Live Video Feed with Jarrett Krosoczka

Another fabulous opportunity for my students discovered on Twitter...

Last night I noticed a tweet about a live opportunity Jarrett Krosoczka was offering for students today.

 I immediately emailed my teachers about it.  As usual, most were skeptical, but my two go-getter, willing to try anything, 4th grade teachers jumped at the 11:00 opportunity.   They even asked questions during the feed and Jarrett answered them!  

Wanting to get more teachers on board, I asked these two to reply to my email about how cool it was (sneaky, I know, but hey, it worked!)  and I brought it up with them in the teacher's lounge at lunch since he was doing another one at 1:00 our time.  

Once they heard how easy and fabulous it was, the rest of the teachers were all on board.  During the feed, Jarrett introduces his Platypus Police Squad books and how he draws the characters.  Some of my kinder students were even drawing along!  

 

He also showed how he changes characters facial expressions by drawing different lines around the eyes.  Here is a 2nd grader practicing.

What a super way to connect with kids and get kids excited about reading.  With summer coming up, I know what books my students are going to be looking for at the library.  

 

Here are some actual quotes from some 5th graders about the experience.  

"We are learning about his books online without him actually being here"

"We loved that it was interactive"

"Not only did he talk about his books, but he showed us how he illustrated them too"

"He gave us a sneak peak of his next book"

"We got to look at a live screen at a famous author that students across the country were able to see at the same time"

Thanks Mr. Krosoczka for a fabulous 20 min that our students will remember!  

Technology Tuesday: 30 Hands

Have you heard of the 30 Hands App?

 I hadn't until last Monday at our Elementary Library meeting and boy have I been missing out.  It is an app similar to Educreations or ShowMe in the fact that you can upload pictures and then record. You can also write or add shapes to the pictures (haven't played with that very much).  But what I love about it is that each slide is its own recoding.  If you mess up, you don't have to start back at the beginning like some of the others.  That feature alone makes it a great tool for the younger kids but even better than that it is really easy to use.

Today, I used it with 1st graders for seqencing the story Bark George by Jules Feiffer

If you haven't read this book, you must!  It is a great story for sequencing, but is so silly. Kids of all ages love it (I sometimes even catch the teachers giggling).  Anyway, normally I have them sequence the story on paper, but after hearing about this app I knew I must try it.

I started off ahead of time by taking some pictures from the book with my iPad and then had to figure out how to get the pictures to all my student ipads.  I was going back and forth between Chirp and Dropbox and since I hadn't used Chirp before decided to go with Dropbox (probably a little more time consuming, but at least I knew what I was doing).  So I uploaded the pictures into Dropbox and then had to download them into the camera roll of the 11 ipads I was going to use.  (I decided to have the students work with partners)  I am sure there is an easier way to do this and would love to hear any suggestions in the comments below.  

Then when the class came in, I read them the story and we talked about the meaning of sequencing. They got their iPads and I walked them through getting the pictures into 30 Hands.  I made sure that the pictures were not in order on the camera roll so they were also out of order when dropped into 30 Hands.  

I showed them how to rearrange the pictures and record and then off they went...  They had to talk to their partner about the order of the pictures, move them and then record their retelling of the story.  

Here are 2 examples from our class today.  I love how one is short and to the point and the other is a little more wordy.  We have not spent much time recording in first grade, so there are some pauses, hesitations and talking between the partners, but over all I was pleased with all of the kids' work.  

Have you used 30 Hands before?  What apps do you like for retelling?

Technology Tuesday: We are Illustrators

In kinder we have been talking about authors and illustrators for a few weeks now.  Last week, we read the book It's a Tiger by David LaRochelle.  

The students love calling out "It's a Tiger!" whenever the boy sees something that doesn't belong.  I love the illustrations in this book and after checking out Jeremy Tankard's website and how he uses ink and digital media to create his illustrations, I found the perfect app to try and replicate his technique.  So after we read the book last week and talked about the illustrations, I told the students that we were going to be illustrators like Jeremy Tankard but it was going to be a two-week process.  First we had to draw a tiger in our Library Journals (read more about my kinder journals here).  I found a step-by step guide to drawing a tiger and then using my airliner slate, I drew on the screnn while the students followed along.  Now, remember these are kindergartners so there was a wide range of tigers 

but as long as they tried, we were OK with what they drew.  

So this week, we reviewed how Jeremy Tankard illustrates and then they found their tiger drawing in the journal.  We then opened the Crayola Lights, Camera, Color  app.  

I was projecting my iPad onto the screen, so the students followed along as we started a new picture and then took a picture of our tiger.  The classroom teacher and I went around and helped the kids who needed help holding the iPad and taking the picture.  Then the app has a "vacuum" tool that sucks the color out of the picture and leaves an outline (our pictures didn't have any color on them but you have to do this step to go on).

Then the fun begins.  After you click the orange arrow and get past the stickers, a marker wheel appears at the bottom of the screen.  Students choose a color and with their finger color their illustration.  

