Notebooking, Teaching, and Technology

Our school district has rolled out iPads to all students in grades 3-5 (and Dell Venue 11 Tablets with detachable keyboards to students in grades 6-12). This has kept us (all the tech coaches) BUSY this year!  One thing I am trying to do is incorporate the use of iPads with the notebooks. One web tool I use a lot is bingobaker.com  . It is free bingo game card generator that you can either print out or play using your tablet.  For students I created a QR code (using QRstuff.com ) and put it at the bottom of their science vocabulary sheet that goes in their notebook (see second picture). When we are ready to play students take out their iPad, scan the code and it goes straight to a randomized bingo board (no two bingo boards are the same). Students touch the screen to make the square light up and touch it again to make it go back if they made a mistake. Once a winner has been declared students touch the "refresh" circle and they get a new randomized board...

Every Monday and Friday I would pull up the weather channel's 10 day forecast for our city. I would have dry erase markers and boards at the table and would ask a series of questions based on the data. - What day will have the highest temperature? - What day will have the lowest temperature? Or what day are you going to have to dress the warmest? - What is the difference between those temperatures? (math!) - What day(s) has the greatest chance of rain? Or what day are we most likely to have indoor recess? - What day(s) has the lowest chance of rain? - What day is going to be the windiest? - What day is going to have the greatest drop between their day and evening temperature? I always look at the weather so I figure why not make it a classroom thing! Luckily we studied weather in the fourth grade so it was easy to incorporate it in my lessons but even if I taught a "non-weather grade" I would still do it. It was amazing to see how difficult it was for the k...

First, I apologize for the long delay in between posts. I was moved into a new position (still a technology coach but servicing Title 1 school...of which we have a lot!) and I have been a little overwhelmed.  As an apology, I have included a link to a complete weather lesson I recently created for some teachers. You will find a Promethean Flipchart (you can only download if you have the Promethean software), a copy of the blank weather map seen in the picture above, and a copy of the homework sheet (seen in picture #2).  https://sites.google.com/site/mrsheatonsfiles/weather This is a two day lesson with the first day showing the flipchart and creating the weather map symbol cheat sheet. The second day involves taking students to the computer lab to complete the two weather activities on Edhead.com ( http://www.edheads.org/activities/weather/ ).  Enjoy!

I had a second grade teacher ask me to help find a computer lab activity for her kids related to the states of matter. I came up with a lesson using Brain Pop Junior (free for South Carolina teachers through Discus) but I also found this Study Jams site through Scholastic . I watched the Solids, Liquids, and Gas one and that was pretty good. I really liked the song that went with it (although I wasn't a huge fan with how long it took to load). They also have a Water Cycle video as well (which sadly doesn't have a song :) I wish they had more videos but they only have two math ones (fractions and determine the missing operation).

I like the simplicity of this video. I would like to get my students to make a video like this!

This may seem a little on the young side but I thought it might be a good filler or morning work activity. Students have to complete the maze (I would make them label it as well) and then color. The activity is a free downloadable PDF from THIS SITE .

I saw this on line and while it is suppose to be used with Versatiles (can't say I am familiar with them) I thought the worksheet would make a pretty handy dandy Friday quiz. You could also use it whole group on the interactive white board (with student response systems if you have them) or add to the examples and make a Scoot review game . Here is the site that I found it on - Water Cycle Versatiles . The worksheet is a free PDF download.

I came across this free lesson plan on TeachersPayTeachers that I thought would be a fun way to integrate ELA into science (specifically a weather unit). Most of our fourth grade teachers are teaching weather in the first nine weeks so I plan to pass it on.   Here is the authors write up of the unit - These are 25 common English idioms that have a weather connection, along with their definitions. Students first study and discuss these with classmates and the teacher using the provided discussion guide. This is followed by a set of 25 context sentences where students must use the correct idiom to demonstrate mastery. Answers provided. At the end is a list if five extension activities to take your students further in the study of idioms. The lesson plan is easy to follow and not complicated. It is definitely something I would do in the classroom. 

I created a short, one class period activity, that can be used to give practice to students in reading tables and graphs (in the context of a weather unit). The lesson plan, activity sheet, and answer key can be found on my TeachersPayTeachers site FOR FREE :)

I have been exposed to "mind maps" before but I've never used them in the notebooks. I saw this pin on Pinterest (see first picture) which got me thinking about how they can be used in notebooks. Using my trusty craft supplies I created two mind maps in my practice notebook. The first had to do with the water cycle and the second I was thinking of  using it as an end of unit review. Here were some of my thoughts as I was creating them. 1. Student would need some serious modeling when introducing "mind maps". You can not just show them a sample and say "go". It probably would be best to do it as a group and then have students copy it into their notebook a couple of times so they get the general idea of how it works. 2. I think this would only appeal to the artistic children. I don't think it would damage the non-artistic children to go through the process of creating a mind map but when I was doing it I was thinking t...

