Tutorial

Whenever you do a tutorial you always want to begin by introducing yourself and explain what your tutorial is about.  I choose to do my tutorial on reading workshops.  All teachers know the importance of reading to children everyday.  Reading aloud to children is one of the best things we can do as adults to help build rich vocabulary, deepen background knowledge, develop comprehension skills, build fluency and set the foundation for a love of reading.  Not only is it important for teachers to read to students, but students need to learn to read independently and partner reading.

I decided to do my tutorial on VoiceThread that I learned to use in class.  I was defiantly going out of my comfort zone, but I wanted to challenge myself with a new application.  I choose this application because I liked the idea I was able to record my voice or video record and comment on the post.  Another great feature is that you are able to draw on your picture as you are speaking.  I first explain in my tutorial the importance of a book and how a book should be held.  I then explain independent reading and partner reading.  Independent reading is silent reading when students sit by themselves and they are looking at the pictures, pointing out words they know and trying to figure of what the book is about.  Students that come into Kindergarten, most of them can not read or write.

The knowledge of sharing between two students takes place in the partner reading.  This is a great strategy in which two students work together by sitting side by side with the book in the middle.  They are looking at the book together and they share thoughts and predictions from the pictures in the book.  I place strong readers with my lower readers to help them read the words and discuss the pictures.  I had my students take pictures with an iPhone of students independently reading and partner reading.  I included those pictures in my tutorial.   Students learn best from their peers and tutorials.  Once I completed the tutorial students were very excited to see themselves and were interested in doing more tutorials.    Students see their peers as role models with similar experiences and concerns.  Knowledge sharing should be encouraged and rewarded.  Shared knowledge is double knowledge!

VoiceThread is a great application for students to video record themselves on a particular topic or voice record  themselves discussing a drawing or picture they have created.  It would take some time to explain to five and six year olds how to use the application and different features it provides. All my students really enjoyed the tutorial and wanted to learn more and do more tutorials.  Technology really gets students excited and motivated.   One negative thing about the application I would say is that I don't like that you need to click on each slide to move forward.  It would be nice if it was continuous slide show.