Using Computers for Daily 5

Last night's #ellchat on twitter was focused on using technology to teach English Language Learners, which encouraged me to write a blogpost on how we can use technology in the Daily 5.

Thanks to www.donorschoose.org I will have SEVEN netbooks in my classroom next year. When I introduce a new website in class I tend to use the computer lab or the computer on wheels to make sure everyone understands how to use the different sites.

My plan is to have the computers be a different Daily 5 choice each week. When I first started to gather resources I thought that I would list them all here, however there a bunch of teachers who have already gathered resources together. There was no reason for me to try and recreate their hard work! You will find their sites at the bottom of this post.

I am going to have my students use this website I created to easily navigate computer choices:

https://sites.google.com/site/daily5choices/. I think that I will have this page be on our bookmark bar, or maybe even change the homepage to the choice for that week.

It is my suggestion that if you have a site for the kids, you keep a list of ALL the amazing resources somewhere else. At the beginning of the year kids need fewer choices and it'd be great to keep the choices rotating throughout the year.

There are two sites I would like to highlight. The first is www.raz-kids.com (subscription is about $80 a year, I got a 3 year subscription through Donorschoose: Raz-Kids project). This site can be used for read to self, read to someone (students can record themselves reading) or listen to reading! My students really enjoyed Raz-Kids and it kept them engaged in reading in a different way.

The second is www.wikispaces.com (we journaled about our caterpillars: http://passagespaintedladies.wikispaces.com/). This upcoming year we are going to keep a wiki to document what we learn in each unit. Laura (@komos72) has spiral notebooks in her room that students use for work on writing. They have different topics like sports or getting hurt--all students contribute to the same notebook. I love this idea and think it could be easily translated to the wiki.

Resources:

Crista Anderson (@cristama)'s awesome Livebinder

Jill Fisch (@jillfisch)'s resources

Susie Goneau (@suser1)'s wiki page

Barbara Day (@BarbaraDay) suggested Spelling City

Laura (@komos72) has used kidblog for blogging as a work on writing option

And just about everyone suggested Tumblebooks (check to see if your local library has a subscription)

How do your students use the computer during Daily 5?

What is your number one resource on the internet for students?