EduBlog Review 05

http://mrssmoke.onsugar.com/

Final review on a blog called Making Teachers Nerdy that is written by Mrs. Smoke, and it’s a pretty hefty one when it comes to teacher technology resources. Mrs. Smoke is Dyane Smokorowski, a Technology Instructional Coach and Integrationist for the Andover Schools and an Intel US Senior Trainer. She has written many blog entries that relate to a lot of the material we’ve been covering in the past weeks. Blogs dealing with digital storytelling and Google search tips are full of information and loaded with links to other helpful sites.

What I like best about this blog is the amount of detail that goes into each provided link or the way they are organized. For example, there is one entry that recommends other blog sites that teachers should be reading - http://mrssmoke.onsugar.com/Educational-Blogs-You-Should-Investigating-2787268. Rather than just posting the links to the recommended blogs, Mrs. Smoke has actually broken them all down into different categories. Headings such as: Technology Integration, Elementary General, Arts, Librarians, and Industrial Technology make it very easy to focus on the blogs that relate to our subject matter. Elementary school related blogs are broken down by grade level, and there are even suggested blogs geared towards administrators. This blog entry is a terrific example of how her links are organized.

A great example of the detail that goes into her links can be seen in the blog post http://mrssmoke.onsugar.com/Action-Get-Cameras-Rolling-Digital-Storytelling-3307628. Here is an example of how she describes what she enjoys about the linked site:

Flickschool – One of the best keynotes I have ever heard was Marco Antonio Torres and how he has developed an outstanding video production classroom. His blog provides tutorials and tips over iMovie, storyboarding, great camera angles, and more.  Be sure to add it to your blogroll.

Besides the descriptor for each link, she also has them categorized into headings like: What is Digital Storytelling, Tips to Get Started, and Storyboards. The detail is incredibly helpful for teachers that are exploring the use of new technology in their classes. Another blog entry that is similarly detailed is http://mrssmoke.onsugar.com/45-Websites-Students-Create-Original-Artwork-Online-3442983. The comments that follow the post with accolades to Mrs. Smoke make me believe that she is doing a wonderful job with her blog entries.

Now I noticed that the last blog entry was written just before the 2010/2011 school year so it’s almost a year that there have been no new updates. Nevertheless, what makes this blog strong is that the links are solid resources and most of the ones I’ve followed are still active and current. If you are interested in getting more advice from Mrs. Smoke, you can follow @Mrs_Smoke on Twitter and http://twitter.com/#!/Mrs_Smoke for more useful links.