Did you know that November is National Novel Writing Month? NaNoWriMo began in 2000 when Chris Baty a freelance writer in San Francisco started a project to promote and encourage creative writing. The idea was to have a group of participants write individual novels over the same one month time period. The first year 140 participated signed up and 29 actually completed the challenge. The following year, in 2001, 5000 participants registered and over 700 completed their novel. Since then, NaNoWriMo has grown to over 400,000 annual participants. Both professional and amateur writers participate, with the idea that all are facing similar obstacles and can lean on one another for feedback, support and encouragement.
Obviously, writing a novel in one month is a very ambitious goal. A novel is defined as a story with at least 50,000 words; if someone were to write a novel during the month of November, they would be averaging over 1,600 words per day. Because this task is so daunting, it would be impossible to apply in the classroom, right? Fortunately, NaNoWriMo has developed a Young Writers’ Program which parallels the novel writing challenge—including a website ywp.nanowrimo.org for the Young Writers Program. The site contains valuable information for youth writers, educators and families. It has novel writing plans for students of various ages and lesson plans to encourage creative writing in their classrooms. - Tricia Lowery
Goodreads Lets users track and rate books and connect with other readers. Dictionary.com Provides a dictionary and thesaurus at your fingertips.
A mind map is a means to visually represent ideas and their relationship to one another. It's a brainstorming tool that can be used by an individual or in collaborative projects. In fiction writing, a mind map can be an effective composition tool, as it more accurately represents mental associations than an outline can. Unlike an outline, a mind map is not linear. Blank spaces can be an opportunity to develop your story or character farther. Coggle is a website app that allows you to "unleash your creativity." With this free site, you can produce notes, quickly and easily. Looking for ideas? Coggle allows you to share your mind map with friends and colleagues to enhance your ideas collaboratively.
With a plethora of productivity tools and features, OneNote is truly for everyone. Available as part of your Office 365 apps, OneNote allows you to plan, research, organize, write, discuss and collaborate. OneNote lets you create simple or complex notes from scratch, organize them into searchable, browsable notebooks and sync them among a variety of platforms. Beyond it's binder-like structure, OneNote offers note-creation tools for drawing, recording audio and video, scanning images, embedding spreadsheets and reviewing the edits of others.
Dragon DictationEasy-to-use voice recognition text to speech app. Hemingwayapp.com Highlights long and complex sentences and common errors, gauges readability and gives a word count.
Writing papers can be a long and tiring task for students. Often they are so glad to be finished that they fail to thoroughly edit and proofread. Even when they do proof their papers, errors are still overlooked - especially errors concerning
awkward word phrasing. It seems that if the student could just hear what they wrote then they could identify the awkward phrasing and fix it. So as teachers we suggest "read it out loud to yourself" and listen for how it sounds. Now students have an alternative to listening to their own voice. Google Translate allows you to copy and paste your document and then listen while it is being read aloud. This is a great way to identify those phrases that just don't work. It won't check your grammar but Google Translate could be a valuable tool in the editing process.
FastPencil covers it all: from inspiration to distribution. Through this app, you can upload finished digital manuscripts, blog posts or Evernotes to publish and sell your novel privately or worldwide. 1. Sign up for FastPencil and write your story for FREE! 2. Manage projects & publications from connected workspace. Import Evernote notes, compile text documents and blog posts. Collaborate with your team! 3. Complete the challenge! Publish and get a FREE* copy of your book. *Shipping not included.
StumbleUpon
Learning to read should always be a fun and exciting experience for kids. With the help of technology, learning both inside and outside of the classroom can be fundamental, productive, and indeed possible. “Consider the benefits others have gained from using the technology as a solution. Is it likely you will realize similar benefits?” (Roblyer & Doering, 2013) Technology provides students with tons of apps, and programs that are designed just for reading. Evidence shows us that younger age groups prefer to read a book from a virtual site. When using technology students can have their favorite books, poems, games, and all that interests them in one. Reading can seem boring to most children if it isn’t something they really want to learn, with the help of apps such as Stumbleupon, Cram, or The Right Word. It can make reading seem more fun while teaching the same concept. Books challenge the readers mind to an extent, but with a virtual book it can challenge the reader in ways standard books cannot. - Thomas Messer
Finds and recommends web content to its users. Cram Flashcard app
The Right Word Practice English & writing skills
Library Media/ Technology Integration Specialist Braxton County Middle & High Schools
Hour of Code December 7 - 13, 2015 The WV Digital Entertainment Library Initiative is an online database for downloadable books, audiobooks, videos and more. With member libraries from across the state, the collection grows more each day. WVDELI uses Overdrive as a digital management system to host and distribute books. Check with your local library to see if they are a member or visit their website to learn more:
http://wvdeli.lib.overdrive.com/
The Hour of Code is a global movement by Computer Science Education Week and Code.org with the goal of introducing computer science and computer programming through one-hour activities.
Special Education/ English Teacher Martinsburg High School
For more information, visit:
hourofcode.com Code.org www.khanacademy.org/ hourofcode School Improvement Technology Integration Coordinator Wayne County Schools