I happen to be in the computer lab and saw our awesome media specialist teaching a third grade class how to read tables and charts (while at the same time introducing students to the website www.factmonster.com - a child friend research site). She had the children pull up First in US Cities  from the site and gave them a series of questions that could be answered by reading the table. It was a fun lesson and gave students some good practice reading tables and charts prior to their state testing. I went through the science section of the almanac and under weather there were several tables and charts from  wind chill to lightning deaths that could be used as part of a science classroom which would easily allow the integration of technology and math (especially if you have children compare the data).

Here is a technology project that I did with a fourth grade science class at the end of their weather unit. This was my sample project I showed children. I had done a project similar to it at the end of last year and wrote about it HERE . I had actually helped a teacher do this paper piece project in Social Studies (they were researching explorers) so I felt pretty confident introducing it in science (we had worked out the kinks and problems in the social studies class :) The project took four days. Day 1 - Students were introduced to the project, grouped, picked their topic (they could choose between layers of the atmosphere, weather tools and their uses, severe weather and related saftey tips, the water cycle, and clouds and cloud formation), and started working on their graphic organizer. Day 2 - Students worked on their graphic organizer, script, and paper pieces Day 3 - Students were at various stages of completion. They were either still working on their paper pieces or ready to ...

Just finished adding the lyrics to this fun Bill Nye song on the topic of WEATHER and posting it to Youtube.

  This is an idea I saw on pinterest about making a cloud viewer. This is the site with the idea and here was the idea for the template I was going to use for the outside of the viewer. I did this with a fourth grade class yesterday and in the planning stages I decided to nix the popcicle stick frame because of time…plus I decided I really wanted them to write on the back of the viewer. I also nixed using a prefab cloud viewer frame because I really wanted children to draw their own representation of the clouds – rather than have it handed to them. So using the idea from the two sites students created their own cloud viewer. I was dreading the activity a bit mainly because I had never done it before, it was being done on a day before a three day weekend, there was a sub in the classroom, it was a full moon, AND I was being observed. Shockingly the entire activity went textbook perfect in all four classes despite all my concerns J . The teacher the day before had ...

A teacher friend of mine is entering a week of the water cycle with her students and I put lyrics to one of my favorite Bill Nye songs on the Water Cycle this morning for her. The embedded video is above but the direct link to the YouTube can be found HERE . This is her schedule for the week: Monday - Water Cycle Introduction Tuesday - I have them in the computer lab using Smart Art in Word to create a Water Cycle flow chart Wednesday - They are doing a cut, match up, and paste activity in their notebook Thursday - They are doing a couple of water cycle experiments Friday - Students are taking a quiz and watching the Magic School Bus Water Cycle video The kids are excited about the week but I think more because they get off for a week's fall break on Friday :)

Sure they may be a little "cutesy" but I liked the height representation. Thank you to the teacher on the blog The Inspired Apple for posting. Trying to think of a way that I can incorporate pull tab clouds into the notebook to represent the cloud heights :)

Someone shared this idea for a cloud window on this nature site . I think the intent is to puchase a kit from the site. However I am looking at it thinking it would be pretty easy to do on my own with a class. Fourth grade goes into weather soon and I might make it a point to try this with a group.

In just about every unit I teach I show a Bill Nye the Science Guy video. Because our school does not have the series on CD or VHS I have to get creative about finding the videos to borrow. Normally I do a search through our school's library system (that links to all the other library systems in our district) or through our local Beaufort County library system (they have all kinds of great videos you can use in the classroom....so does Netflix if you have a subscription...although they don't have Bill Nye). Normally I can find them somewhere and then I have our librarian place an inner office loan for them (at the beginning of our unit because they take FOREVER to get to us). Worse case scenario I have a friend at another school who happens to have access to the entire Bill Nye Science Guy set (the entire set costs $3,000) but they are not in the library system and she will lend me one knowing she'll get it back :) Each video is $30 through this site and is worth trying ...

I had made the larger one in the last picture at a science professional development program at Roper Mountain Science Center in Greenville , SC. One of the teachers in the class said that she made them on a smaller scale with empty soda/water bottles so I thought I would give it a shot. Teacher Tips: - Have students bring in the bottles. Collect until you have enough. Kids love doing contributing to a project and mine always asked if we had enough yet. - I took all of the bottles home in a large trash bag and precut all the tops while watching tv (and made the drainage holes). I kept the top and base together by using small cut pieces of packaging tape so that students had a matching top and bottom (they would just take off the tape when we started the project). - I modeled what I did at home in front of the students in case they wanted to make one on their own at home. - Make extras of EVERYTHING (bottles and cut pieces of duct tape). - Pour aquarium gravel into a shoe box and have ...

When making these I highly recommend using white card stock for the fin and tail. I trace the shapes on card stock and have the students cut them out. If a student is done early you can have them decorate the nose and fin. I try to get students to make a compass rose on their plates (they learned how to in Social Studies so this is a great tie in). Check your science kits (across grade levels) for the modeling clay but you can purchase from Walmart (approx. $4).