Saturday, May 08, 2004
Today we had the second of three Saturday workshops. Mrs. Bell and Mrs. Caldwell, the other two 5th grade teachers attended this session. The officially brings all four of the 5th graders into the Star-W circle.
We discussed the need to get more depth into some of the activities that we already have on the site. To that end, I took them to Rubistar-4-Teachers http://rubistar.4teachers.org and showed them how to created rubrics and tie them to activities they created by using Contribute. Much of the morning was spent creating rubrics and working on the site to update and tie activities to the rubrics.
During the short afternoon, I introduced them to Hot Potatoes software, a template driven tool for creating a wide range of activities. My idea was for them to begin creating activities based on their curriculum in a format that would support their in class work and at the same time help prepare students for state testing.
This year much of our technology efforts came to a halt during March and the first part of April as pressure to prepare the students for the ASK3 and ASK4 test mounted. If teachers can prepare the students through the use of material based on their everyday curriculum, the pressure will be lifted from the teachers and the student.
They are looking toward the summer as the time they can take next year's books and create online units to support them.
As each day passes they seem to be working more like a team. They divide up the work and share materials they have created. They are using their student as mentors and mentoring one another.
Today, Kelly worked with the two 5th grade teachers to show them Contribute and they were able to post their basic pages.
Earlier this week, Janine's students paired up with student's in the other 3rd grade classes to teach them how to use the online journals. Then entries made by the students were testimony to how much they enjoyed the activity.
It was a good day...
We discussed the need to get more depth into some of the activities that we already have on the site. To that end, I took them to Rubistar-4-Teachers http://rubistar.4teachers.org and showed them how to created rubrics and tie them to activities they created by using Contribute. Much of the morning was spent creating rubrics and working on the site to update and tie activities to the rubrics.
During the short afternoon, I introduced them to Hot Potatoes software, a template driven tool for creating a wide range of activities. My idea was for them to begin creating activities based on their curriculum in a format that would support their in class work and at the same time help prepare students for state testing.
This year much of our technology efforts came to a halt during March and the first part of April as pressure to prepare the students for the ASK3 and ASK4 test mounted. If teachers can prepare the students through the use of material based on their everyday curriculum, the pressure will be lifted from the teachers and the student.
They are looking toward the summer as the time they can take next year's books and create online units to support them.
As each day passes they seem to be working more like a team. They divide up the work and share materials they have created. They are using their student as mentors and mentoring one another.
Today, Kelly worked with the two 5th grade teachers to show them Contribute and they were able to post their basic pages.
Earlier this week, Janine's students paired up with student's in the other 3rd grade classes to teach them how to use the online journals. Then entries made by the students were testimony to how much they enjoyed the activity.
It was a good day...
