Techie Thursday

 There will be a new slide every Thursday. Click here to go to the Google Slide Deck.

 

St. Patrick's Day Fun Educational Ideas!

Are you looking for some ways to incorporate St. Patrick's Day into curriculum? Below are a few educational ways to get in some St. Patty's Day fun while learning!

 

Watch and read along with the story, Jamie O'Rourke and the Big Potato. After the story you can have students... 1. Write a different ending to the story. 2. Retell the story in Book Creator, Sock Puppets, or another app. 3. Illustrate their favorite part of the story, then take a pic of their illustration, and use it in an App like ChatterPix Kids to describe their favorite part. Really the possibilities are endless. This story has a good lesson about not taking shortcuts.

Have a Green Tasting Party! Check out this bog article with tons of great ideas for the tasting party, including menu ideas and follow up writing activities.

Or for free... March Literacy Center print outs (for approximately 3rd grade) Limerick template (for 4th/5th grade) Idiom matching sheet (for 2nd-5th) St. Patty's survey and graph (for PK-1st) Lastly a ton of ideas and activities (for all grade levels).

Activities and Techniques for Improving Student Fluency

Scooping Words - Teaching students to scoop phrases in sentences rather than reading one word at a time helps students on their journey to become fluent readers. I have collected a few resources for you to help your students learn to scoop.

 1. Seesaw Activity - In this activity students are to practice scooping phrases in a story of their choosing. I like this activity because students can do it more than once and they can listen to themselves read. They can also have peers and parents listen to their reading for an authentic audience.

2. Book Creator Digital Interactive Workbook - I created this digital workbook specifically for students to practice scooping with arrows and short phrase practice. I like this activity because students can record themselves scooping and listen back to how well they did. Students could also have a quick conference with their classroom teach for feedback or set goals for the next time they read. Pages can be added so this digital workbook is also adaptable and never stagnant.




Fluency Practice - Fluency can often mean several things. Sometimes, in the case of the DRA,  reading with fluency means speed reading. It can also mean reading with inflection and pauses in the appropriate places. Below you will find resources for both options. Sometimes you will have to tell your students what type of fluency you are looking for.

 1. Seesaw has a variety of Fluency activities. I am particularly  drawn to Fluency Self Evaluation,  Reading with Fluency and Expression, and Reading Fluency (for higher readers). If you search the word fluency when you are assigning an activity in Seesaw you will have a variety of choices to meet your students' needs.




2. I created a fluency digital interactive workbook to be used as a fluency journal, Hear Me Track My Fluency. Students should record themselves a few times a week and set goals for the next time they record themselves. Having a journal allows students to go back and listen to their progress. A classroom teacher should give students opportunity to look back and reflect on their fluency growth throughout the school year.

Here is a great site for students to occasionally use to test their fluency and comprehension...

http://www.freereadingtest.com/

 

Wakelet for Education

Wakelet is an awesome organizational tool for educators, but it also can be used with students. It is kind of a mix of Pinterest and Padlet. I have become obsessed with organizing my resources, links, and videos into collections. I can now find everything I need quickly. Do you find yourself having a million tabs open on your laptop? Well Wakelet is the solution. Have you ever felt that you just can't find a useful site that you were using recently,? Wakelet is the answer. Visit my Wakelet Page HERE.

Check out this quick overview of Wakelet.

Check out the resources below on how you can use Wakelet with your students.

Valentine's Day STEAM Activities

Here are some ideas for integrating STEAM with Valentine's Day!

1. Valentine's Day Scrabble Activity - Check out this printable from AndNextComesL. This activity works best with Scrabble Tiles, but as an alternative you could project the tiles for students so that they know how much each letter is worth.

2. Build the Tallest Tower - This can be done with conversation hearts, toothpicks and heart marshmallows, or red blocks. Get creative, have students measure their tower, record their result on their iPads. (Take pictures!)

3. Create Valentine's Day Boxes - Students can get creative with storage for their cards that they will receive on Valentine's Day. Give the structure parameters or certain lengths for their materials to mix in some math. Maybe add some engineering too by stating that there has to be a door on their box/envelope.

4. Create a Green Screen Message for Parents - See video below.

5. Valentine's Day Cupcake Graphing - This is a cute idea created by Life over C's. It includes a printable dice and graphing sheet. You have to put in your email address to get the materials for free or you can easily adjust this activity for graphing something else that is Valentine's Day related.

