Category: Education

Education, K-12, Research, Science, Teaching Tools, Videos

Slow Motion Ladybugs

Terri Eichholz
from pcoimaging
from pcoimaging

This week’s Fun Friday post features a video that I found out about on byrdseed.com.  I know that many of you are still experiencing cold weather, but here in San Antonio it has been mild for weeks.  When we returned from Spring Break this week, I noticed an unusual number of students hunched down in the field during recess.  It turned out that they were all examining ladybugs.  My Kinder students are working on “Scientist Thinking”, so I thought we should take advantage of this abundance of these appealing insects, and do some research.  This slow motion video of ladybugs taking off will fit in quite nicely with our curriculum. It is fascinating to watch that second pair of wings unfold!  Here is the link in case the embedded video below does not show in your browser:  http://youtu.be/87iV4ISAY5U

3-12, Apps, Behavior, Creative Thinking, Education, Independent Study, Language Arts, Motivation, Philosophy, Research, Social Studies, Student Products, Teaching Tools, Videos, Writing

Dream Team

Terri Eichholz

Angela Maiers, an educator/consultant/writer whom I greatly admire, has mentioned on her blog the idea of having a “Dream Team” – a group of people who you would like to emulate.  In her book, The New Habitudes, she also mentions this, and offers a free reproducible here for conjuring up your personal Dream Team members.

I loved this idea, and mentioned it to my 5th graders, who also seemed excited about the concept.  Then I thought of a way they could present their Dream Teams to the class using their current favorite technology tool – the iPad.

dreamteam

The students chose 4 character traits that they believe to be the most important, and then 4 people from history who exhibited those traits.  After researching some specifics, they developed “Dream Team Talk Show Scripts” to use with the full version of Puppet Pals.  The full version has a cast of talk show characters, and also allows you to create your own puppets from photos.  (Puppet Pals 2 is even better – but we haven’t been able to upgrade yet!)

Here are the planning sheets we used:

Choosing My Dream Team

Design Your Dream Team Talk Show Script

The entire class is not finished yet, as the students need to rotate through our iPads, but you can see some of them on our class blog by clicking here.

Behavior, Education, K-12, Motivation, Parenting, Philosophy

What to Do With This Gifted Kid

Terri Eichholz
photo credit: Chris Devers via photopin cc
photo credit: Chris Devers via photopin cc

This article, by Julie Lyons, in DFW Child, has a wonderful quote, “ ‘As everything moves toward standardization and accountability testing and No Child Left Behind,’ Hickerson says, ‘sometimes that means that no child can get ahead either.’ ”

This is the hard reality in many schools, unfortunately, but the article gives good advice on finding schools that will nurture gifted children.  It also has some solid advice on how to treat them, including one that I have mentioned previously on this blog, “Never, ever praise them for being smart. Praise effort and hard work instead. “Allow your child to fail,” Swanson says. “There’s humor and humility with failure, and you move on.” A wealth of research shows that over-praised kids look to others for reinforcement and avoid risk-taking.”  I really can’t emphasize that advice enough.  I have seen the effects of the wrong types of praise first-hand, and do everything I can to undo it in my classroom.  But it’s difficult to change that mindset.

You will find other valuable recommendations in this article, and you might even find some statements with which you disagree.  But it’s definitely food for thought.

Careers, Creative Thinking, Education, Independent Study, K-12, Parenting, Student Products, Videos, Websites

If You Build It, They Will Learn

Terri Eichholz
from "If You Build It, They Will Learn" by Infinite Thinking Machine
from “If You Build It, They Will Learn” by Infinite Thinking Machine

Infinite Thinking Machine “is a high-energy Internet TV show that inspires creativity and innovation in education.”  The episodes are produced every two weeks, and you can find the archives here.  The episode that I am featuring in this post is, “If You Build It, They Will Learn”, which was produced near the end of last season.  Last week, I posted about the surge of “maker studios”, (by the way, my daughter and her friend LOVED the Marshmallow Shooter project) and when I found this video, I knew that it would make a great resource.  Not only do the ITM folks do a good job of discussing different examples of “making” around the U.S., but they also post a nice list with links to the featured entities.  I also like their challenge issued at the end of the short video.  Although the deadline for their contest was last summer, I think that it still would be a fun project to offer students, particularly near the end of the school year.

For some reason, the ITM site cut off the episode in the middle the first time I watched it (probably my computer), but you can also access the entire show at http://youtu.be/cQMKvQ-0B64.  And, if you are lucky enough to not have YouTube blocked, I have also embedded it below.

3-12, Apps, Education, QR Codes, Student Response

Quotes with QR Codes

Terri Eichholz
QR Code Poster from Tony Vincent's "Learning in Hand" blog
QR Code Poster from Tony Vincent’s “Learning in Hand” blog

I absolutely love this idea from Tony Vincent’s “Learning in Hand” blog.  He has taken a series of quotes, and used QR quotes to cover up parts of the quotes.  If you go to this link, you can see 20 examples.  He also offers a link to a video explaining QR codes.  Tony hangs up the posters for people to take a look at during breaks at workshops, but I could certainly see bringing this idea to the classroom, as well.  What I might do is have my students use Socrative to input their own guesses as to what words would complete the quote, then let them scan the code to see if the general idea is the same.  Here is a link to my Pinterest board that is chock full of inspirational quotations.

Critical Thinking, Education, Games, K-5, Problem Solving, Websites

Duck: Think Outside the Flock

Terri Eichholz

Screen Shot 2013-03-14 at 4.59.45 PM

I originally found this on KB Konnected, and made the mistake of trying it out.  I immediately knew it would make a good Fun Friday post, but I was so engrossed in playing the game that I never got around to writing about it.  So, here it is, finally.  What I love/hate about this game is that there are no instructions, and it gets increasingly more difficult.  It’s great for encouraging logic and problem/solving.  Duck: Think Outside the Flock is flash-based, so you probably can’t access it on an iOS mobile device unless you try using something like Rover.