"Bananza!" Simple ways that I use technology daily and weekly in kindergarten

"Bananza!" is what we say when we get a great idea in my class (thanks to the book Monkey Ono by J.C. Phillipps)  Every day, I love taking photos of my kindergarten students and their work in class.  I don't have parent permissions to publish individual student photos at this point, so I'll just stick with the photos of their work.
Here are the simple technology tools that I use on a daily and weekly basis to support learning in my kindergarten classroom:

• A digital camera allows me to celebrate the students' work and to catch their projects before they are taken apart to create new projects.  The camera also allows me to celebrate friendships in our classroom.  I print out and put photos of friendships in our class photo book as well as putting some photos on the wall as a reminder of the important of friendships and "sticking with your buddy" (from the book Officer Buckle and Gloria by Peggy Rathmann)  
• A digital video camera  allows me to film the students as they read independently (or do their best to recall the words from the story.)  My camera (Canon vixia HFR21) is not "top of the line" but it has worked well for several years.  It is important to have a tripod for stability and a good microphone for sound quality.  I experimented with the Canon camera microphone (not so good) and 2 cheap "lavalier" microphones (not good at all!)  I tried having the students use the video camera on my MacBook Pro with a USB headset microphone.  The students loved looking at themselves while they were reading, but the audio wasn't the best quality and the headset kept falling off.  Now, we are using a Shure headset microphone with the Canon camera.  Twice a year, I give families a DVD copy of their child reading (at Christmas and at the end of the year) as well as copies of the digital photos I have taken in class.  In addition to "celebrating our reading" videos, I have made 2 "backwards math videos" with the students in iMovie.  My students must think that I am crazy, because I encourage them to knock down their own block structures or mess up their pattern block designs. When this film footage is slowed down and run backwards, the students see themselves magically creating their towers and patterns out of chaos.  Very amusing...
• Color printers and copiers allow me to create beautiful books with the students.  We have 3 types of books that we create on a regular basis in our classroom.  We make birthday books for each student with pages that say, "I like (name of student who is having a birthday) because....."  The original pages are created with colored pencils and ball point pens, then the birthday book pages are copied in color so that the original can go home with the birthday student and the copied pages can go in our birthday book collection.  We also create "riddle books" with riddles that students create at home based on the letter of the week.  For our "student of the day" books, the students write down stories in a journal with help from their family at home.  Then, I use the color copier to make copies of these journal pages so that we have a back up copy if the journals are lost.
• in the future, I plan to use a digital voice recorder to capture audio of students reading books, telling stories or discussing their ideas.  

These technology tools are so simple, yet they allow me to celebrate the students' learning in the classroom and share their great work with their families...as well as preserve it for students and families to enjoy for years to come.