Break Time

Spring Fever has hit.  Little minds are thinking about the beautiful weather, baseball and softball games, and dance recitals.  School is the last thing on their minds.  Here are some fun things to reel them back in and finish the year with a bang!

1.                     Chromville:  This free app is similar to ColAR App.  You print off pictures from the Chromville website.  Students color them and use the app to make them come alive.  The pictures are all based on lands in the world of Chromville. Choose your land and download the page.  After Student’s color the picture they become great writing prompts. 

2.                     GoNoodle:  Go Noodle is a free program with brain breaks that channel classroom energy for good.  There are different brain breaks for every part if the day.  There are activities to calm, focus, and energize.  There is everything from breathing exercises to Zumba. 

3.                     TooNoisy:  This is an alternative to a Yacker Tracker or other noise regulator.  It is a noise level regulator for the classroom.  The lite version of the app is free.  After you set the sensitivity, the app rewards the class for each time interval that they remain within the acceptable noise level.  I use this app in conjunction with the Go Noodle Website.  When my students earn a specified number of stars, we choose one of the Go Noodle brain breaks.  It really helps with the antsy noise in my room.

4.                      Kahoot:  This is a game based student response program. This is a web-based response system.  Make it easy and create an icon on the screen of each iPad.  Students input a code and let the games begin.  You can create your own quizzes or use one that is already on the site. Look at the screen and choose the correct color.  You get points for the correct and answer and the speed in which you answer.  The top five highest scores are displayed after each question.

5.                     QLovi:  This is an ebook platform.  You can borrow books for up to 6 weeks.  You can give students assignments based on the books they read.  It becomes a personalized reading and writing for each student.  You can add books to the bookbag and assignments such as essays, warm-ups, and exit tickets. On April 4, 2014, QLovi offers free author read alouds in Google Hangouts and live on You Tube.   

Have a great weekend!

Money, Money, Money

            One of my favorite PBL units to facilitate is based on the 2^nd Grade Production and Distribution standard.  Here are some tools that will work with any economics unit.

1.    Moneyville:  This game was designed to teach financial literacy for children 5-9.  Through the game play, students will learn about money and its value. They will learn the difference between income and expenses in this virtual world.  Students will have to work in Moneyville to earn money to buy things to place in their virtual room.  Students will have to learn to save and prioritize for bigger items.  Students can play online or download the new app.

2.    It’s My Life-Money:  This is a PBS Kids Game.  Students chose an item and save money for “thirty” days to see if they can save enough for their big ticket item.  In this simulation students can earn money but they may lose days to receive the extra money.  During the thirty days they have to buy items on their shopping list. They have to make good choices with their purchases to have enough left over at the end of the thirty days to buy their item.

3.    Game of Life:  There is an updated digital version of the old board game available at the Apple App Store and Google Play.  The app costs $0.99. Students make choices that steer their future in the game.  Financial and life choices will determine who wins the game. It helps kids understand the value of good financial decisions and budgeting.  It’s also a fun game to relive childhood memories. 

4.    Savings Spree:  This app teaches kids how daily life choices can lead to big savings or huge expenses.  According to itunes, Savings Spree shows kids that they can SAVE their money for short term goals (like a bike or an MP3 player), SPEND wisely by making more frugal decisions, DONATE to others or INVEST money so it will grow to meet future needs like a college education. The game introduces the concept of earning money for the work that's available and also guides the child through making choices with the money accumulated during the game. Lastly, the game demonstrates that events beyond one's control can cost money, so it's good a good idea to have a rainy day fund available to pay for unexpected events. This app is $5.99.

5.    Save! The Game:  This is a free app. According to itunes, Download this game, and you’ll run, jump and dodge your way through a fantastic world, collecting all the virtual money you can find before time runs out.

But avoid the iWannas! iWannas are those impulse items that pull at your cash: sodas, candy, cheap toys, and more. iWannas roam around aimlessly, but if they collide with any money—or with you—they’ll take it.

So if you want to hang onto your money, you’ve got to get it to the banks. That’s the key to advancing to the next level. And winning Save! The Game.  

Have a great Weekend!

Snow Days Take 2

 Snow days in Alabama are getting old.  The occasional surprise day off is great but 6 in three weeks is over the top.  I’m ready to get back to routine and teaching my students.  Here are a few new to me ideas that I plan on using when the right lessons come around.

