Overload + Ms. Jones 100 Follower Giveaway

I spent the day at a technology professional development which was presented by three lovely ladies from ISTE. From start to finish they modeled a true digital classroom through the use of a wikispace, Google Docs, collaborative learning and interactive/engaging teaching! It was amazing to see how engaged tech leaders were in the day. My brain is going in a million different directions and I am having a hard time pinpointing one idea to talk about and there were so many things that resonated with me.

One of the things that stuck with me most is the idea of personal learning networks (plns) and seeking/creating our own professional development in the digital age.  My new buddy Alex, over at The School Potato encouraged me to start this blog and I initially did it for "fun"! When I first started to post, began stalking following several blogs, getting RSS Feed in Google Reader, "liking" Facebook pages, following pages on Pinterest, etc. my pln was growing and growing but I hadn't really thought of in that way! Today they helped me to construct that thinking! Here is the video that they shared with us.

I have so many more reflections and ah*has from the day but I won't bore you with all that! I promised an awesome Web 2.0 tool last night and I won't let you down! Signupgenius is an amazing little timesaver. Have you ever had parents sign up to donate something to the class or for a conference at the beginning of the year and then you have to send a reminder or they forget to come or you have to copy the schedule for everyone. What about snacks for a party? What about classroom volunteers? How about those that didn't sign up and you try to send options and end up with duplicates? What types of things do you have parents "sign-up" for? Our school has TONS of things so this little bugger is going to be great! Signupgenius is a FREE site but it does require you to sign up for an account. The website is very easy to navigate and offers a little tutorial on the side. It is a simple click through and my friend Alex at The School Potato has already set up her account and a sign up on her own after I merely mentioned the site. I created two sign ups and already have people signed up (it's that easy)!!! For mentor meetings we would like our "old" teachers to present something they feel that would be beneficial to new teachers or that they are experts at so I created a sign-up for that! We have monthly mentor meetings and food makes any meeting better so I created a sign up for everyone to chip in throughout the year by bringing a snack or drink! Here is a screen shot (I cut it off as not to share their last names)! The best part of signupgenius... it sends you an email when someone signs up AND sends them a reminder two days before the event! 

I know this post is getting LONG and I still have so much to say but I am going to wrap up with a 100 Follower Giveaway over at Ms. Jones Junction (maybe the name had something to do it haha)! She is new to blogging and has already reached OVER 100 followers...CONGRATS!!! She has TONS of awesome giveaways including your choice of a $25 Silhouette Cameo Gift Card, or a $25 Silhouette Cameo Download Store Card, or a $25 Teachers Notebook Gift Certificate or a $25 Teacher's Pay Teacher's Gift Certificate, or a Scotch Laminator! Just click her button below to check out her bloc and enter the giveaway!!!

School Based Orientation

Yesterday was our first day with the new teachers! I think I've mentioned that I wear many hats at my school and one of them is Lead Mentor. My morning got off to a rocky start after reading this blog post titled Why I Hated Meredith's First Grade Teacher: An Open Letter to America's Teachers!

If you don't know much about me yet or have just stopped by it would be helpful to know that I have taught first grade for five years and I have L-O-V-E-D every second of it and this year I will be taking on a new position! I am beyond thrilled with the new opportunity but yesterday as I read this my eyes welled with tears and I had my first real melt down over not teaching first grade this year! I will not get to be someone's Ms. Miner this year and that made my heart ache! I have been THAT teacher for some very special little people and I know the feeling it gives! In an effort to pull myself together for the new teachers I texted two of my closet friends (mind you this was at 7:00am on their LAST free day before we are back to school) and they both offered their words of comfort and wisdom!

