Make Writing More Fun: Little Bird Tales

Having trouble getting some of your more reluctant writers and editors to do some work?  Little Bird Tales
 is a free, web-based app that lets students upload their own pictures (or create in the editor), add text, and record original stories to share with their classmates and beyond.

Little Bird Tales has the functionality to create classroom accounts for free and is wonderfully motivating.  Students are very keen to the idea of creating their own stories, gathering works of art, and recording their stories to share.  The interface Little Bird Tales uses creates a welcoming environment for all students to encourage even the most reluctant writers to share their voice.

As an art teacher at heart, Little Bird Tales could be used to create student portfolios.  Uploading their own artwork and writing passages about their work or the teacher can generate prompts for each project.  something I am looking to try in the near future...I'll keep you posted!

Interactive Volcano Lessons

After watching some of our 3rd grade students work on Volcanoes in Science class, I started looking around for   some resources and interactive activities and found a blog post that discusses several great resources for students to use to learn more about volcanoes.  I initially started writing this post in the fall and just recently found the draft after I uncovered   Discovery Channel's Volcano Explorer which allows students to simulate and design different aspects of a volcano, like lava makeup and amount of gases contained inside.   When students make their selections the Volcano Explorer provides a short explanation of how those settings will affect the shape of the volcano and its eruption.

TED Talk: Why Videos go Viral

After my post about Mr. Peck's great video, I started to wonder to myself what makes a video go viral?  It didn't take long to find the answer.  In this TED talk, Kevin Allocca, YouTube's trends manager at a TED youth event discusses what he sees are the 4 reasons a video goes viral.

Learnzillion Common Core Math Videos

 Mastery Connect hosts an active community of teachers who are sharing lesson ideas built around the Common Core standards. Now you can also find more than 300 LearnZillion videos in the Mastery Connect community. 
All of these videos are tied to Common Core Standards from grades 3-9.   If you would like to add a video to your lesson plan, head over to the Learnzillion site and explore their offerings which also list the standard they are covering.  Most of them are recorded whiteboard lessons that are good for going over together as a class or individual review.  If you create a free account, you will be able to create video playlists and also connect and communicate with other members through comments and discussions on the pages.

Posterous Spaces: Great Tool for Classroom Content

I have heard of Posterous Spaces before, but this week is the first time I have had time to give the interface a whirl and try it out. My first thoughts are that this is just a fancy blog, but as I dive deeper into it, I see the benefits that Posterous can provide when used as a classroom management system and a one -stop-source for all of your assignments and content resources.  Posterous is a powerful and free tool for teachers and students to use to gather resources and document projects as well as communicate with other students, teachers, and parents to create a communal learning environment.

If you are thinking of using Posterous for a solution to online content management and coursework for students, here are some of the benefits that Posterous gives you:

• Lots of templates:  Plenty of layouts to give your space the right look.
• You can make as many spaces as you want.  Think of each space as a topic or a lesson plan
• Add videos, audio, documents, etc...  Even Powerpoint slides can be uploaded.  The student never has to leave the site, all objects are converted and set to be viewed right in the space.
• Comments:  Use the comments section in each space to extend learning opportunities and create discussions about the topic/lesson you are presenting.  Students love to post and participate in an online discussion.
• Security:  Your spaces can be viewed publicly, or you can control permissions to the site, only letting students in.
• Tablet users:  Posterous has an app that lets you do all of the work from your Ipad or Android device. Also students can view and participate on their tablets or smartphones.

Overall, I think Posterous has a place in where education is going today, providing a blended learning platform. Teachers and students can personalize their learning and develop 21st century thinking skills along the way by participating in web technologies that combine services and make creation of content easier and more effective.
Check out the test space I created in about 5 minutes here

Animals that can help our little ones get ready to read

There are two sites I have hoped to share with you for while that can give our Preschool through 1st grade students some help getting ready to read.  The first, is Scholastic's Building Language for Literacy whiteboard-ready activities that feature Leo, the letter loving lobster, Reggie the rhyming rhino, and Nina the naming newt.

I have to thank a colleague of mine for finding Leo and his friends who give you three games to play either alone or as a group.

The next site is probably a little more for the younger students (my 3YO thinks it is the best) is Alphabetimals

which is a great resource for teaching letters and sounds.

As I sat down with this site open to look at, my daughter came running into the room and immediately sequestered my laptop and began flipping the interactive book, clicking on both the animal and word sounds.  Great illustrations as well as the ability to type in the box at the bottom of the site to see your words in alphabetimals letters makes for this a nice site for kids to work on their own with.

Here come the GERMS!

