On the move

Thanks to generosity of Chevron through Donors Choose , my math class experienced a new mobile technology, Ollies! Ollies are programmable robots made by  Sphero . We used the app,  Macrolab  to program the Ollies. I modified a lesson from the Sphero website to teach the concepts of measurement and data. The first day, we explored how to program the Ollies and how changing the variables in the program affected what Ollie did. The students recorded data to capture what they were seeing. On day 2 it was time to be more methodical with our data collection. Students only changed one variable at a time. This allowed students to discover the relationship between time and the distance that the Ollie traveled. The students changed the variable of the delay between the roll and stop commands to develop this understanding. There was definitely a lot of excitement and motivation to learn measurement. On Day 3, we analyzed the data recorded from each group. There were some noticeable differences

We completed our travel blogs . This unit was a learning experience for me and my students. I started with trying to answer the question of what my students needed to know about geography and how to make it relevant to their lives. My teaching partner suggested they make brochures about places to visit in our state. To support our goal of integrating more technology we changed the final product from a brochure to a travel blog. I started my creating a  sample blog entry . This generated a lot of excitement with the students that they could be bloggers, too. From my sample, we created a rubric for what a quality travel blog entry should have. I was impressed at the thought process of the students. We also defined some key terms such as blog, hyperlink and rubric. The next step was to have the students research locations. I put links to websites on a  Symbaloo page . This kept the research focused. I provided some documents to support the students as they researched. These I develo

At our Elementary Leadership PLC, we learned an instructional strategy for math. I was so excited about this new strategy that I tried it the next day.  Three Reads for Math  is a close read strategy for problem solving. The steps are 1) read the question stem orally without any numbers. Ask the students to describe the context or situation of the story. Step 2) the problem stem is read with the numbers and projected for the students to read along. The students then think of questions that could be answered with the information presented. Step 3) Present the question to be solved and work in groups to solve the problem. What I really like about this strategy is the students focus on the language of math. They do not default into "harvesting" numbers and choosing an operation at random. Even more exciting is to hear the questions that the students generate. Reading the problem and focusing on the context, helps the students to identify what the language of the problem necessa

One of our activities the first week of school was to write goals. As a model for this activity, I wrote my goal for the year with input from my class. My goal this year is to use technology everyday in my instruction. Now I realize that if I use the definition of technology to mean anything invented after I was born, I meet this goal every time I use my laptop. If I were to apply this definition from my students' perspective I could be in trouble. I am choosing my perspective since it is my goal. I wrote the goal with students to model goal writing but also to be accountable to them for my goal. Here are a few ways I have made progress towards meeting my goal. I have made quizzes for my reading group using Google Forms and a QR  code generator. The students then take the quiz on an iPad. The students and I are writing a blog with posts giving travel advice to families. This project is working on their writing skills as well as the content standards for Social Studies. We have

I have always enjoyed the beginning of the school year. The anticipation of new experiences, building new relationships and fresh school supplies all make me smile. This year I will be teaching 4th grade and instructional coaching.  This is a new challenge for me as previously I have always taught a primary grade. I will of course integrate technology and I am looking forward to working with an older age group. I read, My Teacher is a Monster by Peter Brown to my students. We used to  AnswerGarden  to brainstorm characteristics a teacher should have. I want give credit to Meghan Zimmond's blog post  for the idea. Here's the word cloud that their ideas generated. I have a lot to live up to but it was a great way to start our year.

Here is a wrap up of the last two weeks of the summer program. The students were surveyed about their favorite thing they did during the summer program. This word cloud represents their responses. Boat Building Circuits Claymation Robotics with Glencoe High School Student Kite Making and Flying Final Day and Makerspace . It was an amazing six weeks and I could not be more proud of the students and staff that participated. Thank you to everyone who made this possible.

One of my goals for the summer program is to make sure it can be replicated. This blog has helped me to track this journey. I have also made a list of ingredients for a successful summer program so that others can use them in their own recipe.  I hope they are helpful to anyone who wants to create an innovative learning space for their students. Summer Program Supplies and Resources

We spent time exploring STEM careers using  PBS Kids Real Scientists webpage  and information  from the State of Oregon Employment Department. I wanted the students to make a connection between the constructing and engineering we have been doing and what they can do in the future. They explored the site and chose one career that interested them. They wrote a paragraph telling why that career appealed to them. One of the students chose to explore the career of a video game designer. I told him that if he came the next day, he would get to design and play his own video game. I am not sure he completely believed me. Today he was able to try out his game designing skills. He had an opportunity to try  Pixel Press Floors  during our Makerspace. He was actually impressed with what he had accomplished and shocked to have so much fun in school. This week we had a visitor from the Hillsboro Tribune and she asked me why I am teaching the summer program. I smiled and looked around at a libr

