Wanna Trade?

So the year is almost over....10 MORE DAYS!!! But who's counting?

Anywho, as the year is winding down, I don't get to see my classes as much due to testing (blah) and other activities. So I need some quick, one hour or less lessons for my kiddos to do. I came across another wonderful activity on ReadWriteThink. First of all, if you haven't checked out this website GO...RIGHT NOW...I'll be right here waiting on you!

Now that you're back, this website if FULL to the rim of fun creative, and did I mention easy-peasy, activities for students. My third graders have been learning about Greek Mythology. So to add to their classroom fun, I had them create a Trading Card, on a specific god or goddess, using ReadWriteThink. They turned out SO NEAT! The students had a graphic organizer that I created for them to fill out so that when they got to filling in the card it would be much easier. It was super fun!. Most of my students finished in plenty of time, so they decided they wanted to make more. They made them on book characters, themselves, their friends, famous athletes, etc. This was one activity that I found made the kids want to work without even knowing it! And I mean, c'mon...we all love those kinds of things! The best part was that when they were finished we printed them out on cardstock, cut them out, and they had an "Official Greek Mythology" Trading Card. They were coming up with points, who trumps who...all kinds of stuff that I never would have thought of!

This is a lesson that can fit into any curriculum and the kids love it! Make sure to check it out by clicking below! What are some ideas you have on Trading Cards in the classroom?

BiblioNasium

I recently came across this great reading website called BiblioNasium. This site is for teacher, students, and parents. Teachers can create different classes and accounts for students. From there they can create challenges for their students and keep track of the books that they read. Students are able to search through their wide selection of titles including fiction and non-fiction and add them to their bookshelf as well as share them with friends. It looks like a great site with lots of potential for the classroom! Best of all...its FREE! Make sure to check it out!

We Wove Weebly!

Sorry about the title. I just had to do it! My fifth grade students were recently researching various cultures around the globe and the affect that they had on the American culture. Rather than have the students make a boring PowerPoint or even the usual Prezi or Glog (which are all great but we use them a lot), I decided to take it one step further and have them create their own websites using Weebly for Education. They turned out AHHH-mazing! I was very impressed with my fifth grade kiddos! This was a very student centered project. The only requirements I gave them was that their website had to have at least 5 pages and 1 of those pages had to answer the question "How did this culture affect American culture?" The rest was completely up to them...the webmasters! For the first few minutes they flopped around like fish out of water because they aren't used to that kind of freedom of learning on their own (which opened my eyes greatly...but that's another post in itself.) Once they got with their groups of 3 or 4 and started organizing and coming up with their ideas on what they wanted to learn about their culture, they were off and running and the creativity was flowing! Weebly is a free website where I, as a teacher, created an account, and then had up to 40 student accounts. The websites can be published as private and are password protected so they are not out there for everyone to see. With the simple drag and drop interface it was easy for the kids to customize their pages with text and images. The kids had a great time with these websites and they presented their cultures like pros! Here's some screenshots below of their great creations!

Well hello there stranger! & Digital Storytelling

It has been entirely too long since I have last posted. I'm surprised they haven't booted me off blogger...well if they did that sort of thing. Life has just been so crazy hectic that I haven't had the time or energy to let you know about all of the AMAZING things that I have found! BUT, not to worry! I have a list began, begun, started of new cool tools that I will be posting. It is my resolution...no those aren't just for New Years, you can have one whenever you like!...to post once a day....ok, at least 3 times a week! Wish me luck!
Ok, now onto the GOOD STUFF! I was introduced to an awesome website called Storyjumper back when I attended the NCTIES Conference in Raleigh, NC in March. (That just so happens to be where I met the one, the only...Richard Byrne (pause for applause!)) So anywho, I just now got around to using it with a couple of my second grade groups and it is just as AMAZING as I thought it would be! This is a free website, of course. You create a teacher account and then create as many student accounts as you need under the main teacher acct. Because I work in the computer lab, I created 30 accounts, one for each computer. The children can log in at school and at home. They create a virtual hard cover book, complete with illustrations, a cover page and a dedication page. The website has a plethora of clip art, images, and scenes to use, but you can also upload your own images, which is super cool!
So how did I use this great resource you might ask? Well, my 2nd grade techies are studying insects and life cycles in science and they are working on adjectives in writing. So we read The Grouchy Ladybug by Eric Carle. The students then got into partners and came up with their own story involving an insect, which they described with an adjective. Once they finished writing up a rough draft, they then logged into Storyjumper and the magic began. Because I only have them for an hour, we only got the first few pages typed, but they will come back in a week to finish typing, add illustrations, and complete their book.
The most AWESOME thing about it is, when the books are finished, the parents can go onto the site and actually buy the book for a very reasonable price of about $25-$30! Yes, they actually get a hard cover copy of the book their child created! How cool is that?! This is a great website for uploading pics of mom and writing a book for Mother's Day or the end of the year! The possibilities are endless! Click on the image below to learn more!

Monkeying Around with Math

So I found another great website while browsing one of my favorite blogs, Free Technology for Teachers, and had to re-post! Math Chimp is a great site where you can choose your grade level, 1st-5th, and what common core standards you want your students to focus on, and it provides you with a number of online math games customized to your needs! I think this is a great way to get your kids excited about math, while making sure they are working on the correct skills! Click below to get monkeying around with math!

http://www.mathchimp.com/