Digital Learning Day

Friday was Digital Learning Day, a day for students and educators across North America to celebrate digital learning! 

We completed a Pi Day cyberhunt, several students worked on an ongoing coding project and several others continued a collaborative data analytics project using Google apps. 

In preparation for Digital Learning Day, every student chose one digital project they had completed this year and linked it to a QR Code. We printed and hung all our QR Codes in the hallway as did other classes all over the school. 

We took some time touring the school and scanning codes to see what other classes have been learning this year. We will continue doing this on Monday. 

Homophones, QR Codes and Valentine's Day

Each year my class creates an interactive, 21st century Valentine card and this year was no exception!

Everyone worked with a partner using the free iPad app, Split Lens 2 to create a twin image of themselves. 

Students had a lot of fun getting creative with poses and props!

Students added a filter and text and emailed the image to themselves.

Then, they took their cloned image and uploaded it to Canva. They created a digital Valentine card using their cool double image. They saved and exported their Canva image and imported it into Google slides. Students made the slide public and created a QR Code leading to it. 

 Using Google docs, students inserted the QR Code and some text to print and physically glue to the front of their handmade Valentine card. 

We have been learning about homophones this week so I encouraged a pun using the word "two" since we had created a double image. 

Happy Valentine's Day!

App Smashing on the 100th Day of School

We celebrated the 100th day of school with App Smashing!

We started with the AgingBooth iPad app and took pictures of ourselves. 

We used the AgingBooth app to transform our current image into what we image we might look like at 100 years old. 

The results were pretty funny!

After saving our elderly images to the camera roll, students then moved on to the PicCollage app. They imported their AgingBooth image (this is where the SMASH comes in) to create a cool poster of themselves at age 100.

When the collage was completed, students then imported that image into their Google drive. They made the link to the image public, took that public link and went to goo.gl to shorten it and create a QR Code. They took the QR Code image and inserted it on a Google slide, with instructions to scan.

 Finally, we took turns scanning all the QR Codes to see what our friends 

will look like in 90+ years. 

App Smashing projects are a lot of fun because they really allow students to be creative and reduces the limitations of just a single app. The use of multiple apps is a higher order thinking skill because students must follow quite a few directions and complete many steps before they are able to finalize their project. 

Importing a piece of the project from the iPad to a computer, adds another challenging layer and it is amazing to watch how easily students are able to switch back and forth between devices and apply so many skills to one project. 

My class had a great time with this project and I heard more than one student say they were going to save the image and check back when they were 100 to see how accurate AgingBooth is. 

Geometry with Candy and QR Codes

We have been working on a geometry unit in math class!

Students learned about lines, rays and angles and got to demonstrate what each was using toothpicks, marshmallows and candy corn. 

Later in the unit, students used an iPad to scan assorted QR Codes. Each QR Code brought them to different information about a shape including an image of the shape, the definition of the shape and properties of the shape. Each student created a chart of all the different shapes we learned and included all of this information. 

Back to School Selfies

Last week was Parent Curriculum Night, and I always like to have some sort of student created project on every desk for the parents to admire while they are waiting for the presentation to begin.

I tried something new this year, having each student take a selfie and edit it using a fun photo editing app called PicCollage, adding the hashtag of their current grade. 

We discussed what a hashtag was and why someone might use one, although many of the students already knew all about hashtags since we used Twitter in class quite a bit last year.

Once each student created and edited their selfie, they emailed it to themselves via pvLearners. From there, they added it to a Google doc, made the doc public, copied the link and went to my favorite URL shortener and QR Code creator, goo.gl.

From goo.gl, they created a QR Code, which they then pasted into another Google doc. They made sure to label their QR Code with their name, since QR Codes all look very similar, and had fun experimenting with different fonts. We printed the QR Codes and mounted them to a piece of construction paper so they were waiting for parents when they walked in on Curriculum Night. 

There were a lot of steps to this project, but most students impressed me with their ability to handle the project with ease. I especially enjoyed watching many of my returning students assist the new students. It was exciting to witness such fantastic communication and collaboration skills!

Quick recap of skills learned and demonstrated during this fun back to school project: using the camera of an iPad, photo editing, adding an appropriate hashtag, emailing, Google docs, URL shortening, QR Code creation, collaboration, communication, and creativity. We hit three out of the "Four C's!"

It's going to be a fabulous year!

Fabulous First Week!

The week began the night before the first day of school, with students sprinkling "Planet Powder" under their pillows to get the jitters out.

On the first day of school each student participated in a scavenger hunt looking for another student in the class who...can count to 10 in a foreign language, has a dog, has brown eyes, left the country this summer, is on a team, etc. This was a fun way for students to get to know each other!

Homework the first day of school was to decorate and fill a "Getting To Know You" bag. 

Throughout the rest of the week each student got a chance to present his or her bag to the rest of the class. It was fascinating to learn about each student! This year in our class we have chess champions, math maniacs, baseball stars, rock climbers, super swimmers, amazing dancers plus lots more! 

We also worked on a glyph about pizza and a craft about apples. Along with creating the craft, each student had to scan various QR codes to learn facts about apples to include with their project. 

QR Codes are one of my favorite learning tools and we will be using them a lot this year.

On Thursday students literally clapped and cheered when I told them we would be "Buddies" with Mrs. Bird's 5/6 self-contained class again this year. Each student was matched with a buddy who they then interviewed and then later we played a game as a large group.

We wrapped up our fast paced week on Friday with a little "Mystery Science." Students worked collaboratively to create play-dough out of flour, oil, water and salt. Each team also got to choose a color to dye their dough.

Once each team was finished making their dough, they participated in some challenges like creating an animal out of dough, a musical instrument, something you eat, etc. 

We had a fabulous first week with a wonderful group of students! I am so excited about this coming week and the rest of the year!

Mother's Day Cards With The Tellagami App

 An early Happy Mother's Day to all the fantastic moms! We created Mother's Day cards, but of course, added a 21st century twist.

First, students wrote a script in Google docs containing the message they wanted to send to their mom. After editing and practicing reading aloud, students were ready for the next step.

Using the Tellagami app, students created an avatar that looked like them. Then they set the avatar somewhere. 

What I love about this app is you can take a photo and set the avatar somewhere, real, like the classroom! This adds an element of Augmented Reality, one of my favorite new learning tools.

Next students read their script into the app, attaching their voice to their avatar.

Once they finished, a link to their video was generated. Students took the link and inserted it into a QR Code Generator. Then, they copied the URL of their QR Code and inserted the image of the QR Code into a Google doc, which I printed for them. In order to scan your special message, use any free QR Code reader. I like the i-nigma app, but there are literally hundreds to choose from.

The final step was pasting the QR Code onto their card, adding stickers, decorations and a personalized handwritten message to mom! Everyone enjoyed this project and the Tellegami app (free!) was a big hit! Happy Mother's Day!

Here is a link to an adorable sample gami and here is another!