The students chose words to describe roller coasters. We recorded them using  Answer Garden . I think it also describes what building roller coasters is like. There was a buzz of excitement as groups of students designed and constructed marble roller coasters. One of the student remarked, "This doesn't look like regular library time." He had just asked me if he could tape the roller coaster ramp to the wall and was shocked when I said, "Of course." The students were so engaged with their projects that they did not notice a visitor from the  Hillsboro Tribune . Kathy Fuller came to learn about what was happening in our building this summer. We are proud that we will be featured in the newspaper. I will make sure to include the link in a future post. We will be continuing our roller coaster construction tomorrow. I am very thankful that our custodial staff is supportive of these messy projects. This video captures the feelings expressed in the wordl

We completed our first lesson using the Schoology  learning management system. I created a lesson on digital citizenship using content from  Common Sense Media . Their assignment was to watch a video featuring the Super Digital Citizen and then answer questions about the video. They wrote their assignments in Schoology and submitted them to me. We had some minor problems with usernames and passwords but by the end everyone was able to access the materials and complete the assignment.  I am thankful that our Tech Department is so supportive. This summer program is a great opportunity to try out different methods of accessing content. The students are relaxed and curious and so am I. We can work through the obstacles and learn together. The students also researched roller coasters using  Wonderopolis  in preparation for the construction of marble roller coasters tomorrow. Many of the students have not been on a roller coaster. They were fascinated with the videos of the roller coasters

Wind powered cars generated a lot of excitement at the summer program today. I explained how to make the chassis of the car. The challenge to the students was to design a way to capture the wind from the fan to make their car go. Students could work in pairs or individually to construct their cars. We had a variety of models. Some of cars almost flew. This activity from PBS Kids  was accessible to all grade levels. The car that traveled the fastest was designed by an incoming second grader. The collaboration and and conversations between the students was impressive. One of the staff members and myself also noticed that they students were excited for all of the cars. There was no need to compete with each other. They only wanted to modify their own car to see if they could make it go faster or farther. I heard one student say, "This is my best car ever." I believe that was the highest endorsement of our time today.

Mr. Wilson taught a lesson on one point perspective drawing to the students. Even though drawing a horizon and vanishing point was a challenge for many of the younger students, they were still engaged in the lesson. The novelty of using rulers to create a design was all many of the students needed. There were lots of diagonal lines and attempts at vanishing roads. All of the students were very proud of their line drawings and could not wait to show me what they had created. I believe that the message from our read aloud books is making a difference. Students see themselves as creators. A group of students continued their video game creation with Pixel Press Floors. The intensity of focus and success reinforces the need for gamification as an instructional strategy. Creating the games and getting immediate feedback is so motivating. I asked one of the students who I know struggles to stay focused in class if he would work harder if he could design games during the school year. I

As I searched for books to read aloud to the students, I chose books that inspire innovation and perseverance. We have read books about inventors and artists. Today we read about a duckling called, Little One Step. The duck struggles to keep up with his bigger siblings who encourage him to just take one little step at a time. I continued this theme perseverance by introducing the students to the  Bee-bot app . This is a simple computer science app but becomes challenging quickly. The students collaborated with a partner to program the bee-bot to move along a path. Oh no and ah yes could be heard in the library. When students became frustrated and wanted to give up, I reminded them of the character, Little One Step. This encouraged them to try again. In another part of the library and computer lab, students worked on video game design. Students used  Pixel Press Floors  to design video games. They sketched their game on paper and then scanned with the Pixel Press app to an

Being a robot proved to be more challenging than it looked. Using the  My Robotic Friends lesson  from Thinkersmith, students had to create the commands to program a student robot to stack cups. It took a lot of thought and arrows to create perfectly stacked cups. It was a sure sign of learning when one of the students was able to find the "bug" in the teacher's set of commands. While the older students were busy being robots, the 1st and 2nd graders listened to The Beautiful Oops by Barney Saltzberg. The students then created their own "Beautiful Oops".

Who knew that tape, string, balloons and straws could cause such excitement? We constructed balloon rockets and flew them along a string. Thank you again to the  4 O'Clock Faculty Blog  for the idea. There was a lot of shouts of joy as the balloons either shot along their path or spun in place. This activity opened the door for lots of questioning about what worked or what did not. The students were able to make adjustments to the straws, tape and string to allow for faster rockets. I think the adults enjoyed the activity as much as the students.

