The Digital Scoop

Creating Quick "Graphs" using Google Sheets on the iPad

This idea is perfect if you need a quick graph of classroom data from a question you ask your students.  You will not actually be creating a formal graph...your spreadsheet will just look like one!

Start with a Google spreadsheet like this one: 

I've added five columns for categories and placed 23 spaces in each column.  If you have more students, you can add rows.

Next, replace the categories with items you are collecting data on.  (I forgot to do this when taking screenshots!)

You could either have students individually color a cell for their vote or ask for a raise of hands for each category.

Tap on the number 1 cell for the category and tap and pull up on the left-hand circle.  Pull up until you have selected the number you need.  

Tap the paint bucket and switch to fill color.  Select the color you want.

Repeat until all the categories have been completed.

 

Now you have a quick graph of data that you can project and have a class discussion about!

Click here for the graph template. 

Want to make a real graph on the iPad, the Create A Graph website will work on an iPad or desktop.

Happy graphing!

 

Learning Notebooks Using Google Presentations- Part 1

A couple of years ago, I really enjoyed having students use spiral notebooks to record their ideas and learning.  I loved how it provided a way to reinforce what they were hearing, a resource they could use to help them problem solve, and a place to record their creative ideas. 

I did come to also find some drawbacks with the physical notebooks. I see my students on a rotating basis, either once or twice a week. The notebooks stayed in my room.  I created an organized way to store them, but that also meant the students couldn't access the notebook outside of my room.  At the end of the school year, students did take their notebook to use as a resource.  

This year, I decided to try having students keep learning notebook using Google Presentation and I am loving it!  I decided to start with my 2nd graders who are learning to use Google Drive and Google Classroom.  I am having them create coding notebooks to record ideas about Computer Science and Coding.  

  

I thought about giving them just the first two slides and having students create each slide as we added concepts.  Ultimately, I decided against that for my second graders.  I don't think it makes a huge difference, but with the school year quickly coming to a close and many concepts I would still like to introduce, I decided to give them a notebook template containing several slides with simple headers for topics.  The first topic we added was "Event".

 

The students talked about what an Event in coding is, added a simple definition, and then used word art to add reminders of events they have used or seen.

Adding Word Art to a Google Presentation:

Go to Insert - Word Art.

A box will appear.  Type in the word or words you want as word art.  Press Enter or Return on the keyboard.

Your word art will appear in the center of the slide.  You can then select fill and line colors, line weight, line dash, and font.

Word art can be resized by clicking and dragging the corners in a diagonal direction.  It can be rotated by using the circle found at the top of the word art.

How could this same technique be used in other learning areas?

Math- use word art to highlight words dealing with addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, or any other math concept.

Language Arts- use word art to illustrate figurative language, such as, onomatopoeia.

Word art could really be used in any type of learning notebook.

I assigned the notebook using Google Classroom.  For now, students are not turning in the notebook after each page.  In the future, I might ask students to periodically turn in their notebook for grading.  However, I LOVE that I can access their notebooks to check for learning at any time, whether they have turned them in or not.

I am planning to share notebook ideas as I have students add new pages to their notebooks.  Have you tried learning notebooks, either paper or digital?  What worked for you?  I would love to hear your ideas!

 

 

Pattern Block Learning- Creativity, Problem Solving, and Coding?!?

Last week, I invited my 1st grade students to be problem solvers and creative thinkers using the Math Learning Center online Pattern Blocks.  They loved it! 

I allowed them to freely move between three different activities using the site:

 

• Free create- I encouraged students to use their imagination to build items of their own choosing.  I was delighted (as I always am) to see their originality and creativity shine.

  

Lion

 

Rainbow

• Solve a Puzzle- I showed students the outline feature where they can complete a puzzle using the shapes.

 

• Build from a Picture- I provided a bunch of pattern block picture cards to inspire students.  Many students started by replicating the cards and then adding their own twists!  If you are looking for picture ideas, check out this Pinterest Board for ideas!

