Mr Fisher's Global Learner Blog

The Second Grade Wildlife Experience

2011-05-22T22:16:00.004-06:00

My class and all of Kemp's primary students got to visit the Wildlife Experience in Parker, CO. As part of our project we learned some vocabulary prior to going, practiced documenting with video and still cameras, then I set the students loose in teams at the Wildlife Experience to learn and photograph the parts they were most interested in so that we could create our PowerPoint presentations.
We found some exhibits with QR smart barcodes and phone in features that we explored only superficially given time constraints. I imagine a future in which students in the classroom go to their "Centers" with a mobile device and scan the barcode on the table for the center activity.
Anyway, we have been practicing with students building files in Smart Notebook which has been a lot of fun. We decided to use the Smart Notebook export to Powerpoint feature for our powerpoints. It is definitely easier for my second graders than making slides in Powerpoint. One draw back as you can see in the attached Slideshares of our presentations is that when you convert files you get some strange font size changes. We messed around with it for a while trying to fix it. Ultimately by the last Powerpoint we found that if we took a screen capture of the page we had built in Smart Notebook and then deleted the original page it uploaded all the content as an image.

Wild 1

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Wild 2

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Wild 3

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Nutrition Series, Smartboard lesson

2011-02-15T20:02:00.002-07:00

Our school has partnered with INEP the Integrated Nutrition Education Program through CU where the students receive different healthy foods, learn about nutrition, help in food preparation with the goal of eating more fruits and vegetables.

I'm going to post some lessons that I am adapting to include technology for my class. For most of these I will incorporate a descriptive writing piece.

Here's a lesson on making healthy English Muffin Pizzas that the students really enjoyed. I modified it to include some graphing, photo examples, and an interactive activity with the food pyramid. This helps me cover more information in a shorter amount of time. The lesson is posted here.

Welcome, Mrs. Cipkar's class!

2011-01-24T10:19:00.003-07:00

Dear ePals,
We are so excited to get your emails. We loved learning about Canadian money! We took some pictures of our money and we will send them to you. We made a short video to introduce ourselves. We hope you like it!

The Best Group Blog Nomination goes to....

2010-11-30T22:41:00.003-07:00

My Nominations for The 2010 Edublog Awards are:

Best Group Blog: The Adams 14 Global Learner Blog

This outstanding blog represents a collaborative effort of dozens of teachers to find ways to integrate technology in education. Go to the Edublog Awards to make your own nominations.

Great Webinars from Classroom 2.0 at LearnCentral.org

2010-09-06T22:27:00.004-06:00

I wanted to give all my Global Learner colleagues a heads up to some great webinars on technology in education. These webinars (short learning seminars) are great interactive sessions on anything from where to get great online resources to the latest web 2.0 tools and emerging trends in 21st century learning. These live, interactive sessions from Live Classroom 2.0 are hosted by LearnCentral.org, a social learning network. The platform for these webinars is Elluminate which is a collaborative web conferencing tool that we should look into for our own web conferencing and future trainings.
Anyway, there are always good webinars there. Some of them for this week are:
Tues. 5:30 MST Supporting Differentiated Instruction and Technology Integration
Tues. 6:00 MST Interview with Charles Fadel (Cisco) on 21st Century Learning and STEM
Wed. 6:30 MST Ripple Conference with Cathy Moore: Action Mapping (visual approach to instructional design)
Wed. 7:30 MSTMath 2.0 Series (on the National Library of Virtual Manipulatives)
Thurs. 5:00 MST Edublogs Fine Focus - LIVE & PAPERLESS with GoogleDocs (a teacher shares how she uses google docs with her students)
Sat. 10:00 am MST Global Education Conference (Steve Hargadon, Lucy Gray, and Julie Lindsay talk about how to get involved in the upcoming [November] virtual conference)

Check out these and more in the calendar of events over at Classroom 2.0.

Video Resources for StoryTown reading grades 1 and 2

2010-08-22T17:06:00.005-06:00

I’m excited for this year and have already begun incorporating technology in a couple of ways: First I am using Excel to house and display my student reading assessments. I needed a little refresher on conditional formatting in version 2007 so I just watched a quick Atomic Learning video. (Don’t forget our new login is at http://www.atomiclearning.com/login/adams14 Just login with your district network login credentials). Next, I’m using the SmartBoard quite a bit for math and literacy. A great resource I also use quite a bit is DiscoveryEducation.com’s video library. Last spring Tara Ward and I put together a list of video resources for first and second grade to accompany the Storytown reading program. These video clips are largely from Discovery education and YouTube. The resources can be found here: http://eslpages.pbworks.com/StoryTown.

The Miss Zaleski and Mr. Fisher's Class Beautify Project

2009-12-06T22:24:00.004-07:00

Sara Zaleski and I are teaming up for a vocabulary writing project. We are modeling our project on the story that we read called "Jamaica Louise James" which is about a girl who makes pictures to beautify a subway. Our students have made a picture and explained how it will beautify a place using at least two robust vocabulary words. We look forward to sharing comments with Miss Zaleski's class!

My Nominations for the 2009 Edublog Awards

2009-11-30T21:10:00.004-07:00

My Nominations for the 2009 Edublog Awards:

Best Group Blog: The Adams 14 Global Learner Blog

Best elearning / Corporate Education Blog: The Atomic Learning Blog

You can check out the Award nominations here: The Edublog Awards Homepage

Project Fall

2009-10-18T18:57:00.002-06:00

I thought I'd give an update on Global Learner stuff so far. It has been a busy semester. I'm finding it hard to fit in all that I want to do with my students.

