CCMS Tour

CCMS or Corpus Christi Montessori School is a private elementary school that teaches using the montessori method. I was supposed to have a tour May 7th, but unfortunately the school has closed. I was lucky enough to have visited their the past for the voicethread project. The first thing I noticed about the school was the aquarium. I was told that the children take care of the aquarium themselves. They also have a garden that they also are in charge of. I love that this school really teaches life skills. When I saw the classrooms, I liked that there weren't many tables. The classroom was filled with manipulatives. They were organized; each manipulative has its placed. It was definately different from the classroom that I student teach, but it was great for me to see.

Service Project: Week Three

This week, I really felt like I had a clear path to follow. Most of the work is completed: I finished my storyboard and my goal was to finish the movie. I decided to use VoiceThread for my movie because it was a compilation of still images. Once I found my images and recorded my voice, I was able to record his voice. It was difficult at the beginning of this project, but now I am so glad that I
did! The more that I played with VoiceThread, the more ideas I thought of to use in my own classroom. I am so glad that I had this experience, because I feel like it made me a better teacher.

Service Project: Week Two, Part 2

After my meeting with the parent and student, they researched about their topic which is Greek mythology. Since he hadn't researched anything yet, I gave him some questions that will help guide him to finding some insightful information. I told them to basically find facts that interested him. The KWL chart that we started during our meeting helped him figure out what kinds of interesting facts he wants to include.

Once I received some information he has found, I was able to think about how we could put this into a VoiceThread. Creating the storyboard was my next challenge. When we meet on Tuesday, we will take this storyboard and put it into a movie.

Service Project: Week Two

A couple of days ago, I was able to meet with my student! He talked to his teacher, and there are not alot of guidelines for his research project about mythology. Since he has not had the chance to research yet, it was a good time to get him started in the right direction. I set up his blog, and showed his mother how to access his blog site. During the week, he will research his topic and I will be able to help him once he has more information.

Fortunately, he has siblings that are working on a research topic with other students in my class. This made it much easier because we all were able to meet them at the same time. Also, we need to create our video this weekend, but I won't be in town. One of the other college students who are working with one of his siblings, will be able to get the information we need. I am so thankful that there was someone who was able to help. As a teacher, it is so important that we rely on one another for help, because we can't all be everywhere all the time.

So, far his project is going well and I look forward to helping him create his voicethread.

Service Project: Week One

This was the first week we had information about my student and his project. It was frustrating at first because we had a hard time communicating with eachother. I was unsure what to do, so I continued to email the parent. It wasn't until monday where I was able to get a hold of the parent. I was so excited that I would be able to meet with my student tomorrow at his school. As a teacher, it is important to understand that like us, the parents are busy too. We need to accomidate for their schedules so that we can best meet the child's needs (since the child is the reason we went into teaching in the first place). Its a vital life lesson for me to learn as I grow as a future educator.

Speadsheets in the Classroom

Since high school, I have had the opportunity to play with Excel. I usually used to make graphs and small charts. I only used the basic functions because I did not know any more about it. Excel is a complicated program that allows for one to many things. When I was practicing with the wedding planner spreadsheet, I learned that excel has simple functions that can make your life much easier.

I always thought of the program as mainly a business program,but this week, I looked at it from a teacher's point of view. How can I use this in my classroom? How can I integrate this program into my lessons? The first thing that came to mind was tying it to my unit plan about seasons. I decided I would use excel to make a seasons survey. I listed every student in my classroom and asked them to rank the seasons, 1 is the least favorite and 4 is the most favorite. The Excel program took the numbers and totaled each column. Because the program quickly found the sum, I was able to see which season was the most popular.

Though my program was created by the teacher, Excel is a program that can be used by students to create their own projects. This type of project could be used in an inquiry based project. For example, the teacher could show students the basic functions of of Excel, and then create guidelines for a project. Students then must solve a problem by adding functions. Students can conduct their own surveys and have the program calculate the totals. They could also create a budget list for toys, clothing, etc. There are a few questions a teacher should consider asking students while they are working on these projects.