With the kind of winter that we have had so far, it is always a struggle to stay healthy with all the germs floating around looking to give us the next runny nose, cough, and occasional temperature.  That is why it is important for us in school to stay on top of the things we can do to keep ourselves from being sick.
As we all know, the best line of defense is hand washing.  After watching the first graders wash up for lunch after recess, I felt it was my duty to give them a few pointers on how to keep our mitts clean by washing our hands with lots of soap and water.  But how to incorporate that into an art lesson?  How about by studying the organic shapes of germs and then creating our very own.

After looking at some images on the web of germs and bacteria through a high-powered microscope, the students described the shapes by calling them "round-ish" and "spiky-like", I explained to the students the differences between geometric shapes (shapes with angles and straight lines) and organic shapes (shapes found in nature).  The students used a loop of yarn to adjust and fine tune the organic shape they liked most and then traced around the yarn with a pencil onto paper.

The students then used markers to add all kinds of yucky feelers and eyes on them, adding patterns and colors to create a germ worthy of the CDC's attention.  We used glue to draw lines and patterns on top of our artworks so that we could run over them with printing ink to create unique textures and shapes.  After they were all finished, we looked at Joan Miro's Harlequin's Carnival and talked about the creatures created from organic shapes in the piece.
Hopefully, all the kids got a little creeped out by the germs and will spend a little extra time at the sinks before lunch!

More Clay Projects: 3rd grade Coil bowls

Can you tell Mr. P. remembered to charge his camera battery or what?  Another finished round of clay projects from the 3rd graders who looked at the native American method of coil clay construction and then put their own twist on it by creating coil circles and pressing them into Styrofoam bowls to generate unique lines and textures onto the outside of their pottery.  Painting the bowls is always the favorite part for the students, who like to use the metallic and neon colors to add pop to their not-so-ordinary coil pottery.

What to do with a Bunch of Envelopes?

I am thankful that I work in a building and community where people ask the art teacher if they want something before they throw it away.  We love to recycle here in the art/tech labs and are lucky to have enough space to store all of the junk so bring in your tired, poor, huddled art supplies and we will accept them graciously and figure out a way to make something with them.
Perfect example:  Someone a couple of years ago donated nearly 1 a thousand white 14x10 envelopes.  We have used them for the usual storage of classroom resources, and the occasional ghost or two around Halloween, but this is the first time I ever thought about stuffing them!
The Kindies needed a good soft sculpture project that could tie into some of their standards, so I thought we might make snowmen out of the envelopes.  In hindsight, I could have given them more than 1 envelope and we could have made the sections of the snowman work, but the project turned into more of a Pillow Pet than a snowman.  When the kids actually are covering the goals you had planned for them, subject really isn't that important, so I went with it and it turned out to be a lot of fun.  The Kindies used markers and foam shapes to adorn the face and body region and then did the same to the construction paper legs and arms.  If we could have spent more time on them, I am certain we could have used construction paper scraps to add clothing and hats as well as hands and feet, but for the most part the kids had fun and learned some valuable sculpting skills along the way!

Back to the Kids: Clay Projects Done

After first day of painting

Well, for the 3rd and 4th grade anyways!  The 4th graders have finished their portrait mugs that were influenced by the Moche culture that thrived in Northern Peru nearly 2,000 years ago.  It took a few weeks with careful planning and excellent students to create these slab-built mugs.  The 4th graders learned to score and slip clay to bind pieces together along the way and did an excellent job of wedging their clay (no kiln eruptions!). It took us two class sessions to paint them because the kids were more than willing to make sure every detail was perfect, crafting a final product that looks both worth the time and awesome!

30 second Narration of Pic with Qwips (Vocaroo still better)

Harlequin's Carnival

For quick annotation of images for students, about the only thing you could do for younger students is either make a movie with audio, narrate slides, or use Chrome's text to speech app and listen to a robot read it to them.  With Qwips, you can record a 30 second annotation for an image or passage on a web page or blog and Qwips will create a unique URL for your audio and then you can place it next to an image or a passage where you would like the students to be able to read it, but some words you know they will get stuck on.
I can see using Qwips for a lot of different things where I would like to add text for students to navigate a page or online activity or describe an art principle or process that an artist is using in a piece.  Look at the example of Harlequin's Carnival by Joan Miro.  Click on the link below it and listen as Mr. P. asks them to count the organic shapes in this painting.
I can also see using this for a passage that a teacher is trying to have the students read online, but knows that many of the words can be difficult.  Record the passage and add a link that says "listen" and link it to the Qwips URL to instantly stop having students say " what is this word?" and focus on the content of the instruction even more!
My only wish is that you could embed an audio player into the caption of a picture instead of the link moving you to another site.  Younger students will need some navigation help the first time, or you could use Vocaroo where you need no signup, and can embed the player (next to the link) into any blog or site.

