Week 13rsion of treasu

Hey all,
This week I want to tell you about one graet site I found and the varied use of QR codes.
The site that I'm talking about is called Tools for Educators and what is so great about it is that it links to a veriety of teaching tools for educators that help in teaching writing, reading, vocabulary, listening etc.
I would definitely use many of the offered tools in my classroom. For example, if you want to teach vocabulary for development purposes or as pre-reading stage, you can use The Free Word Search Maker after teaching the vocabulry and create a cool word search where the glossary is not the words themselves but pictures or texts that get the students to think on the words and learn much better and much faster!
If you want to work on reading and spelling you can use the Spelling Worksheet Maker and Reading Sheet Wizard to make spelling worksheets where students select the correct spelling of words or have the students write the correct spelling. It's recommended to use this tool in the pre-reading stage to help your students improve their spelling and by that their reading to come!
If you want to test your students to improve their listening comprehension skills you can use Free Listening Test Worksheet Makers and choose from 5 different styles to create listening worksheets with images! 
And these are only few example out of the abundance of offered tools in this amazing site. Be sure to visit it!!
Now, as I promised,I want to talk to you about QR codes. Briefly, in case some of you are not familiar with the codes - they are coded pictures that can be recognized and decoded by your smartphones (for more information go to QR codes). Regarding education we can use them in the classroom in many ways, such as decoding the answers in a vocabulary exercise where the students can check themselves in a fun way or if we teach reading (and listening) the code could be attached to the text and lead the students to an audio file in their phones where they can listen to the text. Another way is when you have your students work on their pronunciation you can make a worksheet with words where each word had a QR code that leads to an audio file with the correct pronunciation! these ways are all fun and engaging!!!
Lastly, I want to share with you a way to use QR codes that my students thought of!! This year I guided a group of nine graders through their social involvement project. They had to find a way to make the experience of visitors to the Eretz Israel Museum in Tel Aviv much more exiting than is today. They finally came out with a plan to have a version of treasure hunt in the museum's area where the visitors compete with each other on who will find all the information and clues needed to solve the mystery of a missing object stolen by one of the museum's guards. In order to answer the riddles one has to learn and investigate through the exhibits found in the museum. That is the educational value of the game. To engage the young audience my students used QR codes. This way, a player who finds the code hidden in every station gets the riddle and information directly to his/her smartphone!! You have to admit that it's briliant!! Visiting the museum is less boring for teenagers and they actually learn something!
Hope I gave you some good advice,
Enjoy!

Week 10

Hey all,
This week is all about research tools I think you should use. We're all familiar with the regular search engines that help us get the information we look for on the internet. They are helpful to a certain extent. What happens when we try to find specific information or specific research regarding educational issues and we want to get reliable sources? We often find ourselves wasting precious time reading irrelevant and unreliable materials. What happens when we want to engage our elementary and junior high school students with information and definitions of terms and we find that most encyclopedias like Wikipedia are written in a language level that doesn't suit or accommodate our students' level?
These questions led me to search for research tools that deal with these problems.
The first one I found is Simple English Wikipedia . I wasn't aware that there's another version to Wikipedia that engages elementary and junior high junior students in the level of language they can read and understand. When your students feel they can actually retrieve information and get knowledge from Wikipedia they get more competent and motivated in the English environment. Be sure to try it out!!
Looking for a specific/reliable source related to your discipline? Researches or essays that are peer reviewed by scholars? Go straight to Google Scholar. With the help of this tool you get access to academic materials you look for to explore more and expend your professional knowledge.
Last but not least is a link to a site called Noodletools . Here you will find a guide for using the appropriate research tool to your specific needs each and every time you search for information. For example, if you need to refine and narrow your topic Noodletools directs you to use iSeek Education and explains exactly how the tool is being used (you ask a question or search a topic in this database of "trusted resources" - use "targets" to refine search).
Have fun!!!

