I just started a new project in my fifth grade classroom. One group of students was given a list of spelling/ vocabulary words for a future week. They were given the assignment of recording the correct spelling, definition, part of speech, using it in a sentence and the word in Arabic (which all of my children speak or are learning). The finished recording will at first be burned to cds for students to listen to in class or borrow. Eventually I may have the recordings made into a podcast available for downloading. This in someways will depend on my students home computer situations.

Monday: It was interesting today watching the students work at finding the definitions and asking our para professional for translating help.

Wednesday: They started recording today. I think they enjoyed recording the introduction. Tomorrow is a short day so they’ll start recording their individual pieces.

Thursday: They finished recording all of their spelling words… one word at a time. Since I’m relatively new to sound editing, I’ll have to try and see what I can make of it. There are some minor mistakes to fix.

Friday: Downloaded some Podsafe music to add to the intro. It took a little while getting used to Audacity. Is there an easier editor for students to use?

The second week went much smoother. The students learned to leave a bit of space between words and we added a new feature, the question of the week. We will soon record an intro for that segment.

Groups will alternate so that all students get a chance to participate.

So what do you think?

UPDATE: I continue with this project and I hope to expand it to include the students creating their own podcasts.

Suppose you could start with a clean slate.

What software/hardware would you have in a K-5 classroom?

What sorts of web tools would you recommend?

What if there was no lab to use? How would that change things?

I am looking for ideas to implement at my school. We have Inspiration, Microsoft Office, and Kid Pix. I am looking for other tools that I have not thought of.

Recently I have been using my Monday morning commute (and occasional afternoon) as an opportunity to listen to podcasts about educational topics that interest me. This time is easiest for me as I am relatively free of distractions (other than traffic).

Two podcasts of interest this week were from the TED talks website. The first was Sir Ken Robinson’s talk about education and the second was from Burt Rutan talking about space exploration. These seemingly random choices started with reading about why Math and Science Education are bad in the US from Creating Passionate Users which provided the link to Sir Ken Robinson’s presentation and continued when I subscribed to the TED Talks podcasts and discovered the Burt Rutan podcast Burt Rutan is an aviation and space pioneer. Space exploration is an interest of mine as I had followed the X-Prize competition last year.

Both podcasts mentioned mistakes. In both talks they mentioned that our society has grown to discourage mistakes and that this has resulted in a loss of creativity and innovation. In space travel there has been little in the way of innovation when compared to the initial innovations and creativity that occured when aviation was new (1908). In the field of education there has been little innovation in classroom education. What’s the common factor?

Both the space industry and education have been controlled by the government.

While government oversight is necessary to help insure an educated society, more local control and innovation is needed to help prepare our students for the world they will work in. Perhaps there needs to be an X-Prize sort of competition for classroom innovation.

What do you think?