Twitter Teaching

Here is a great article that gives 100 ways to teach using Twitter:

http://www.diigo.com/annotated/83ed37d7fdce95c38312e00622488369

It is good for all levels of teaching. ENjoy!

New Blog

Here's a cool blog I thought I might use to teach my students about French Culture. This blog writer even made her blog into a book! http://www.french-word-a-day.com/

Wiki

I just thought that with my wiki I could have my students collaborate on their country project. I have 3 8th grade classes and each class is collaborating on 1 country. They each have a part to contribute about the country (music, attire, fast facts, culture etc.). I am having them all bring the info in, but I think it would be better managed if they all just contributed to the wiki! I got this idea viewing Sara L.'s blog while I was leaving her a comment. Woo-hoo!

My wiki

http://weberfrenchclass.wetpaint.com/?WPC-action=invite

This is a link to my wiki. This is a complete work in progress and I really need to start thinking about what my students can post/contribute to the site. Maybe they could do their own quizlet sets and post them on there? Or resources they find?

My wiki is called, "Mlle Weber's French Class" and has games, reading and study tips to help learn a foreign language (French). My hope is to have my students use what is given to them and continue on at home to work on their own.

If you have any ideas of how my students could contribute more, PLEASE let me know!

The Open Road

After a long day at work: parent complaints, data meeting, confusing papers and CMT testing, I was at my end. Not to mention some grocery shopping on top of that and the slowest drivers on the road. When I got home, I just turned to my boyfriend and told him we should take our bikes out. The weather was a tad nippy, but still warm enough to log my first 7 miles ever on a motorcylce. there was just something about riding that put me at ease and made my day all the better. Can't wait for more Spring days ahead and more riding! :)

Technology

I just came up with a bright idea: a technology day! I think that staff should have one day a week to focus on technology. This could be as simple as a half day every Wednesday to allow teachers to catch up on technology. This could be as simple as sorting out e-mails or looking at their RSS feeds to catch up. This could also be a time to introduce new technologies and ideas into the classroom. Or, even better, a time to teach the older generation just how useful their computers are if they used them more often! What do you guys think?

Create an Avitar!! Use it in your classroom

Get a Voki now!



Hopefully this embedded link works! Go to http://www.voki.com/ to create your own. You can even have the students in your class create a play using these avitars!!

Using a bookmarking site

This is by far one of the most useful creations yet: a community bookmarking site. The one that I use is delicious and it is FREE. On this site you can put in all of your bookmarks, and then you will be able to retrieve them from anywhere, anytime. Yes, you heard right, you can save bookmarks at home and see them at school (and vice versa). This saves you from having to e-mail the site to yourself, or write it down for future use. I LOVE IT!

you can also use diigo. These two sites also allow you to find other people who might have the same types of bookmarks, or TAGS that you do. Then, you can "take" their tags and add them to your collection!

Just thought all of you should know to save time for yourselves. :)

Vacation

What is it about vacation? If you do something exciting, like take a trip, you are exhausted when you get back. Then, you end up needing a vacation from your vacation. but, if you do nothing, then you feel like you have wasted time.

The worst part about vacation is the 2 weeks leading up to it when the kids are all amped up and you are just counting down the minutes!

But, by far, the worst thing is when there is a 3 day week-end and the 4 day work week DRAGS ON FOREVER!

Another Day

OK, since I'm forced to write and it's Valentine's day, what better topic do we have than the holiday itself? I would have to say that I have had many different types of Valentines days: the fancy dinner, the lay low, the ignored one, the lonely one, the one you spend with your parents as a kid and so on. But, I would have to say today was one of the best Valentine's days yet. Other than the lonely Valentine's day, it was all of them wrapped up into one. I was with family, my significant other, we had a nice home cooked meal and we really didn't make it about Valentine's Day. It was just a nice family dinner with little boxes of Valentine's Day candies. I also got to sleep in until 11 too, so that wasn't so bad!

Anyone else?

Resources for French

Below I have a few resources for the French teacher to use to enhance lessons:

Here is a site where you can find French Realia (newspaper ads etc.)

http://www.makro.be/Content/promoties/folders/2/index.jsp

Soccer Lingua (Bring the excitement of France's #1 sport to your classroom:

http://www.soccerlingua.net/

Madame Fifi's creative french lessons:

http://www.madamefifi.com/pages/main.htm

Adopt an escargot (bring the fun of snails into your classroom to inspire the creativity of your students):

http://www.adoptanescargot.com/

French Rhyming Dictionary:

http://www.yourdictionary.com/dictionary-articles/French-Rhyming-Dictionary.html