Week 6

Hey all,

This week I would like to share with you 5 amazing tools to work on and improve your students' speaking and writing skills. Debating or Brainstorming ideas in the classroom? Talking on-line with classrooms around the world or working together on a shared document? Improving writing skills through working on Spelling? You've come to the right place!!

We all strive to teach our students problem solving skills. Having them debate on issues concerning their interests is a great way to do that, and at the same time it improves their speaking skills as well. Check out this link IDEBATE that provides you with plenty of topics to discuss and each one of them offers for and against arguments for the students to use. Now, the fun part is to get them speak out, present and defend their arguments in front of the class!!!

Brainstorming is another great way to generate a fruitful discussion around different topics. It teaches the students how to aproach a problem from different aspects. It involves speaking and writing skills. I teach a lot as way to grapically organize their thoughts. Use WiseMapping and teach your students how to use it too. You can easily insert your topic, chose a template or create your own, and then fill in your associations. You can ass icons, links, notes etc. It's very user-friendly and your students would love the resaults!!

Now, there's no better way to work on speaking skills than actually speak to another person, so why not a whole class? When I taught in Tichonet we had a weekly lesson that was all about talking with another classroom on-line. Every week we had this session with a different class from different location. China, Belgium, Estonia and more. How? It's easy!! Use VoiceChat  to have great conference chats. The students get to talk to other students of their age from different parts of the world!! You .just have to get in touch with fellow teachers around the globe, share a link and get to business!

What about working together on a document on-line. It sure helps with writing. Let your students work together simultaneously on a text, presentation or any type of writing oriented project via GoogleDocs . They will have to enter with their google acount and that's it! They can work on a shared document and each students would contribute his/her part. When you split the work you actually get them to work ;) I did it all the time in Tichonet!!

Last but not least is SpellingCity . It's a tool to improve writing skills through games and a lot of fun!!

All you have to do is insert your word list and you're ready to go!! Much like Quizlet the games will use your words to get your students practice their spelling in a way that motivates them to do so!!

'till next time...

Peace, y'all

Week 4

Hey guys,

Hope you had a great week. This week is all about Graphics and Visuals.

How can we use them to our benefit as teachers and what do our students know on how to find, work with and generally use them. It's widely spread that a picture is worth a thousand words. This is, of course, a saying/cliche that refers to the idea that complex stories can be described with just a single still image, or that an image may be more influential than a substantial amount of text. Therefore, there is an abondance of opportonities in using Graphics and Visuals. It can help you easily teach vocabulary and get your students more engaged (as it is more appealing), for example. It can help your students create better presentations and evolve creatively. You can use pictures to get your students to write what they see and much more...

I advise you to read this very interesting article on how images and pictures with text appear all around us. It suggests that every student can  find them in his daily landscape and we can ask them to bring examples of such that have problematic grammar issues. What a great idea!!! This will help them practice their meta-linguistic knowledge!!

My tips are for you as teachers but I advise you to share them with your students, so they would use them too...

Having trouble finding pictures or images on the web? Most of us know how to use Google Pictures but Scribds makes it a lot easier for us teachers to find complete sets of them related to specific vocabulary.

Want to add something to a picture you find or make your own image? MS Paint could really come in handy! You already have it on Windows so why are you wasting time? Watch this here to learn all about it!!! 

Want to go to the next level? Make your own cartoons? My fellow blogger Shuki Sela told me about a great website by the name of Toondoo.   

Finally, there's Photofunia. I've encountered it a few times reading other blogs. It's fun for sure to play with pictures, but no-one has given me an idea on how to implement it in class, so I've decided to leave it here for you... Who would pick up the gauntlet??

Week 3

Hey all,

This week I found out about many interesting tools.

I chose to use tools that I haven't used before.

I am going to teach a lesson to 11th graders next week.

It is a reading activity and as pre-reading activities I figured Quizlet and Crossword Puzzle Maker

could help me teach the vocabulary needed for the text in fun and easy ways.

As you can see in this link https://quizlet.com/129182918/do-vegetarians-kill-more-animals-than-meat-eaters-flash-cards/

Quizlet is very easy to handle. It finds the pictures for you and enables the students to practice the vocabulary in various fun ways such as flashcards,speller, test etc.

