Autism and iPads

·         Creating social stories will help students with autism learn their school schedule which hopefully will reduce meltdowns in the classrooms.

·         You can provide a list of instructions for all students not just autistic students

·         Having iPads allow the student to have a portable tool for easy mobility

·         The tapping sensory can be more satisfying to (some) autistic students

·         iPads offer students many positive aspects

Top 10 Digital Storytelling Apps: Grades K-6

·         Digital Storytelling  multimedia movies to reference something.

·         Storybots Starring You Storybooks: motivates students to read because they are the characters

·         Picatello: Teaching academic and social skills

·         Puppet Pals: Allows students to create their own stories about certain topics while using your own photos

·         Kid in Story Book Maker: Templates allow students to make their stories come to life

·         Scribble Press: Students can write and publish their own stories and also offer prewritten scripts

·         Storybird: Turn any simple image into a story

·         Show Me Interactive Whiteboard: You can use this easy tool to promote classroom rules or show artwork through the groups portion of the app

·         Toontastic: Creative learning tool that allows students to present their work. They can record their voices to tell the story or retell a story they might have heard in class.

·         Tell About This: students use their voice to customize pictures and tell the story behind it

·         Tellagami: Students create a “gami” where they can record their voice to create a story

·         These apps allow students to create or recreate stories in their own voice and also allows them to share what they took away.

Incorporating Art in STEM

·         Creativity has no limit so students are made to be more creative and think a little harder

·         Art is not just coloring or painting. It can be learning to music or creating models. Acting can also help boost the curriculum to help retain information.

·         Art has helped students retain the new knowledge and information in classrooms because they were working in a hands-on activity

·         Adding art to STEM really amps up the value of the lesson

·         Art allows students to experience trial and error which provides learning on their own

Whole Brain Thinking

·         Interactive form of learning that engages students

·         Applies teaching and learning in a fun way

·         Interactive and fun with both the teacher and students

·         Made for everyone

·         7 teaching strategies: attention getter, mirroring, teach/ok, switch, motivator (scoreboard), focusing hands and eyes, classroom rules

Incorporating Brain Breaks in the Classroom

·         Helps students memorize math facts

·         Allows students to express creativity

·         Gives students awareness to problems they might run across in school and maybe even outside of it

·         Dance in classrooms has been proven to increase the levels of learning being done in the classrooms

·         It builds relationships in classrooms and allows promotes movement

·         Brain breaks are timed breaks to allow students to ease the mind before continuing their work

·         They can be used before, during, or after the lesson.

·         Can be exercises or dance moves

·         98% of students benefit from brain breaks

·         GoNoodle is a great resource for brain breaks

Estimating Quotients- Emaze

During my third semester of the education program at JSU, I taught a group of 5th graders how to divide by estimating quotients. If you click on the highlighted title,  you will be directed to the Emaze tool I used to follow my lesson. 

iPads for Teaching & Learning

Click on the link above to see a newsletter I designed on the pros of using iPads in the classroom. I used smore.com to create this newsletter.