I Want My Mtv! Volume 1

Link to the Google Form

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLqRBE3Br3wllCi6rTVd3eKEb956jDBEfN

Tie Tuesday Returns!

Here we are showing our swag at our first Tie Tuesday of the year. The purpose of tie Tuesday is to have a special day where we dress up and look fine. Every day we have together is special, but when we dress up and look nice it can be extra special!

A Google a Day

A Google a Day is a daily puzzle that helps you to hone your search engine skills. Each day you are given a question that you have to answer using Google search. This is a fun way to work on finding better ways to search the net and become more skilled and successful finding things.

Secret Builders

 Secret Builders brings something new, the opportunity to converse with other people outside of the classroom. Use common sense and the online safety practices we have talked about in class. I am no saying you cannot have a conversation, just remember that you are looking at an avatar and not the person. You really don't know anything about them, so don't let them know anything about you!

The Music is Infectious!

Coach Cooper is having his students do line dancing this month. Here is a video of 5th grade students dancing to the Cha Cha Slide Part 2 by DJ Casper. DJ Casper is also known as Mr. C!

While watching the video on my class computer I had to quickly grab my camera to get some video of Jonathon sliding in his chair. Apparently you "can't stop the rock!"

Here is the class dancing to "Cupid Shuffle" by Cupid.

Having line dancing in physical education classes help the students with rhythm and coordination. It is also an excellent aerobic exercise! Coach also wants the students to know how to do a few of the more popular dances so the students won't feel self-conscious at their future dances.

Pivet Stick Figure Animator

Pivot Stick Figure Animator is freeware I downloaded after seeing examples created by students.

One great feature is you can add your own background and make interesting videos.

There are a few things to consider if you want to post the video to your blog. First you have to save your movie as a .gif file. This is a moving picture file (not to be confused with a .mov file) You have the option in the save menu of the program.

After I saved it as a .gif I uploaded it to the blog as a picture, but it was not animated. I did a Google search on "uploading gifs to blogger" and found this post from the blog Blogger Tips and Tricks. In it the author suggested using Photobucket to host the picture and using the html code to post the picture. As you can see above it worked!

Would You Like to See This Happen at Noel?

Karl Fisch's blog The Fischbowl is a regular stop for me since he covers things that interest me. For the past four years he has posted video on his blog of his school's faculty dancing. Here are the links:

2007

2008

2009

2010

A Digital Christmas Gift to You: Nintendo8.com and 8Bit Christmas Music

Picture from Wikimedia Commons

Nintendo8.com is an old school gamer's dream, it hosts emulations of some of the best early console games of my generation including the Sega Master System, the original 8-bit Nintendo, and even some Commodore 64 games. If you have never experienced these early games, I would suggest you take a look and appreciate the evolution of gaming. This will make you appreciate your now generation consoles!

Here is a link to the top games played on the site. This is a good place to start your adventures!

As an added bonus here is the link to the 8Bit Christmas music all you OG's (Old Gamers) have to have for Christmas. You can listen to the songs or download them and play them on your MP3 player.

A special thanks goes to Dusty our WebMaster for showing me the game site. Thanks!

Build Your Own Snowman from Yahoo

Here is a fun little site that lets you build your own snowman. Unfortunately, there are not a lot of different choices you can make with the snowman and the ways they have for you to share your creation are extremely limited. To save your picture you will have to do a screen capture!

Make Your Own Winter JibJab

JibJab is a fun site where you can take pictures and insert them into movies. I have picked two movies you can use Elf Snowball Fight and ElfYourself. There are many JibJabs you can make, but most of them require you to purchase a membership.

Here is the link to our eighth grade picture set on Flickr. You will have to download pictures and then upload them to create your movie. Just click on the the pictures you want to download. Right click on the picture and save as: name of person to your desktop. Then you will have them to upload.

When you have created your JibJab, download the video and upload it to the video section of the 8th Grade Ning. Don't forget to log in first.

Snow Ball Fight

Justin's Part Time Job

Here is what Justin does on his day off. I was as surprised as you!

Samorost 1: A Point and Click, Critical Thinking, Trial and Error Adventure Game!

