As the school year starts to wind down for many, it seems like we are caught in a whirlwind of trying to get "it" all in, trying to finish up projects, tying up loose ends, etc... all while trying to "finish strong". This has been the strangest school year on record for most of us. Hopefully a few of these tips, and articles can help you finish up and have fun doing it.
This has been all over Twitter and FB over the last week.
26 Great ideas for the End of the Year! Click thru to the shared doc and make yourself a copy. Thank you to @candytechideas, @MongelliMegan and @the geoffwagner!
Backyard Bio
BioBlitz is really fun, whether you do it with your class, your school, your club or your family. There's still time (not much) to sign up for this! Check it out here. STEM for ALL Video Showcase
Coming up next week. Check out more info here.
Save the Dates! May 11th - 18th Climate Action Kit
My latest "thing". I love microbits and have tried several types of bit boards to extend the pins and make it easy for elementary kids to use. This one has it all so far.
It has an easy to access Microbit board and an excellent curriculum linking to UN SDG goals with STEM content. I have attended several Inksmith webinars to learn more about the Climate Action Kit, after getting one a year or so ago. It pretty much sat on the shelf for a while, but after the webinars, and building my own plant watering system, I am hooked. These are easy to use, give very clear instructions and diagrams, are inexpensive and are linked to Ontario curriculum. Check out the Climate Action Kit here. Teams scores big on this one!Imagine if the developers of the Flipgrid Shorts Camera, Immersive Reader and Microsoft Teams all sat down to come up with an idea. Well Reading Progress is just that! Learn more about automatic running records and how this new tool can be in used in reading classrooms everywhere!
I drank the Google koolaid years ago and love all of the ways we can connect with our students, collaborate, etc. But- that doesn't mean that I don't love Flipgrid, Immersive Reader, etc- all in the Microsoft realm. So when I saw this come out the other day, I had to investigate. It looks GREAT! Honestly, I am not sure how to integrate it all into our googlesphere, but we should. As teachers and students we can get free Microsoft teams accounts. I don't know how crazy it would be to assign the reading passages in Teams through Google Classroom, but there must be a way. So- check out the videos above and visit the blog post to tell you all about it.
Ideas to Share
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April is right around the corner and will be bringing us National Poetry Month. More about that next time, but, a friend shared this article with me about a new anthology of Native poetry, with U.S. Poet Laureate Joy Harjo. Check it out. I'm sure that with Amanda Gorman and poetry at the Super Bowl, we will have a lot to share in the upcoming weeks. Equity and Accessibility I tend to write about various tools for accessibility a lot as that was the biggest change for me when I flipped from private schools to public schools. I had never had kids with disabilities of any kind in my many years in private schools, either it wasn't a "good fit" or the kids had private tutors, so it did not impact my teaching. Then in the fall of 2013 I started working in a public school. I ended up taking a crash course- 36 credits in 16 months and an Ed.S later- now, I get it. This didn't even touch on equity issues relating to gender, race, digital access, etc... just physical and cognitive issues. I was thrilled to see the article and listen to the podcast that Katie Novak and Mirko Chardin did with Jennifer Gonzalez recently, called If Equity is a Priority, UDL is a Must Check out the article and podcast here: www.cultofpedagogy.com/udl-equity/ Katie and Mirko talk with Jennifer starting ~ 5 min in. More Accessibility Stuff
CAST presented a webinar today called : What It’s All About: Teaching, Learning and Assessment These frameworks are a work in progress. This is the slidedeck (ppt). The recording will post in the coming weeks. Torrey Trust et al, recently shared this really nice hyperdoc/choice board on the Foundations of the U.S. Political System. Please remember to make your own copy/ do not request edit access, and please credit the authors. Tall Tweets I highlighted Eric Curt's tutorial for Tall Tweets, back in 2018. Lately I have been seeing more and more folks using both Tall Tweets and the new version Studio Creator to quickly and easily create gifs and videos. Teachers have been assigning or offering this as an option... show mitosis as a gif, show the water cycle as a gif, etc. So, I added the new version, Creator Studio, the slides add-on, to our allowed marketplace add-ons. It has mixed reviews, so if you try it and want to share either your positive or negative experiences, let us know. It's an add-on, so go to slides, add-ons-get add-ons to find it. It looks like most of the features you may want to use may not be free. Ideas to Share
Student Resources
I got an email today from ReadWorks that got me thinking about Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. The email was a pretty typical one, with lots of passages and question sets for students to learn more about his life- with lexile levels for grade 1-12. I passed this along to some teachers, but thought that this may be a good opportunity to create a resource for MLK and a little bit of Black History Month, for both teachers and students.
One thing that really struck me was the idea of a Day On vs a Day Off and incorporating service learning as part of the celebration of Dr. King's life and contributions. You may be aware of some these organizations, but some were new to me. Both The National Day of Service website and theGeneration On site offer not only ideas and opportunities for public service, but lesson plans for all ages as well.
Here are the 2 webmixes aimed more at students (They are both pinned to the beginning of the regular HES Symbaloo)
Teacher Resources
This one is more for teachers with lesson plans.
** added Discover kids link. You must create an account for access. Four of the 7 parts to the MLK jr unit are free, varying lexile levels.
Please feel free to add your ideas, share lesson plans, site, etc. in the comments.
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AuthorMaureen Tumenas Archives
June 2021
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