The links that we got on Wednesday night were a great display of how children can do more with modeling and guidance if we expect more. I was glad that I brought up using the invertebrates project at school because when we were able to discuss it I got a lot of new and different ideas to use for the next time. We often talk at our grade level meetings about if you expect it, model it, nurture it then you will probably get it. The projects we looked at about the Bermuda Triangle etc. were a great example of challenge the students and they will do the work.
I also appreciated the different literature circle ideas that were shared for different books that we often use with our fifth grade classes. I do try to change up literature circles because I do not want it to become monotonous and boring.
I did feel rather challenged myself because I had e-mailed both of my projects to Dr. Schmidt and she had not received any of them. Since then she has received one but not the other. I am never quite sure what I am doing wrong, but I will get it figured out. Also I was very much challenged when drawing Willie who I called Thompson for some reason. I thought I had to have a program that perfected Willie and the drawing so after spending about four hours and just becoming more and more frustrated I decided I would make Willie on a power point and compare him to a semi and the Empire State Building. I decided I wasn't perfecting Willie without buying a program. Do remember though I couldn't even get his name right. It was Thompson as far as I was concerned. Who knew where I came up with that except by Wednesday night at 7:30 my brain is pretty tired. Have a good week!
I debated about how to draw Willie as well. I wasn't sure about how big he actually was so I searched the height of the Empire State Building and compared that to his height. He is much much bigger than the Empire State Building. It took me a little time to decide how I wanted to draw him. I just couldn't believe he was that big! I decided that I would use paint program. It's a pretty basic program and when I was younger, I loved to play around on it. When I started drawing Willie, I remembered that when I was younger I wasn't very good at drawing things on paint. I found out that I'm still not very good! It was still fun to be able to use paint again.
ReplyDeleteThompson is Willie's real name! It was one of the clues that we had to figure out so don't feel like you're crazy-it's right!! I labeled my drawing Thompson too.
ReplyDeleteI ended up using a program called Tux Paint. I searched the net for awhile for a drawing program I could use. I decided to use Tux Paint because it was free & could be downloaded easily. It wasn't as great as KidPix, but it did do the job. I felt like one of my first graders drawing him but had so much fun doing it!
I like that you used powerpoint to make you Willie drawing. I have never thought of that. I was going to used my friends computer and use that paint program. I didn't know if there was anything already down loaded on my mac computer like there was on the PC. I just have to figure out how to make it mac friendly. I think I can do it but I don't know we'll see :)
ReplyDeleteOops, I thought Thompson was his surname, haha. I also used paint and have to admit that I suck at drawing in that program, Perhaps is is because one uses a mouse as opposed to a pen. So I was wondering if any of you are familiar with a program that allows you to have an interactive pen (so you draw on a tablet and it shows on the screen)... that would really make the drawing process easier. Reading what I wrote though, and thinking about using it in the classroom, wouldn't it be easier to just use normal pen and paper and scan the learner's pictures rather than investing in expensive interactive pen devices? Or perhaps I am missing some extra uses of 'the pen'?
ReplyDeleteWillie Thompson! I just always call it the "Willie" activity! In using technology, I think we always have to think about how we can use it to challenge our students' thinking. By just having students present "facts" it keeps their learning at a recall level. Once we challenge them in a "context" of learning then I think we see powerful results -- with and without technology.
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