One of the problems I have doing summative posts at the end of a project is that I often forget some of the small details that go into it. While these details are small, they are often part of what made the activity a success.
So I am going to try a blog post that I will update all year. This is going to be a record of the technology activities my students engage in, with the hope that by the end there will be a clear record of how I got from A to Z.
The first thing we did in my class this year that involved technology was using the Smartboard. In the second week of school I introduce my classroom helpers. One of the jobs is a technology helper. This student is in charge of turning on and off the Smartboard. They learn how to reset the Smartboard if it stops being interactive. They are the ones that can tap it if it goes to sleep. As the year goes on, I add more tasks. For example, I teach them how to use extended desktop, so that when visiting teachers are in the room who are unfamiliar/uncomfortable with extended desktop, there are many students who know how to help.
2. Smartboard Whole Class Work
Early in the year I begin having students come up to interact with the Smartboard. This allows me to teach the whole class how to do full screen, move to the next page, close, and push rather than hit the Smartboard. We use wands in our class on the Smartboard. This allows smaller students to reach all parts of the Smartboard. It is also easier to clean the wands than the entire Smartboard regularly to control the spread of germs.
3. Smartboard Centre Work
Once students are comfortable using the Smartboard in my class, I introduce it as a reading centre. We start off with practicing the centre as a whole class. I review how the turn taking works on the Smartboard. I also review during centre work that they need to get the technology helper, not me, to help solve Smartboard problems.
Example of Smartboard Centre Work- This is an example of a centre I use. After the class has done a Making Words lesson and the subsequent Sort and Transfer lesson, I assign a review centre. This one is after we made the word
autumn. During any centre work in my class, there is always a leader.
4. Introduction to Netbooks
Once I have all the prep work done and I feel my class management is under control, I introduce the netbooks to the whole class. I have gone into detail about how I did this this year in the post
Introducing Grade Twos to Netbooks.
5. Introducing Centre Work Activities to the Whole Class
Throughout the year I have reading centres and math centres. One of the centres I frequently use for both is a "netbook" centre. For reading centres that typically involves having the students use
RAZ kids to read an online book and then take an online quiz. For math centres that typically involves having the students use
Mathletics to an assigned activity and then "live math" where they practice their basic facts.
Before I introduce these as centres, however, I introduce each program as a whole class activity. Not only is this a prep for centre work, but it is a great chance to review how to log on to the netbooks.
For more information on different subscriptions available for the division one classroom, you may want to read the post
Subscriptions and Sign Ups.
6. Centre Work
Once students seem comfortable knowing how to log on to a netbook independently, I introduce them as a centre. It is important to have slightly longer centres when using netbooks as student need time to log in to the programs they are going to use. What I typically do is teach the first group to not log off but simply shut the browser. That way the subsequent group using the netbooks does not need to log-in to the wifi but just needs to log-in to the program they will be using. The last group is in charge of shutting down and putting the netbooks away.
7. Google Account Authentication with Buddies
The majority 95% of my grade twos have never used Google Apps before. This means they need to accept the terms and conditions that Google has and type in that funny little code given when you accept and continue.
I like to break this step apart from the first actual lesson. This year our grade 6 buddies came in and helped. It was just a 25 minute lesson that I modeled on the Smartboard as they followed along. They went to SchoolZone. They went to the Google Apps tab. They selected Docs. They were directed the page that requires them to accept Google's terms and conditions. They scrolled down to the bottom. Their older buddies helped them decipher the word they had to type to activate their account.
When they finished, they went to Tumblebooks until buddy time was over.
8. First Simple Google Apps Assignment
I keep my first lesson with Google Docs simple. The main goal is to introduce them to the steps I will be using fro the rest of the year for using Google Docs. The actual product is not the goal during this first lesson.
For this first lesson, I actually had them do a 30 minute math lesson online first. They did 3 online math activities and then logged on to Mathletics. The first Google Docs assignment can be a bit stressful, so I like starting kids off with something they can do successfully. It also allows me to deal with any technology or logging in problems before we get to the Google Docs assignment.
Here is a basic overview of the lesson:
- review logging in to the netbooks
- model getting to Google Apps via SchoolZone
- model opening the document (I had shared it with them earlier)
- model "make a copy"
- model naming document
- students filled in the blanks (was not concerned if they didn't finish or did not do it correctly for this activity)
- model sharing the document with me
9. Laptops for Halloween
I used
Halloween as a time to introduce my students to the other technology in the school this week - laptops. The laptops have a different routine for handing out and logging in. It can be time consuming and frustrating. So I booked the laptops for the last hour for our Halloween celebration. It's great as a teacher because it is low key. It's great for the kids, as they love the activities. I put the links on my msmondor.wordpress.com class website (but you could put them on SchoolZone). I also like it because there are many Halloween activities that have real curriculum connections (reading, spelling, math and art activities for instance). I've collected a number of activities to use with students over the years that I keep on my
sundayideas blog.
By having a fun activity as the goal AND a full hour to work, it made using laptops for the first time successful.
