The 3rd graders are getting ready to present their suggested solutions for cafeteria issues to Mrs. Jessop and Mrs. Bailey next week. Two students worked on creating a video using a special app called Touchcast. This app allows us to use our green screen and add some other special effects. The other students are making games – one a video game and one a board game – to teach cafeteria rules. We still aren’t finished so hopefully we will make good progress next Tuesday morning!
I want to thank the PTA for providing the funding for Mrs. Dillard and me to attend the ISTE conference downtown this week. This is an annual, international conference for technology in education, and I always get great ideas when I get the chance to attend. I can’t wait to try everything out this upcoming school year!
One of the themes that was very prominent in many of the presentations was the “gamification” of learning. This does not mean that kids need to sit down and do all of their learning by playing Minecraft, but it does mean that there are some valuable lessons that children learn from playing games that we can use in our classroom. If you’re interested in reading more about this, you can visit my professional blog here.
With that in mind, I have two resources to share with you for the students this summer. One is GameUp, which is produced by Brainpop. Our school just got a subscription to Brainpop near the end of the school year, and I highly recommend the animated educational videos. (If your child needs the username and password, feel free to e-mail me.) The game section is free, though, and requires no log-in. There are many games for the upper grades, and then you can also access the somewhat fewer games on the Brainpop Jr. site. (BTW, there is a free app for Brainpop, and you can use our school log-in to access all of the videos on your mobile device, too.)
And, if you would like your child to stay away from the computer, I highly recommend a site called GameKit, which has a really cool assignment to modify an old game that you have around the house to make something new. You can learn more about GameKit here.
Lastly, I have started “tweeting.” If you are interested in following me, my address is @terrieichholz.
Using some of the money from Fun Run, I was able to purchase some games for the GT kids that I think will challenge their brains. Today, I let the 1st graders try a game called Morphology Junior. It’s similar to Charades, except you can’t act out what is on the card (unless you roll the “Morph” number). Instead, you are given various pieces that you can use to build something that will give the team clues to the word. They really seemed to enjoy the game, and it definitely requires some divergent thinking!
Here is a link to my Pinterest board in case you are looking for more games and toys for gifted kids.
