What's Your Killer Application?

Alex here is curious, he wants to know what are the most important applications to use in school. Is it blogs, wiki's, or Nings? Maybe you prefer Glogster, Kerpoof, or Edmodo? Tell me what program you can't live without.

Our Last Chance to Comment This Year

Here are two posts that were inspired by you! This is what happens when you reach out to others, you change things and make them better. Show them some comment love!

Mrs. Pohanka's post.
Daraj aAcademy post.

Here are some more blog posts to comment on. Make sure you give positive and relevant comments.

Little Voices, Little Scholars
Creative Voice- Dante
Creative Voice- Caitlin
Room 15 Point England School

Pick Your Book of the Year: Mrs. W's Blog

We are going to post our favorite book we read this year on Mrs. W's Blog. Here is the link to the post. Make sure your comment is a paragraph that identifies your book and give three reasons why it is your favorite. Also make sure grammar, punctuation, and spelling are right.

Students Making Decisions for The Biome Project

My students are working on their biome projects now. Throughout this project they had to make choices based on what works best for them. Here are some vids of my students talking about what choices they made.

Here is Seth explaining what strategy he used to gather his information for the project.

Here Rosa talks about what strategy she used to gather her information for the project.

Here is Megan explaining what biomes she chose and which project she will do.

Here is Nathan explaining what biomes he chose and which project he will do.

Here is Parker explaining why he likes to be given choices with his work.

The Mystery of Saint Matthews Island

I've alluded to this story this year during our watching of the Digging for the Truth episode on Easter Island. This story is also about sustainability and how we need to learn from others examples.

We are going to use this story to launch The Biome Project 2009. This will be our extension for reading this week, but I expect it will take longer to complete than the usual extensions. Therefor, I am going to shorten this weeks assignment list so we have more time to finish. I expect we should be finished by next Tuesday including recording. We won't start doing anything on it until Thursday so we can focus on our story.

Here is the link to our Google doc instructions for this weeks reading.

Here is the link to the instructions for The Biome Project 2009.

Call for Participation: The Biome Project 2009

I would like to invite you to participate in this years' Biome Project. This project asks the students to use art to create visual representations of biomes and then give information orally about the biomes.

Students are given two options with their projects. The first choice is to create dioramas of three biomes. They then have to give a presentation about the biomes that is visually recorded. Here is an excellent example from last year of Macy's project.

The second choice is to represent the biomes using cut construction paper. The projects will be photographed and uploaded to Voicethread, where the students then narrated the pictures. Here is Keith's example from the project last year.

Here is the link to the Biome Project 2009 instructions. If you would like your class to participate, leave a comment with contact information, tweet me, or email me at wmchamberlain@gmail.com. Our last day of school is May 22, so if you would like to be involved please contact me soon.

Friday is Comment Day

It is time to comment on other students' blogs. Remember to make your comments positive and relevant.

The first blog we are going to comment on is Mrs. Owens' Noel School Library Blog. Pick a post and leave a comment. We want to encourage more teachers here to blog!
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The second blog we are going to comment on is Mrs. Heaton's Class in South Carolina.
Click the first link and read the explanation of The Best Part of Me Assignment and then leave one comment for each link.
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Page 3 Comment only on The Best Part of Me Posts

The third blog we are going to comment on is the Eagles' Nest Radio and Class Blog. Listen to the podcast and then leave a comment. With luck we will be creating audio this good next year.
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The fourth blog is the Fairview Physical Education blog. This is the only physical education blog I have ever seen. Mr. Berenger has asked for us to leave a comment.
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If you finish with these posts early, leave Devon a comment on his story in the post below. I am sure he would like to have your comments.

Learning from Mrs.She and Little Voices, Little Scholars

Here is Devon writing a story for me. I showed him the excellent stories Mrs. She's students are posting on her blog as inspiration. Devon wrote and recorded this story in less than an hour. Special thanks to Cole who listened to Devon practice.

Investigate 1 Mixture and Solutions: Can We Separate a Mixture?

Yesterday we conducted an experiment where where we created a mixture of salt, diatomaceous earth, gravel, and water. Then we used filters to see if we could separate the mixture. We had planned on recording the lesson, but Ustream died on us halfway through.
Write a post on one thing you learned from the experiment.