I was able to get it together and could not have had a better first day with the newbies! This year is unique in the fact that we have 12 new teachers (we are a pretty small school - 3 teachers per grade level 1-8 and all specialists). At times this has made me beyond nervous because I will be in a new position myself and Meghan and I have only mentored 1 to 4 people at a time so this group is rather large for us. We had a jam packed day and we were really worried about overwhelming or scaring off our new teachers with the list of expectations. We tried to make the day as interactive and fun as possible while also being informative and clear of what we needed from them! We started our day using Today's Meet to follow up from their county wide orientation the previous two days! I blogged about it awhile back if you want to check it out over here. It was a big hit and Meghan and I have all of their comments from the day right here which is a great take away for us to be able to reflect on the day and follow up on anything they mentioned throughout the day! I was so happy with the amount of teachers who were excited to take back QR Codes and implement them in their classroom! We plan to use Today's Meet at other faculty meetings and definitely tech trainings. Next we did an ice breaker with candy (for each piece of candy you took you had to tell about yourself) which was a great way to get to know everyone. It is so fun hearing what people have to say about themselves, we have one lady who described herself as Martha Stewart but in brown and she just cracked us all up. We have a funny, articulate and very talented group! After that we got down and dirty with expectations which is where we saw the panic begin! We tried to cruise through this and then hit the lab for some tech things. They had 2 hours for lunch and time in their classroom. Our AP treated us all to lunch with a panini bar and her as the chef in the lounge. It was a great time for everyone to relax and chat. After lunch the AP talked to everyone about evaluations and a few other admin things. For the best part of the day we sent the mentees on a QR Code scavenger hunt around the building to find key people and places! They were SO into it and some were even running from place to place with excitement. We closed up the day chatting about our meetings, brainstorming first week ideas and reflecting on the day again with Today's Meet! So many of the teachers thanked us for a great day and were very appreciative which made us feel really good.

We have such a range of newbies  and I am so thrilled to welcome each and every one of them to our family. They all have great personalities, are filled with enthusiasm, have open minds and are willing to learn. They come from many different backgrounds and levels of experiences. I had such a great day and before I knew it it was 4:00. I was sitting in my room decompressing from being "on" all day and then I realized that these 12 teachers are my new babies... and that the teacher's of my school are my babies. I think I will be ok with being THEIR Ms. Miner! I know it won't be the same but it will be a different kind of awesome and I will be learning just as much from them as I hope that they can learn from me!

Do you believe in me?

I spent the day at a middle school leadership conference and the rest of the evening working on our new teacher school based orientation! In the past two weeks I have felt excited about getting the 2012-2013 year started but also overwhelmed, stressed and exhausted (school hasn't even started)! I know this isn't exactly technology but stick with me!

While preparing for the newbies we are trying to overwhelm them as little as possible and offer inspiration! As I was surfing YouTube.com, an amazing technology tool I found these some awesome videos that remind me WHY I am a teacher, WHY I love teaching and WHY I support new educators despite the never ending to-do list, the lack of pay and respect, the stress, the sleepless nights, etc. etc. etc. . This was one of my favorites but I also love What Teachers Make and The Story of Starfish.

So, YouTube isn't the most tech-savvy tool that I can show you today tonight (yawn) BUT I think it has a lot of value if used properly! How have YOU used YouTube in your classroom? I think this is also a reminder that technology doesn't always have to have bells and whistles or be extremely difficult to use.

Monday Made It

Happy Monday Friends! My head is spinning in so many different directions that I don't even know where to begin! I went to an ITRT professional development on Thursday, a mentor training today so I haven't been in my room and I feel like my to-do list is never ending! In between checking off boxes on my to-do list I wanted to be sure to post for my first Monday Made It Linky Party with Tara over at 4th Grade Frolics!

So if you have been blog stalking you know that I am moving positions this year from 1st grade classroom teacher to ITRT (instructional technology resource teacher)! While being an "internet zombie" which is what my husband now calls me I found an awesome pin that linked to a keyboard inspire monogram! With my last name changing I thought this was a perfect opportunity to put it on display AND how cute is it? My new last name is Jones and it is going to be a big change for the teachers and students.