• How can Excel help you and/or your parents in your everyday lives?
• Why is Excel sometimes more helpful than Word?
• What Excel functions did you find helpful during your project? Why?
  

My Movie Making Experience

This week presented many challenges for me. I spent several hours creating my first movie! Before this week, I never realized that most computers have a movie making device as one of its default programs. At first, I felt completely unfamiliar with the tools, but after I experimented with it, I figured out how to make my movie. After creating my movie, I related that tools that I learned to how I could use it in my classroom.

One of the best ways to engage your students is to involve them heavily in a project like this. For example, you can give each student a line to read or film the class participating in an activity. When you are finished filming the movie, teach them how to edit movies. If they are too young to edit on their own, have them help you with the order of the movie clips. Your students will be so proud of their work once it is finished, and I guarantee that they mastered the material that the film covered.

I enjoyed making this movie, because like I said, it my first time experiencing something like this. It is great to see the final product for which I worked so hard. I plan on showing this clip to my students as a focus for my season’s lesson in science. Once I have showed them this clip, I am hoping it will excite them to want to create their own!

Digital Storytelling: Creating a Story Board

This week, I have been researching a new and exciting tool that is excellent for the classroom: digital storytelling! I feel so fortunate to be alive during a time where technology is growing at an exponential rate. Though I have been introduced to many technological elements in my life, this was the first time I was introduced to a way to create movies. In the classroom, digital storytelling can be an exciting teaching tool that can really engage your students.

I have been studying the essential question: "why do we have seasons." During this semester, I have found many videos, images and great information about the topic. I know that this would be a great topic to create a movie that will excite my third grade students. In order to make a great movie, I had to decide how I would include the seven elements of digital storytelling.

1. Point of View – This will be from a teacher's point of view, in a conversation with a student.
2. A Dramatic Question – "Why does the earth have seasons?"
3. Emotional Content – creates curiosity and gives viewers answers.
4. The Gift of your Voice – presents information as a conversation rather than just a presentation.
   
5. The Power of the Soundtrack – background music used while the teacher presents a picture and answers the dramatic question.
6. Economy – conversation is short, to the point, and question is answered with a picture and a simple explanation.
7. Pacing – the story progresses rather quickly. It sets up the dramatic question and answers the question in a direct manner.
   

Once I began creating my story board, I was decide how I would lay out my video. My approach to the video was taping a conversation between a student and teacher because I felt like it presented the information in a more personal way. I look forward to creating my video, and sharing it not only with you all, but with my third grade students!

Digital Storytelling

As I have discussed in my previous posts, the internet has opened the doors for teachers to have more interactive and effective lessons. Thanks to Microsoft Office, teachers have had access to Powerpoint for many years. There are many exciting things that one can do with a powerpoint; animation, sound, pictures, etc. But it wasn't until this knowledge explosion through the internet where Powerpoints can be taken to the next level: digital storytelling. Digital storytelling is presentations through the internet that can be accessed and shared by anyone whom seeks them.

An internet site that I have used for my class for which I student teach is slideshare. This is a free site that people can use to look up and create presentations. They even allow you to add music to your presentation. Because of the great reaction I got from my students, I also used this site for my unit plan. I included my presentation about why we have seasons. The presentation is timed with music so that the teacher can discuss each slide without having to be near a mouse. The music as well as the pictures enhances my lecture. By adding music and pictures to a lesson, the teacher is appealing to more multiple intellenges: allowing more students to learn. In addition, with more exciting features, students are more likely to stay engaged. To show you an example of my Slideshare presentation I have included it below.

The Seasons

View more presentations from Jessica S. (tags: earth months)

Though learning about the Earth and Sun is usually only considered science, this is a great unit that can be used across the curriculum. When looking through the third grade TEKS, I found many Texas state objectives in other subject areas. Students can write about what they have learned through a classroom post. In math, students are able to measure the temperature outside and keep record of how it changes through out the year. By using engaging unit plans in your class, you can keep a consitant theme while keeping students excited about what they are learning.

