Publisher

I decided to try Publisher with the students and tried to do too much.  They became very frustrated, I became frustrated so we used another program for whatever we were doing.  I found out that experience soured them on Publisher.  I left Publisher alone for a week or so.  Then I made a main idea detail chart from one of the stories in our reading series.  I used the information from the teacher's manual to create boxes.  I put the main idea boxes on one side of the Publisher document, the detail boxes were on the other side and out of order.  The students had to grab a detail box and move it flush with the correct main idea box.  They loved manipulating the boxes.  It gave us a chance to talk about what to do if they change the size of the box or delete a box.  By the time we were done they were no longer were afraid of Publisher.  We didn't do much, but they were successful and that changed their minds about the software.  Now we have used Publisher a few more times and each time I add a few more new things.  I love using this program and they are starting to love it, too.

Wordle

(The beginning of this post is at the end of the post below...hope you figure it out!)

Open the wordle in its own window.  Expand the screen.  Press control and Print screen button on your keyboard.  (For you print screen newbies, when you press this NOTHING HAPPENS!  Don't panic.)  Open PowerPoint.  On a blank screen, right click and click paste.  Your wordle should show up.  Adjust the size and go to picture editing.  I can't give you specific details because I'm on an old computer at the moment and don't have access to the newest version of PowerPoint.  You need to find the picture tool bar.  Find the crop tool.  This crops different than any photo software I've ever used, but it works.  Grab the black lines around the picture.  Move them to where you want to "cut" the picture.  Cool stuff!  Then stretch the wordle to fit the frame.  Print if you like.  (We change the background to white to save on ink.)

Time to Reflect

The intentions behind this blog was to document the year with all of the new technology in my classroom.  I've been so busy that I've failed so far.  This post will be an attempt to start to record what has been accomplished so far.

First, we established expectations when using the computers and returning the computers to the cart.  These are posted on the cart.  The students have done a fabulous job of following expectations.

Our first "project" was a wordle.  Students typed their name in five times (the more times the word appears, the larger it is in the wordle) or so and then typed words that described them.  The word list was created the night before as a homework assignment.  The words were typed into a word document.  Using Word helped with spelling and spacing of words.  Once the words were typed, students copied and pasted the words into the wordle web sight.  The reaction of the students was GREAT when they saw their wordles.