6. Code Your Name - Use binary code to either code your name as a heart or a bracelet. Idea by Little Bins for Little Hands.

Guided Reading iPad Choice Menu

I have been planning on creating a literacy iPad choice menu for teachers to use with their students during guided reading literacy flex for some time now. We all know how that goes... items get moved down the to do list just like this one did. Thank you Mrs. Richardson for reminding me of the need. I found a menu on-line that had a good base and then I adjusted it for the needs of our students and what we have as choices in Self Service for our school district. When you go to the doc, feel free to adjust it to your classroom needs by making a copy of the document to your Drive. My copy is not editable. You will notice that there are a few apps that are on the menu more than once. That is because those apps are apps that can serve many purposes. For example, Book Creator can be used by students to create, but there are also a variety of already created interactive digital workbooks for the students to download and use on their iPads like Sight Words, Vocabulary Journals, Hunks and Chunks, plus many more. To access these books, click here. Another versatile app is Seesaw. There are activities already created for students to practice word work or other skills along with recording students reading.

When you visit the iPad choice menu, scroll down to the second page for a Key to help you identify the apps from the first page of the menu. Also use this menu as a source of ideas of what I can model for you and your students or what can be a point of discussion when we meet during a PLC or another time throughout the school day.

I also created a log in flyer for Lalilo. Thank you Mrs. Harnik for the idea. I marked over the actual school codes in the screen shot with red so that if you are reading this and not from MSAD6 you can get an idea of what the log-in flyer looks like. If you are an MSAD6 employee you can click this link to access the flyer and print some for your class.

I suggest that after students scan the QR code they should click the share button, up arrow inside a square, to create a fast link to the Lalio site. It will look just like an app on the iPad once added.

Tips to Make Your Life Easier on a Mac and an iPad

Below you will find a bunch of tips and tutorials that will make teaching and LIFE with technology so much easier. Please let me know if you want to set up a time for me to help you get organized.


1. How to find your saved passwords in Chrome...

2. Take a screenshot or a screen recording on your laptop with... command + shift + 5

3. How to Airplay from a Mac or an iPad...

Mac

 iPad

4. Taking Advantage of Shared Photo Albums on your iPad (to make room for updates and new pics)... 

5. Finding Google Drive docs, sheets, etc...

Create folders and add docs to them. Put the docs that you will need to find most often in the starred folder.

6. Have a pointer on your iPad to show what you are talking about when you are projecting your iPad during instruction...

iMovie as a Green Screen Creation Tool

Tony Vincent created this awesome graphic covering how to use green screen in iMovie on an iPad. I was tickled pink when I saw that the option is there and then kicking myself for never discovering it. Even though we have access to the Green Screen app by Doink, iMovie is another fabulous option. iMovie is especially awesome if you want students to add other things to jazz their video up with things like a title, credits, voice recordings, and music. Below you will find a video tutorial on how to use the green screen effect on an iPad.

Overwhelmed by iPad App Choices?

I recently had one of my teachers mention that it is sometimes overwhelming to see all of the Apps available to teachers and to know which ones to use. My response is to pick two Apps and get really good at using them and have students master them. It will make teaching easier to know that you have a tool available to students that is independent for them. If you are going to pick two Apps you will want ones that can be used with all subjects, engage students, and allow students to create and use their imagination to go beyond regurgitation. With that being said, I would recommend Seesaw and Book Creator. You can use these Apps whole group for teaching moments along with having them available for independent student work. Educators can create activities, in Seesaw and digital workbooks, in Book Creator that are based on the specifics that you need students to engage in. Even better, Seesaw has tons and tons of activities already created for you to assign students plus Coaches at MSAD6 have created several Book Creator digital workbooks customized to standards that we teach. I am always happy to make a Seesaw activity or a Book Creator digital workbook if you let me know what you need.

Here is a Quick Video to get you Started with Seesaw Activities

Holiday Games for PreK-5: Plugged and Unplugged

I created a poster for teachers to print and share with students. It includes QR Codes for students to scan with their iPads. The games are pulled from the Santa Tracker website hosted by Google and are great activities for when you want to let students have a little fun while building on STEAM skills. Some of the games involve design thinking and coding as an added bonus. Click Here for the  printable poster.






Looking for some UNPLUGGED fun? Click Here to find a printable decorating a Christmas Tree coding activities, an unplugged stacking cups project Click Here, or a drawing a Nutcracker unplugged coding project. Click Here

You can find more of these wonderful activities at https://jdaniel4smom.com/ She has a great coloring page for The Polar Express.