I also used the Crossword Puzzle Maker as can be seen here http://worksheets.theteacherscorner.net/make-your-own/crossword/crossword.php

to further instill the vocabulary to my students.

Both activities turned out to be easy to create and fun and engaging for my students!!!

Along other Apps I've encountered the Text Compactor  and I really can't wait to find
an opportunity to use it in class. It helps you summarize texts in seconds!!
I strongly recommend you to use them... I sure will!

I follow these blogs

Hey guys,

This week I want to tell you about 3 interesting Technology in Education blogs I've decided to follow. I will cover them weekly, and let you know of any new and innovative tools, techniques or ideas bloggers share in them. I also advise you to follow them yourself as I truly feel they can enrich your knowledge and open your minds to new and intriguing ideas.

Now, the first blog I want to talk about is called BYOT Network and it's all about Bringing Your Own Thinking (BYOT). The goal is to get your students engaged with the lesson by letting them choose from a variety of sources. Although the blog is not about specific technological tools, reading this blog is a MUST. The blog will guide you in details towards designing your classroom to fit and accommodate the environment needed for meaningful learning. How to provoke critical thinking, What are the qualities of choice and How to provide choice, How important it is to encourage creativity, and moreover - How the integration of technology will benefit this factors. Read the latest post on confidence-for-personalized-learning to learn about the importance of building confidence and trust between teachers and students in the era of technological abundance. I can't wait to put these ideas in practice!!!

The second blog I recommend is called Class Tech Integrate. The is written and updated by elementary school educator Mickey McFetridge who has made waves with his platform how-tos. This guy will tell you all about what actually works in the classroom and is worth using. Furthermore, he will guide you how to easily use this technology yourself. His latest posts are about Accessing free eBooks with Open eBooks, My Maps in Google Drive: Create Interactive Maps and Student Response Tools for the Digital Classroom. The last mentioned introduced me to 4 unfamiliar apps : Answer Garden - that allows a teacher to ask a single question and makes a word cloud out of student responses, Nearpod - that allows the teacher to control what is on the screens of the students via WiFi, Poll Everywhere - that shows real time results in a bar graph on the teacher dashboard, and Socrative - which is an excellent site/app for giving tests/quizzes to students. All of these ideas are great and sure worth a try. I believe that Nearpod and My Maps would greatly assist the learning as well as the general fun!The last blog I want to introduce to you is called Edutech for Teachers where Educational technology specialist Jamie Forshey brings some color to the world of classroom technology solutions. The blog is colorful and inviting. It offers, for example, 16 Edtech Tools to Check for Student Understanding or how to Spark Creativity with the Plot Generator on its latest posts. I find the last one very intersting. It allows you to stimulate creativity for writing projects and/or to motivate reluctant or struggling writers. I would definitely use it in my classroom. Whether my students are going to write short story, film script or novel in the near future, the Plot Generator will help them do so with its varied features!!

That's all for today,

See you next week.

about me

Hi,

My name is Yehuda Elbocher and I'm 33 years old. I'm a third year student at Levinsky College. 

I'm married to Vered and we have an adorable one year old boy named Yoel.

We live in Holon with our two dogs - Jackie and Lulu. 

I work as a private teacher, teaching Math, English and Language (Lashon).

I've practiced teaching in 3 different schools so far and it's fair to say that today's generation is very different than my generation in the way of learning as well as for its interests and abilities regarding technology and its use. Therefore, I feel that it's necessary for us as educators to update our teaching methods and adjust them to this generation's needs. This change, obviously has to do a great deal with bringing the use of technology to the front stage and make the best of it.

However, this course is not the first one I have as a student in Levinsky regarding that subject.

I have had at least four of them by now and also had the opportunity to practice teaching in a school that is considered the cutting edge of technology use in the classroom.

That being said, I hope this course will add meaningful insights and ideas to my arsenal.