I have also been encouraging the kids to look for patterns when solving Code.org puzzles.  The pattern blocks were a great way to practice making patterns and simplifying them into "loops".  I love when a tool has a variety of uses!  Students can use the pencil tool to draw the "loop" block and the number tool to show how many times it repeats.

Do you have a great idea for pattern blocks?  I would love to hear about it!

 

NETA 2015 Treasures

Thanks for attending our NETA session, Technology Treasures:  2015 Edition!

Here are the slides and links to sites.

 

 

Symbaloo with all of the links:

 

 

X and Y Coordinates in Scratch

Screenshot from Flocabulary Video.

This lesson was prompted because I wanted to help my students make connections about coordinate planes and moving sprites in Scratch.   I have to say, this turned out to be a super fun and engaging lesson!

I searched Pinterest for ideas and came across a free Flocabulary video.  I love their videos, but don't have a subscription.  I was stoked that this one was free!  I knew the kids would love it and the fact that several moved up by the screen to enjoy the video was proof.  They were hooked!

 

Next, I had them open a Scratch file containing a grid.  I found a similar project here, but simplified it a little bit.  Once the green flag has been clicked, students can move scratch around the screen using the arrow keys on the keyboard.  They are able to see the x and y coordinates in the upper left-hand corner.  I took this opportunity to talk about quadrants and what the kids noticed about x and y in each quadrant.

Finally, I had them code scratch the cat through a castle maze to find the treasure using only x and y coordinates.  I loved how engaged the students were in working through the maze.  

They came up with several different strategies and loved it when they made it to the treasure.  I also had them add a pen to their code to see the line the cat took.  I found the maze idea here and just changed it up to a treasure theme.

My students really enjoyed every aspect of this lesson.  I love it when that happens!  I will be using this again and hope to help students make more connections about coordinates, coding, and math.

Dash and Dot Robots: Around and Around We Go!

 

Around and Around We Go!

 

I love a good challenge and this week I gave my 2nd graders a new Dash challenge called Around and Around We Go!  

I placed an x inside our tape squares and a rectangle in the middle.  Their first task was to code Dash around the square and avoid the green rectangle in one button press or event.

   

 I also created two student handouts.  I wanted to make sure all group members would have a job to focus on during the task.  We worked in groups of 3-4 students.

 

The first handout was used for recording the original code the groups created.  I also asked them to briefly write about what happened when running the code.

 

The second handout was placed in a dry erase sleeve and used to guess and check their code as they worked.

 

The guess and check strategy was another important part of this lesson.  I stressed to the kids that programmers write small parts of their code and then test them often.  The kids did a great job with this!

 

 

Cheers could be heard around the room as groups completed a challenge.  

Once they coded Dash around the square, I would give them another challenge.  

Several groups made it through 3 of the challenges in 1 50 minute class period.  

I loved how this activity turned out.  It was open enough that groups could have creativity, yet challenging enough they really had to problem solve.

Around and Around We Go Challenge Cards

Around and Around We Go Handout

Around and Around We Go Guess and Check Sheet

 

Using Skitch in Kindergarten

 

I LOVE the app Skitch (free for Mac, iPhone, and iPad) for many reasons! I can easily use it to annotate any picture or screenshot.  I often use it when creating handouts for teacher training sessions.

Knowing how simple the app is to use, I got to thinking it would be great for the kids use to annotate pictures they take in the classroom.

This lead me to ask a kindergarten teacher in my building if I could come and co-teach an iPad lesson with her using Skitch (thanks, Kari!).  

We started by talking to the students about taking pictures, and what would make a good picture.  We came up with a short list of helpful tips for the kids to follow:

1.  Frame your picture...make sure you are not cutting off someone's head!

2.  Freeze...you don't want the picture to be blurry!

3.  Wait...for the square or rectangle to show up in the picture.  

4.  Press the circle button or have your partner press the button.

 

The kids then worked in small groups to practice take pictures of objects and classmates.  Later in the day, the kids learned how to open Skitch, find our pictures, and add words!  They had a blast!

