This course is designed to help teachers become more tech-savvy and familiar with resources that can greatly enrich their classroom, excite their students, and enhance their productivity. The first two sessions are awareness builders. Session One allows teachers to seek out web-based resources they can use in their lesson planning and builds on the skills the teachers may already have (creating worksheets, building rubrics), but streamlines the process. Session Two introduces teachers to curriculum-based web sites that have high-quality resources they can use in their classrooms immediately. Finally, Session Three helps teachers uncover strategies for integrating technology via articles and model projects.

The goal of The Tech-Savvy Teacher is to leave educators with a working knowledge of what is current and valuable on the Internet as it applies to their teaching and ways in which to integrate that material into their daily planning.

Objectives
Participants will be able to

1. Locate and utilize teacher resources on the Internet.
2. Explore and recognize high-quality Internet sites for classroom use.
3. Understand various strategies to integrate technology in the classroom.

Overview
There are many web sites designed to make teachers’ lives easier. Need to design a rubric for an upcoming project? Visit Rubistar and create a customized rubric, which you can print out and distribute to your class. Want to make a list of web links for your class to use for a research project? Visit PortaPortal or Filamentality to get free web space. Want to create a web page for your classroom, complete with a calendar and homework postings? Go to the Scholastic Home Page Builder. The list goes on. Best of all, these resources are all completely free and easy to use.

There are also free software tutorials on the web, designed with teachers in mind. Have you always wanted to learn PowerPoint so your students could complete presentations? Do you want to learn how to use Excel in a math class? There are resources on the web that can help you accomplish exactly that.

Readings

1. Access the “technical tutorials” section of your How to Use the Internet in Your Classroom CD-ROM. Visit a few of the tutorials listed and choose the ones you feel might be applicable to your classroom work.
2. Visit three of the sites listed. Each is designed as a resource for teachers to help them find new ways to complete familiar tasks, such as grading, creating worksheets, keeping a calendar, designing rubrics, and more. Register for at least one site and make use of it, noting how it may be helpful in your own teaching practice.

Rubistar
http://rubistar.4teachers.org/index.php
A site designed to help teachers compose and customize classroom rubrics

Scholastic Home Page
http://teacher.scholastic.com/homepagebuilder
Allows teachers to create a classroom web page without needing web design skills

Filamentality
http://www.kn.pacbell.com/wired/fil
Provides web space for teachers, designed around online learning activities

Worksheet Wizard
http://wizard.4teachers.org
Helps teachers create classroom worksheets in a step-by-step fashion

Teacher!
http://teacherly.com
A free online grading system for teachers

Assign-a-Day
http://assignaday.4teachers.org
Provides teachers with online calendar space to manage dates and assignments.

PortaPortal
http://www.portaportal.com

Teacher Web WebQuest Wizard
http://teacherweb.com/TWQuest.htm
This site provides teachers with a WebQuest template they can customize for their classroom.

Reflection
What new resources did you discover through this session? What tutorial site did you find most useful? Why? What teacher-helper site did you find most useful? Why? In what ways can you envision using one or more of these sites in your teaching practice? How will they aid in your teaching? How might they help your students?

Overview
There are so many wonderful and educative sites for the classroom on the web but where to look? Usually, teachers learn about great sites through word-of-mouth, professional development sessions, or via exhaustive and time-consuming Google searches. We’ve done the legwork for you here, pointing you in the right direction for resources to use in your planning and research, as well as online activities to use in the classroom with your students. Museums often publish educative resources, so they’re always great places to access online and, more importantly, they have information that is trustworthy and reliable.

For example, see Phillip Seymour's unit on Biodiversity (http://www.teachersnetwork.org/readysettech/seymour/biodiversity1.htm). In it, he uses online resources taken from the American Museum of Natural History’s online web site for kids, Ology (http://ology.amnh.org/biodiversity/globalgrocery/index.html). Phillip uses the site as an in-class resource for his students to learn more about biodiversity. Geraldine Solano’s Kingdoms of Life WebQuest (http://teachersnetwork.org/everywhere/solano/WebquestNew/index.html), uses the Brain Pop web site as part of her students’ task to learn more about the six kingdoms of life (http://www.brainpop.com/science/diversityoflife/sixkingdoms).