Our read aloud stories  have been about inventors with the theme of stamina. Today we gave them a chance to be inventors, engineers and experimenters. We had our first day of makerspace. I put out a variety of materials and told them that they had to be able to tell me what they made and what it did. It was an engaging and messy day. Mr. Wilson and Ms. Vincent (another AmeriCorps Member who joined us) led the students through block printing. It was great to see them share their love of art with the students. The students loved the chance to try something new and make their own visual creation. I think I need to spend some time in the makerspace creating a way to measure the creative energy in the room.

We used  Wonderopolis  to answer some of the questions we put on our Padlet yesterday. We also discovered some really wonderful about Wonderopolis. The articles have a read aloud feature. This made the information accessible to all of the students. I had planned for this to be a short part of our day but the students were enthralled so spent more time exploring the wonders. The staff and I enjoyed watching the students navigate their learning and find answers to their questions. After exploring and learning about helicopters, robots and tigers, the older students learned about coding functions with Mr. Wilson and Mr. Berkley. We are fortunate to have amazing AmeriCorps Members working in our summer program. They connected the idea of functions with the coding the students have seen on  Code.org . The students then made a key chain with beads to represent a function. This lesson came from  Thinkersmith . The first and second graders made their own discoveries using the

We started our week with some off-line computer science. The 3rd through 7th grade students learned about binary code using a lesson from  Thinkersmith  called Binary Baubles . They examined the inside of computer and used the pictures from the lesson to identify the parts of the computer. They learned that computers communicate using a language called binary code. To try out the language of computers the students made baubles. The baubles were magnets with their initials in binary code. With their ASCII Encoder Card, they read the binary code to discover the owner of the magnets. The 1st and 2nd graders used  Educreations  to retell the story, Violet the Pilot . They drew pictures and then recorded themselves retelling what happened in the story. We focused on using sequence words (first, next, then and last). They shared their creations with other students. We finished our day by creating a Padlet - What do you want to learn about this summer?  to record what we what to

We gathered our ideas and thoughts about building towers onto a Padlet page. Building Towers Padlet We then used our knowledge to build towers from spaghetti noodles and marshmallows. Watching the students preserve through the building challenges and be completely engaged is the best part of teaching. I am looking forward to next week and our next building challenge.

We turned our library into a construction zone. Students worked in small groups to build towers from newspaper and tape. The challenge was to build the tallest free standing tower. Design and construction methods varied but the excitement level was shared. An observation made by one of the staff members was that some of the students who struggled with math on the computers were thriving with this challenge. It is amazing what a motivating activity can do for students. The idea for this activity came from The  4 O'Clock Faculty  blog. The library was also still a library. Students checked out books to keep their minds engaged at home. Our other major accomplishment for the day was to enroll the 3rd through 8th graders in Newsela . Students are working on the summer challenge and completing quizzes. I even heard a student who is a reluctant reader say, "Yes, I did it!"

We launched our first day of the summer program with straw rockets, Mobymax math and coding. 38 young scholars extend their school year. They ranged in age from incoming 1st graders to incoming 8th graders. The best comment I heard today was, "I am learning lots of math." The 1st and 2nd graders listened to the story, If I Built a Car by Chris Van Dusen. They discussed which part of their story was their favorite. They recorded their preferences on an index and posted them on a bulletin board. We will track all of our stories and fill the bulletin board by the end of the summer. We finished our time with some coding. The 1st and 2nd graders worked on the iPad app,  Kodable . For some students this was an introduction to coding. I had a few of my students from Kindergarten who were able to teach the other students how to code! The older students explored the websites from the http://www.symbaloo.com/mix/mkesstudent  that I set up for the summer progra

Last year at this time, I remember writing that I needed to accept uncertainty. A year later I still have to accept the uncertainty but this year it is more excitement than nervousness. I spent time today planning and I feel as prepared as possible for what Monday may bring. I am thankful that I documented the process last year so I have a model for what we will do this year. I have a larger number of students registered than last year! We were able to generate a buzz about summer learning at our morning assemblies. I think this help more students to realize that learning during the summer could be fun. This year I will continue to learn along with my students. Last summer I learned about computer programming, iMovie, Newsela and how to find STEM projects that required lots of tape. This year we will make marble roller coasters, balloon rockets and newspaper towers. We will learn about computer programming through off-line as well as on-line projects. My first challenge is implementin