lunedì 31 dicembre 2018
Writing Skills using Storybird.com
The website https://storybird.com/ is an interesting tool online which can be used for enhancing writing skills by using beautiful images.
You can sign up for free and create your content for poems, short stories , long books and picture books.
I happened to use it in February to describe some tasks which I had carried out in an EVO SESSION about CLIL - year 2018 - (1) but it is so powerful for creative writing for language learners . Ideally it is the perfect tool for starting " creative writing" in English with younger students but it can be used with adult learners too.
If you get access to the website you will see that you can find texts for reading https://storybird.com/read/ if you choose create https://storybird.com/create/ you will be given images which you can use to begin writing your text or your poem.
What you have created online and is public can be shared on social networks too, in addition if you want you can also take part in competitions and earn badges.
For educators there are special courses and I am sure that they will be challenging. I might take them to see which interesting tips they suggest for teaching writing.
Here is my short poem for celebrating the arrival of the new year: I just had to choose the image and the words and I created something which any child could do while he/she might be rewarded with a badge for creating another poem.
https://storybird.com/poetry/poem/gz4nye5uxd/
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Tiziana Angiolini
(1) This is the link to my narrative board for CLIL https://storybird.com/books/my-narrative-board-technoclil-2018/?token=zuu87aqkze
The story is not public so it cannot be embedded.
domenica 30 dicembre 2018
Memories from 2018
My favorite memory from 2018 was... pic.twitter.com/CInkSp8JGY— Charlie Brown (@Peanuts_4Fans) 30 dicembre 2018
What I have achieved this year.
I have been thinking about what I have been doing so far.
First of all I have met many educators online and shared with them ideas and learnt a lot. Thanks to the Moocs which I have finished I have become part of an online community of educators living in Europe and in many parts of the world, from the USA to Argentina, Brazil and Australia.
I have learnt how to use some new webtools and I am going to learn more about new ways of learning.
I have tried to widen my horizon and now I am aware of the challenges which I have to face.
I have worked online as an educator with courses for my students ; I have used the LMS Weschool - https://www.weschool.com/ for uploading lessons and sharing materials with them.
Together with the Erasmus Team in my school we are now taking part in the ERASMUS PLUS Project for mobility of teachers which will be followed by a group of teachers who will spend some time abroad to learn about other schools, methodologies and also bettering their English language .
Our mobility Project is online and it is called Reach : in October we presented it to the community in Reggio Emilia http://www.erasmusplus.it/erasmusdays-coffee-break-leggere-leuropa-attraverso-larte-e-il-patrimonio-artistico-e-culturale/
The abstract of the Project is online and it is available also in Italian : https://s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/scuolaonlineservice/chierici/circolari-sos/uploads/2239-Abstract%20REACH-2.pdf
I worked online to learn more about English IGCSE exams which I will have to prepare in my school in 20120; this is something I am worried about as I have never prepared students for this type of exams.
What I need to do to improve
There are many things which I need to improve in my way of working and planning. I need to better my way of dealing with problems in a school which is changing. Families are demanding and sometimes I feel that I am overwhelmed and under pressure.
I will have to deal with Special Education Needs and to cope with the challanges of a school which does not get much financial help.
I feel I am not a giant but I need to bear the burden of preparing students who are not willing to learn.
Right now I am finishing a course online about Flipped Learning and Cooperative Learning on the Italian platform Pearson.
I would like to work online and provide support to my learners. I find that this approach is interesting as it seems to be focussed on the students and provide more engagement in the lessons.
The Italian translation is " Il Metodo Rossi" , the slide is available online IL METODO ROSSI SLIDE
My Hopes for the future
I am willing to continue learning and sharing with other educators and being able to build a better learning environment for my students.
Ready to go on learning !
venerdì 28 dicembre 2018
Commonliterature
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venerdì 21 dicembre 2018
New Skills for interpreting Texts Zanichelli COURSE 2018 Modules 3-4
Module 3 Becoming a Writer ZANICHELLI COURSE 2018
The focus of the module was on communication and creative use of the English Language in a content that had to do also with Literature.
I really liked the activities which were presented as they were focussed on doing and using the Language .
