I am sharing a new resource tool called Flocabulary with you. I have joined Ken Zimmerman and several Lancaster Lebanon IU13 districts in a pilot that started yesterday to use all the features of Flocabulary FREE until the end of the school year. Currently this year we have 25 licenses that some of our teachers and SWs are using. If we have more staff that like this tool we can expand our licenses for a reduced cost. This can be used with student accounts or the teacher can just use it as a whole group activity. Please do not hesitate to ask me about it or how to use it. However, I am sending some resources here below.

Need some fun spring activities for your class. If you have Lesson Pix account there are some Egg-celent Ideas for Spring through a thematic approach to promote language and learning.  Lesson Pix is a tool that the IU13 purchased to replace BoardMaker. This tool not only helps you make pictures for different activities it now provides pre-made materials for themes. Check out this one for Spring.  For OTs, PTs, and SLPs check out these premade activities you can just tweak to make yours.  

Check out the right hand side to win an OZOBOT for your program, classes, student. All ECSES staff members can participate. Good Luck. 

Coming April in MLP I will have my summer technology sessions posted. Please read carefully as they are specific to professionals and/or paraprofessionals. If sessions get filled I will run duplicate sessions at One Cumberland. Those dates to be determined based on sessions filling up at Burle. 2018 Summer Technology Sessions offered by Lori Blantz

Congratulations to Faith Burchfield (Speech Therapist) and Tabatha Hedrick (PCA in AS classroom) for being the lucky winners of last months give-away. They each won a Mini Sphero to use with their student(s) that they serve at the IU13. Thanks for all the essays this month. This was our biggest month of submitted essays. Keep them coming. You only have two weeks to try to win this month's spotlight item - Ozobot! 

This month I am sharing out about two easy and fun apps that I have been sharing with staff I work directly with at the IU13. The first one is called Sock Puppets (free version) or Sock Puppets +  ($3.99). These apps allow you to expand student's imaginations by having them use puppets to retell a story, present a social skills topic, or role play. You can incorporate writing with this tool and after they write out their script or story they can use the puppet app to retell it. Uses of Sock Puppets.  Here is a example of how to use it in Elementary School. Check out this fun video. Here is one on how some students wrote a book review for their ELA class.  Check out this video. Here is a HOW TO VIDEO on teaching you how to use Sock Puppets. The difference between the free and paid version is more options of puppets, scenery, and props.   The second app is called Puppet Pals (free) or Puppet Pals 2 ($5.99). This app uses real characters or photos of people. You can also take pictures and upload for scenery. Here is a video on using Puppet Pals 2 to enhance Literacy Instruction

Might just have to say I found the neatest activity to do with students!!! How many of you have been to an Escape Room- maybe the one in Lancaster, maybe in Lititz, maybe some other location??? Well, take the fun from being with friends and trying to escape out of the room and add some students and some fun subject matter and you get BreakoutEDU. Here is a video for 2 minutes to explain. This is just like the Escape Room concept, but for education.

Juliana entered my January essay contest to share that her students love using OSMO on their iPads. She has a student that is particularly interested in Coding apps and online programs. She has seen growth in this student's problem solving abilities, as well as, focus on an academic-based task such as coding. Having access to OSMO coding, this student would be able to physically interact and change the items in order to complete the skill or level. I am pleased to provide her with a OSMO Coding Program for her class.

If you are a new staff in the ECSES department, or a staff that has been here forever it might seem:), are you aware of all the Instructional Technology resources that we can provide for our students and staff? In my role as Instructional Technology Specialist I am here to assist all professionals and paraprofessionals in the ECSES department on Instructional Tools to use in the classroom or IU13 online programs that we use for our students. I have created a document that shares IU13 purchased or piloted programs for our classrooms and how to get on them. Click here to view document. Also, we have over 150 iPads being used by teachers, students and/or itinerants, and over 150 Chromebooks being used by our students. This is not to mention the laptops for each para, PCA, itinerant, support staff and/or teacher. With all that technology and trying to get to our teachers lots of great instructional tools to use with our classrooms, I have hired an Help Desk Instructional Technology Assistant to help out with all this great stuff going on. Please welcome Hillary Holler to this new role. She is currently with the Speech and Language Department as their PA, and many of you have worked with her on ITT or IEPWriter issues in the past. Once she transitions to this new role, she will be your contact to help with problems you might have with ITT, IEPWriter, Chromebooks, or other Instructional Tools that we are using. Please know, I am not going away:) and you can continue to go to me; however, as more and more staff are using these tools I can't keep up with the emails in a fast enough way to help everyone out. To assist with helping you faster we will eventually be using the ticket system to help respond to your needs in a more timely manner. This process will come out once Hillary is in her new role. Nothing is changed now until her current position is filled. Again, please check out the Instructional Tools we have here at the IU13 to use with our students and join me in congratulating Hillary. Also, huge reminder to check out this blog at least once a month so you can see the fun stuff you can win for your classroom. Check out the right hand side pf the Blog for the items to win. I have already given away a complete OSMO kit, an OSMO Jam program, and  an Ozobot to teachers and itinerants. Will you be the next to win??? You can "Subscribe" to this blog by going to the bottom right hand side and adding your email. You will get an email when I post something new on this blog. Stay warm!!!

I am excited to share that Lyn Carvell has been selected as our December Winner for a Coding game from OSMO. Lyn is an Occupational Therapist here at the IU13. She shared that during the first week of December, she participated in the global Hour Of Code by incorporating coding tasks in her OT sessions. Since some of her students on her caseload cannot participate in Music Education she felt using OSMO Coding Jam can incorporate that Music component as well. Enjoy and Happy Coding!!