  

Since, I have had LEGOs out for several projects, I thought we could try taking pictures of them and using them in math problems.  My kindergarten students are working in pairs to develop a math problem, display it using LEGOs, take a photo, and annotate it in Skitch.

I love Skitch for  how easy it is to use and how powerful it can be for learning!

Do you use Skitch with students or teachers?  I would love to hear your ideas!

 

App Review: Land of Venn

 

I was recently given a redemption code for the geometry math app Land of Venn ($2.99).  I was excited to see what it was all about!  Below you will find my honest review.

 

This app is presented as a game with levels, stars, potions to buy, and bosses to defeat.  In fact, when I started playing I didn't immediately see the math involved.  I think this would really pull kids in and get them started in a fun way.  The app uses quirky characters and voices, which were sometimes hard to understand, but very fun to interact with.  There was often the same text on the screen, so I didn't miss anything.

Once I had played for a short while I started to hear math vocabulary:  point, straight line, open shape.  As I was playing, I was actually practicing the concepts by drawing a straight line or open shape to destroy characters.  The game repeatedly uses the vocabulary word as you create the shape.  What a fabulous way for kids to practice geometry!

Once you complete several levels, you are asked a series of questions in order to move one.  Kids are taking a quiz without even knowing it!

During the game, kids can purchase potions with points earned and retry levels to get more stars.

I could see this app appealing to and helping students in grades 1-5.  It would be a great beginning app for younger students, and could help older students review previously learned concepts.

Want to see more?  Check out this YouTube video:

 

Land of Venn is definitely a new treasure that I will be adding to my repertoire!  

 

Dash and Dot Robots: Turn the Bot Around

 

Turn the Bot Around

Once my 1^st graders were comfortable pairing Dash to the iPad, making Dash go to “sleep”, and adding move forward and backward blocks, I knew it was time for more.

 I decided to have the students focus on turning and not on having Dash move forward or backward for the beginning of this lesson.

Dash facing the back wall.

They placed Dash facing the back wall of my room and coded Dash to turn Left 90.  They were excited to see that Dash was now facing a different wall.  They repeated this process, but had Dash turn Left 180. 

Dash after a Turn Left 90.

I knew this simple lesson was a powerful one when one 1^st grade girl said, “That 180 was two 90 turns put together!”  And another student made the connection to the Teaching Loops with the Beats Project lesson we did earlier this year.  She said, "Dash is turning just like we turned in our dance loop!"

 

I then asked them to make predictions for Left 270 and 360.  It was amazing how quickly they understood where Dash would face at the end of each turn.  Next, we talked about making Dash turn right and do the same movements.

 I was exciting to see lots of light bulbs going off for students.  Left and right in coding can be very hard when a character is 2 Dimensional.  Coding and seeing Dash move in relation to the room really brought the concepts home to students. 

I created a handout for groups to record their findings.  I didn’t use the handout with all of my classes, but it does help to give students in groups of 3-4 different jobs to be accountable for.

Once they were comfortable with turns, I let them have free time to explore all of the blocks we had learned and add in sounds and other fun blocks.

Do you have an angle or coding lesson involving turns that you use often?  I would love to hear about it!

Turn the Bot Around Handout

Webmix Wednesday: Numbers and Patterns

 

Happy Wednesday!  Today's webmixes are all about numbers and place value.  There are links for all grade and skill levels.  

 

 

Count/Pattern #kinderchat by Kinderchat (link for regular Symbaloo users)

Count/Pattern #kinderchat by Kinderchat (link for SymbalooEDU users)

 

Patterns and Place Value by smalnar (link for regular Symbaloo users)

Patterns and Place Value by smalnar (link for SymbalooEDU users)

 

 

Place Value by Melissa Latham (Link for regular Symbaloo users)

Place Value by Melissa Latham (Link for SymbalooEDU users)

 

Do you have a favorite number, counting, pattern, or place value site?  I would love to hear about it!