It is ALL on SALE!!!

Swing on over to our TPT store and check out our great products at some fantastic prices. If you have been curious about what we do, now is the time to scope it out!!!! Just enter in the code CMT12 to get an extra 10% off our already reduced prices!

Sale!

We hope you have a chance to check out our teaching tools while they are on sale!! Don't forget that the apps we use for the iPad will also work on the new mini.

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

We hope that you have had a happy holiday with those that you love the most! We have so much to be thankful for---including all of you who take the time to support us!!! We want to say thanks by throwing our first ever TPT sale! All of our items are 20% off on Monday and Tuesday, Nov 26-27, PLUS you can get an extra 10% off from TPT! What great deals!!! So please click below and head on over to our TPT store! Thank you!

ELA Apps are a MUST in my room!

If you are anything like me, you love for your kiddos to practice, practice, PRACTICE! My Kinderkiddos are struggling with the dullness of letter writing.  We are a ways into school now and for my students who aren't getting it this has turned into their least favorite task of all time (I know this from the ever popular thumbs up/down quick assessment at the end---some solid thumbs-down out there) A great app to help combat the letter rec/writing blues is Pocket Phonics by Apps in My Pocket.  Its a great app that helps kiddos work on letter names, sounds and blending! After pairing it with our iPod App Activity Packet from our TPT store I've found that I'm getting many more thumbs-ups! Check it out here!!!

Chirp

Here is a great app called Chirp. It lets you send things to other devices through sound. Do you work with young students? Do you ever want to have them go to a website, receive a document or picture from you but they don't have an email address on their device? Have no fear. Download Chrip on devices and you can send things through sound!
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/chirp/id529469280?mt=8\

Symbaloo

Hello!
We wanted to share this great resource with you. It is called Symbaloo
http://www.symbaloo.com/mix/interactivebooks1
I have started to create one for my students to use with interactive books. It is simple to use and very helpful.
I am going to link tumble books that work on the iPad to this Symbaloo. Then during Daily 5, students will have a whole bunch of books they can use for Listen to Reading.

We will make a bookmark of this screen and save it to the home screen on the iPad. Apple Configurator will  will allow us to put this on all of our iPads in a few simple steps instead of having to touch each device.
Happy Reading!!

Math App review: Friendly Shapes

Wanted to share with you all an app that I (and my K kiddos) are currently loving: Friendly Shapes by TabTale! It incorporates both reading and math with lots of fun interactive scenes and great shape recognition practice!! The free version is wonderful on its own if you are on a tight school budget like me, otherwise the paid full version has some great add-ons as well.  Check it out in iTunes: Friendly Shapes  Check out the app packet we created to help extend the learning from Friendly Shapes at our TPT store.  I used the matching shape cards today and they were a HUGE hit! I love being able to take the 'hook' of the iPod apps and transfer that intrigue from my students to further their knowledge. Teaching with technology is the best!

Math Standards

I have been working on connecting apps to standards. Here is a Google doc with the Common Core Math Standards. Next week at the MEMO conference I will be presenting on apps in a primary classroom. I will be talking about reading, math, creating, organizing and teaching apps. Currently in the process of putting my keynote presentation together. I will share it with you when it is done!

We are still here...promise!

First of all-we have to apologize to all of you! We have been missing for the last few weeks and we are so very sorry! Between Angie working hard at her new Tech Integrationist position and my switching schools, it has been a uber busy start to the school year! To be honest, we both have been getting home the last few weeks and crashed (a 8 o'clock bedtime isn't that lame---right?!?!?) But I promise we haven't given up on you or our mission to help elementary teachers integrate technology easily and successfully into their classrooms!
This week I have been working hard on a grant proposal to obtain a small group set of iPods for my classroom. My new school does have some iPods for us to use, but to have a set that I can use during both my math and reading times every day would be HUGE! So if you are like me and trying to obtain more (or your 1st set) of iPods to use in the classroom, I thought I would share with you a few different options for grants out there.
Heres some of what I've found:
***A great article titled 5 Opportunities to Get iPods Into Your Classroom. Gives good info on how to start obtaining iPods/iPads to use in your classroom.
***Donorschoose.org I'm currently working on writing my own proposal for here. Might as well try and get it out there!
***Your school's PTA and/or other school/community groups

Also, from what I read, it is worth the effort to ask for donations from your local businesses-ie Walmart, Target, Best Buy or whatever you have near. These businesses may be willing to donate even 1 iPod or iPad (hey you got to start somewhere!), even if it is refurbished it will still work for the classroom! Another great idea-ask people to donate their old iPods as they are upgrading to new ones. Its a tax write off for them and a great way for you to bring in the community as well!
Good luck hunting down those iPods! If you know of any other ways to get iPods into classrooms let us know!

What a Whirlwind!

Whew! What a week!! This week was our workshops and open house night. With both of us being in our new 'homes' it has been a learning experience for sure! In one workshop we had an amazing speaker who discussed writing down the things you value in your life, and making sure you are devoting the appropriate amount of time to all of them-otherwise you are on the fast track to being burned-out. Well, I for one, am not holding a very good balance right now (and I can definitely feel a little of that burn-out igniting!)  So to our friends in the apps world, we will do our best to get our balance corrected and make sure that we are devoting the time needed to bring you the most current and up to date info we can find about the best education apps out there! There should be something coming out very soon...so stay close!

iPod/iPad Presentation was a BLAST!

