Project Background
This particular week we were reading a story titled Sam and the Bag, about some naughty cats who crawl inside a paper bag. I thought it would be fun to engage parents at Open House by using QR codes in a project, and thus this project idea was born!
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Lesson Background
In math we have been working on understanding addition concepts. In reading we read the story The Hat. In this story Pam’s hat blows away and her friend Dan retrieves it for her. This week we cover the short a vowel sound, so in addition to the word “hat” students also had the word “cap” on their spelling list.
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Project Planning
When I first sat down to brainstorm about cross-curricular projects for my classroom, I began by making a table that had 6 columns. In the first column I listed the weeks of school. In the second and third columns I mapped out what we would be covering in math and reading each week. I reserved the fourth column for possible social studies or science connections. In the fifth and sixth columns I began jotting down ideas for connections to the arts and technology. I would recommend this brainstorming activity for anyone trying to follow in my footsteps in regards to integrating technology into your curriculum.
Lesson Background
During the first week of school we focus on reviewing phonics skills and sight words in reading, and in math we focus on number sense. Many teachers do “All About Me” activities the first week of school to help students get to know one another. I wanted to modernize this process, so I thought digital storytelling tools would be a natural fit with this goal in mind.
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We are all familiar with the writing process. We brainstorm. We draft, revise and edit. Then, we publish. Publishing writing in school usually consists of hanging the writing in the hallway, perhaps with a cute craft attached. Students see the projects as they move up and down the hallways, but really, who gets the time to enjoy and appreciate student work in the hallway?
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Towards the end of last school year we had Interactive Whiteboards (IWB) installed in the elementary classrooms in our district. The specific brand we obtained is the EPSON Brightlink. I love it because it uses the preexisting white board surface I your classroom, so you can still write on your board with good old fashion dry erase markers when you want. I wanted to modernize my morning calendar procedures to incorporate this IWB this year.
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