The tools which were suggested are now familiar with me: ADOBE SPARKS, PADLET and NEW GOOGLESITES.
As I am used to working with Padlet and also the new Googlesites I chose ADOBE SPARK for the task in this module.
We were given this interesting PADLET with some ideas shared by educators for using PADLET in the classroom and I am sharing it with you now. Padlet offers just three free boards now so I am not using it anymore but I must admit it has great uses in education.
Here is my creative Task for this module- I thought of Autumn and also some poems I had read about it:
this is the link to the activity which I created in a short time
Module 4
We had to focus on the way we learn and how we teach. We also saw an interesting webinar with Margaret Layton.
The webinar was interactive and made me realize that we can work on some topics related to global issues by using authentic materials and also extracts from modern literature.
The teacher plays an important role in choosing, selecting materials and guiding the learners into reading, reflecting and writing or speaking in English.
Hopefully, I can say that today we have a lot of free resources online which can help us. I am used to social networks like Twitter where I can find articles, videos and images that can help me develop units where learners are guided into learning while they are using English. Images and videos play an important part in the way we try to interact with our learners.
Here is my WAKELET with the resources for this interesting course. I cannot but say that I learnt a lot and will try to put into practice what I have learnt about.
The focus of the module was on communication and creative use of the English Language in a content that had to do also with Literature.
I really liked the activities which were presented as they were focussed on doing and using the Language .
The tools which were suggested are now familiar with me: ADOBE SPARKS, PADLET and NEW GOOGLESITES.
As I am used to working with Padlet and also the new Googlesites I chose ADOBE SPARK for the task in this module.
We were given this interesting PADLET with some ideas shared by educators for using PADLET in the classroom and I am sharing it with you now. Padlet offers just three free boards now so I am not using it anymore but I must admit it has great uses in education.
Here is my creative Task for this module- I thought of Autumn and also some poems I had read about it:
this is the link to the activity which I created in a short time
Module 4
We had to focus on the way we learn and how we teach. We also saw an interesting webinar with Margaret Layton.
The webinar was interactive and made me realize that we can work on some topics related to global issues by using authentic materials and also extracts from modern literature.
The teacher plays an important role in choosing, selecting materials and guiding the learners into reading, reflecting and writing or speaking in English.
Hopefully, I can say that today we have a lot of free resources online which can help us. I am used to social networks like Twitter where I can find articles, videos and images that can help me develop units where learners are guided into learning while they are using English. Images and videos play an important part in the way we try to interact with our learners.
Here is my WAKELET with the resources for this interesting course. I cannot but say that I learnt a lot and will try to put into practice what I have learnt about.
mercoledì 19 dicembre 2018
New Skills for interpreting Texts Zanichelli COURSE 2018 Modules 1-2
I teach in Italy and I have been working with my classes by using some books by Zanichelli.The Italian publisher has worked to implement learning and thousands of educators have been trained online in the last years.
This is my third year with the use of the books published by Zanichelli and I have been learning a lot as the books are supported by online tools and lots of materials both for educators and students.
Currently I am using Performer B1 - the new edition and in the third, fourth and fifth year of the secondary school we have chosen Compact Performer, the book is about English Literature but it offers a lot of links with today's world. http://online.scuola.zanichelli.it/compactperformer/
The books are available online and in print ; educators can rely on many resources for helping learners and providing help and support while learning. Educators can create collections of videos and materials online - Collezioni in Italian- and they also rely on online tools for creating tests.
You can choose the topics and then select exercises from a rich database.
Last winter I could do an interesting course online-New Skills for interpreting Texts-, it was my second course with ZANICHELLI and I really loved the work carried out with us.
I am here to say that I have developed as an educator thanks to them. When I did my first course with them I had not used their books in the cloud, now I can use part of the tasks they have created in the editions of their books as I am using them.
The course which I took in the winter had an interesting title " New Skills for interpreting Texts" and I felt I should do it as teaching reading and literature is a great challenge. My passion is literature and I think that literature can enhance our student's learning. We just need to approach the teaching of literature in a new way.
The Learning Platform was Cloudschool and I really liked working with the other educators as it is user-friendly and everybody can work online in an easy way.
We had to follow 4 modules, we were guided into the Platform by doing Module 0 as an introduction.