We are currently working on a Fall Project with Tita Martinez' class in Center, CO. The idea behind the project is to compare some pictures and share some fall writing with another classroom. We set up a wiki to show our work. So far the students have taken a lot of pictures, charted some weather, done some leaf rubbings, and shared a book, The Leaf Man, with Mrs. Martinez' first grade classroom. We are working on some poems to include too. We look forward to finishing up the project when Center comes back from Fall break.

The project can be found here: http://projectfall.pbworks.com/FrontPage

More updates will be forthcoming as we add to the wiki.

Primary lesson on Odd and Even

2009-10-10T19:58:00.007-06:00

This is a lesson I did to help students get a better grasp on odd and even numbers. The students really enjoyed it and learned a lot. I think it could be used for Kinder or First grade too.

Lesson Plans:

Odd and Even Lesson
Second Grade
Adapted from a Lesson by Alta Allen
http://www.learnnc.org/lp/pages/3621

Objectives. Students will learn the concept of odd and even numbers by counting and sharing candies. Students will demonstrate the ability to identify odd and even numbers by selecting and categorizing odd and even numbers on a Smartboard, showing odd and even numbers of cubes, writing odd and even numbers, and filming or photographing odd and even things around the school.

We begin by telling about things that come in pairs, like shoes, feet, paws etc. We will tell that an even number is one that can be shared equally between two people.
We will model handing out odd versus even numbers of Smarties candy to pairs of students to try to see if they can be shared equally.

Show odd and even movie from DiscoveryEducation:
The Living Numbers: Odd and Even up to Twenty (segment of The Number Crew: Drinks for All). Then students act out forming even number by lining up with matching lines and adding one or taking one away to change it to and odd number.

Practice identifying odds and even numbers to 20 with cubes.
Then show students how to identify larger odd and even number by looking at the last digit.
Students drag objects from Smartboard images that are odd and even to their respective sides.
Practice the odd and even chants.
Then students form groups. Two groups will go around the school with video camera to get students to act out odd or even numbers. Two groups will go with digital camera to photograph evidence of various odd and even objects. One group work with teacher to search Creative Commons photos from flickr.com.
Following day. Students work in center rotation to record audio descriptions of the odd and even photos. One group works to add titles and practice Windows Movie Maker.

Should Teachers Follow Business Media?

2009-09-22T20:00:00.003-06:00

What is the teacher's role in keeping abreast of technology advancements that are shaping our society? Should teachers follow business technology blogs and magazines? I follow some blogs, some educator technology groups on Diigo: http://groups.diigo.com/groups/classroom20, http://groups.diigo.com/groups/discovery-educator-network, and http://groups.diigo.com/groups/infusEDtech and subscribe to Wired magazine. Some weeks I'm too overwhelmed to read all that comes my way. What is our responsibility in this regard?

Second Grade Lesson on Teaching Place Value.

2009-09-01T22:24:00.003-06:00

Here is a lesson I created last week for my second graders in math:
Grade Level Essential Target:
1.1c Use objects and pictures to represent whole numbers including odds and evens from 0 to 1000
1.2.c Group objects by ones, tens and hundreds according to place value (for example: given 9 ones, 5 tens and 4 hundreds the student can write the number 459; given the number 459, the student can show 4 hundreds, 5 tens and 9 ones)
ISTE NETS Standard 2. Design and Develop Digital-Age Learning Experiences and Assessments (2a: design or adapt relevant learning experiences that incorporate digital tools and resources to promote student learning and creativity)

Student friendly objective: We will use objects to show numbers up to 1,000. We can use place value to help us group and count large numbers of objects.
Language Objective: We will use language that helps us work as a team. We will use writing and speaking with math words and numbers to show our answers.

Resources needed: Smart board, straws, rubber bands.

Open the lesson by reviewing counting by tens.
Begin by telling students that when we get a lot of things to count we need a good way of counting. Bring a bag of M&Ms, a deck of cards and some other items that contain many objects. Ask the students to discuss with their elbow partner something that contains a lot of objects. Give students a sentence starter: One thing that contains a lot of items is…. Put students into groups of five and dump a bag full of straws (at least 50) on the table. Tell them they will need to use complete sentences to ask questions and to help them work as a team. (“I have x straws. How many do you have?”) Ask them to work together to count the straws. Observe how the students work together and praise any examples of teamwork. After a few minutes, bring the students back together and tell them that if you have numerous objects it is easiest to count them in groups rather than one by one.
Now break out some rubber bands and start to group the straws into bundles of ten. Ask students to use polite language such as “Could you please pass me a rubber band? I need five more straws. Could we share to make a bundle?” Show the students that we will group exactly ten straws for each bundle, and then we can count by tens. Leftover straws do not get bundled. Let the students return to their groups and circulate to check with students as they proceed.

After the students have counted write the numbers for each group while counting the bundles. Review the concepts of tens and ones with students. Tell the students that if we want to count all the straws from each table group together we might even want to put together 10 bundles to form groups of 100. Use the Smart board to show place value boxes. Practice writing a variety of two and three digit numbers and call on students to identify the number of ones, tens, and hundreds. Have students use precise math terms such as, “There are x hundreds, x tens and x ones.”
Then use the blank base ten chart in the place value folder of smart board under “Mathematics”, then “Number Concepts and Operations” or search by keyword. Type in labels for the chart then from the Place Value folder use the ones, tens, and hundreds blocks to represent various numbers and have the students write the numeric value for the blocks chosen on white boards. In the video I show how to set this lesson up.