Before using a web site in class, check its reading level to make sure your students can comprehend the material presented. Check the links leading from the site to ensure that you’re not leading your students down a wayward path, and check the site for authority: who publishes this site? Is this a web site worthy enough to present to your class?

Readings

1. Access the “Curriculum Resources” section on the How to Use the Internet in Your Classroom CD-ROM. In it, you will find several sections listing high-quality Internet resources for the classroom organized by subject area. Choose a subject area that is most appropriate for you and visit several of the sites listed.
2. Also on the CD-ROM, in the section entitled “Museum Resources,” excellent and educative online experiences are listed which can be used for teachers in their lesson planning as well as directly in the classroom with students as online activities. Choose three of the museum sites to visit, and familiarize yourself with the curricular resources they offer.
3. The CD-ROM also contains student-centered resources listed by grade level: elementary, middle, and high school. Choose the grade level most appropriate for you and visit the sites listed.

Reflection
What are some criteria for deciding that a web site is “high quality” and appropriate for the classroom? In what ways may one of these sites complement a unit of learning for your classroom? Choose one of the sites you visited and explain how you would integrate it into a classroom unit or project that you normally teach.

Overview
Now that you have some quality web resources bookmarked, how can you best put them to use in the classroom? How does the classroom change when you bring technology to your students? What are some practical strategies you can use when planning your Internet-infused lessons?

On both our web site, www.teachersnetwork.org, and our How to Use the Internet in Your Classroom CD-ROM, you will be able to access several model projects created by other teachers who have become expert at using technology in the classroom. The “How to” section of our web site contains many articles on technology integration, all written by fellow educators. This section contains help on a range of topics, from the basics (the parts of a computer) to setting up a complete online classroom to creating your own WebQuest. No matter what your comfort level is with technology, there is an article in this section that applies to you, and contains helpful step-by-step tips that allow you to try out a strategy on your own.

Readings

1. Visit the Teachers Network web site and access the “How to: Incorporate Technology in the Classroom” page (http://teachersnetwork.org/NTNY/nychelp/technology.htm). Choose three articles that are of particular interest to you, and read them.
2. Locate the three teacher videos on the How to Use the Internet in Your Classroom CD-ROM, in the “Classroom Management” section. The videos feature an elementary school teacher, a middle school teacher, and a high school teacher. Each of these teachers illustrates a different, but exemplary, method for integrating technology into the classroom. View the teacher video that is most appropriate for your own grade level. Read the accompanying articles written by that teacher.
3. Read Chapter One of the How to Use the Internet in Your Classroom book, “How to Manage the New Media Classroom.”

Reflection
How does the teacher in the video you watched integrate technology in the classroom? What strategies are employed? What accommodations would you need to make in your own classroom to include technology as a regular part of instruction?

Teachers Network’s “How to Use Technology to Reinforce Instruction” page
http://teachersnetwork.org/ntol/howto/incorptech/index.htm
This area of the Teachers Network web site features teacher-written articles about using technology as a tool to expand the curriculum.

Dr. Sheila Gersh’s site, Teaching with the Internet
http://www.schoollink.org/twin
Dr. Gersh, a world-renowned expert on teaching with technology, has amassed a long and useful list of web sites pertinent to teachers.

Teachnet
http://www.teachersnetwork.org/teachnet
This page contains over 600 teacher-created projects, all incorporating the Internet. Choose a project by subject area and grade level, and get inspiration for your own classroom.

The Top 101 Web Sites for Teachers
http://www.assortedstuff.com/top101
This site, created by a teacher in Fairfax County, VA, is an annotated list of the best on the web for teachers, updated yearly,

Sandy Scragg’s Teacher Training Site
http://www.sandyscragg.com/training
Created by a technology specialist in New York City, this site has links to curriculum resources, tutorials, teacher projects, and more.