Spring Session Week 5

B1-2 Technology:
This week we started class by doing some assessments in our Tech Star folders, but then soon got on to more exciting things with the site Panwapa World. Designed by the people behind Sesame Street, Panwapa World is a "multimedia global initiative" to encourage children to become responsible global citizens-read all about it here. Because we know not to use our full names on the internet, we started today by logging in and getting a username, making a password, and then creating our panwapa kid identity, house, and flag of interests. We'll use these as we "travel" around the world next week "meeting" children from other countries. Here is my passport:

We also played the "hide and seek" game on the site, which had a neat twist-the counting and clues were all in a different language!

3-4 Technology:
This week was all about getting ready for Market Day. First, students used powerpoint to create a business card-special thanks to Emma, who was my Queen of the Printer! After the card was finished, students used Voki to create an advertisement that is a Celebrity endorsement.and embed it onto their kidblog. We had a few technical difficulties with the site, but most students were able to create a commercial to show their class. Here is one example:

Spring Session Week 4

B1-2 Technology:



http://www.canadianmarketingblog.com/finalfoot.gif

As B1-2 students talk about rocks and fossils in their classrooms, we talked about some of the "fossils" we can leave behind on the internet-our "digital footprints". We did a great activity from commonsensemedia.org called Follow the Digital Trail. Students worked in small groups to find clues about Mizzle the mouse and Electra the elephant and decide who left the bigger digital footprint. While waiting for their chance to go on the clue trail, students worked on some rock, fossil and dinosaur internet sites including Bitesize Science Rocks and Weathering, You Dig!, Dinosphere Children's Museum, and Brainpopjr. Fossils.

3-4 Technology:

Students are getting ready to create a business for a good or service for their class Market Day, so we talked about advertising. We discussed how advertising is all around us, especially on the internet whether you are on google search or a fun game site like nick.com. We discussed pop up ads and pop up blockers, then tried to find all the ads in Admongo, a game created by the Federal Trade Commission to teach children about advertising.

Spring Session Week 3

B1-2 Technology:
Our study of habitats coincided perfectly with some Earth day activities this week. We talked about how humans can affect habitats and watched these great little video clips from Animals Save the Planet. This one was their favorite! 
The children created a creature in Eekoworld and did a great job making ecofriendly decisions about their home and environment.

3-4 Technology:

Our last week with Shidonni-can't say I am sad to see it end! The students really enjoyed it and many are playing at home, but the technical difficulties of using it in the lab made it very frustrating. This week we took our country research and turned one of our Shidonni worlds into that country with an appropriate landscape, flag, and place to visit. Our "pet" was a person from that country dressed in traditional clothes with a traditional name. We also drew some traditional food for our person to eat.

Spring Session Week 2

B1-2 Technology:
After our keyboarding practice, students reviewed habitats and animal classifications. Since we started the year focusing on mammals, this time we talked about birds and combined it with a fantastic activity borrowed from Ann Oro at St. Michael School that teaches skills for reading a web page. Students went to Enchanted Learning's Bird Picture Dictionary site and searched for birds matching the clues on their worksheet-a bird scavenger hunt! This reinforced scrolling through a web site, alphabetical order of dictionary words, reading for information (and not just guessing!), and patience. After they finished, students could explore some animal activities such as Funschool's Bird Watcher, Design a Panda Habitat, Paint and Make Habitats, and Bembo's Zoo.

3-4 Technology:
Our "Underwear Club" for Type to Learn is growing as more students hit level 10 and are restarted, this time with boxers on the keyboard to cover the letters! After keyboarding, we checked in on our Shidonni pets to see what other countries they traveled to and then picked one country to research using a variety of sites including google search, Trekearth photos, and the Cultural Profiles Project. Students copied and pasted pictures and information onto a Word document about their country's flag, landscape, traditional food and dress, popular names, and places to visit. We will be using all this information next week for our final Shidonni activity.

Computer Challenge #1

Click here on World of Wonders , take a long trip, and print your certificate! Return your certificate or parent note to me and get your name in the "I can" can!

Spring Session Week 1

B1-2 technology:
Habitats, habitats, got to have a habitat! Check out the habitat song. After Dance Mat typing, we talked about habitats, things plants and animals need to survive, and how different needs require different habitats. We tested this with the Build a Habitat activity-each time we changed animals, we had to adjust things in the habitat like precipitation, plants, and environment to make it happy. After that, we read about a pretend creature called the Manatami and had to draw a habitat where it could survive based on things we learned about what it ate and how it lived.

Any extra time was spent exploring the interesting world of Switchzoo where we could make our own imaginary creatures.

3-4 Technology:
For keyboarding practice this week, we logged in to our Kidblogs and blogged about Spring break. While many of us were traveling or just enjoying the time at home, our Shidonni animals were out traveling the world! We checked out their travel diary to see what countries they visited and then drew their trip on a map, including information like country, capital city, and continent. We used the search engine Wolfram Alpha to find out the travel time from Maryville, Tn to each country and added that information to our maps as well before we sent our pet out traveling for another 6 days.