 





Visit my website for some more great online Holiday activities and games that includes Hanukah and Kwanza. Click Here Students can also Google Search Mrs Gleason and the link to my website is usually the top link suggested. Find the Holiday Fun page under the student tab.


 

Fun Digital Holiday Projects

***Scroll down for a variety of projects students can do to create digital Holiday Greetings for their parents. Have students use Seesaw or Class Dojo to easily share their project with their parents. As an alternative you can have students airdrop their project to you and then email the projects to the parents. All video Tutorials below are student friendly. Merry Creating!!!    

 

Create an Ugly Sweater, Decorate a Christmas Tree, 

and Reindeer Yourself Using PicEDU

Student Examples:

Tutorial Video: (Use the same process for the other two projects.)

Make a Greeting Card with Green Screen

Student Examples:

Tutorial Video: (Take a green screen photo with the iPad camera and save images from safari before using the green screen app.)

Or Make a Green Screen Video: (This example is for Valentine's Day. Just switch it up for Christmas.)

 

Create and Print 3D Ornaments

Student Examples:

Teacher Example:

Tutorial Video: (This project is one that you will probably want to have me help you with, but if you want to do part of it on your own... have students create their ornaments in Google Slides using shapes or in Book Creator using the Magic Pen, I can help with the rest. Of course I'm willing to help with the whole process as well.)

Tell a Story Using ChatterPix and Student Art

Student Example:

Tutorial Video:

 

Decorate a Snowman in Google Slides and Make it Talk Using ChatterPix Kids

Student Examples:

Link to the Project: Click Here (Have students make a copy in Google Drive and then they can decorate their own snowman.)


Tutorial Video: (On an iPad students will hold down on an image with a finger, click copy, and then go to the snowman slide and hold down their finger. Click paste.)

Create a Holiday Poem with Adobe Spark Video

Student Examples:

Tutorial Video:

Hour of Code Resources 2019

The Hour of Code event that takes place during Computer Science Education Week (December 9-15 this year) is worth setting aside some classroom time for students to explore coding via apps or websites. Learning to code will help students in a variety of skills including, reading, writing, math, and design thinking. This article will host a variety of resources for you to enjoy a successful Hour of Code in your classroom. For a printable flyer for your classroom click the pic below. The QR Code will direct students to my Hour of Code page on my website that hosts a variety of Hour of Code activities. You can have students download any of the suggested apps from the flyer or use any of the code.org coding games linked on my website.

 

It is not necessary to participate in the Hour of Code all in one day. Feel free to break the hour up throughout the week. Also, because students love learning to code you can use the apps and website coding games as incentives throughout the rest of the school year. I have yet to walk into a classroom of students learning to code who are not completely engaged. My schools have participated in this event since the very first year of Hour of Code. 

Debugging is one of the most important lessons of coding and students who can debug can solve a variety of problems they come across in any subject. Below are some resources for teaching debugging.

Beebots in the Elementary Classroom

Beebots were created with the intention to teach early coding skills to lower elementary school age students/children. However, Beebots have grown into much more of a learning tool. Students are extremely engaged while using Beebots so educators can take advantage! Teachers can have the bees help reinforce what students are learning by creating customizable mats, question cards, and answer cards.

I have created transparent mats so that any type of flash cards can be used with the clear mats. You will just need answer cards to be placed under the transparent mat, like in the photo.

In the sight word game from the photo to the right, one student would direct/code the Beebot to travel to a sight word and then another student would read the sight word. Students would take turns continuing to code the bee to a word for their classmate to read. I created answer cards for 24 of the toughest Frye words in the first 100 and then another 24 from the second 100. The answer cards shown can be turned over to be used with math flash cards that have answers from 0-23.

Thanks to the generous donation from David and Sandy Perloff of The Perloff Family Foundation we have several sets of Beebots. At Edna Libby Mrs. Cutter and Miss Magnuson have 4-6 Beebots and mats in their classrooms plus there are 2 Bees and mats in the STEAM Lab. At HBE Miss Nappi will have 5 Beebots and mats plus there will be 4 Bees and several mats in the STEAM Lab. I plan to make more mats including some for story retell. Krista Poulin, our curriculum coordinator, is going to make some customizable mats using a poster maker they have at Central Office. Teachers will be able to write on those mats with a dry erase marker so that they can be changed up regularly. Beebots make a GREAT center activity! Please let me know if you want to try them out with your students. (SF - We can work something out if you are interested.)

