Blog Post #10

Almost 2,000 miles away in Moose Jaw, Canada lives Kathy Cassidy, an innovative kindergarten teacher. This week we were invited to see a glimpse of the wonderful things Ms. Cassidy is doing with her students. Some technology that Ms. Cassidy has incorporated into the classroom are;

• Blogs- The students each have a blog in which they write in at least once a week.
• Wikis- The students use this web resource to learn about things. ex). Traditions, Rituals.
• Videos- The students make videos with a small group.
• Skype- The students skype their reading buddies, and also other experts.
• Nintendo DS- The students use games to help them learn.

Ms. Cassidy is definitely a prime example of an educator who has taken technology and is using it to her advantage to help her students learn. She says "kids and technology go hand-in-hand" and therefore it is not benefiting children when you ask them to "unplug" themselves while in the classroom.

Some of the technological ideas that I would consider using in my future classroom that Ms. Cassidy currently uses are:

• Blogs- I love the idea of children using their creative skills and expression to write freely on a blog weekly. I could see that the blogs were fun for the children and they especially loved that people from all over the world commented and viewed their work.

• Videos- I also think having children invest time and their ideas into a project such as a video will help them learn to work together with their peers and therefore this technology is a great idea for the classroom.

• Skype- In my elementary experience I remember having pen pals in another state and I remember how thrilling it was to write and receive letters from these fellow students. I think what Ms. Cassidy has done with the reading buddies is a 21st century equivalent to pen-pals and I think this global outreach is very crucial to a child's development and understanding of the world. 

It seems as though Ms. Cassidy has had few to no problems that she has encountered while incorporating technology in the classroom. The only problems that I think should be of concern in my future classroom is safety, Ms. Cassidy mentioned she instructed the students not to click on the flashy sidebars that advertise all sorts of things while using their educational games but it is inevitable that students will sometimes break the rules and therefore I think by the time I am using computers with my students we will be using a blocker that prevents PG-13 things from popping up or even being accessible.

It is clear that there are endless benfits of using Ms. Cassidy's techniques in the classroom. As I have observed it seems the students are:

• More Engaged.

• Excited to Learn

• Motivated

• HAPPY!