Bienvenidos

Some thoughts about Web 2.0. 

I am learning a lot while taking this course online, and it has taught me that in a very short time  technology makes all of us quickly obsolete if we are not constantly updating our technology skills. 

I would also suggest to somehow pair people up complete to  this online course.  I found myself to be more cofident and relax when I worked with  someone else, not because the material was difficult, but because it is easy to postpone work when it is self paced. Chris and I got together several times and it worked out fine. I also think that the face to face catch up meetings were great. I am glad I attended two of those. The tutorial videos and instructions were great but sometimes a meet could really help people who have technology issues.

As a last thought, I think the graduates of BEST 2008 need to share what they learned with department heads to show the administrators what is being learned and how can it be applied.

I have been checking spanishpod101 often and I found several podcasts created by native speakers and I have download some for me to use later on. I like how they present a dialog only in Spansih and then they repeat it in Spanish and English. Afterwards, they cover the grammar and vocabulary included in the dialog.

This site gives the students a good opportunity to practice listening, grammar and vocabulary. Not evrything is free on the site, but some of the podcasts are!

Tags: Add new tag, http://www.spanishpod101.com/

I enjoyed exploring Ning, and I was excited to see how easy it was to join. 

This social network helped me find out how other teachers are using VoiceThread.  I got some great ideas from it.  I read about a teacher that allows students to ask questions/share ideas through audio comments using VoiceThreat. I thought this was great for parents and students!

Another great find on Ning was a teacher who was looking for other school classes willing to Skype with his class. This gave me the idea to search for members of Ning that teach in Spain, and I found one. After I signed up, I sent him a comment explaining to him that I am looking for teachers in Spain who would like to have their school classes Skype with student in my Spanish classes, and share ideas. I thought that would be a great way to enhance their learning.  What a great idea!

Overall, I think Ning is a great resource.  What a great way to network with other teachers and start up collaboration between classrooms!

I really like this tool!  I had a lot of fun customizing it to be my personal Pageflakes homepage with all the things I need on a daily basis and even some I don’t, just for fun!  I think for my Spanish III and V classrooms I will probably add a favorites flake with links to my favorite educational websites, google, and teacheryoutube.   I will ad spanish news flakes for when I am searching for something specific, and the RSS flakes for whatever topic we are currently studying so that I can add extra information to supplement my lesson plans and encourage class discussion.

I find Google Docs similar to Wikispace, but the first one gives me more options (presentations, spreadsheets and documents can be shared).
Google Docs is an effective tool and I really like the idea of a collaborative piece. Some ideas I have for using this tool in the future are the following:

1. Sign-ups for bringing in supplies or food for Spansih Club meetings.

2. I would love to use Google Docs to create our monthly newsletter in Spanish for Advanced level Spanish students.

3. Google Docs allows me to upload any document (tests, quizzes, vocabulary lists…) that I already have saved in my computer and share it with other people. These people can publish it or just view it. Teachers can upload PowerPoint presentations and allow others to view it.

4. In my Spanish V class, I plan on having students read an article and have them collaborate on a report about that document using Google Docs.

Listen to my podcast!

 

 This is just a test activity. I could not use the headset for the recording so the sound it is not the greatest. I am going to start using evoca from now on to record podcasts for my students.

Here is the video that I selected. Great tool to teach students about the Spanish Explorers. Students can translate from Spanish into English the infromation presented in the video.

Here is my slideshow. All the photos used in the slideshow have been taken by Carmen Adair.

It is amaizing how students become more invested in learning when they are put in charge of the process of  Podcasting. In the middle school I recorded some students saying the list of new Spanish vocabulary and I posted the audio files on the internet. Later on students downloaded the Podcasts from iTunes. They listened on the bus  to school, at home, in the car….

Great way to comunicate with others!

http://www.librarything.com/ can be used to encourage critical thinking in an advanced Spanish class. Students could create a group to post and share their opinions about different books.

I checked out a group on books about Mexico and I though, “What a great idea to have students join and write a post in Spanish since the posts can be made in Spanish or English in that specific group”.

It also can be used to find recommended titles for students on topics such as culture  and traditions in Spansih Speaking Countries, typical foods….