Technology in the Classroom

One of my blogging bff's, Katie from the Queen of the First Grade Jungle, is having a Technology Link Up Party over on her blog! I love reading how other teachers incorporate technology into their classroom (even though I get totally jealous at what they have access to!) 

But, before I show you my technology, I need to show you another picture of my beautiful niece!! 

I mean how precious is she? 

Alright, back to what this post is supposed to be about ;) In my classroom I have 2 desktops, 2 laptops, and I recently received an iPad! 

In the morning I have 4 rotations. One rotation is always to me for reading and another rotation is always computers. Our school has an account on IStation, so this is what my students have to work on during centers.

IStation is a wonderful reading program. It assesses the students frequently and based on how well they do, it assigns them different work. This is wonderful! Not only does it save me time from having to assign different students different things, but they are able to feel successful on the computer. 

I usually have 5 students at a time going to the computer center. This leaves one student out. That's where the iPad comes in handy! They rotate using the iPad. I have found some great apps. All the ones I am currently using are free. Below you can one of my students working on letter tracing with LetterSchool. 

Some other apps I have:

- Sight Words by Little Speller. I have the free version so it isn't so 'fun' looking to the kids at first. But what is super cool is you can add in your sight word list and your own voice/images....then they love it!

-8 Planets where they can earn ribbons and test their knowledge of the planets. My students will be experts by the time I do my space unit!

-All of the Elf on the Shelf apps! They are free and not really educational...but super fun! (Great to use as a reward)

-Did you know students can also watch PBS kids, Disney, and Nickelodeon shows for free on the iPad? Yep, I caught one of my students watching a Disney show. He knew how to go to the app store and download it by himself! I now use it as a fun friday reward :)

I also have a listening center. Not all students go to this center everyday. But, I try to have each student go at least once a week. Here is one of my little ones listening to his absolute favorite, Pete the Cat.

Lastly, I have a projector in my class. We love using the projector to view our Let's Find Out magazines online and play the free games that they have. We also have enjoyed watching this wonderful LIVE Penguin Webcam!! We even saw a macaroni penguin! The kids went wild! :) I searched around and looked through a bunch of live webcams...and this is by far my favorite one! The penguins come close to the camera, there are a bunch of different kinds of penguins to see, and you can even watch the 'scientist' as I say to the kids, come out and feed the penguins quite often! Love them! 

Click above to go to the webcam :)

Hopefully you made it through this post will head over to Katie's blog to read more about how technology is being used in the classroom from other wonderful bloggers! I would love to hear how you use technology as well!! Any advice on good apps?