Emerging Readers Site

Check out this great site for emerging readers: http://toon-books.com/bandp/

Glogs on a Blog

Some of the 5th grade has been working on researching states and regions of the US. We wanted them to have a fun way to compare the regions and states without the boring charts and maps, so we turned to Glogster. Today the first class got started on their Glogs and loved it. They did an excellent job and were so into the project they did not want to stop and kept asking how they can do them at home and on their own. The assignment was to personify and compare two regions or states as a couple and how compatible would they be. Take a look at what a great job they did - (these are still in progress)!

You can see some finished ones here, here, here, here, here, and here. It was great to see each different personality in their Glogs and how they made connections. All we did was give direction on how to use Glogster and what they had to include, all the designs are fully the kids' creativity.

Ahhh...Technology

Technology is a wonderful thing and adds so much richness to our curriculum and involves students in ways they never would be otherwise.

Except when you get them excited and it goes wrong. Sometimes you just have to roll with the way things play out - go with Plan B. (That's how I roll!) Anyway, today we were very excited for 5th grade to come to the media center and participate in a live webcast with Karen Cushman, Newbery Award Winner and author.

Once we got 3 classes in and settled, we got started - or so we thought. Now, keep in mind that I had checked and double-checked the site, clicked and tested the click here to test your connection button at least 3 different times, and the pre-webcast music was playing perfectly.

Then, it started - and so did the issue. The streaming was intermittent so you heard parts of words, then nothing, then a sentence, then a part of a question. We tried for about 10 minutes hoping it would clear up, but it didn't, so we called it a day with the webcast. The good news though is that it will be archived here on or around May 15th, so you can see it after the fact, it just is not live so not as much fun. Oh well! I think it is a good thing for students to see that sometimes things don't go as you planned and it is ok to sometimes need a Plan B, because that is how we roll here.