Last Full Week of February

Where does the time go?

Here we are in the last week of February with only two weeks until Spring Break and there's much to do, much to do...

The Short Story:
3rd Graders continue Keyboarding for Kids
4th Graders perform a screengrabbing mashup in their kidblog using Scratch, the PrtScr button, and Microsoft Paint.
Kindergarteners visit PBS's Between the Lions website
1st Graders work on math skills at the BBC Bitesize Math site for their grade level
2nd Graders do the same at their grade level's Bitesize Math site, focusing on Shapes

And then of course, there's
The Long Story:
3rd Graders continue Keyboarding for Kids and I'm proud of the way many of them have waded into the program and are making real progress. "Mileage does vary," though, and as I anticipated many are still struggling into it, some likely developmentally unprepared for either the physical challenges, the regular practice, the understanding of the importance of this skill, or all three. My goal over the month of March is to improve the numbers in all three areas so that our 2010-2011 4th graders have a real jumpstart on their work.
4th Graders perform a screengrabbing mashup in their kidblog using Scratch, the PrtScr button, and Microsoft Paint. This activity is a good example of why a computer lab curriculum needs to be at least to some degree flexible. I came up with its design just yesterday, when I was helping a teacher learn how to do a "screengrab," basically taking a snapshot of a desktop window and creating an edited image of it for a website archive. We've neglected Scratch the past few weeks, concentrating on blogs and blogging, and I wanted to fuel the interest in that program, so 4th grade students

1. opened Scratch and found a project they'd either created or edited
2. screen-captured its display with the PrtScr key on their keyboard
3. opened Paint and edit/pasted their picture then(if needed) with the Select tool, then saved it as a .jpg file in the My Pictures folder
4. opened Firefox and clicked in the Webliographer to go to the USN4th Kidblogs
5. created a New Post and uploaded their screengrab into it, resizing as neccessary
6. wrote a few sentences about their selected project.

Wow. Here are two examples of the products in our password protected Kidblogs, more or less selected randomly:

and

Kindergarteners visit PBS's Between the Lions website where there are great, fun activities ranging from Movie Clips to Stories to Games, all geared to enhance kids' literacy skills. One of my basic intrinsic goals in my work is to expose children to fun ways to learn, to broaden their knowledge and appreciation of just how many ways there are to practice important skills, and to get them in shape to pursue their own means of life-long learning online. "Between the Lions" is one good source for that.

1st Graders work on math skills at the BBC Bitesize Math site for their grade level.

2nd Graders do the same at their grade level's Bitesize Math site, focusing on Shapes.

I may be Bitesize Math's newest big fan. This site holds a wealth of engaging content, and one screengrab of my own (from the 1st grade site) will give you an indication of just how many activities are available at each grade level.