Options

One of the absolutely awesome and yet completely overwhelming things about incorporating technology into my classroom is deciding what technology to use when and for what purpose.

There are just so many options!

One of the main questions I ask myself when I'm trying to decide what tool to use is "What do I want my students to accomplish by doing this?" Do I want them to gain experience with a new tool? Do I want them to collaborate and work on communication? Do I want them to be creative? Do I want them to show me what they learned? etc.

Not that those questions always narrow it down ... but it gets me off to start!

One tool I am excited about using with my kiddos this year is a Wiki (I plan on using wikispaces.com).

Every year my 4th graders do an animal research project. Over the years this has looked a couple different ways ... from a paper, to a diorama, to a persuasive letter ... next year I am thinking a Wiki may be a great solution!

Using a Wiki will get my kids working together. They can collaborate with their partner as well as other groups. It will encourage greatness as they see that their work is out there for the world to see (not just me and their parents!). Creativity will be built as they can include some multimedia - pictures, even a video, of their choice. They will get to learn a new tool (as they probably have not worked on a Wiki before), and they still will definitely be showing me what they learned!

I will use a rubric to grade each student's Wiki page - and I'm not sure *exactly* what that rubric will look like yet. But the effectiveness of the Wiki use will be easy to judge based on my kiddos success and their engagement throughout the project!

I think the kids will absolutely love this new adventure!