Differentiation: The lesson offers tactile and visual forms of learning. Because of the ease of manipulating the smart board manipulatives the number of place values being taught and assessed can be increased or decreased to work within a variety of zones of proximal development.

An additional lesson based on counting candy can be found here.

http://peabody.vanderbilt.edu/depts/tandl/mted/faculty/Mted3250/HtmlPapers/Diane%20&%20Michael.html

Communicating More Frequently, Mentoring

2009-08-08T18:05:00.004-06:00

One of my goals this year is to communicate more frequently on this blog. I am going to try to update this on a weekly basis even if I don't have anything exceptionally noteworthy. I think that I've been getting away from the original intent which is to reflect on my journey of growth as a teacher integrating technology.

The Global Learner veterans at Adams 14 school district finished giving a two and a half day training for the new Global Learner mentees. I will be working with two fantastic teachers from other schools. I understand the feeling of frustration and being overwhelmed with all the new technology. Two years ago, I went through the same thing. If I had had a mentor I think it would have reassured me. Sometimes you just need a nudge in the right direction every once and a while.

Welcome Second Graders

2009-08-07T09:14:00.005-06:00

Bienvenidos al salon de clase de Mr. Fisher. Vamos a utilizar mucha tecnologia interesante. Mi meta es usar la pantalla SmartBoard y aprender y usar VoiceThread. Vamos a trabajar con dos clases -una de Hanson y la otra de Haskin Elementary en Center, Colorado. Mi numero de telefono es 303-853-5862.
Welcome to Mr. Fisher's Classroom. We are going to be using some exciting technology this year. My goal is to use the SmartBoard and really work on VoiceThreads. I am excited to work with Mrs. Talamantes from Hanson and Ms. Martinez from Haskin Elementary.
My classroom phone number is 303-853-5862.

Practicing Embedding VoiceThread in blog

2009-08-06T15:29:00.001-06:00

This post is just a practice for embedding a post during the training for the 2009-2010 Global Learners training. This was one of the more popular training segments and I think the appeal of Voicethread lies in it's simplicity. Many primary teachers were excited about using this with their younger learners who do not type or write well yet. More to come on VoiceThreads later.

practice

2009-08-06T15:22:00.000-06:00

Animals Internet Inquiry student artifacts

2009-06-04T21:42:00.006-06:00

Here I'm posting some student artifacts. The students created them in Windows Movie Maker. For copyright issues we didn't use the screen captures from kids.nationalgeographic.com but instead we found some photos on flickr.com under Creative Commons license. The students recorded their voices with Microsoft Sound Recorder. The students really showed their learning and they reflected on what part of the website was most helpful to them.
You can find the lesson plans here: https://sites.google.com/a/adams14schools.org/mrfisher/lessons

Overdue Kidspiration Needs vs. Wants Lesson

2009-06-02T00:01:00.004-06:00

Here's my lesson for distinguishing needs vs. wants. The students created a multimedia file using Kidspiration to distinguish between needs and wants.
The objective of this lesson is to sort pictures to distinguish between a need and a want as well as to select picture files to add to illustrate understanding of the concept. The digital product will be a Kidspiration file. Students will create a multimedia file including a written or voice recorded sentence stating two needs in addition to listing 5 needs and 5 wants. Students will address technology and operations standards to manipulate media to create interactive media files in Kidspiration.
Learning Objectives:
Students will differentiate between a need and want.
Students will show they can drag and drop files, enter text and/or insert a voice recording.
Students will create, locate, and use digital media and digital media tools to create a multimedia file.
The lesson plans (as well as the other lesson plans from this year) are posted here.

First/Second Grade collaborative project.

2009-05-10T21:37:00.008-06:00

To get my students ready for second grade I asked them to develop some questions that they are curious about. Each table group developed a question, edited it for errors, and filmed it on their own. I helped them add their questions in MovieMaker. Now the movie/questions are assembled in VoiceThread ready for Mrs. Kellogg's class. The VT can be found here: http://voicethread.com/share/487074/
Lisa and I will post again after we have finished.

Lesson Enhancement with Habitats

2009-04-27T21:53:00.007-06:00

I'm taking a course right now on using technology for learners with special needs. Some of the interesting things we have learned about are Lesson Enhancement Strategies and Student Learning Strategies. In this lesson I'm using a Concept Anchoring Routine and a student acronym strategy.

Title: First Grade Habitat Lesson
Standard
Colorado Model Content Science: 3. Life Science: Students know and understand the characteristics and structure of living things, the processes of life, and how living things interact with each other and their environment.

Outcome
Students will be able to explain what a habitat is and describe the things in a habitat that animals need to survive.

Materials and Resources
Anchoring Table created in Notebook software for Smart Boards. Smart Board, projector, book entitled The Little Polar Bear, United Streaming video clip on habitats.