Kids Learn Circuitry from Blobz and Basic Programming from Lightbot

The Blobz Guide to Electric Circuits is a fun little interactive for kids to learn about basic circuitry.  Each learning module has an explanation, and interactive activity, and then a quiz at the end to measure your knowledge.

This is a great little activity to get elementary-age kids thinking about circuits, the next step is to get them thinking about programming.

Tech professionals around the globe stress the need for kids to learn basic coding and programming at an earlier age.  Games like Lightbot can get kids started on the path to learning basic programming by arranging a series of tasks to a small robot to maneuver through a puzzle.  Easy to play and addicting controls make this a great logic game for kids to start learning the basics of programming.

Online Safety Resource for Kids: Webonauts Academy

Webonauts Academy by PBS Kids is a great game for 2nd graders to play when you are discussing cyber-safety.

As you travel through the Academy, you are given challenges and other scenarios for practicing safe online behavior while completing mini-games and upon completion, a certificate detailing your path to becoming a full fledged Webonaut.

After a little gameplay (favorite part of the job), I can't help but smile and think about all of the fun the 2nd graders are going to have with another fantastic example of gamification in learning.  Being able to complete tasks, earn power-ups, and become a Webonaut is all they need to power through this game and pick up some helpful cyber-tips along the way.

Psychology of Color using Zoomit

I would like to thank the Free Technology for Teachers blog for posting this graphic about the psychology of color from Louisville Paints as well as using a tool I did not know existed to make it easy to post in my own blog.  Both the infographic and the tool used to display the infographic can be used in multiple ways in the classroom.
First, the 3rd graders are beginning to discuss in art class some of the portrait work of VanGogh and Modigliani, introducing expressionism in art.  The psychology of color is great reference for students to understand that colors can evoke emotion.  This infographic will help encourage good color decisions and creative results.
Zoomit is a great image capture tool for large images with information (like an infographic) giving the user the ability to paste an image url into a box and Zoomit will place the image in a frame with tools to zoom in and out for your audience to explore the entire graphic without taking up an entire web page or blog.  Compact, easy to use (no signing in required) this app can make light work of a screenshot you may have marked up for step by step tutorials for the students or simply to explore larger images where details need observed.  It reminds me a little of Prezi in how you can travel through the image and discover new information and details.

Teacher's beware! When describing the color green, the publishers of the infographic used the s-e-x-word.  Prepare yourself if you decide to use this graphic in your class!

Shameless Gamification: Epic Win my Daily Awesome

All three of you that actually read my blog know how big of a fan I am about gamification in learning.  Previous posts aside, I have been using Awesome Note for my to-do lists for some time now and have doubled my productivity from a teacher standpoint, mercilessly ticking checkboxes  while keeping track of long-term projects and scheduling all of the other insane activities that happen daily in elementary Art and Technology classrooms.
I recommend Awesome Note to people all of the time, but lately, checkboxes hasn't been that rewarding lately, but Epic Win has created a nice fix for people like me who need a little adventure in our lives.
Epic Win  takes your to-do list and shuffles around your tasks into a alternate realm of RPG games like Dungeons and Dragons (last RPG I played-showing my age) where your list becomes a quest and checkboxes are traded with experience points, gold, and a few more steps along the middle-earth-type map.  Where are you going?  I have no clue, but now my to-do list has a little gamification, which has turbo-boosted my productivity once again to the sound of falling gold coins and level-ups like the "Helm of Questionable Appeal" where I don't know what I can buy or what the items are used for, but I have them and I want more.
Just another example of how gamification can motivate students to continue to work towards leveling-up in their schoolwork.  Task lists like Epic Win have the ability to capture your imagination and will remind you of those nights you stayed up trying to get another piece of the Triforce.
My goal is to use develop some instructional strategies in the coming months that use gamification and technology to help students master 21st century skills in the classroom.  I'll keep you updated on the project here, but until then, it is time to collect my 100 gold coins for finishing a blog post!

Shout out to Peckzilla Ice and his Crew

Mr. Peck, our wonderful new colleague over at the Junior High is bustin' some fresh beats with his students and inspiring us all to kick some funky rhymes in our classes and pump up the learning to 11 on the dial.  Keep those raps coming Junior High!

Looking for Math and Science Content? Gooru can Help

There certainly is already a lot of interactive content out there, the problem is it is often hard to find or lies in the collections of some teachers old website where the links are broken and the content is not updated.  Good news for us is now there is Gooru: which is developing Math and Science collections and organize them so that a user (free signup) can scroll through different skills from a variety of grade levels and find interactive content, diagrams, videos, and a host of all other sorts of helpful bits that a teacher can place in their collection on the site and use to help students both visualize and practice the contents being taught.

