Jacquelyn Olson

SLM 521 – Elective # 7

Teacher Developed Sites

To begin this project, I tried several different ways to search for teacher web sites that I could use in future planning materials. Listed below are several phrases I found useful to my search.

-	Teacher created classroom websites
-	Cool teacher created websites
-	Classroom websites

Mandy’s Tips for Teachers –

http://www.mandygregory.com/index.htm

This website was developed by a fourth grade teacher named Mandy Gregory to organize her class activities. At the time she developed the site, she was a fourth grade teacher. Then, Ms. Gregory was moved to second grade, and now for the 2009-2010 school year, she will be teaching third grade. She explains that all of her materials can be adapted for use in any primary or intermediate grade level. Mandy’s site covers classroom management strategies, daily routines, and ideas for organizing and maintaining your own personal lesson archive. Some of the areas she covers are writer’s workshop from initially starting a program to managing one, including suggestions for grading and writing tips. Ideas and materials to promote student reading and literacy are provided. Some of the categories listed include: guided reading, mini-lessons, novels, readers theater and book lists. She does an excellent job of using embedded links to illustrate her resources and materials. Other subjects such as math and social studies are in separate categories. Each subject is comprehensively covered with concrete examples of effective learning strategies. I find her ideas and examples extremely on point, and plan on utilizing her suggestions in my own classroom.

Three commendations to Mandy Gregory’s site:

1. Excellent use of embedded links to illustrate materials and provide sources.

2. Extremely easy to navigate site and return to the home page when needed. Each button provides useful information and ideas to modify to suit primary and intermediate curriculum needs.

3. Wonderful tips for teachers to implement in managing their own classroom.

Three recommendations for Mandy Gregory’s site:

1. I would like Mandy to incorporate more examples of her students’ work on the site. I would like to see how her students put her good teaching skills to use.

2. I would also like to see Mandy include pictures of her classroom to illustrate how she implements her management ideas.

3. I would also recommend that Mandy include pictures of her students engaged in her lessons.

(I should note that this site is wonderful and I had a difficult time coming up with the recommendations I noted to improve upon it.)

Planet 13 - http://hill.troy.k12.mi.us/staff/bnewingham/myweb3/

Planet 13 was created by a third grade teacher, Beth Newingham, to provide students and parents with an opportunity to share and explore the exciting things going on in their child’s classroom. Ms. Newingham provides an extensive category list to choose from. Some of her topics include: meet the class, tour the classroom, classroom happenings and academics. Within each category, links to specific lessons provide an inside peak into the daily activities in her classroom. She offers great ideas and suggestions to share for other grade levels and classroom styles. For example, she provides a link to her writing workshop series which illustrates how to begin a workshop and continues through the process of maintaining a writing workshop, including suggested mini-lessons. Parents can view her amazing third grade newsletters. The pictures and graphics on these newsletters are brilliantly designed and extremely visually appealing. I have enjoyed looking through her ideas, and will find them quite valuable as I organize my own classroom. Overall, the site is very user-friendly, beautifully designed and exceptionally welcoming.

Three commendations for Beth Newingham’s site:

1. I love the way Ms. Newingham used colorful pictures and graphics to make her site inviting for families and students to enjoy.

2. The links to her classroom activities included student pictures as they were engaged in her lessons and also included pictures of students’ completed work.

3. She provides many useful activities for other teachers to incorporate into their own lesson plans. The embedded links within these activities often include tips on creating learning centers, and how to progress through each lesson.

4. She spent a great deal of effort planning her site and planning the elements she included within it. Wonderful, inviting classroom atmosphere!

Three recommendations for Beth Newingham’s site:

1. I suggest including a monthly calendar page from the county school calendar to show how her classroom activities coincide with the master calendar. For example, what activities will her students accomplish before the end of the grading period?

2. In addition, it might be helpful for parents to see how the activities Ms. Newingham is doing with her students are associated with the activities the rest of third grade is doing. Are her activities related to what other classes are working on?

3. I would also suggest that Ms. Newingham provide a link to the school website so that parents can navigate her site, go on to the school’s site, and then continue to link to other teachers websites within the school. By doing this, she provides parents with the accessibility to navigate other teacher created websites within the same school setting.