Internet Resources

The internet has allowed for the classroom to have an infinite amount of resources. It has become such a valuable tool for teachers as well as students. There are resources for teachers such as lesson plans and activities. In addition there are many tools for kids to use as well songs, games, and safe search engines. Because of this availability to unlimited knowledge, the computer has become an essential tool in the classroom.

In my classroom, I plan to use these tools so that my students will become more familiar with what the internet has to offer. Students can communicate with one another by using blogs like this, Google docs, email, etc. They also have the opportunity to use the internet to search on kid-friendly sites. These sites offer valuable information that are put in simpler format than other sites on the internet. Some valuable search engines include "Kids Click!", "SuperKids", and "Yahooligans". They all start on one page where students can click on links depending on the topic for which they are researching.

For my "seasons" unit, I found many internet resources would be helpful in the classroom. These websites are great for teachers as well as students. As I continue working on my unit plan, I am sure I will find more resources that will be useful.

Using Blogs in My Classroom

In the classroom, technology can be used to do a countless number of things. With technology growing as fast as it is, students have access to many resources including the internet. Students can use the internet to connect to one another, even those who are half way across the world. Blogging has become a popular form of communication for students, whether it's just for fun or for school. By integrating blogging into the classroom, students can get more involved with technology. This makes the classroom more exciting for students and that means that students will be more likely to enjoy learning! As a future teacher, that is my main goal.

Blogging is something that can be used for all kinds of lessons throughout all subjects. In my classroom, I want to use blogging as a way for students to reflect upon lessons. In addition, they will be able to share their ideas with their other classmates. I will give students the opportunity to read each others blogs and reply to them. I also plan to use blogs to create compositions. The blog title will be the name of the composition and each post will be their individual compositions. This way, students will be able to look and read each others work from home as well as share it with family. Blogging is like hanging work in the school hallway, except more people will have the opportunity to read and appreciate it.

If you have never done anything like this in your classroom, there are many websites out there that can help you implement blogging the classroom. The Warlick website, 2cents worth is an example of a blog that helps educators. From this website, I also found a social networking site for teachers.

Unit Plan: What is it? and Why integrate inquiry and project based learning?

Essential Question:
Why does planet earth have seasons?

This is an essential questionbecause it is something that took us a long time to figure out. Thisconcept has to do with the sun and the earth’s rotation. This questionis what students begin to explore in early elementary grades and theylearn more depth in higher grades. According to the Galileo education network, “essential questions allow us to explore what knowledge is, howit came to be, and how it has changed through human history”. There was a time that we thought the earth was flat, but that would not accurately explain why we had seasons. When it was discovered that the earth wasround, the explanation for seasons could finally have been made.

Unit Questions:
What are the characteristics of each of the four seasons?

Why is one side of the world in their summer while the other side of theworld is in their winter?

What are the main source of heat for our planet?

The students will learn about seasons through reading the text book,researching in the internet, participating in engaging experiments andwatching demonstrations. Students will also be given the opportunity togo the science museum where they can learn more about seasons throughother interactive activities.

TEKS:
Science 2.3C: explain a problem in his/her own words and identify a taskand solution related to the problem.

Science 2.4A: collect information using tools including rulers, metersticks, measuring cups, clocks, hand lenses, computers, thermometers,and balances.

Science 2.7D: observe, measure, and record changes in weather, the nightsky, and seasons.

How to integrate inquiry and project-based learning:

This topics allows for students to investigate the rotation of the earth around the sun in many ways. Students can physically re-create this rotation by using materials a simple a a flashlight or lamp and themselves. They are able to work in groups to role play, so that they understand how this system works through a physical way. To extend the lesson, students can be given the opportunity to answer questions like: What would happen if the earth stopped rotating around the sun?