I found a broken keyboard to take apart and bought a shadow box from Michael's!  Did you know that Michael's has an app you can download and get coupons right on your phone? They also offer an educator discount when you present your school badge! Just a side note!

First, I pried the keys off with a small pair of scissors. I thought it would be cute to spell out my name and some how incorporate my wedding date in the "J" so I quickly started to find letters. I also added RM. 129 and the ctrl key above it! At first glance you may not notice these small touches but I know they are there! It took me awhile playing around with the size and shape of the J but I finally got it perfect.

I incorporated my black and white theme by adding a strip of ribbon across the bottom! I am using yellow as my main accent color but pink is really my favorite so I used a hot pink piece of card stock as the background (left over from wedding crafts). One of the hardest parts was deciding on a font for "Mrs. Jones." I recently became obsessed with downloading fonts! I would say that I have become a font hoarder and can add it to the list of my additions!

Once I got all the pieces in place which took a lot of patience (they were like Dominoes) I started the hot glue process! I have a love hate relationship with the hot glue gun because it has the potential to be so amazing BUT once you put your piece in place you better hope it's where you want it! It looks awesome hanging outside of my new room!

One of the many *hats* I wear at school is being a lead mentor! This is something that I love doing. I am very passionate about supporting new educators! I found tons of "Survival Kits" for new teachers that I tweaked from Pinterest so make this one my own! (Alex, pretend to be surprised because I know you will be reading this)! I picked 15 different things that I found at the Dollar Store, Walmart or Target and added a little positive note or representation for each! I put all the items in a red, white and blue party bag and can't wait to give them to our newbies on our first day together! I have the Word document if you are interested in it, just leave a comment and I am happy to share.

Happy Monday Made It Friends! Thanks for checking out my blog and I hope you will become my newest follower if you are looking for technology tips throughout the year! If there is something specific you have a question about or are looking for just let me know!

QR Codes

Last year I became obsessed with QR Codes in the classroom! They have the potential to do SOOO many different things and my kids loved using them! The engagement level was insane and I looked for every possible way to integrate them into 1st grade curriculum and can't wait to use them in the lab this year.

I'm sure you have seen them EVERYWHERE! They look like this ------------>

A QR Code is actually short for a quick response code! All you need is an iPod, iPad, tablet or smart phone with a QR Scanner app. There are tons of apps but I prefer QRafter for iPod/iPad and QR Droid for my smart phone. It is pretty much a point and scan to bring up whatever is behind the QR Code. Go ahead scan it, you know you want to!!! There is a message waiting just for YOU (and Alex) just click the link! Don't forget to click the word SMILE to brighten your day too!

There are also TONS of generator sites that are so user friendly and simple. Basically you can link ANYTHING to a QR Code (text, pictures, email addresses, websites, maps, phone numbers, you get the point, etc. etc. etc.). I really loved QR Stuff to make basic QR Codes with text or websites but QR Code Maker allows you too add pictures or files which is awesome. There are millions of other sites just Google QR Code generator! Some have the possibility of changing shape, color and even adding a picture in the middle. They are so easy to copy and paste into a Microsoft Word document or even a SMART Notebook file or you can print several at a time on labels!

One of the *many* hats I wear at work is co-lead mentor with my PIC (partner in crime), Meghan! As we were preparing for our new staff orientation (we have 12 new teachers, yes you read that right, 12 new) we decided to integrate QR Codes into our day with a scavenger hunt to get the teachers acquainted with the building. How fun, right? I cannot wait to teach the newbies about QR Codes and show them just how fun and easy they are if they haven't already explored with them. The scavenger hunt goes to 15 different key places in the building with a funny, witty, lame rhyme clue and they have to take a silly picture at each place to prove they were there! Now this is just ONE professional development way to use QR Codes.

Kids LOVE scavenger hunts and QR Codes are a great way to design a hunt, self-checking worksheets or activites, questions in a book to promote reading comprehension, learn more about places on a map, the list goes on and on and on. How have you used QR Codes in your classroom OR if you haven't before where will you begin using them?