Lori the workshops were wonderful. Fortunately I was able to attend all three. I walked away from each one with numerous ideas to use in my classroom. I am hoping to use the slideshow and movie making throughout the school year. I learned many things about the Smartboard for future lessons and activities. The possibilities are endless! I never knew there was so much. I have enjoyed searching through the variety of sites that you gave us for lesson ideas and ways to enrich learning for our students. Each workshop was full of ideas that I will use in the upcoming school year.

Thanks a bunch!
Karla Tyler

Lori,
I was very happy to attend two of the three workshops you gave. After eight years of being home with our children, I needed to be enlightened by the outside world!! I learned so much in the two days. I plan to use the slide show with pictures that I take throughout the year for parents to get a view of what goes on in the classroom. As a stay home mom, I treasured pictures of what my children do when I am not there and what I miss. I also loved all the websites that you gave us for future references. They are always helpful. I am also a big scapbooker, so I plan to use the "smilebox" for projects. I think parents would buy them for keepsakes as well. Now I am also going to have to get a flip video camera!! That was amazing and how easy that will be to use in the classroom to film presentations and send them to parents. Even I could download them! I look forward to getting in my classroom and using the smartboard . I think it is a great way to introduce and capture students attention for a new topic or subject. Thanks for all your hard work Lori! It was awesome. Donna Reid

I always sign up for Lori's workshops because I know I will always come away from these workshops learning at least two to three new things. I was not disappointed. Even though Lori touted July 1st as a beginning workshop, I learned some new sites. I really enjoyed the different websites where you could house pictures and create powerpoints and books. My wheels immediately started turning about uses for it in my classroom. I will utilize the Mixbook website for my class when they are creating their writing portfolios. With the new added laptops and technology in the classroom this year, I see my kids really getting into writing and wanting to write more. This will be also beneficial for keyboarding and general computer use. I really think it will be a beneficial for the reluctant writers using technology and get them interested in the process.

One other technology tidbit I will definitely use is the Google Earth for location tours. I am a Social Studies teacher and have used Google Earth in the class, but I don't feel I have used it effectively. It has been thrown in here and there when we talk about certain countries. Now after the workshop, I now feel that Google Earth can be used effectively with my map id each week. I can create tours for each week and really incorporate some background knowledge and learning to really make those features for meaningful. Students can even create Google tours for locations and projects to show in the classroom.

There were a bunch of other items that were shown that would be easily incorporated into the classroom. I will always go to Lori's workshops when they are offered because they are good refreshers and I always learn something new that can be easily incorporated in any class. Thanks Lori!!

I love attending Lori’s workshops. I always come away inspired with many great ideas. I am also a fan of www.lorislatestlinks.blogspot.com. Summer Sandbox was full of great technology ideas I look forward to implementing in my classroom this year. With new knowledge about Google Earth, I plan to use it to display the ocean floor in science and to record literature tours. I set up an account with Yodio and may try to use podcasting with my class. I recently purchased a flip video to use in my classroom and would also like to experiment with using Movie Maker. I will definitely be taking more pictures and videos of my students, lessons, and class activities. I will now be able to easily share pictures, videos, and classroom information with parents, as the new school fusion web page will be helpful in communicating with students and their families. We reviewed all the great tools we have available to create engaging, interactive lessons with Smart Board software that I will continue to implement. Also, I always find it helpful to search the numerous web sites Lori shares with us to get lesson ideas. I thoroughly enjoy going to Lori’s workshops to learn, review, and be inspired. Thank you, Lori!

Susan Carter

Loved your workshops as always, Lori. My reflection is on the front page...sorry if I did it wrong. Paula

Lori....thank you for your expertise and willingness to share with us during the Summer Sandbox workshops.

The ideas/reflections listed below are those I plan to integrate with kindergarten/first grade children:

*Slideshows as an"anchor-hook"; or an introduction or culmination to a unit.
*Present the "Student of the Week" or special projects through the use of Slideshows.
*Create student-written books ("I Like..." "It Looked Like....." "A is for....) using Slideshows.
*Present information for parents at Meet Your Teacher events..."All I Ever Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten", "The ABC's of Kindergarten", etc.

Young children love animals and love to learn about animals.....information researched (Trash and Treasure method) could be presented in PowerPoint...complete with student narration and mood-setting, background music!

Wordle----possibly an engaging way to present science/social studies/math vocabulary or spelling words.

Podcasting---great for "back to school greeting" on profile page. Podcast/Vodcast "Reader's Chair" throughout the year. Attempt one for each student at the beginning, middle, and end of the year.

Movie Maker would be a great avenue for literacy activities with young children----"Getting to Know You", "Q is for______", ABC books, etc.

Thanks Lori for also sharing grant-writing information with us as we all want and need more "Flips", microphones, microphone head sets, etc.
It was a great learning experience for "natives" and "imigrants"!

Cindy Marquardt, Century Elementary

I was really excited to be able to attend all 3 of Lori Elliott's Summer Sandbox workshops! Her workshops are extremely informative, and we always take back lots of neat ideas to add technology to spice up our classrom presentations.

During the first session, Lori told us about photo slideshows. One program I plan to use often this year is Smilebox. To practice, I created a slideshow for my brother and sister-in-law's anniversary, and it was so much easier than creating programs in Power Point as slide frames are already created for you to use, and music is simple to add. I also created a slideshow of a graduation celebration we had for one of my seniors last year, and I'm planning to show it during the first days of school to hopefully inspire other special ed students to continue to work toward their goal of graduating from high school. It will also be fun for students to see a bit of what we did last year. I love the fact that anyone can view Smilebox presentations, even without being members. This is a great way to communicate with parents and keep them involved in their child's educational experiences.

I had always wondered how to add narration to slideshows, and Lori explained different methods for incorporating narration into programs. We experimented with Yodio, and I plan to use that this year when creating podcasts.

I was glad to know we can download Smart Notebook at home so we can prepare presentations without actually having the Smart Board there with us. It was also great to find out what the "Print Screen" key actually does!
To be continued....
Elaine Hancock

Another great program we learned about was Google Earth. I was amazed at the versatility and possibilities of this program! During our unit on Geometry, I plan to "travel" to various sites such as castles and famous buildings and have students calculate the perimeter and area of those structures. This is also a great program to use when teaching reading to introduce background information on authors and characters in stories. Actually seeing a location helps create real-world connections for students and makes the information they are learning come to life. Google Earth also has the capability to show locations from past to present, so students can actually view how an area they are learning about has changed over time. The past to present feature would be very useful in demonstrating changes on the Earth's surface for science classes.

A concept I learned and plan to use is creating activities with hidden answers, where students read a question and give an answer, then slide an object aside to check their answers. This could be used to check comprehension at the end of class or review for tests, plus it gives students a chance to get up and move around. One group could work on this activity while the teacher works with another group.

Lori taught us how to find photos that are copyright free, which I had not known before. She also explained the difference between a blog and a wiki, and I definitely plan to create a wiki this year as a resource page for both students and parents.

It was fun learning about new technology gadgets such as flip cameras. I also appreciate Lori giving us time to practice using programs after she presented the information to us.

I kept writing too much and lost all my information just now so finally saved it to a Word document and cut and pasted! Lori, you taught me so much, I had trouble putting it on one page! Thanks so much for all the great technology ideas and for your inspiration!
Elaine Hancock