Samorost 1 is a crazy cool game. The idea is to get the character, Samorost, to explore the space ship that he finds flying towards his planet. To play this game you simply point and click until you find out how to progress. You will have to collaborate on this one, don't be selfish we you figure out the puzzles!

Now for your assignment: I want you to write Samorost's story. Why is scared when he sees the spaceship? Why does he decide to explore it? What does he find along the way? You will need to take notes as you travel with Samorost. You will be posting Samorost's story to the class ning.

I will leave you this picture as a clue for the first puzzle. Can you see what has changed?

Fear Factor 2009

On Friday we held our annual Fear Factor challenge for the fifth grade. I started this six years when I found I had some extra beef stick and cheese packages that I found to be pretty nasty. As I am wont to do, I solved my problem by having students compete in a contest. It originally was something I did in my homeroom, but the response was so good I expanded to the whole fifth grade the next year.

Fear Factor consists of three "tasks" which students have to complete. First we draw three student names from each classroom. (Students are asked first if they would like to participate.) Then I assign them the first task. This year it was a repeat of a task introduced four years ago, wearing their shoes around the neck. Some shoes smell so bad that it can be a difficult task to complete.

The second task this year was a variation on something we did last year. During the junior high dance the students had to sing karaoke to Michael Jackson's song "Thriller".

Students love to watch the final task, the eating and/or drinking of whatever nasty food we come up with.

Finally at the end of the day the remaining contestants had to eat something nasty, Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Bean. These particular beans came in such wonderful flavors as vomit, soap, and booger.
At the end of the bean eating, the students had to drink buttermilk. Treyton won the competition and was crowned this years Fear Factor Champion!

Halloween Fun

Here are a couple sites you might enjoying visiting for Halloween. The first site is online pumpkin carving. What kind of face does your pumpkin need? The second site is Zap-A-Ghost. How many ghosts can you click on? The last site is Hidden Spirits. Can you lead a scientific investigation to debunk a haunted hotel?

Online Pumpkin Carving

Zap-a-Ghost

Hidden Spirits

NO HOMEWORK!

I am on a quest! Mr. Miller has informed his class that class homework ends when his cluster map hits 2500 visits. Since I am a firm believer in 1) Too much homework is way bad and 2) Helping out students with their projects, I decided to make a post. To help out these students simply click here, here, here, or here.

Mr. Miller's class would especially like to have visits from Africa because they are difficult to get. So if you have any friends in Africa, have them click on the link as well.

Boys Basketball and Cheerleading

Cheerleaders performing at halftime of the 7-8 grade boys game.


7-8 grade boys playing against Southwest City.



5-6 grade boys playing against Southwest City.

Last Day of School 2008

Here are a few snapshots from our last day of school in 2008. The first is a picture of our student council with the canned food they collected from the annual food drive. Here is a video I took of one of the sixth grade classes "caroling". It pays to have a pocket video camera handy!



This picture shows what we had for our annual fifth grade breakfast. Muffins, Krispy Kreme donutes, and various juices were on the menu.
Gavin is enjoying candy I gave to the students for Christmas.
Teachers are trying to get the grades in the online gradebook. The end of the semester is almost nigh!
Traditional Christmas stories for the students to enjoy. Can you compare the movie to the original Dr. Seuss story?
Spongebob Christmaspants wishes the students Happy Hollidays!
Here the students are creating snowflakes. Every snowflake they create is different, just like the snowflakes we find floating through the skies.

The Power of Negative Thinking

Can the power of negative thinking really cause someone to shrink? My class decided to imagine Gavin getting shorter. Before we went to PE I marked his height on the door jam with a permanent marker. The class concentrated on him shrinking the entire time they were at PE and when we came back, Gavin stood against the door jam again. As you can see it looks like he shrunk an inch!

We (really me) felt bad about his losing so much height. This was a bad time for him to get shorter, with basketball tryouts going on. I decided we needed to think positive and imagine Gavin getting taller. We will measure him again tomorrow and see if our positive thinking worked.

Letters to Santa

My students have written the traditional "Letters to Santa". Read the comments to see what they would like for Christmas, then leave your own letter.