Below is another generic mat I created that can be used with any flash cards.

 

For the Rules PDF Click Here

Resources for More Ideas:

(Click Photos Below to go to the Sites)

 

Making STEAM Doable: STEM Challenges and Digital Interactive Workbooks

Do you want a 30 minute or less lesson that you don't have to plan and takes very little prep? Do you want to get in some STEAM in a very heavy literacy focused classroom? Well, I have the solution for you. STEM Challenges!!! Through STEM Challenges students can work on all kinds of skills that we need students to have. 

For example the video Team Building STEM Challenges I have created focus on skills to help students to work well with others. All of the Challenges have a video about working as a team for the classroom teacher to show before the STEM Challenge video. Then teachers show the STEM Challenge video to their students so that the classroom teacher does not have to present the challenge. All of the STEM Challenges have an instruction sheet like the one pictured. Each sheet includes three more videos that can extend the lesson. There are also STEM Challenges that don't involve videos. You can also find them in the instruction sheet link. They are listed as PDFs in the STEM Challenge folder.

Beyond team building I have also created STEM Challenges that go along with Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). Again there is very little prep work for teachers and most of the supplies, if you work with me, are in our STEAM Labs. I am working on more challenges and will align those with NGSS. The first ones I created are not aligned, but are still great for design thinking and touch upon skills that will help students think. Some include math, science, and technology skills in the design or as part of the video. Some also integrate literacy because they accompany a story book, like The Runaway Pumpkin or Marshmallows Galore. To get to the play list for STEM Challenge videos CLICK HERE.

Another awesome tool that other tech coaches and I have been creating is Science and Math Book Creator templates that are aligned with NGSS or math standards. This allows a classroom teacher to have students work through a digital interactive workbook when they get 5-15 minutes here or there throughout the school week. Then there is no pressure of time. When you have a little extra time you can fit a little science or math in. CLICK HERE to find the downloadable workbooks that work in Book Creator on an iPad. 

 

 Example STEM Challenge Lessons 

Kindergarten

1st Grade

2nd Grade

3rd Grade

 

For more information about the STEAM Labs visit my Website.

Educandy for Creating On-Line Games

Educandy is a great tool for educators and students! Create activities for students by adding words or questions with answers and students will have a variety of game options to choose from. The games are really cute and perfect for word work as part of independent centers. There is also a quiz feature to use for formative assessments, exit slips, or pre/post tests. The learning games can be played on any device. Accessing the games is quite easy for students and there are a few different options for teachers to choose. Educandy is very well designed and user friendly. I highly recommend you give it a try!

Below is a great tutorial video by Richard Byrne showing how to create and share games using Educandy.

Try out some games I created with words from 
Literacy Dictations. (Use code 3c71)

Green Screen Bee Project

Kuddos to Mrs. Sparks for having her students research what is happening to our bee population and letting students show their creaivity! Mrs. Sparks students did a ridiculously fabulous job with this project. After students researched bees they wrote a script with their partner, performed the skit in front of a green screen, and then used the Green Screen App by Doink to add cool backgrounds. Below are a few students examples. I truly was blown away with how fantastic these students did with their projects!

This article is meant as a shout out to fabulous work by Mrs. Sparks third grade class. However, if you would like to learn more about using DoInk with your students check out my article on, Green Screens Rock and What I Have Learned the Last Two Years or Smashing Zookazam with Green Screen by Doink.

Flippity for Building Educational Games and Other Classroom Tools

Wicked AWESOME tool/interactive game building site including spelling games, bingo cards, matching games and much more! That about sums it up, but I will go on to share more information. All of the options can be customized to the content you are using with your students. Lindsey Cawood and I presented a session on Flippity at MassCUE recently, a technology focused educational conference. Lindsay made some really good examples for a couple of the options. Click Here for pre-made bingo cards and spelling games. Click Here to go to the presentation Slide Deck to check out what we presented. Also I recently made a connection with Kevin Spencer via Twitter and check out his superb resources for Flippity!


Wowser! Scroll down to be amazed with all of the things you can make and many of them are interactive for students on their own device. Bonus: Flippity works on any device! I personally love the Bingo Cards, Matching Game, Snowman (Hangman), and Spelling Games.

 

Pics of the fun we had! I highly recommend attending MassCUE!