Procedures
Anticipatory Set: Read The Little Polar Bear by Hans de Beer. This is a story of a polar bear that floats away from the arctic on an ice floe and ends up in the tropics. We will use this story as a segue to the discussion of what a habitat is. We will discuss how each animal has a place where it lives and gets all the things it needs to survive. Then we will use questions to draw analogies between human habitats and animal habitats.
Discovery questions:
What do you call a place that you find food?
Where do you get water from?
What do you call the place that keeps you safe at night?
What do you call all these things together?
Where do animals get these things from?
What do you call the place where animals live and get all these things to survive?
Additional questions:
How is the habitat/environment in the tropics different than in the arctic?
What are some things that might make it difficult for the polar bear to survive in the tropics?
In what ways would it be difficult if the hippopotamus were to try to live in the arctic?
Pre-teach vocabulary: Organism, Shelter, Survive. Read the first four questions to the students and elicit responses to fill out the first column of the Concept Anchoring Table. Read the fifth and sixth questions, elicit responses and explain that we are going to be learning about habitats. Finish with the additional questions for higher order thinking.
Show the introductory clip from the Discovery Education video on habitats. Pause the video and annotate and screen capture to the Smart Board the images associated with basic needs. We will gather screen caps of water, food, and shelter. Then we will watch the clips from the forest habitat and the pond habitat. We will screen capture examples of the basic needs for animals found in these habitats.
We will use the learning strategy of the acronym WAFLS (Water, Air, Food, Living space, Shelter) to remember the basic needs of organisms. We will pause to fill out the right-hand column of the anchoring table. We will form groups of three students with mixed abilities to take turns coming to the Smart Board to fill in a Venn Diagram of animal needs and human needs and dragging and dropping both picture and word examples in Spanish and English.

Assessment
The students will work in groups of three at the classroom computers and the Smart Board station to build a complete habitat by dragging images and words from the side of the screen to a circle in the center of a blank Smart Board Screen. Students will then type their names and print their screen shot.

Reference: Habitats: Homes for Living Things. 100% Educational Videos (2000). [Motion picture] Retrieved April 4, 2009, from Discovery Education: http://streaming.discoveryeducation.com/

VoiceThread in Action

2009-03-21T21:43:00.007-06:00

Last month I posted about a live conversation I had through Classroom 2.0 about Voicethread. I have been playing around with it and trying to figure how to set it up for best usage in my classroom. I decided to go with the $10 teacher account. This lets me create identities for contributing to the voicethread without setting up individual accounts for each student. I put it to test last week as an assessment for a presentation I did on Cross Linguistic Influence for my CU Bueno master's class. Many of your colleagues are here contributing to the Voicethread (under my fish identities).

Here's how it went: After some fumbling to get my powerpoint to play the embedded videos I presented my review of a chapter we were reading. I had asked those with laptops to bring them and we were able to form five groups. I gave each group an identity (I called them fish 1, fish 2, etc. -which is what I'm thinking of using for my first grade groups). Then I logged them into Voicethread and helped them to click on the identity for their group. I showed them the different ways of commenting and let them choose. I gave out some microphones and a webcam and I set one group up with call-in minutes (fish 1). I let them choose how they wanted to respond. I circulated and helped but very little help was needed except trying to adjust microphone volume.

The Voicethread consisted of some videos of students answering questions with prompts for my colleagues to answer specific questions related to the language forms of the students or feedback mechanisms of the teacher. Overall the lesson was very well received. The interest and motivation was high and the quality of the responses were great.

Some instructional caveats: The project was very absorbing and we ended up going well over the 30 minutes allocated for discussion. In a k-12 classroom setting you would need to have a very simplified practice setting (reduced content-focus and increased practical-focus). I might have done better to include a discussion rubric if this was a graded assessment. I also would ask the groups to state their names in their comments next time.

Set up time: 10 minutes for videoing students, 20 minutes editing videos and putting subtitles, 30 minutes setting up the slideshow and creating identities. (A simplified one with just photos could have been done in 5 minutes).

Next steps: simplified practice with classroom. Perhaps just one intriguing photo and ask the students to list three descriptive words for the photo using two different means of commenting. Then, begin using it for commenting on student writing projects and other learning activities. Finally, students create their own. (Note: the way I have it set up, students have editing authority and could accidentally erase the whole Voicethread or other students' comments. I haven't figured out a way around this yet without paying the $60/yr teacher Pro account. Does anyone have some ideas how to remedy this?)

I really had fun with it. It seems like a great way to present multiple assessment options and is great for emerging writers. I think it can help foster collaboration skills in the classroom and serve as a great vehicle for project-based learning. An added benefit is that it could serve as a vehicle for metacognitive self-reflection in a student portfolio.

Anyway, here is the link to the Voicethread.

Classroom 2.0 Webinar on VoiceThread

2009-02-21T18:24:00.008-07:00

I just thought I'd share my experiences using the live webinars from Classroom 2.o. This weekend I participated in a discussion on VoiceThreads in the classroom. Classroom 2.0 uses a software called Eluminate which has really nice functionality. I learned a lot more about voicethreads and how they can help foster transformative learning practices through collaboration. I see the real strength in VoiceThreads as an opportunity for students to gather feedback and reflect metacognitively on their projects. Here's a little VoiceThread I put together with some screen captures from the webinar.

Here's the link:
http://voicethread.com/share/360781/

Beverly Ingle on 21st Century Learning

2008-12-26T23:14:00.004-07:00

Beverly Ingle, president of the Colorado Education Association has a video news conference out on YouTube talking about meeting the 21st century's challenges in our schools. In this video, she talks about the importance of preparing today's students for the challenges in the global marketplace. She mentions the importance of highly qualified teachers and mentions that quality teaching is the most important influence on student learning. Part of that quality teaching involves integrating technology in our classrooms and preparing our students to compete in the global economy. The skills that she mentions in preparing our students involve: analysis, critical thinking, evaluation, creative problem solving, and multiple communication skills. When questioned by a reporter on the challenges of teaching these skills to students she followed that all students have the ability to learn and added, more importantly in my opinion, that all teachers can also learn. I would add to that by saying that all teachers MUST learn to incorporate technology and critical thinking skills in their classrooms. I applaud Beverly Ingle in making this a priority. You can view here video here.
Crossposted on the Global Learner Blog