After bouncing around the site, I found all kinds of stuff from Kahn Academy videos to old games and interactive activities that I have seen before from other teacher's collections, but these are neatly organized and easy to access with one click instead of having to field through several Google queries before finding that perfect fit for a lesson.  Try it out if you have the time and see if there are any Math and Science goodies in it that can help you bring that lesson full circle.  I need to check with one of the teachers in my building because I remember her showing me another site that was similar to this, but I immediately forgot it's name.  Look for that post in the near future.

A Wintry Landscape

After long breaks with the 2nd grade students due to short weeks, they finally finished their landscape pics.  First step of the process was to discuss the use of foreground, middle ground, and background to the students using the Birmingham Museum's Learning about Landscapes page.  We discussed all of the tricks that landscape painters from the Hudson river School used to create a sense of grandness in their paintings and tried to re-create some of these tricks in our own marker drawings of landscapes.  the most important part of this process was to explain to the kids that we were creating a winter scene without snow, so the trees had to have no leaves (unless they were evergreens of course).  This was the hardest part because the kids wanted to make snowy mountaintops and such, so I had to tell them that we were going to make it snow later.  

In order to make the snow, the students used white glue to draw lines around the landscape which gave us a wonderful opportunity to hone our observational skills as we looked at trees outside the window and noticed how snow would land on the trees and stick in certain places (normally there is snow on the ground for us to see, but this warm winter forced us to use our imaginations this year).

After the glue has dried (next class)  the students used brayers and white block printing ink to run over their pics and the dried, raised glue lines picked up the ink as well as some marks that looked like snowfall.  Very happy with the way these turned out!

OK Go does Primary Colors

OK Go is well known for their revolutionary music videos (The treadmill video is still one of my favorites) and this time they have teamed up with Sesame Street to create a nice little video about the primary colors.  I wish this had been published before I went over the colors with my Kindies, but I can put it in the vault until next year and I think I will still show it to them anyways because it is just that cool.  This video along with all of the videos done by some of my favorite musicians on Yo Gabba Gabba's website makes me wish that there would have been cool music and videos on like this when I was a kid...All we had was Davey Jones and Mama Cass guest-starring on Scooby Doo

Monroe Splash Page: Take a Ticket!

One of the first posts of the new school year was about our Monroe Splash page where all of the students start when they open the browsers on the school computers.  We collect all of our links and other resources here so students can quickly and easily get to what we are trying to discuss in the class.  It is a long Google site address, but with the help of Tinyurl and an old trick from my college days, the kids can just walk by the Art/Tech bulletin board and tear off a ticket!

Check the New Schedule

"What are we doing after this Mr. P.?"  A Question I get all too often and especially never at the appropriate time (when we a trying to focus on today's project).  I found this idea on another art teacher's blog and thought that this was a great idea for the art teacher who has students that understand if you need to talk to Mr. P., you better be ready to move because he never stops!

Daily Awesome: Ze's page

Anyone who is a fan of TED knows or has seen Ze Frank's talk about how he goes about using technology to create new things.  I happen to stumble across his web page today while looking for some interactive activities for my second graders to do and found all kinds of cool interactive tools on his site.  Some of the highlights include:
Kaleidoscope
Create your own kaleidoscopic designs
String Spin-
Draw either a simple or complex drawing, click play and watch it spin into a 3-D form
Scribbler
Draw an image on the canvas and then press play to watch the computer create a sketch-like design based on the lines-you can manipulate all kinds of factors to create some cool designs.
Create your own Snowflake
Create a snowflake and view it in both 2 and 3-D
5-Second Doodle
How much can you draw in 5 seconds?

Welcome to the Web

The 3rd and 4th grade project learning classes are doing some brushing up on their web skills and safety the last couple of weeks.  We have been using a wonderful site called Welcome to the Web. This site from a UK -based teaching group is a great resource with printable handouts that the students can work through.  This is a really great way to also teach students to actually read the page that they are viewing on the screen.  We have had big issues with students having the answer flashing in front of them on the screen while they raise their hand to tell me that they can't find the answer.
Welcome to the Web uses a lot of tricks and tools to get students to interact with the page to find the answers to the worksheet questions.  Students have to mouse over, check boxes, and click particular hidden links to find answers and move along through the course.  Hopefully this along with my constant nagging of them to read the page first before panicking about not finding the answer and teach them to become more successful and independent users in the future as well as bone up on the safety issues we discuss in class on a daily basis.  We will be skipping the browser section b/c it is kind of outdated, but all of the other information is current and well organized to give the students the ability to discover new bits of info they might not have known before that we may have missed in class.