Sandy’s Blog

We had a sharing circle in science class today around the SMARTBoard. We pulled up Google Earth and tried to locate each student’s home as if they were walking home from school and then the location of their summer camp or vacation site. It was a great experience. The students had to use so many skills to find their destinations from Google searches for addresses, to understand over head views, picking out landmarks, understanding how to adjust shapes related to thier position and so much more. They all had an opportunity to share. I can’t wait to do this with my homeroom students. 

Now that I have been becoming attached, in a sense, to all of this new technology that Mike has introduced me to I am going to be cut of from all of it for 5 days. I am going on an outdoor camp adventure with the 6th grade students form my district and there are no phones, TVs or computers available. This is going to be interesting.

Last summer I won a Senteo student response system from SMART Technologies, for my classroom. We have used it periodically for surveys and lessons but never for a test. Today we tried taking an 11 question quiz using the response system. When used correctly, it reports the student’s % scores right on their clicker and provides the teacher with a spreadsheet reporting student responses question by question and gives their % score.

Well it wasn’t as easy, just entering the quiz itself took me an hour, or productive as I thought it would be but the students and I worked as a team to figure out how everything worked. First, we figured out that you can go back and change an answer but you have to ask the teacher to go back to that question on the screen. Next, we figured out where to find the complete teacher report. It was hiding. The students then decided that they would rather have a printed test in front of them so they could go at their own pace and check their work by going over the quiz question by question. We tried it and found that it could be done. You do not have to be on the question that is on the computer and you can correct your work as long as you do not confirm “Finished.” After that was decided a student asked how they would share their work with their parents. Excellent point! At this age they still love to share their successes and failures with their parents and I do not want to deny then that right. So, as a group, we decided that the Senteo student response system is great for surveys, lesson questions and practice tests and quizzes. Tests and quizzes that count should be paper and pencil. I was very impressed with the discussions that ensued and the team effort in this problem solving adventure.

I thought having a scanner and a projector permanently attached to a computer in my classroom was great. Anytime I wanted to show all of the students something at the same time I just pulled it up on the computer and displayed it on the big screen. The only problem was that images and documents that were not already in the computer take time to scan. Most objects can’t be scanned. I have learned that my presentation system is not as dynamic as it could be. Enter the document camera. Live, real time, images, documents, objects and moving demonstrations instantly enlarged for the entire class to see at the same time.  Wow, I couldn’t believe how easy it was to use. I was thinking that if you can’t afford an interactive whiteboard this may be a cheaper alternative.  It will definitely replace the old mirror, light and magnifying glasses overhead projector.  At the least, it will save your eyes for the light and the students will be much more engaged as they are all able to see demonstrations at the same time.  My classroom would be over the top tricked out with a document camera in it. I am thankful for the time I do have it because it is amazing.

I have read many blogs on how to be a better blogger over the past few weeks. Several have made great points and given some useful information but I am still not sure if blogging is for me.  I understand all about sharing ideas with those that want to read them but I guess I am not into the random sharing idea. I have enjoyed reading a few other blogs but other than my friend Kate’s blog I really wouldn’t have looked at the other blogs if someone hadn’t directed me to them.

I have been trying to think of a way to and a reason for using blogs with my fifth grade students. They do enjoy being on the computer but not many of them enjoy writing on the computer because their keyboarding skills are very week. Maybe opening a line on communication about a novel will not only peek their interest in the novel but will also encourage them to practice typing. I was also thinking about creating a blog about our class trip to Philadelphia and inviting my former students to blog along with my new class. I don’t know.  My district does not believe in keyboarding as a necessary skill for the students to have so I am afraid very few will volunteer. Logistics of assigning blog entries will also be an issue.  Several of my students are not allowed on the Internet at home and the computers we have in our classrooms are so slow to log a student on that time becomes an issue. I am not sure what I am going to do.  I guess I can ponder this over the summer. Maybe I will find a blog with an answer.

This year I bought a few Rubik’s Cubes for my students to explore and try to solve.   A few very interesting things came up.  Several students couldn’t figure out how to turn the colored cubes.  It took them several minutes to learn how to hold the cube so sides and colors could be moved.  Those students were content with simply turning and twisting the cube over and over.  They all have fine motor issues and this activity turned out to be very enjoyable and challenging to them.   A few other students wanted to take the Rubik’s Cube apart and figure out the mechanics of how it works.  Knowing how to put it back together myself, I wasn’t worried that they would be broken and encouraged them to keep exploring.  A few other students wanted desperately to solve it after they had confused all of the sides. One student went home and over the weekend bought his own cube with his own money.  By Tuesday of the next week he had 2 sides of the cube solved and and by Friday could solve the entire cube and could solve it over and over.  We were all very impressed and then the student shared his secret. He had researched and found the solution for the Rubik’s Cube on the Internet.  He practiced every day until he had the solution committed to memory. Soon he began to teach other students the many steps to solving the puzzle. 

This is where my question to you comes in.  Did he actually solve the puzzle?  Did using the Internet defeat the purpose of the mind bending puzzle challenge or is this what technology is for? Letting someone else solve your problems?  I am torn.  I think it is great that this student had the ability realize that he was not going to be able to solve the puzzle easily and that there was probably help out there in cyberspace. He had the ability to find the help and then to decipher it and use it to solve his problem.  But is technology then an easy out?  Is this removing the higher order thinking piece I was trying to expose them to or did he just take a different route? Any opinions?

I have been wondering lately why my students don’t seem to care about challenge work or independent exploration on topics we are studying.  I have actually opened a discussion amongst my homeroom about this and have received very varied responses. Some students admitted that they just don’t care and would rather be doing anything other than what we are doing.  Others say they want to learn more and are interested but they want me to give them the information and the answers. One student said that he has so many after-school activities planned for him by his mother that he just wants to relax and be social during school.  Several students said that was true for them also.

That comment made me think about the impact over scheduling has on the students.  Most of the class has only 15 minutes after school every day of unstructured time when they have to relax or be creative and do something they want to do.  Is this why they don’t seem to care?  Is this why they just want to be done?

RSS?  I am not sure what it stands for but it sure seems like it could be a useful tool. My instructor showed us another video, it explains what RSS is all about.  If you seem to be over run with information such as emails, news, etc, an RSS page my be for you. Check out the video and then check out Net Vibes. It is free.

 I am running into some troubles using it at home because I am having Internet connectivity issues.  I set it up to look really pretty hoping that I would use it often at work. I keep it up as my homepage.  In doing so I have learned a bit about myself.  I really do not have a lot of interests that I want to know about in any regular fashion.  I am struggling to find things to link to my page. Does anyone have any suggestions?

After returning from a four day long class trip to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, I am questioning the educational value of the experience.  Is it enough for me to know that the children learned about the formation of our nation in the location that started it all, or should they have the understanding that they learned something?  All of the students had a great time being away from home and staying in a hotel with their classmates and teachers but they returned saying that they didn’t do or learn anything. They said all we did was walk around the city and have fun.  I know we talked about things from politics to architecture, and William Penn to Benjamin Franklin.  What do the parents think?  Do they look at it as a free week with no children, as a social experience or as a learning experience?  Should I even worry about them?  Any opinions?

If you are interested in visiting the historic district of Philadelphia the following link gives a great overview of what there is to do and see.   The Constitutional Walking Tour of Philadelphia

Today in today’s technology seminar Mike played this video for us.  It really makes you think about where we have been and where we are going as a global society.