ALN Blogging Challenge Winners

The first ever ALN blogging contest got off to a slow start.  Only 10 users contributed blogs during the contest.  But the blogs that were submitted were some of the best that we have had on the ALN in the last year and a half.  People posted about their class, different appoaches they used, problems with testing and technology.  So the contest was successful in starting to generate a whole new type of information on the site - teachers reflections on their classes.  Next year we will have another contest and hopefully the experience here (and the lure of easy prizes) will generate even more contributions.

Total entries:  27 Blog posts  26 comments

Winner:  Michael (8 blogs)

Michael's blogs covered a lot of topics from adoption of math texts to alternative maths to robots and clickers.  It became a forum where he could talk about the many different ways he was connecting kids with algebra.  In some ways Michael's comments were so well thought out that they may have intimidated other would be bloggers (hopefully not, we welcome all kinds).  For his contributions, michael recieves a year subscriptions to Gizmos!

2nd Place Blogger: hrudolph (3 blogs)

hrudolph blogs from Ohio and used her blog to talk about what they are doing with their success academies and in her "Jack of all Trades" post explained about all the many different things she is doing in her class, with the math forum etc (over 2000 words long! an ALN blogging record).  For her contribution, h recieves a 6 month subscription to Gizmos!

Runner up lynnwinner

Our runner up got a late start to blogging, but was active readers and commentors on the other blogs.  Lynn gets a 3 month subscriptioins to Gizmos!

Take a look at the blogs that have been posted and then take a few minutes to start your own blog.  Dont worry if you dont have something deep and important to say, just tell us whats going on in your class.  This is a chance for teachers to speak their mind and share what they do.

Why Gizmos?

The ExploreLearning Gizmos are a collection of virtual manipulatives that can help your students visualize, explore and eventually understand the concepts you are teaching. Dr. Cheng uses Gizmos regularly in his classes to bring algebra concepts to life.  With a subscription you use the Gizmos for class demos or have students work through problems in the lab or from home.

To learn more about Gizmos, click here