Many things have been happening at the Boulan Park Media Center since the beginning of the school year! All 6th graders have visited the media center for lessons on how to use the library, how to be safe online, and how to use Google Drive. Students signed a poster pledging to be good digital citizens. Many students have been checking out books from the nonfiction section for their Accelerated Reader quizzes. To help students find these types of books, Mrs. Chatel has created a display of popular nonfiction and biographies. A few teachers have been partnering with Mrs. Chatel to teach their students how to use the iPads. Mrs. Megahan's 7th grade classes used iMovie on the iPads to create wonderful "Pure Boulan" videos. Mrs. Dodge's Communication Arts students used iMovie to make their own soundtracks to a story and iMotion to create stop motion videos. Mrs. Dodge's 8th grade students used the ShowMe App to write, illustrate, and narrate their own stories. All of these innovative lessons could not happen without teachers who continually push themselves to use technology in their classrooms and without the school iPads! Currently, we have 30 iPads for a school of over 700 students. Please vote yes on the TSD bond on November 5 in order to make even more technology resources available to your child! Upcoming Events Book Discussion Club November 7 from 2:35-3:30 pm Meet in the Media Center after school. Scholastic Bookfair December 2-6 All Day Online Bookfair Nov. 27-Dec. 9
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Mornings are a busy time at the Smith Media Center! Students gather to look for books, read, or hang out with friends. Others make use of the computers and printers available to work on class assignments. Many thanks to the parent volunteers who have been busy at work helping to transform the media center layout to make the environment more welcoming and user-friendly. This is what the library looked like at the beginning of the school year... And here is what it looks like now. Check out our new Troybery room! Students have been coming to the media center to learn about the Dewey Decimal System and to check out nonfiction books.
One iPad app that I shared at my BYOD PD session has great potential to be used in any subject area and in any classroom. ShowMe, a screencasting app, allows you to create, narrate, and animate your lessons for students to watch as a video. This video then could be posted on your Edline page, Edmodo, even Google Docs. Here is a sample of a teacher explaining rhyme scheme: You could also have your students create their own videos using this app. They could explain their thinking as they work on a math or science problem, annotate a story and record their thoughts as they read, create a tutorial for a program or process....the possibilities are endless. Check out ShowMe's website to get inspiration. This video done by a student explains the water cycle. If you're wondering how to use ShowMe, watch my tutorial or see me for help. This tutorial was created for English classes working on a storytelling video, but you could still use it to show your classes.
If you missed my session last month on how to use mobile devices and iPads in your classroom, check out my Prezi. And the handout.
The easiest way to start is by using QR codes, which, when scanned, take you directly to a website. Have your students download a scan app on their phones (make sure it's free!) and then whenever you want them to quickly get to a website, they can just scan the code that you have created. No more waiting for kids to type the URL or fixing their typos.... |
Mrs. Christina Chatel, MLISA teacher librarian at Boulan Park and Smith Middle Schools in Troy, Michigan. Archives
October 2017
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