Resources for Digital Equity for Spanish Speaking Students

2008-10-11T21:21:00.004-06:00

Equity and diversity in education are important themes in education today. Paul Gorski, in defining multicultural education mentions that, “Every student must have an equal opportunity to achieve to her or his full potential” (EdChange Multicultural Pavilion). Linguistic minority students do not have the same internet resources available as English speaking students and may struggle with the technology to locate them. One of my goals with regard to multicultural education is to help close the digital equity gap. EdReform.net lists the five dimensions of digital equity as: Technology resources, quality content, culturally responsive content, effective use of resources and content creation (http://digitalequity.edreform.net/, 2003).With that in mind, I've added a page to my website for Spanish language elementary web resources (https://sites.google.com/a/adams14schools.org/mrfisher/resources). The resources presented on my webpage are intended for students, parents, and teachers of students who speak Spanish. Teachers are constantly searching for quality web resources for their Spanish speaking students and parents frequently ask me for web resources they can access at home to further their children’s learning. The purpose is to consolidate on one page some of the best Spanish language web resources for primary age students. I'd like to solicit your feedback on additional web resources available in Spanish that I could add to this.

References:
Gorski, P. C. (2003). : The Challenge of Defining “Multicultural Education”. EdChange Multicultural Pavilion. Retrieved October 11, 2008 from http://www.edchange.org/multicultural/initial.html

cross posted at http://principianteglobal.blogspot.com/2008/10/digital-equity-for-spanish-speaking.html

Virtual Manipulatives, First Grade

2008-10-01T21:22:00.008-06:00

This evening we just had a great skype chat on Using the SmartBoard in the standards-based classroom. The focus was on what was working well and we talked about engagement, math, and literacy. The consensus was that there was a need for more training or refresher courses. Some ideas where bandied about regarding students teaching other students or creating short training sessions in peer to peer learning. I like the idea and I'm going to share some screen capture tips in one of my subsequent postings. Much of the focus was on math and so I'd like to show a short clip of some place value work we did this week using the National Library of Virtual Manipulatives at http://nlvm.usu.edu/en/nav/vLibrary.html.

Specifically we are using base blocks to represent place value. This address the Grade Level Essential Target of 1.2C: c) Uses objects to show meanings of = ,<, >, from 0 to 100. e) Uses multiple models to develop initial understanding of place value of ones and tens (base ten blocks, abacus, computer, manips). This is a great place to differentiate because while all first graders need to represent up to 100, many of my students can use blocks to show numbers in the thousands. (Please note this website is available in Spanish as well)What I like about the base blocks virtual manipulatives is that they are easy to move around, you get immediate corrective feedback from the number counter, and it is a fast way to demonstrate mastery of a difficult concept.

Here is a short video of my class doing some base block exercises. In the first two segments I am filming but for most of the class work my students film everything and do all the documenting with the digital cameras. Each week I assign a class photographer who take all the pictures and videos. They are filming the third segment. As you can see, it is a bit shaky (Note to self "Get tripod"). Mildly reminiscent of the Blair Witch Project.

First Grade Internet Workshop

2008-09-14T08:56:00.005-06:00

Here is an internet workshop I developed for my first grade classroom.

Website, Content, and Rationale
This activity will involve a trip to the Great Plant Escape website at http://www.urbanext.uiuc.edu/gpe/index.html. I chose this website for several reasons. First, it introduces our classroom unit on plants. Second, it is available in Spanish which is the primary language of all of my students. Finally, it is fairly easy to navigate; it has few external links, and does not contain advertisements or other distractions. Of my 28 students, 12 have a computer at home and of those students, seven have internet access. A website that is simple with large colorful images to support the content is appropriate for students at first grade and appropriate for students with limited internet experience.

Activity and Objectives
Students in groups of four will work together to navigate through the portion of the Great Plant Escape dealing with growing plants indoors. The objective is threefold: Students will identify the basic needs of plants. Students will demonstrate and reflect on their ability to work together. Students will demonstrate beginning internet navigation skills including following a bookmark, navigating by hyperlinks and navigating by navigation arrows. The standards associated with these objectives are:

Colorado Model Content Standard 3, K-2 Benchmark 5: Organisms interact with each other and with nonliving parts of their habitat to meet their basic needs (for example: food, water, air, shelter, space) (Colorado Department of Education).

Illinois Social Emotional Learning Standard 2C: Use communication and social skills to interact effectively with others. Demonstrate cooperative behaviors in a group (Illinois Department of Education).

National Educational Technology Standards 6. Technology Operations and Concepts:
Students demonstrate a sound understanding of technology concepts, systems, and operations. 6a: understand and use technology systems (International Society for Technology in Education).

To open this activity I will explain that we are going to plant some plants and we want to find out what the best way to keep them alive is. The students have practiced basic navigation using the Smart Board. I will plan a day for navigating using only a touch pad. A fellow first grade teacher and I will model working together, emphasizing how to discuss and question the web page content. We will model how to help each other when one of us does not know a word or where to click. We will also model taking turns and handling the laptops carefully. Next, I will present the learning goals in kid-friendly language and the rubric for content, cooperation, and technology.
Then, students will be assigned their groups and jobs and given their laptops and begin. I will circulate to monitor the students and provide assistance as needed. After navigating the site and taking notes (drawings with labels) we will return to a whole group and students will share what they learned about plants, navigating through the site, and working together. In addition to knowledge level questions about plant needs the following questions will be used to encourage higher level thinking:

Content:
What two needs do you think are most important?
Where would be the best place in this classroom to place the plants so that they grow best, and why?
Do you think it would be better to plant 15 seeds in pot or to plant only three? Why?
Does your lawn have to be mowed in the winter? Why not?
Why do you think we do not see flowers outside in the winter?
Do all plants need the same amount of water?
What are some plants that do not need as much water as others?
How are plants and people alike? (Or different).
What are some examples of plants that need to be cared for and why do they need to be cared for when other plants do not?