Here are some links you can leave a comment on when you are through.
Comments for Kids
ABC's and Transformations
Bacteria Conclusions

Getting Ready for the Talent Show

During recess I noticed some third graders practicing for the end of the year talent show. Are you ready to show some talent?

Third Grade Presentations of National Monuments to Mrs. Blakemore's Fifth Grade

Third grade students from Mrs. Greer's class visited Mrs. Blakemore's fifth grade class today to do oral presentations on National Monuments. This was an extension from story they had in reading.

I think that creating reading extensions make the stories much more interesting and allows the students to internalize the information better. Don't miss the video below. Please forgive the loudness, the students were nervous.

Ghost Towns Reading Unit

Image by mlhradio

After last years great Ghost Town moments, see post 1 and post 2, we have a high standard to meet. Since the skill this week is graphic sources you will have the opportunity to create your own. You will also look at Flickr pictures of real ghost towns to get and idea what they really look like. Then you are going to use Kerpoof to create your very own ghost town.

Here is the link to the checklist for you to use.

MathMagic M and M's

Mrs. Keaton, our awesome fifth grade math teacher has a special unit she teaches every year during testing. She gives each student a bag of M and M's and has them identify the number of each color and the number of M and M's in each bag. She uses this to teach ratio, percentage, and graphing. Here are some students giving their reflections on the assignment.

If you would like more information about this unit or even like a copy of it send an email or leave a comment and I will be happy to have Mrs. Keaton contact you.

Here is the link to the rest of the students' reflections about the project.

Evans Elementary Wants Comments

Evans Elementary from Seminole County, Florida did some amazing work with reading discussion blogs. They have asked us to look through them and leave them some comments. It is a real honor to be asked to do this, so make sure you your comments are positive and relevant. They deserve your best effort.

Visitors, we invite you to follow the links and make a comment or two as well. Comments motivate students and teachers.

The first blog we will look at is the Swindle discussion blog. Here are the links to the 3 pages:
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The second blog is The Lightning Thief Discussion Blog. Here are the links to the 4 pages:
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Page 4

We Need to Comment on Content

My classes spent the last two days commenting on blog posts. This is why we did it.

#Comments4Kids was started because several people thought that more attention needed to be spent on content created by students. They need feedback to improve and get better. They need others to notice what they create. I decided my class needed to go out and do commenting because they want others to comment on their content.

Let's Do Some Commenting!

Today we are going to go commenting to some classroom blogs! You and your partner will need to leave a comment on each of the blogs listed below. Remember, do not use your last name. Please link back to this blog when they ask for a url.

Make sure your comments are positive and relevant (they should have something to do with what is posted). Discuss with your partner what to write before you start to write. Please remember these students and teachers are important and deserve your best!

Geography 6: from Fredericksburg, Virginia.

Little Voices, Little Scholars: from Auckland, New Zealand

Live and Learn: from Missouri

My Web World: from New Zealand

The Official Blog of the Daraja Academy: from Kenya, Africa Watch Welcome to Daraja video before commenting on the blog.

Room 11 Bloghetty Blog: From Hamilton, New Zealand.

Classroom Collaborations: ToonDoo

I love to have my students share what they learn with others. Even though my students and I have found ToonDoo to be a bit difficult to figure out, we have finally started posting our cartoons. 

The best part about doing something new is giving my students the opportunity to help each other. After I showed Parker how to download the picture and then upload it to the blog, he showed Tristin. Within ten minutes I had students helping each other get the job done. 

Compare and Contrast the Scientific Methods

For this assignment I want you to compare and contrast the six step scientific method we have used all year with the steps on the Scientific Method Web Page created by Dan Tripp.

Identify how the two methods are alike and also identify any differences you see.

Using ToonDoo With Journey to the Center of the Earth

Toondoo is an online cartoon maker. Your assignment is to create and post a cartoon related to your Journey to the Center of the Earth stories. You will need to create an account using your email address and password. After creating your account explore the site and see what you can do. I want your cartoons posted by the end of Reading tomorrow.

Here is an example:

Create A Graph

Create a Graph is a wonderful tool for creating graphs (especially if your students don't know how to create spreadsheets). You can use the program to create bar, line, pie, and other types of graphs and you can print them or save them as a pdf or jpeg.

I want you to explore the site. Find three neat things you can share with the class. Create a graph using made up data and then save them to the desktop of your computer as a jpeg.