10. Repeat
I plan on having my students repeat a variation of their first Google Docs assignment 3 times so that they learn the steps and routines for working with Google Docs.
**NOTE This was harder to keep up with then I anticipated. I apologize!****
11. Blogging
In November I attempted blogging with my students for the first time. You can read about my first lesson in the post
Grade Two Bloggers. Since then we have done more blogging, not a lot. Here is a list of the things we have done with blogging.
- Replying to a post (as discussed in Grade Two Bloggers)
- Using it to publish a final copy of a persuasive writing based on the book The Little Snowgirl. Students did this by replying to my initial post.
- Using it to publish a final copy of an acrostic. Students learned how to create their own posts. Students also learned how to comment on other student's posts/acrostics.
- On Hundred Day, students had to use jot notes to plan what they would buy for $100. Then students composed their paragraphs as a blog post. They also commented on other students' posts. We had technical difficulties this day, so not everyone had a chance to comment.
- In March we posted a class write on our blog about what gum looks, smells, sounds, feels and tastes like. I encouraged students to log in at home to comment on the class write.
12. Culture Presentations
I decided to have my students do their final copies of their culture research projects on Google Docs this year. They still did the research using books in class and jot notes on paper. We did one day of guided research using the Internet. I blogged about the first project,
Inuit culture. For that project, I just had them share their knowledge using jot notes. The second project was about Acadian culture (
template) and students were expected to write in sentences. The third project is about Ukrainian culture.I blogged about all the culture presentations in the post
Putting Presentation Into Presentation.
13. Brochures of Places Studied
Each year I have students make four brochures: Edmonton in the past, Iqaluit, Meteghan and Saskatoon. I have always found it a challenge to find enough images and research material for students when they do Meteghan. So I decided to turn to the Internet this year. In the blog post
Making a Brochure with Presentation Lesson Plan, I explain the steps and include a rubric. It was so successful that I plan on doing all four brochures with Google Docs next year!
14. A Story
In March, after planning a story on a paper graphic organizer, I had students compose their story on a Google Document.
15. Using Technology In Art
Before my students did their first pointillism painting, I had them view paintings of Seurat up close using Google Art Project. I blogged about how to zoom into paintings and other ideas in the post
Google Art Project Reflections.
16. World Education Days
Each year I have my class participate in
World Education Days/Games. I give them one practice session at school for each topic (literacy and math) where I teach them how to log in and encourage them to practice at home. I give them 20 minutes to participate on each "game day" and again I encourage them to try again at home.
17. Continued Use of Centre Work
Throughout the year I regularly use centres in: reading, math and social. I don't teach science, otherwise I'd use it in science as well. :) I've blogged about a few ideas:
18. Using Google Presentation To Learn
My students created a Google Presentation about working in Meteghan, Nova Scotia. I detail what I did in the post Another Grade Two Presentation Activity.
19. Blogging and Using the Webcam
While I don't teach science, I used something my students did with their science teacher in a writing activity. The students had to write a draft (on paper) of how to make a Plasticine boat. They had to use strong sequence words and used a posted organizer to help them. The next day they started a blog post and learned how to use the webcam to take a picture of their boat for the post. On the third day they did their typing and published.
20. Synergize!
We are a Leader In Me school. Our current habit is Synergize. So it was time to learn how to work on a shared Google Doc! For four Wednesdays in a row I had my students work on their spelling sentences as a shared Google Doc. The goal was simply to give them experience working on a shared document. I assigned one student to create the document, name it and share it with their three other group members. Those group members were to help spell their name and help the creator select the correct users to share with. Then the leader pressed enter a bunch of times to create space on the document. Each student was assigned a word to write a sentence for. Early finishers were to choose another word.
21. Smartboard Centre
Every six weeks my students have a spelling review test. During that week one of the reading centres is a
spelling review activity. I choose 20 out of the 25 words for them to review. I used a template I got from
SmartExchange and modified it for spelling. Students have to write on a small whiteboard (or small chalkboard) what they think the answer is. Then, once everyone in the group has an answer, they check to see if they are correct.
22. Science Reports!
My students put their science research notes about an animal into a Google Presentation.
23. Commenting on Blog Posts
My students were eager to comment on each others' blog posts but their comments were "asom" (awesome) and "nic sintincs" (nice sentences). So I decided I needed to tap into that interest and we discussed what made a good comment. I tied this into health and students wrote "friendly grams" - which had to be specific compliments that had a greeting and had to include who wrote it. As well, I added
awesome and
sentences to the spelling challenge words.
24. Father's Day Poems
Using a simple worksheet, I had my students plan a Father's Day acrostic. I edited them. Then they created a Google Doc to type their good copies. We used laptops so that they could print them to take home.
25. Filing Away Our Grade Two Work
As my students were taking home their paper duotangs and organizing their paper/binder portfolios, I also had them pack up digitally. I showed them how to make a folder. They named it Grade Two. Then they moved all their grade two work into that folder.
Wow! It was a busy year!