Process:
What was the best thing about working in a group and why?
What was the best thing about this website and what was the worst thing? Why?
What were some hard things and what where some easy things in navigating and why?
What would make this activity better and why?
How is learning on the internet like learning from a book and how is it different?
Who do you think made this website and why?
Would you call who made the website an author? Why or why not?
Is there a better way to show what plants need?
How could you make this website better if you knew how to make websites?

Activity Management
The students will work together to make sense of the content. They will work in four person heterogeneous groups that include a strong reader, a strong navigator, a note taker/artist, and a time keeper. They will take turns in each role at the computer and help each other. All the students will work at the same time using the laptop carts for about 20 minutes. The students will record the information gathered online by taking turns drawing pictures with labels. The students will only need their note taking sheet, a timer, and their rubric.

Rubric:

References:

Colorado Department of Education: Colorado Model Content Standards. Retrieved September 12, 2008 from http://www.cde.state.co.us/cdeassess/documents/OSA/k12_standards.htm.
Illinois Department of Education: Social Emotional Learning Standards. Retrieved February 12, 2008 from http://www.isbe.state.il.us/ils/html/descriptors.htm
International Society for Technology in Education. National Educational Technology Standards. Retrieved September 12, 2008 from http://www.iste.org/Content/NavigationMenu/NETS/ForStudents/2007Standards/NETS_for_Students_2007_Standards.pdf

Using the Smart Board for Phonics Instruction

2008-09-12T21:11:00.003-06:00

As a Colorado Reading First school with very explicit and systematic literacy instruction I often find it hard to integrate technology during my Core Literacy time. One of the nice features about the Smart Board is the ability to manipulate text and graphics. For many lessons I hand write the words to emphasize letter formation and because the speed at which I write is a good speed for first graders decoding on the fly. For this particular lesson I pre-typed the parts of the words. I wanted to emphasize common end blends. I used the Smart Board to quickly move ending “L” blends to the initial consonant. (GLET 1g: Uses word and letter recognition skills. Produces sounds to common letter combinations. ) Here is a short screen cast of that lesson.

Cross posted on the Adams 14 Global Learner Blog

How to create a student data sheet in Excel using conditional formatting

2008-09-06T17:40:00.004-06:00

Here's a follow up to last weeks post on creating a student data sheet in Excel using conditional formatting. I posted an example file in the Global Learner Wiki under Elementary Reading: http://globallearner.wikispaces.com/Elementary+Reading

2008-08-30T09:53:00.002-06:00

Since our district has adopted DIBELS as a literacy measure I would like to share how I use Excel to help me organize and analyse my student data. The Dynamic Indicators of Early Literacy Success tests has an online feature that is helpful but I like to keep student data in a format that allows me to group students more meaningfully.

First I create a spreadsheet with the DIBELS Benchmark measures. I add a column for nonsense words recoded. Then I add columns for data from the core phonics survey.

I select each column and then apply conditional formatting to populate the cell with a specific color based on a number range to indicate if the student skill is considered benchmark, strategic, or intensive. I use the DIBELS ranges for the DIBELs measures but I have my own set of cut-off ranges for Core Phonics data.

I then sort the data by Nonsense Word Fluency (NWF) and NWF words recoded. Letter Naming Fluency is also a good indicator of reading ability for first graders (though sometimes not a good measure for ELL students). This gives me a general layout that allows me to make general groupings. I use the more specific Core Phonics data to fine tune my groups.

Finally, I set up additional worksheets within the Excel document for progress monitoring and for Winter and Spring Benchmark data. I add a worksheet that details what letter sounds and letter names have not been mastered for each student so that I can differentiate my instruction at the individual level. I add district writing scores and CELA scores so that I can have a very robust data set at a glance.

Cross posted on Adams 14 Global Learner Blog

Moving to block fonts

2008-08-24T17:18:00.005-06:00

My school has anounced that we have chosen to move from D'Nealian manuscript to Block style letters for elementary handwriting. Since I think this was a district-wide decision I thought I'd share a few resources for those teachers scrambling to get practice writing sheets together.
I found a couple of nice websites with handwriting sheets to print as well as some websites that allow you to input the text you want to print. I downloaded some for printing as well as for using on the Smart Board:
Handwriting for Kids has a feature helpful for Spanish accent marks and special characters.

Kid Zone has a page that allows you to make custom tracer pages as well.

Also check out the Amazing Incredible Handwriting Worksheet Maker by Tampareads.

