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Lately, I’ve had some writer’s block. That is…creating activities that will both be fun and helpful. Emphasis on fun…with a hint of technology. My block must have something to do with the dog days of winter up here in New Jersey. I thought the cold was almost over, but for the past 2 weeks it has been extremely windy.
So…with the help of my colleagues (real and virtual) I’ve planned out my next few projects. Without going into the specifics, I’ll just give you the main ideas.
1. Use Google’s Sketch-Up to create buildings of the Middle Ages and/or Renaissance. (still working on the specifics)
2. Create a stop-animation video for a scene out of any period or age that we have discussed in class. This will be sort of like a final project for the school year. (I need to thank my virtual “colleague” for the inspiration for this little gem. Mr. Mayo has his kids create stop animation videos for literary terms. They are quite clever! This just proves it to me that my 7th graders can do stuff like this. Thanks Mr. Mayo.)
Here’s a sweet little Newspaper clipping generator. You can do awesome things with this in the classroom, but I chose to write my own awesome news clipping.
The final test is done. The kids stopped bringing materials to school. The weather is nice. It must be the summer…
Think again!!
We still have 2 partial weeks of school.
As far as the PACT test goes…I think most of my kids nailed it. I received a pretty warm response to the test. Of course, I had some students claim that I didn’t teach them anything this year, but those were the ones who didn’t bother to learn my name, let alone learn some history. The kids that wanted to learn something…did learn something. Now, I’m not saying they’ll remember it for next year, but I hope they’ll remember some of the major topics.
My plan for the last days of school are to work on a radio advertisement for a city in South Carolina. With a little begging and handiwork, all of the computers in the Media Center have been equipped with audacity. Let the games begin!!
I’ve decided to start a new project with the kids for the remaining 10 days of school after our state-wide testing is finished. We’re supposed to start next year’s curriculum, which is South Carolina history.
I’m thinking about having the students create a radio commercial about a city in South Carolina. After doing simple research on a city, they’ll have to put together a 60-second advertisement about their city of choice. They’re main goal will be to attract tourism to their city.
The only part I’m struggling with is finding the proper program that has the ability to record, bring in music, and export as an mp3. The only one that I’ve used is audacity. This is a great little program, but it might be a little too hard for most of my 7th graders to get a grasp on.
Eventually, I’ll make them available as podcasts.
I might just have to suck it up and use audacity!!
I hope the kids enjoy this little project…it’ll keep them out of trouble during the last days of school.
Grades are due today and these extra credit podcasts are still coming in. Procrastinators never cease to amaze me….I know because I’m one of them. Anyway…here it is.
As the quarter comes to an end, more students become interested in creating an extra credit podcast. Unfortunately, I still have to hold their hand as they create, but I still think they are enjoying what they’re doing…oh by the way…I think they’re also learning something.
Here’s the latest…
For all of you educators out there. Check out your blog’s reading level. It looks like I’m writing on a Junior High School level. I guess I did that on purpose because that is my main audience, but I can’t say I’m satisfied with this. I’ve been in school systems for 23 years now. I’m really disappointed to be writing as a teenager, and an early teenager at that. The website analyzes the most recent post, so somewhere down the line I’ll strive for that High School level. I’ll have to thank big bro Greg for that link. He’s a year older and his blog reads at an elementary school level. Trumped!!
You can also check the gender of your blog post at a different site. I won’t tell you how I write. It’s official…the internet has everything.
I just created an animoto video. Pretty cool how it the program edits the pictures for you. And adds music!! I just don’t know how to make this a project. I’d like to add writing to it. Maybe I can turn a PowerPoint slide into a jpg.
Ok…It’s nothing special, but I’ve created a wikispace for the class. It is completely editable by you and me. Give it a shot, you just may like it.
Just click the badge below.
This past week was crazy!! I had my students create a VoiceThread. During the week I had to contend with several different obstacles. The first issue came with the jumbled up schedule due to MAP testing. Everyday had different times to meet with the classes. Then I had to deal with a blocked website. That was ok because I had a password to get past the firewall, but I had to put in the password every single time the students went to the website or even refreshed the page. It got old quick. Then my headsets with microphones came just at the nick of time, unfortunately getting them all to work with the computers was another issue. I had to log on to the computers as me and not as student, just to go into the control panel and fix the microphone settings. After all was said and done, only about half of my students finished their projects when I wanted them to finish. There were too many technical difficulties to contend with. Next time I know I’ll be better prepared for this. Even though, towards the end of the week I had a short fuse, I was extremely happy with the out come of the projects. I’ll post the links to the VoiceThreads later on in the week, once everyone has finished.
In addition to creating the VoiceThreads, I had a handful of my students create our podcast for the week. I ended up mixing all of their comments, but they created the entire podcast.
Here it is…
Here is the first official podcast. Although we had a shortened week, we still managed to put something up. I’d like to thank all the kids who worked so hard to help create the podcast.
In an attempt to get more street-cred on the internet, I set up a Technorati account. We’ll see what happens…
The Kneighborhood:
The first of many podcasts is up. I am definitely open to suggestions on what content to put on the podcasts. The podcasts are here to have fun and learn something while listening. I hope you enjoy.
Hey, I just tried this program called voice thread. It is really cool. I created a simple 2 minute voice thread about a classroom revolution. Since we are studying revolutions, soon I will ask you to create a voice thread about any revolution you want.
Check out mine here.
I got the help of my fiancee to record some of the comments. Our librarian Ms. Nelson has also recorded some comments into the voice thread. I think this will be an exciting project for you guys.
See What They’re Saying…