Module 0 was focussed on the platform which is offered to teachers in Italy
In Module 1 we were guided to help our learners to become critics: we worked on some simple tools like using adobe acrobat reader and annotating the text in a pdf- this is quite easy and useful.
Here is my task for module 2 : I used Nearpod, which a nice tool ,but I realized that the basic account doesn't offer many activities. You will have to rely on a premium account to have access to many lessons and to use it .
In my next post I will describe modules 3-4.
This is my third year with the use of the books published by Zanichelli and I have been learning a lot as the books are supported by online tools and lots of materials both for educators and students.
Currently I am using Performer B1 - the new edition and in the third, fourth and fifth year of the secondary school we have chosen Compact Performer, the book is about English Literature but it offers a lot of links with today's world. http://online.scuola.zanichelli.it/compactperformer/
The books are available online and in print ; educators can rely on many resources for helping learners and providing help and support while learning. Educators can create collections of videos and materials online - Collezioni in Italian- and they also rely on online tools for creating tests.
You can choose the topics and then select exercises from a rich database.
Last winter I could do an interesting course online-New Skills for interpreting Texts-, it was my second course with ZANICHELLI and I really loved the work carried out with us.
I am here to say that I have developed as an educator thanks to them. When I did my first course with them I had not used their books in the cloud, now I can use part of the tasks they have created in the editions of their books as I am using them.
The course which I took in the winter had an interesting title " New Skills for interpreting Texts" and I felt I should do it as teaching reading and literature is a great challenge. My passion is literature and I think that literature can enhance our student's learning. We just need to approach the teaching of literature in a new way.
The Learning Platform was Cloudschool and I really liked working with the other educators as it is user-friendly and everybody can work online in an easy way.
We had to follow 4 modules, we were guided into the Platform by doing Module 0 as an introduction.
Module 0 was focussed on the platform which is offered to teachers in Italy
HOW TO BECOME A MEMBER OF MYZANICHELLI
RESOURCES ONLINE BOOKTAB
BOOKTAB ZETA AND HOW TO CREATE MAPS
The four modules were focussed on practical activities and how we could work with texts in our lessons:
In Module 1 we were guided to help our learners to become critics: we worked on some simple tools like using adobe acrobat reader and annotating the text in a pdf- this is quite easy and useful.
- Create a pdf document of a text you would like your learners to analyse and use Adobe Reader to annotate the text to show how your students might annotate the document.
Here is the task which I created
I really liked the way you can work on a text and work with comments and brainstorming ideas.
In Module 2 we worked on Feedback: here you can find a collection of activities we worked and shared on Padlet https://padlet.com/zanichellicorso/sharing
In Module 2 we worked on Feedback: here you can find a collection of activities we worked and shared on Padlet https://padlet.com/zanichellicorso/sharing
Here is my task for module 2 : I used Nearpod, which a nice tool ,but I realized that the basic account doesn't offer many activities. You will have to rely on a premium account to have access to many lessons and to use it .
In my next post I will describe modules 3-4.
lunedì 17 dicembre 2018
Merry Xmas and Happy New Year 2019
Christmas (copy) on Biteable.
Just using Biteable to create a video. It is easy and simple!
I wish you all the best for the coming new Year!
martedì 4 dicembre 2018
Dear Santa
Just a few weeks and Christmas is going to come. My great wish is to start living in a better world. However, the real world is getting much worse and it is only a dream to find a better world.
If I had to write a letter to Santa, I would ask him to give everybody some more hope and health , which cannot be bought at the market and online.
School and my students should rely on a better school system as in many cases I feel that it is hard to meet the needs of my learners.
I would like them to be more interested and feeling satisfied with what they are doing and I would like them to rely on themselves.
This is my great dream: everybody should be given a chance to develop and find his /her own way.
Dear Santa help the world to provide better opportunities for everybody.If you happen to visit the place where I am living, I would like you to come to my door and bring us Golden box with positive words and lots of mindfullness to face the difficulties we are facing.
Thanks a lot for reading my letter!
Dear Santa… pic.twitter.com/qVlIp2J3Ws
— PEANUTS (@Snoopy) 3 dicembre 2018
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