GAFE4Littles & more

GAFE for Littles

It seems like a week doesn't go by without seeing a great new idea from Christine Pinto, or a new way another teacher has used one of her templates. Looking though my bookmarks for the last couple of weeks, there were a couple of ideas I wanted to be sure you saw. 
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First was her graphing with Google Sheets template. I saw another teacher post on Twitter about how she had used this with her Kindergartners to graph eggs and they did a great job. What a wonderful way to introduce the idea of data collection and visualization to our youngest students! You can check out her post here.  You can take this idea and run with it for spring with flowers, baby birds, etc... 

Christine and Jessica Twomey also collaborated on a 2D connected play board. This is the tweet about that one. Looks like fun for a lesson or just a center time activity. 

Studying 2D shapes soon? Check out our Connected Play Board! Ideas included:
-Stop motion animation
-Optical illusion shape art
-Partner shape building w/ positional words
-Pattern block wordshttps://t.co/I9TghKkXWj#innovatingplay #mathchat #gafe4littles #kinderchat #ecechat
… pic.twitter.com/JVPfLwPkFr

— Christine Pinto (@PintoBeanz11) April 22, 2019

Another great collaboration from Jessica and Christine was on animal habitats- using Google Slides. Looking at this one,  I could easily see this being adapted for our grade 2 habitat projects. Lots of ideas, tools, ways for students to demonstrate learning.  Click though to Flipgrid and you can even get the link for the complete lesson plans. 

Tackling some @OfficialNGSS, DRAWING to create digital/physical MURALS, & animal fact sharing in the Forest Discoveries project! @pintobeanz11 & I are sharing our WHOLE LESSON PLAN for the project! Details in my #innovatingplay @flipgrid response https://t.co/k3Y9uPPJVG #tlap pic.twitter.com/AkmnQviyVN

— Jessica Twomey (@jlabar2me) April 21, 2019

So, if you aren't already following Jessica and Christine on Twitter- here's another reminder! You're missing out on great ideas, not only for the littles, but most can easily be transformed for all elementary grades.
​Jessica Twomey : https://twitter.com/jlabar2me 
Christine Pinto:  https://twitter.com/PintoBeanz11

CanonLab

This is a resource that is new to me. It is essentially research based curriculum for CT. Here's part of the blurb- "...focuses on researching innovations in computational thinking education at the elementary and middle school levels with a primary emphasis on equity and inclusion for all underrepresented populations - underrepresented ethnic minorities, females, and students with learning differences." ​

What I really liked was the fractions unit for grades 3 and 4. There are also 2 Scratch units- one for an intro and one for middle school. The breadth of these ideas flow from a CT reading list for PK-2 and up to quantum mechanics for HS and uni.  And the resources are free.
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Check them out here https://www.canonlab.org/resources

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Ideas to Share

Adding Audio to Slides

​Once again, H/T to Eric Curts for another great blog post/podcast/video with step by step directions to use one of the 4 recording tools he highlights.  No matter your learning preference, read the blog post, listen to the podcast or watch the video- great ideas - easy to use tools. 

WEB LITERACY FOR STUDENT FACT CHECKERS

​Mike Caulfield's book on Web Literacy is available online as a free download.  It was published in 2015, but many of the basic principles still apply. 

Digital Choice Boards

Kasey Bell over at Shake Up Learning has a great post aboutdigital choice boards and is even offering a free download of her ebook that goes into detail. 

Here's a blurb from the post:
"Choice boards provide students with flexible learning paths to the learning goal. Every student has different strengths, learning styles, and interests, and choice boards allow us to reach more learners in new and different ways."
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My first question was- Aren't you talking about hyperdocs?  That is also one of the first questions Kasey answered on her post. 
Check it out  

Google Expeditions

​Michael Fricano, @EdTechnocation, shared a whole slew of new Google Expeditions on Twitter, and then, thankfully, also shared the Google Sheet with all the links listed, topics, etc.    bit.ly/gExpeditions 

School Norms

​When I first read this interview that Jennifer Gonzalez did with Angela Watson, I had mixed emotions.  I think that many of us feel like we have to go the extra mile, "it's all hands on deck", "for the kids", etc.  I'm pretty sure that almost all of the teachers I have worked with over the years have put in countless unpaid hours to do just that- for the kids. Teaching ends up being a vocation, your life, not just your "job". This interview and Angela's new book may have you rethinking this. 

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