in the room. It was a big hit. All the kids came in and made cubes and pyramids out of toothpicks and marshmallows and then migrated to the big, shiny board for some games. I will definitely keep using this when I want to review concepts or keep students interested. This would work for any website that has games such as http://www.gamequarium.com/ or the plethora of lesson plans and games available through BBC.

2. Math: The EnVisions Math site has everything from the student and teacher's edition online, including printable resources. Every day in math I can pull up the Problem of the Day or Daily Spiral Review and use the "annotate over screen" button to write all over it. This comes in handy for underlining our important words in word problems and drawing pictures or writing number sentences. EnVisions also has videos at the beginning of each topic in the student edition and I can pull it right up on the screen. The class has also taken advantage of the etools. Since we just did a geometry unit, we used the shapes and I was able to demonstrate slides, flips, and turns then have the students come up and give it a try.

3. Sorts: The first thing I do with my spelling words at the beginning of the week is open up a flip chart and type in all the words. I make an individual text box for each word, which merely requires me to click on the text box button, click on the flip chart screen and begin typing. When I am ready for the next word, I click somewhere else on the screen. The text boxes will continue to pop up until I click on another icon. I put all the words on the side or bottom of the screen. Then I can ask the students to sort them. I don't type in any titles for the sorts so I can use the flip chart for any sort that we do throughout the week. As we begin sorting, I can just write our sort titles using the pen or text recognition tools. After we sort the words I can print what we have done and then choose not to save the changes to the flip chart. The next day when I open it up for another sort, the words are back on the bottom of the screen and we have a blank canvas for new possibilities.
I have also used the shapes option to create sorts for geometric shapes.

4. Promethean Planet: I feel no need to reinvent the wheel all the time. When I am looking for an interactive activity I can visit http://www.prometheanplanet.com/ and enter in my keywords to search for whatever I am teaching. I recently found a flipchart titled "Fact or Inference?" by Jaime Dawson. I tweaked it just a little for my purposes, but it went over really well and was a great time saver. What was so great was as we went through the examples in the chart, students were able to come up to the board and underline their supporting details. That really got them interested in what we were doing.

5. Test Prep: I can import PDF files into ActivInspire software. This is great for importing those End of Grade reading passages or math questions. We can go through and highlight, draw pictures, and answer the questions right on the board. I had been using the Elmo, but I know many people don't have that technology in their classroom. The passage is up on the screen and I can zoom in and move the page around on the screen.

In our recent training I learned even more about the amazing resources available right there in ActivInspire that I can pull up easily. I'll get to those in my next post.

In the meantime, tell me the easiest ways you have incorporated your Promethean...just leave a comment.

Resources

I, and so many others, say often "There's just SO much information out there to pull from!" Especially when it comes to lesson plans, worksheets, ideas, centers, articles, etc., etc., etc. I spend a lot of time filtering through all the muck trying to find websites with resources that are useful in my classroom and for my curriculum. In a recent webinar I attended through Kappa Delta Pi I learned more about delicious.com, a bookmarking website that will keep and store all my bookmarks which I can then access from other computers. I can also see other's bookmarks and share my bookmarks with others. I have been bookmarking the sites I have found recently and want to share them with you now. You can access my bookmarks at http://delicious.com/hilarythomas.

Resources I have found for Promethean start first at http://www.prometheanplanet.com/. I can download flipcharts and resource packs, find answers and support for my questions, and even sign up for free classes. Anyone starting to learn the Promethean board must start at Promethean Planet. To get started you will need to create an account. In the login box on the left there is a link to register. Just choose a username and password and you're in business. The site is easy to navigate through the tabs along the top. For lesson plans and flip charts, click on Resources. For free classes and tutorials, click on Professional Development. I have registered for the ActivInspire Primary online course under the "More Free Courses" tab. There are also free ActivInspire webinars. I find webinars to be a nice approach to learning because I get the benefits of face-to-face classes while still in the comfort of my own home. Some webinars just require you to listen and follow along, while some like class participation. I haven't checked out Promethean Planet's webinars yet, but I am definitely planning to soon.

You should also check out http://teacher.scholastic.com/whiteboards/languagearts.htm for more interactive whiteboard activities PreK-12.

How Do I Turn This Thing On?

The long awaited and anticipated arrival of my Promethean board has come! I have proudly used it in my classroom for two whole weeks and, yes, it has been turned on and used EVERY day.

(Ok, so I know it's not my Promethean board. It belongs to the school. But I treasure it so dearly that for now it will remain mine.)

Oh, how I prepared for its arrival. Where will I put it? How can I use it? What will my students think? How will this change my lessons? And then suddenly it was up, drilled to the wall in all its glory. And I stared at it thinking, how do I turn this thing on?

That's where this blog fits in.

I am currently studying Instructional Technology through Virginia Tech. This semester I am doing a project on the Promethean board. I will be evaluating it, collaborating with other teachers using the technology, sharing my work, and keeping this blog of all I learn and do with my board.

I hope you find it useful. I hope too, that you will comment and share your work and thoughts. Happy Boarding!