I'm a teacher from Romania and I work at a secondary
school, I teach mother tongue, Romanian. First I worked as a primary school
teacher and I am qualified as secondary school
teacher since 2006.

The school from Filipestii de Tirg, near Ploiesti, is
a small one, yet we have an ICT lab with 20 PCs, an internet connection by
cable and in some classes we have access to a PC and a video projector. My students
range is from 11 to 15 years old.

I want to use tablets in my teaching because I find it
a necessity. The informational technology provides us such good tools, the
children nowadays are captivated by IT and I cannot use the “old school”
methods and willing to create an appropriate learning situation. I consider the
teacher must be open minded, innovative, creative; this is what tablets in my
teaching process offer. The children love it, it is already part of their life.

The challenges I might be facing when using tablets in
my school are:

-Including in our school development plan the
implementation of tablets

-Involving our colleagues

-Providing a space and a wireless connectivity

-It is hard to find a pedagogical support according to our
need

-We need special app and tools according to our
curriculum and on our mother tongue.

process several times. But I am sure my students have used tablets for preparing their homework and different projects, power point presentations, videos and photos. I teach mother tongue (Romanian) and Romanian literature, so I had a demonstrative lesson with the theme on ,,school essays- book versus e-books”. The class was divided into two groups, because not all the students had their own tablets, and I wanted to prove that there are advantages and disadvantages on both sides. They were asked to make an invitations and to send it. The lesson was a real success, the children were encouraged to use tablets for learning not only for games.

criteria or number of pupils in one group. When I use homogeny groups, I chose which student goes into which group, I want to assure a group has students with different skills and different levels of knowledge; and in this situation all groups have the same tasks and are able to fulfill it. Another way is to make different groups considering the level of knowledge and the skills of the students, so in the same group are children able to do personalized tasks this way I do differentiated work and in the end the groups make a hole assembling their work. Dividing students into different groups is a good way of learning especially for the children with difficulty of learning because they cannot face the challenges like others and they are not able to cope, they are usually left behind in homogeny groups or others do their work.  

The numbers of students into groups vary from 4 to 6 members so I have 6 to 4 group. Other time we work in pears, they are allowed to choose their coworkers only when it involves a creative task, the student’s criteria is doe to their affinities and I don’t find this efficient in other situation.  

to keep students focused and on track during collaborative projects. I have set for my students a sett o rules, supervise their work carefully. Especially when I set my objectives and activities I prepare myself for the unexpected, I always have something extra to do,  just in case I need it, I am not afraid of challenges and I consider I am good in improvising. During any lesson the big risk is that some students get bored because they have finished the task earlier than the others, or many of them consider the task too easy. Not all the children in the class have the same rhythm of work or the same skills so I think at something especially for those situations.

product and trough ought the students’ self-assessment. The tasks reflect the goals and the objectives I have set for the final product, so fulfilling each step is a way of assessing the group work.

The main challenges when it comes to assessing group work are:

- The objectivity/ the impartiality

- Establishing the criteria for assessing

- The insufficient  time to discuss the achievement of the goals and grades with the students

To gather information about my students’ learning style a use initial tests and progress tests and constantly observe their activity and the success of the methods and tools of learning I use, of course the feedback I receive. I don’t believe there is only a learning style the  individual use, people find one better because of their capacities, but in the learning process we use all senses stressing onto the multiple intelligence one has . People are aware of their type of learning doe to their experience; the teacher can identify the personalized type of learning of his students in time after applying different teaching strategies and assessments. 

I have created only power point presentations, videos and
photos not edited and I presented them to the children. Thanks to my peers I have
discovered and I am still learning to use some apps like: Prezi, OR codes, Tellagami,
Powtoon, Posterini and many others. I am very enthusiastic about this, I find it
very interesting and useful.

Felling proud!

My very first content created with tablet:

scenarios in not a new concept for me, is new the structure: DREAM, EXPLORE, MAP, MAKE, ASK, RE-MAKE, SHOW. I have used learning scenario in developing a lesson plan or a unit. I will reconsider  the concept and apply it. It is very interesting .

Thanks to Carina Costa  from Portugal

“APPS FOR EVERITHING” !

I have a lot to discover and study

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1aXAdPBsNjs8DykTK9MxH2h_FWpd3-I3jeibcsKpIBRw/edit

Giuly63

Environments:

*GOOGLE APPS & CLASSROOM

*EVERNOTE

*EDMODO

Games / maps:

*WORD MOVER

*TINY TAP

*POPPLET

Video/cartoons/dialogues

*iMOVIE

*ANIMOTO

*POWTOON

*TELLAGAMI

Slides / Noticeboards / Posters/ Digital storytelling

*STORYBOARDTHAT

*SLIDE SHARE

*STORYDESK

*HAIKUDECK

*GLOGSTER EDU

*PINTEREST

Photos

*PIC COLLAGE

*THINGKINK

*SKITCH

Thank you Marina Tanasoska, Macedonia!

might be:

- providing the students access to internet connection

- not all the students posses a device (tablet)

- getting the students involved and working

- getting the parents involved

-the  teachers time to prepare the lessons

- deciding if the task is treated like a homework,  optional or a “must do”

- criteria and methods of assessing

http://v.gd/TVZ96a