153 Educational Uses for the iPod

2008-03-03T21:59:00.003-07:00

I’ve used my iPod to provide PowerPoints for my students. It makes for a great flash card tool. Great for first grade since I have a couple of students who need more help with sight words. I found this article on Yahoo tech which points to a couple of other educational resources (Online Education Database and Kottke.org) and I thought I'd share it:

http://tech.yahoo.com/blogs/raskin/18019

The sites they mention are:

http://oedb.org/library/beginning-online-learning/100-ways-to-use-your-ipod-to-learn-and-study-better and

http://www.kottke.org/plus/50-ways-ipod/

This link is for some really cool podcasts on Smartboards:

http://pdtogo.com/smart/ This is a cool link too. This is one I use for keeping up on my Spanish. It's a series of free podcasts (costs if you want the transcript) called NotesInSpanish:

http://www.notesinspanish.com/ Its a fun way to learn on the go. Other languages resources from OpenCulture:

http://www.oculture.com/2006/10/foreign_languag.html -sadly there is nothing under Icelandic languages.This site has tons of resources for podcasting:

http://www.podcasting-tools.com/
Okay so that's more like 154 resources.So how are you using your iPod?

crossposted on http://principianteglobal.blogspot.com/2008_03_01_archive.html
Photo from Louder: http://www.flickr.com/photos/hermida/390819852/

My Mission Statement

2007-10-27T22:43:00.001-06:00

In a course I'm taking at Walden University I've developed and refined my mission statement. One of the outcomes of the course, Teacher as Professional, is to demonstrate that I adjust my teaching strategies and techniques based on reflective thought. Since this blog is my main place for reflective thought I'm including my mission statement below along with some goals I've developed for the this year:

Mission Statement
I believe all students can achieve academic success in an environment conducive to learning and that each student brings a unique set of strengths to the classroom. My mission is to motivate students to be lifelong learners, to inspire them to achieve academically, and to prepare them to be productive members of a global and digital society. My responsibility is the betterment of education, within my classroom and beyond by collaborating with colleagues and engaging in critical self-reflection.

Goals
One goal this year is to deepen my connection to students and empower them to achieve by helping them feel valued, creating a culture of belonging, and making learning meaningful and relevant to them. I will try to have a one-on-one affective conversation with my students weekly. I will sign up for another course on linguistically diverse learners between now and next Fall.
To motivate students to be lifelong learners I will model that learning does not stop after high school or even college. I will discuss the courses I'm taking now with my students and share one new thing I learn each week.
I will inspire my students to achieve academically by purposefully integrating technology to enhance student achievement. My goal is to create at least one smart board lesson per week using strategies from Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol (http://www.siopinstitute.net/).
I will fuel my passion for teaching by seeking out at least two professional development opportunities in my district this year and applying my learning in the classroom.
My goal with regards to the betterment of education is to present three trainings to staff at my school or to other educational professionals this year and to practice and share my critical self reflections on my blog.

Neuroscience of Learning and Becoming an Expert Teacher

2007-09-30T22:08:00.000-06:00

This blog is one of my forays into developing my collegial interaction and since the purpose of my blog is to facilitate the exchange of ideas in order to promote student achievement I thought I’d post my thoughts on becoming an expert teacher.
I’ve become more and more fascinated by the research that has come out regarding learning for students and the brain and understanding how students learn is a key endeavor of mine.

In a course of mine at Walden University we are studying the facets of the concept of Teacher as Professional. This week we are focusing on what makes an expert teacher. We read an article from the Journal of Staff Development (Garmston) that discusses the journey of teacher along the continuum from novice to expert. In this article he discusses six areas in which expert teachers must be knowledgeable; Content, pedagogy, students and how they learn, self-knowledge, cognitive processes of instruction, and collegial interaction. When I think of these six areas I think of them as irrevocably intertwined. It is important to be an expert in the content matter you are teaching but you must also have a good understanding of your own learning styles so that you don’t teach to only one style of learner. Garmston states that “Knowledge of one’s own patterns and preferences supports informed decision making and the overcoming of egocentric teaching choices.” (p. 2) This self-knowledge in turn affects the cognitive processes of instruction where the teacher uses a wide variety of teaching modes and “take an allocentric perspective, employing the learner’s frame of reference in instructional planning, teaching, and evaluation.” (p. 2)
Understanding a learning style or frame of reference is important but we must also delve deeper into how the students learn and teachers can learn from each other through collaborative reflection. This also requires us to reconsider current teaching trends and critically analyze popular research into learning including the brain-based learning research that has come out. Pat Wolfe in an article from her website cautions against implementing strategies that have not been tested in classrooms (Brain Research and Education: Fad or Foundation?).
As a Reading First (http://www.readingfirstsupport.us/) school we are conducting a book study on “How the Brain Learns to Read” (Sousa, 2005). What I’ve found interesting are how male and female brains process language. In the book, Sousa confirms that "Male brains tend to process language in the left hemisphere, while most female brains process language in both hemispheres." (pp. 14, 15) He goes on to mention that in females the nerve bundle connecting both hemispheres, the corpus callosum, is larger and thicker in females and he implies that information travels between the two hemispheres more efficiently in females and may account for why young girls often acquire spoken language more readily than boys. As a first grade teacher this idea merits more than passing consideration. We know from research that boys learn differently in many ways than girls do. The open question for now is “How do we capitalize on that research and differentiate learning for boys and girls?”

Garmston, R. J. (1998). Becoming expert teachers (Part one). Journal of Staff Development, 19(1). Copyright 1998 by National Staff Development Council. Reproduced with permission of National Staff Development Council in the format electronic usage via Copyright Clearance Center

Sousa, D. A., (2005). How the Brain Learns to Read. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press

Wolfe, P. (2003, Fall). Brain-compatible learning: Fad or foundation? Retrieved May 24, 2007, from http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa..edu/forum/fall03/brain.htmlReprinted with permission. From the December 2006 issue of The School Administrator.

Brain photo from Killermonkeys

How to turn a Word document into a Powerpoint presentation.