1.   BiblioNasium:  This is a free protected social network designed to engage, encourage and excite students about reading.  It helps you drive a challenging independent reading program.  It works like a digital reading log.  Teachers can offer reading challenges and recommended book list. Students can share book recommendations within the class.  Parents and teachers can monitor student reading, too. The BiblioNasium mascot offers encouragement, entertainment, and rewards good reading behavior.  This would have been the perfect tool to have in place this week during the snow event

2.   Storehouse:  This is a visual storytelling app for the iPad.  You can combine photos, videos, and text to create a story.  Unlike other storytelling apps, it is a blank canvas that allows you to drop in pictures and video clips from the camera roll, dropbox, or instagram.  It is a create tool to use to showcase the sequence of a project.  They can write about themselves, field trips, or snow days.  The possibilities are endless.

3.   Write About It Free:  This app is designed to encourage writing narrative and opinion pieces.  The app gives a picture and a prompt.  Students write their response and publish their writing piece.  The levels can be changed for more challenging prompts.  This app is easy to navigate.  It allows students to save their work.  Multiple authors can work on the same piece.  They can also publish their work by recording themselves reading their work. Students can email their finished writings to you or their parents to share their work. It can also be saved to the camera roll.

4.   Kid in Story Book Maker:  (This app is $6.99 but it was free last week.) This app makes it easy and fun to create stories for kids.  The app has 8 templates that let you add student’s pictures to create a story.  Student’s can record their voice reading each page.  After pictures are added and voices recorded, students will enjoy reading their very own visual story.  Stories can be shared by email or dropbox.  This is a great app for the beginning reader or young students that need visual cues along with audio to help with their reading.

5.   Duplo:  Lego Duplo offers a series of free apps that encourage problem solving and following directions. There are several apps that include Zoo, Train, Food, and Circus.  Young students follow the directions to complete tasks in each app.

I hope you have a snow free Valentine’s Day and a great weekend!

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Random Ramblings

No theme…No connection…Just random thoughts.

This week I’m sharing some of the favorite apps and tools I’ve used recently in my classroom.

1.    Moby Max:  How have I not heard about this before?  This site is amazing.  It is an adaptive curriculum.  It has reading, vocabulary, math, facts, writing, language, and test prep areas.  It has placement tests, adaptive lessons, and IEP reporting.  Students login to the program and complete lessons.  Students are rewarded with game time for correct answers.  You can also set up weighted contests in your room.  It identifies missing skills and provides practice for those skills.  The Fact Master portion is very similar to FASTT Math.  You can click on the questions they’ve mastered and it tells you the correlated Common Core Standard.  Between the real time data and the fun the students have with the games, it is a Win-Win for everyone.  Oh, did I mention the basic Moby Max is free.  Some of the modules and reports are in the paid version.  It is $79.00 per year.  If you have an android device or a Kindle Fire, there is an app.  Moby Max recommends that you create a home page icon for apple products.  It is fully functional on an iPad.

2.    Boom Writer:  This is a site for collaborative writing.  Boom writer gives story start. A story Start is the first chapter of a book.  It can be written by anyone, even a celebrity.  Students continue with chapter 2 and write.  At the same time other Boom writers will be writing their version of chapter 2. Once the chapters are submitted, students vote on their favorites.  Then the names of the writers are revealed and they’ve created a book.  This book can be viewed online or purchased.

3.     Animoby:  This is a free app that turns your tablet into an interactive whiteboard.  Animations and videos can be created.  I tallows students or teachers record themselves as they create a screencast of a picture or a pdf.  With a completed project you can generate a URL to embed in blogs or share in other ways, such as edmodo.

4.    Story Me:  This app lets you turn pictures into comic strips.  Students create a collage, add speech bubbles, and add a fun comic effect.  Individual images can become s story in seconds. Here is one of my 2^nd grade student’s Story Me created about Martin Luther King, Jr.

Story Me app Project

5.    Be a Part of Digital Learning Day on February 5, 2014:  Let’s celebrate innovative teaching and highlight practices that personalize learning and engage students, exploring how digital learning can provide all students with the opportunities they deserve—to build the skills needed to succeed in college, a career, and life. In other words, show the world what Talladega County does everyday!

Have a Great weekend!