ClustrMaps is a fun and informative widget that you can embed on your website, or the websites of your students. Simply visit the ClustrMaps websites, enter the URL of the site you want to create a map for, and an HTML code will be generated for you. ClustrMaps appears as a world map with red dots, varying in size based on the amount of visitors from a particular region. Of course, since discovering ClustrMaps my blog has had an all-time low number of visitors (an extremely modest 14) but what's really interesting is that I had no idea people were visiting my website from their homes in Ireland, Australia and Singapore. The idea of someone across the globe stumbling into my humble little blog is so neat! As a student, I would be so excited to see how many people were viewing my writing portfolio, and where those readers might be located. With that said, (shameless begging) please forward the URL for my blog to as many foreign countries as possible! I want more dots! UPDATE (7-8-11): I was noticing some major inconsistencies between my clustr map and the statistics that I was receiving from Weebly (my website host). For instance, as of today, my clustr map reports 130 visitors to my website; however, according to Weebly, I had 248 visitors yesterday alone. With the question "what's up with that?" spinning in my head, I discovered that Clustrmap only counts visits to the page where the map itself is displayed, so if anyone visits another blog or post (anything other than the page where I embedded the clustr map) it won't be counted. Weebly, on the other hand, counts visits to any blog or post on my website. This makes sense, really. Not sure how to "fix" this solution so that Clustrmaps counts all of my page views without embedding the map on every since page, though. I'll play around with it and, in the meantime, you may see some clustrmaps randomly appearing. :) UPDATE 12-16-11 A HUGE thank you to the ClustrMaps team for explaining why Weebly's tallies are inconsistent with ClustrMap's stats. And another thank you to ClustrMaps for providing such accurate information without counting duplicate visitors or IP addresses. Comparing ClustrMaps' visitor count to Weebly's visitor count will provide me with a whole new layer of data! (Please the comment posted below by the ClustrMaps team.)
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Classtools.net offers two fun random word/name pickers for free: the fruit machine and the typewriter. These are great when you need a fair way to select students for reading, answering questions, assigning new seating charts, or delivering presentations. You could also enter vocabulary words and randomly select a word for students to define, or put in English words and then have students give the corresponding Spanish word, etc. As names/words are selected, you have the option to remove them from the list. My students like the typewriter option, because they try to guess whose name is slowly being spelled as letters are revealed.
Six Word Memoirs challenges writers to write their life story in an intensely concise format: using exactly six words. The project is part of SMITH magazine which, consequently, is loaded with great writing ideas (stumbled into the Freeze Frame project while I was there and it made me giggle at its humor and innovation). With all these great ideas for writing, I'm seriously going to have to start holding "creative day" in my classroom once a month or so just to find time for all of these fun, imaginative writing projects that will really get the creative juice flowing in my students. The website even has a section of Six-Word memoirs written exclusively by teens. Wouldn't it be exciting to have your students posting their writing to the Internet and experiencing a genuine authentic audience for their writing? Note: A special thanks to Stephanie Krajicek for sharing this resource during her BER seminar. Note: The above image came from the When I Grow Up Blog. PostSecret, according to Wikipedia is "an ongoing community mail art project, created by Frank Warren, in which people mail their secrets anonymously on a homemade postcard. Select secrets are then posted on the PostSecret website, or used for PostSecret's books or museum exhibits." You could take samples of PostSecret postcards and use them as writing prompts (write the story of the person who submitted this postcard), or you could create PostSecret cards for characters from literature. Special thanks to Stephanie Krajicek for sharing this website at her BER seminar on Blogging, Wikis and Podcasts. Warning: The PostSecret website is entirely inappropriate for students to view on their own. Do not let them roam free on it. Snag a few pictures from the site and put them into a Power Point presentation instead. I have seen this video before, but recently was reminded of it at a seminar led by Stephanie Krajicek, a wonderful educational technology expert who runs a very informative and well-organized blog called Education Ad Infinitum. After attending her seminar, I have been inspired to do more blogging with my students next year. I'm going to start with a small group of seniors, and see how smoothly everything runs. If it goes well, I'll have the rest of my classes blogging the following year (or maybe even after Christmas break). Here's to high hopes! I highly recommend watching this video, and then visiting her website for a ton of useful information. Click on the "Seminar Handbook" link to access a PDF file of her resources. |
AuthorDr. Jessica Pilgreen, Ed.D. Archives
December 2020
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