2007-09-27T17:14:00.000-06:00

Tonight I'm leading a study group for my elementary school on brain research and how students learn to read(Sousa, 2005). For this lesson we will also be learning how to turn a word document into a powerpoint presentation.
We will copy the text below (notes we developed while reviewing a chapter) and change the questions by highlighting them and assigning them a "Heading 1" font style. We will highlight the questions and give them a "Heading 2" font style(I'll add an asterisk in front of the content that should be formated "Heading 2". The document doesn't need any extra returns. Then we will click "Send to Power Point" from the file menu and it will populate powerpoint slides with "Heading 1" text at the top of the slide and "Heading 2" text below. Then it's up to everyone to add a color background or style. *EDITED We found that when we sent the document to Powerpoint all the data was on one slide and the font was too big. FIX: Put a hard return between the Headers and then once you are in Power Point change the font by going to VIEW, MASTER, then SLIDE MASTER and selecting font 20 for the Header and font 32 for the text.

The option now is to select slide design and give it a style or color.
Text to copy:

How the Brain Learns to Read (Sousa, 2005).
Discuss the difference between learning to speak and learning to read. Why does this difference exist? (pages 31-32)
*Speaking is a natural, genetically hardwired capability and areas of the brain are not specialized for reading.
Were you surprised to see that learning to read is not strongly related to intelligence? Do you agree? Why or why not? What skill does Sousa say children must have if they are to learn to read? (page 33)
*Learning to read is dependent upon learning the alphabetic principle and phonological awareness.
Sousa states that “being aware of sound differences in spoken language is crucial to learning to read written language (2005, p33).
Why is the English language considered to have deep orthography? How does this make English more difficult to learn to read than many other languages? (pages 35-36)
*In English one letter has many sounds. English has a poor correspondence between how a word is pronounced and how it is spelled. (1,100 ways to spell the 44 phonemes).
Discuss Ehri’s four phases of word recognition in early reading. Do you agree with Ehri’s model? Explain your answer. (pages 37-40)
*We, Kemp, believe there might be more stages than just the four and we teach specific parts such as multi-syllabic etc.
What are morphemes? How does morphological awareness help students learn to read?
*Smallest word element that can change a words meaning. Morphological awareness helps students learn to read by allowing them to understand chunks of meaning.
Discuss the six syntactic variations found on pages 43 and 44. Does your teaching experience confirm that these variations are difficult for young readers? What strategies have you used to address the reading problems caused by these variations?
*We found negation, word order, and passive voice to be difficult for our students.
How does morphological awareness contribute to reading comprehension? (page 45)
*It adds meaning to what they’re reading. If students understand affixes and other morphemes it can lead to understanding of unknown words.
Why are children’s reading comprehension often less than their comprehension of spoken language? (page 46)
*The complexity of written language is greater than that of oral speech. We also don’t always talk in complete sentences.

Sousa, David A., 2005: How the Brain Learns to Read. Thousand Oaks, CA. Corwin Press

2007-09-24T22:10:00.000-06:00

Ésta es mi primera tentativa de fijar un vídeo a mi blog. Éstos son mis estudiantes presentando sus primeros patrones. Necesito arreglar el nivel de sonido también. Ésta es nuestra primera tentativa en desarrollar nuestras voces profesionales.

Rockyou slide show

2007-09-09T22:56:00.000-06:00

Video Screen Captures using Smart Board

2007-09-09T22:24:00.000-06:00

Last week I practiced capturing screen shots from a United Streaming video about farms. The students really liked that we could write on the screen shots. I dropped the photos into RockYou.com slideshows with comments in Spanish. We will use that to review our learning on Monday. The next step is to have the students doing all the work and deciding what to capture and why. This might be a fun way to expand on a lesson about sequence of events. The possibilities are almost endless!
Now if I can only figure out how to embed the slide show in my blog post.

First day with Smart Board

2007-08-24T21:07:00.000-06:00

Today was the first day of school and I introduced my students to the Smart Board. I showed a couple of students the set-up procedure so that after many practices they will be able to connect the Smart Board, Laptop, and LCD projector. My goal is to have my students proficient in running the technology hardware and software we will be using in class.

I had the students practice aligning the Smart Board. There were many opportunities for practice because they kept bumping the board or the projector. We practiced writing on the board and many students found it challenging to make legible letters on the board. The shadows of their hands obscured what they were trying to write. To get them accustomed to the markers and erasers I had them practice playing tic tac toe. I drew a tic tac toe grid with the line feature and they put in the Xs and Os. After they got the hang of it I used the tic tac toe game to introduce the idea of writing with transitional words.

I like the idea of using the screen capture tools to save our learning moments. I also look forward to integrating literacy and other content area skills.

2007-08-14T10:48:00.000-06:00

My focus over the next week will be on how to add photos and other media to this blog. My students are first graders so they can't really write. I'm interested in having them post short videos, photos, and podcasts. One of the cool technologies I saw recently is flixn.com. It's used to create short videos with a webcam. You can't edit these videos but they look easy enough for a first grader to use.

My First Blogpost

2007-08-14T10:45:00.000-06:00

This is my first blog entry. The purpose of this blog is to facilitate the exchange of ideas regarding the integration of technology to enhance student achievement and the creation of a global learning environment in my classroom. In this blog I will share my successes and failures in an effort to learn from them and to share with other teachers.

Ésta es mi primera entrada del blog. El propósito de este blog es de facilitar el intercambio de ideas con respecto a la integración de la tecnología para realizar el logro del estudiante y la creación de un ambiente de aprendizaje global en mi sala de clase. En este blog compartiré mis éxitos y faltas para poder aprender de ellas y de compartir con otros profesores.