Project Based Learning and the Scholastic Book Fair

My class turned the school book fair into a Project Based Learning opportunity. We decided our driving question would be, how can we increase attendance at the school book fair? We began this project last October and students have been working in small groups on different parts of the project at various points throughout the school year.

First, we took a vote via Google forms to decide what method or project would be best to answer our driving questions. Creating a commercial won almost unanimously!

The next step was for a small group to work collaboratively writing a commercial script using Google docs. After doing some research, the students found a similar project I did with a class several years ago, took that existing script and revised it. I was impressed by the editing and revision skills of this group.

At the fall book fair, we took some video footage. I worked with another small group using iMovie to edit the footage to create a promo about the book fair. Students took turns reading the script and we added that as a voiceover. Our finished project is below. We hope to see you at the book fair!

Pumpkins

We have had a spooktacular time this week with our Prime Pumpkin Prediction Project! 

Students learned about circumference, radius, vertical lines, estimation, alliteration, units of measure, the life-cycle of a pumpkin and of course the grand finale, estimating and counting the seeds of a pumpkin. Thanks again to all the families who donated pumpkins. Watch the video below to see a little snippet of the seed counting fun. 

I create most of my videos on iMovie on a Macbook. On a whim, I decided to try out the iMovie iPad app. I was confused and am thrilled to say, I had a group of 1st and 2nd grade students guide me through creating this video! This is what they learned during our Apple Store field trip and they were obviously paying attention! Great job, students! I was excited to learn something new and am eager to use this iPad app more in the future. 

Fun Is In Session

We were excited to kick off our first field trip of the year at The Apple Store in Scottsdale to learn about iMovie!

Each student worked with a partner to first create video footage and take photos and then edit their movie.

After the movies were edited, the Apple Store Geniuses helped students upload their creation to a bracelet zip drive.

Everyone had a wonderful time and walked away with a movie strapped to their wrist! I uploaded all the movies to my YouTube Channel and created a playlist which can be viewed here. 

We were a little sad to ride the bus back to school because we had so much fun at The Apple Store, but we are excited for our next field trip in a few weeks.

Watch the video below for an inside glimpse of the field trip in action!