Mrs. Swanson's class

Kindergartners LOVE to play games on the Internet.  They are interactive, help engage the students, and are educationally supportive to students needs.  Gamegoois a great website for students in K-2nd grade to use for supplemental reading instruction.  I use gamegoo on my SmartBoard during center time.http://www.earobics.com/gamegoo/gooey.html  During morning centers, which are more academic based, students can use the games to reemphasize a new letter we have learned. Yet during afternoon centers, which are social centers, students can work together to win the games!  On the side of the website, there is a color code to show the levels that each game is at.  At the beginning of the year, most students could play only the beginner games which helped identify capital and lower case letters pairs and recognize letters of the alphabet.  Currently my students can play the intermediate games, which spell different words or add digraphs to the beginning of words.  With so many different games, it is also easy to differentiate according to each groups educational needs and abilities.  Students are able to maneuver the website by themselves. I really enjoy this site and my students do too!

After exploring lots of  visual elements for my Kindergartners, I decided to make an Animoto video for our science unit on living things.  I plan on using this video to engage my students in our new unit of study.  I want them to realize living things are everywhere.  I hope this video will motivate the students for the unit!

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

I am attempting to take my students to the computer lab for the first time (without the computer teacher) next week!  I am going to have my students make their own Animoto video that has various living things on it.  I think my students will enjoy creating something on their own.  This website is great for younger students because it goes through step by step how to make the video.  All of my students are able to maneuver websites and other parts of Windows extremely well for Kindergarteners, so this should be a fun project!  I will model how to use Animoto before students are asked to make a movie by themselves.  Animoto is a great program for little ones!

My students LOVE, LOVE, LOVE YouTube.  I recently attended a conferece hosted by Dr. Jean Feldman.  Those of you who are pirmary teachers probably know who I’m talking about.  She has made hundreds of fun songs such as the “Tooty Ta” and other of educational songs to learn letters, letter sound association, numbers, counting, and lots of other things.  Before going to the conference, I had thought YouTube might be a little over the top for Kindergarteners.  At the conference she said many of her videos were posted on YouTube.  Here are a few of her fun videos!

This video is called Lettercise. My students love to “exercise” to the letters of the alphabet.

This video shows how to add simple addition facts through a song.

Currenlty, my students and I are just viewing YouTube videos using my SmartBoard.  I save the link from YouTube  using my deliecious links and then open another window of internet explorer.  I maximize the YouTube window and we lettercise together.  After the first viewing, my students wanted to see other videos that were on the side.  We discussed how adults need to view YouTube videos before children view them.  I told my students not to visit YouTube.com unless mom or dad is viewing the website with them.  I would hate for one of my students to see something inappropriate because of me.  In a Kindergarten setting,  I would use digital videos to show my students a new concept or idea.  In a few years, they will be able to create videos on their own.  I hope to continue using You Tube or other digital videos to interactively show my students new songs and fun educational activities.

It is amazing how much my students have picked up regarding technology skills since the beginning of this course.  A few days ago, a problem came up on the SmartBoard while I was working with a student.  Together as a group, they figured out how to close their program and reopen it without my help.  This was a BIG step for my class!  It is amazing how quickly they pick up computing skills!

The video “Kids Represent Their Work Through Tech” shows how all students can achieve at a high level.  Students at a culturally diverse middle school in Maine completed a digital project about animals.  Each student in the grade was part of the assignment.  As one of the teachers stated in the video, it didn’t matter how much work a child did, every child was a part of this project.  The students worked with members of the community to print their technology project onto cds for each student.  For the final part of their project, students invited family members to see their final project. 

I really enjoyed this video.  It reemphasized the fact that all students can learn regardless of learning ability, race, or religion.  The teachers made sure to differentiate the project to each students achievement level.  Every student felt like they were a part of the project.  Without each part of the project, it would not have been such a big success.  This project also showed the sense of community the teachers have instilled in their classroom.  I hope I am having this impact on my students.

Finally, this project showed students how they can achieve using the 21st century framework model.  Students were taught how to use information, media, and technology skills to create a class masterpiece.  When a community member volunteered his time to print cds and other materials for the project, students learned life and career skills.  Students were able to work with various types of environmental print and global awareness regarding animals.  Thus students learned about core subjects and 21st century themes.  There were many more aspects of 21st century framework used in this video.  It is a great example of what young minds can do when technology is incorporated!

What an amazing kid!  I found this video about Cameron, an eleven year old boy from central Indiana.  It shows what amazing things kids are able to do today with technology.  Many of his teachers discuss how Cameron has helped them make videos or other fun technology ideas to help students understand a certain concept.

I really enjoyed this video.  I liked the idea of having kids work with adults to create the best possible website for Fortune 500 and other companies.  Kids today are very “computer savvy.”  They know all of the shortcuts and means to get to their favorite website.  Kids also have amazing ideas!  They may think of something completely different than an adult.  My students always ask inquisitive questions about things adults do in their everyday lives.  But all of their questions make complete sense.  Sometimes as adults, we do things because they are a routine.  Kids tend to think outside of the box more often than adults!

A goal I have for myself after watching this video, is to let my students dictate more of our classroom lessons.  I need to let my students ask a question and build simple mini lessons about their interests.  I think this is especially important in science at such a young age.  I want my students to enjoy learning about things they are interested in.

Here are some great websites to use in any K-1st grade classrooms.  There are fun educational games for the kids to play and exciting ideas for lessons to use in the classroom.  Enjoy!

http://delicious.com/aliswanson

Cindy Lou Who

our Kindergarten story

 Today we used storybird.com for the first time.  Students explored the website together using our SMARTboard.  They were excited to write their very own story as a class!  Mrs. Swanson found the collection of drawings to write our story about.  Please view our pictures to see how our lesson went!

I want to add a sentence

My students were very excited to use the website. They loved the pictures of the little girl, whom they named Cindy Lou Who (haha!).  We talked about why she was upset, why she had her stuffed animal with her, and why her teacher was yelling.  They all had great ideas about their little friend!   All of my students were fully engaged in the lesson, which is something I was concerned about.  They keep asking me when we’ll use storybird again.  I will definitely tell the other teachers in my school about this website.  I think older students can explore the website and write wonderful stories they can publish on their own.  After the lesson using storybird.com, students went back to write a story on their own.  Take a look at our wonderful writing!

My own story

I can write on my own!

My brain is working hard!