We had an amazing day presenting to a great group of educators from a neighboring school district about all things iPod/iPad related! It was a challenge as everyone has such different experiences with iPods, iPads and even using apps, so we really hope that each person was able to walk away learning at least one new thing (I know I learned about some great new websites and some other fun new apps that I can't wait to check out!) Isn't it fantastic when educators come together and share resources?! We really got to see the great things that can come from collaboration today.  This is especially important since the wonderful world of apps can be very overwhelming at times!!!  But as overwhelming as it can be, we know what a great teaching tool it is for our students...and that's what really counts! So if you are just learning how to integrate iPod/iPad technology into your classroom-WELCOME! You are going to love it!!! Be sure to check back in with us often as we will be posting lots of great resources to help you navigate your way to being a techie teacher! Find us on Facebook and Twitter to get the most current happenings in our techie teacher world!!!!

We are up and running!

Ooftah! We have been hard at work and are happy to say that we currently have 11 great products on our TPT store! They range in price from FREE to $5! Our App Menus have already been downloaded over 25 times (woot woot!) and we hope that many more people will be able to utilize them!!!! Our iPod App Activity Packets are an affordable and easy way to increase student accountability and extend student learning from some of the most current popular educational apps. Everything is ready for you-just download the app (you know its high quality and student tested if we are recommending it!), download the corresponding App Activity Packet, print and VIOLA! you have an instant learning center that is engaging and fun for students! Now that's what we call technology integration at its best!!!

We've got a great FREEBIE for you!!!

We are SUPER excited to say that we have finally got our iPod/iPad app menus available for FREE at our TPT store! Check out our TPT store by clicking here!! We both use these app menus within our classrooms and they are really a great resource!!

A close up of our app menu-I made mine double sided and put it in a 3 ring binder and just flip the  pages when needed.  I love that it stands on its own and all the students can see it at that center! The app icons can be found in our app packets at our TPT store

They are super easy to use! Just print, laminate, and velcro on laminated copies of your preferred app icons! Change the icons around as you see fit!

As you can see by the pictures, it truly allows the students to be independent and make appropriate choices for their learning, all while allowing us (the teachers) overall control of what apps the students are focusing on.  This is great for so many reasons, one being that research shows when students make choices within their education they are more likely to retain the information.  Another great reason is that it allows students multiple choices, thus increasing their ability to find a 'just right fit' skill level app.  For example, I switch out the app icon choices each week depending on what skill we are focusing on in math/reading.  I pick 3 different skill leveled apps that pertain to the appropriate skill set, creating an independent differentiated activity that students love (and I love because I know that they are getting that ever important skill practice, practice, practice!)
Because the students are able to make choices and have access to multiple skill levels, they are able to work hard and focused-with truly minimal behavior issues. These app menus are not only a great way to integrate technology into your everyday teaching, but they are a wonderful classroom management tool as well! We hope you enjoy them as much as we do!

A student hard at work at our iPod center! 

We are soooo close!!!

We finally have our TPT store up and running! Now we just need to add our products (including some great freebies!) and we will be ready to go! This has been such a great learning process, the blog world is completely new to us and we are so happy to have found many great people to help us on our journey! Stay tuned-by this time tomorrow we will be unveiling what we think are great products that will really help teachers integrate technology into their classrooms! Til then, back to work we go.....

Caribou Company

We are working hard to get everything ready to share with you! Our favorite meeting place has been Caribou. Sara's drink of choice is a Turtle Mocha, while Angie's is a hot green tea and ice water.  What would we do without you Caribou?!?

Here we are!

After a long and hot day of teaching summer school , we finally remembered to take a picture! Sara is in the purple. Angie is in the white :) We hope you enjoy all of the hard work we have been putting into our materials!

Our Top 3 Free Reading Apps!

It is always exciting as a teacher to receive free materials! We spend so much of our own hard earned money that when we get something for free we celebrate and share it with others! So, we are going to share a few of our favorite free apps for reading books on your iPod/iPad!!!

• Stories 
• 'New book a day' program to help you build your library. If you do not want to wait you are able to purchase books.
• You can choose to have the books read to you or you can read the book yourself. When the story is read to you the words light up in a different color allowing students to easily follow along. 
• Background music is played as well as sound effects that fit the story line
• Visit their website to find out more! 
• TabTale
• Numerous titles for free with ads. If you would like an ad free version of the book you are able to purchase it.
• Engaging pictures, activities, and audio keep students engaged.
• You have the option of read to self, or read to me.
• Words are highlighted as the story is read allowing for students to follow along.
• Visit their website to find out more!
• Storyboy
• Stories are created by parents for their children to have fun learning in a safe environment.
• 20+ titles to pick from with a handful of stories offered for free!
• There are no ads present in the free books!
• One thing I wish they had included is a way to draw attention to the words as they are being read. 
• Visit their website to find out more!

Terms of Use

Today we got our Terms of Use set up! We tried Legal River, with no luck. termsfeed saved the day with their simple step-by-step generator. Check it out on the lower left side of our blog.

Blogger Beginners...

thats us! Learning that there is a whole lot more to this blogging thing than just typing your thoughts! We have been a follower of many great education blogs for awhile now, and we're excited (& slightly overwhelmed!!) to be a part of that world!! We look forward to sharing their blogs and information with our followers, and of course share with them the great things we are working on!!! We are so super excited---its difficult to remember to take it 1 task at a time when we can not wait to share our ideas with the world!

In case you are looking to start a blog, we've found this blog, Seredipity and Spice, to have some great pointers and very helpful hints!! Thanks for sharing your great info Melissa!

Our 1st Blog!

Hello! Welcome to our blog!! We are super excited to be here, taking on an adventure that we both thought about for along time but are now finally seeing come true! Looking forward to blogging with you!