Here is a link to my Educreation that I made:http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/educreations-interactive-whiteboard/id478617061?ls=1&mt=8

oops!  I must have copied the wrong link.  I will update it later today :) 

Click here to view this lesson about Homophones 2.  Hopefully this works! It works!!!!

So I used Inspiration to create my digital story map.  I thought that this app was very user friendly.  it was pretty easy to navigate through.  The digital story map I created was for a "How To".  That's the Genre of writing that I am focusing on this quarter.  Since I only have one I pad in my room it wouldn't be easy for my students to access this digital version, but I'm thinking of printing it out and giving a copy of each to my students.  As I was reading about digital literacy I really liked how the 3rd graders were very engaged.  I really liked the app that had the pen that could be used to write and and then the voice is recorded, and you could go back and tap the screen hear that part.  I totally could see this working for my students who have trouble getting their thoughts down on paper, or spend too much time trying to get things perfect.  I would love to have a classroom set of these pens!

Since I already had Educreations downloaded to my I pad I decided to use that app to create my screencast.  This week we are learning about Homophones, so I did mine on Homophones.  As luck would have it, one of my students missed the lesson today, so this will be  the perfect opportunity for me to use it besides showing it to the whole class.  The student will be able to view it during independent work time and then she'll be able to apply what she learned with the worksheet.  I did find this app easy to use once i figured it out, and  I could see myself using it again.

Digital citizenship is an important tool to teach children to be safe!  I guess one of the ways that I see fitting this into curriculum is with school wide expectations: Be Safe, Be Respectful, and Be Responsible.  We teach kids to follow these rules at school and at home, so why not teach them these same rules when using electronic devices.  The E rate toolkit for teachers would be a great way to teach this to kids. 

In general we teach kids to be safe wherever they are, and online is no different.  The Scope and Sequence tab on the Common Sense Media Curriculum has many good lessons that teaches online safety in many different ways.  One example is a lesson called " Keeping it private", where kids are taught what information should not be shared on the internet.

The Digital Citizenship posters are also a great tool to reinforce skills that have been taught about Digital Citizenship and overall care for electronic devices.