Again, there was a wide variety of coloring, but I was going the experience ;)

All in all, I was please with the lesson and using the iPads with kinders this early in the school year.  And they loved being illustrators!

Technology Tuesday: Doodle Buddy App

Our teachers received 3 iPads for classroom use this year and since some teachers are still unsure about how to use them instructionally, I  like to try to model different apps with the 20 that I have in the library when classes come in for a lesson.  I have author, Aaron Reynolds, visiting in January so I decided to introduce my 2nd graders to some of his books and the Doodle Buddy app at the same time.

I started by reading two of his books, Creepy Carrots and Carnivores to the class. Then I told them to think about the characters, problem/solution and setting of one of the books.  I sent them to the tables and with very minimal directions - basically just how to start a text box and the drawing tools - I told them they had to write a sentence about one of the books and then illustrate.  It always amazes me what they can discover on their own just by using the app.  Here are a few of the pictures the 2nd graders made.  

I love that without me telling them, they figured out how to use the glitter paint, the speech bubbles and the google-eyes.  I want the teachers to see that it is OK if they are not 100% sure what an app does, the kids will figure out way cooler things that we ever could.  

After the students finished their Aaron Reynolds picture, I let them have a few minutes to explore and draw whatever they wanted.  During this time, one of the students had figured out how to add backgrounds and found a "snow globe" background.  The teacher happened to see this and said, "Oh wow! We could use the snow globe for a writing prompt when we come back from winter break at stations!"  -  Now that's what I am talking about!  It never would have occurred to this particular teacher to use Doodle Buddy at a station during their language arts time if I hadn't introduced her students to the app in the library and if they hadn't had time to be creative on their own and find the snow globe background.  MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!

How have you used Doodle Buddy in the library?  Have you had successes making your teachers comfortable with a new piece of technology so they will use it in the classroom?

3 for Thursday: Thanksgiving Picture Books

 Turkey Bowl by Phil Bildner - Everyone likes a little football with their turkey.

 'Twas the Night Before Thanksgiving by Dav Pilkey - field trips, turkeys and rhyming words make for a great Thanksgiving story.

Turkey Trouble by Wendi Silvano - Turkey donning costumes to keep from being Thanksgiving dinner. 

Why, Oh Why Can't They Remember

Every year I teach 1st and 2nd graders how the Everybody section is organized and every year my 3rd, 4th and 5th graders act like they have never heard that the Everybody (and Fiction) sections are organized in alphabetical order by the first three letters of the author's last name.  I have two different activities for 1st and 2nd grade and in both lessons, they can find an Everybody call number that I give them.

In first grade, we read the book Elsworth's Electrical Ears, a cute alphabetical book of alliterations.  While we are reading I ask if they notice anything about the book and someone always comes up with that it is in ABC order.  After the book, I ask them if they notice anything about the Everybody section and someone always notices that the wooden letters I have attached to the shelves are in ABC order.  Then I talk about how the library is like a little city and we have different neighborhoods and if a friend asked you to come over and play, what would your mom need to know to get you to the house?  They say the address. Then I explain to them that each book in the library has an address or call number that tells us where the book "lives" in the library.  When an author write a picture book, then it lives in the Everybody "neighborhood" on the "street" of the first letter of the last name.  I tell them that if I wrote a book, my book would live on "R" street at the address "ROM" and I go stand at the Rs.  I ask them to think about their last name and to go sit in front of the shelf where their book would live if they wrote one.  Then I say the whole alphabet and tell them to stand up when I say their letter so they can see all the way around the shelves A-Z.  Then I give each partner group an index card with an address on it like E PAT, E MUN, etc. and tell them to find that address and raise their hand when they do.  I give them about 3-4 different cards depending on the time.  And low and behold, they are mostly successful.

In second grade I start with the story Alpha-Betti.  A story about a girl who finds out that it is easier to find things when they are organized in alphabetical order.  I remind them about the lesson we did in first grade and how the Everybody neighborhood is organized by the author's last name.  We then go to the tables and play a game called "Sticks and Stones" that I got from the book Stretch Library Lessons.

In this activity, they have stones with letters on them and sticks with author's names.  They have to arrange the stones in order first and then the sticks and if their are two names that have the same letters, they have to look at the second and third etc.  When they are all finished, I give each person a stick that has a call number on it, similar to the index cards from 1st grade, except this time they are working alone and I tell them we are going to see how many they can find in a certain amount of time.  When they find the first one, they raise their hand and the teacher and I go around, check that they found the right spot and give them a new stick.  

They think it is SO fun to find books this way and love to see how many they can find in the given amount of time.  Afterwards, we gather back together and I tell them that they are becoming better library users and can now start finding books on their own.  If they ask me where a "No David" book is and I tell them SHA, they should be able to go there and find the books.  Then I make them raise their right hand and repeat after me..."I am a library user.  I know the Everybody books are organized in alphabetical order by the author's last name.  I can find books in the Everybody section by myself.  I will NOT forget how to do this when I am in third grade"(that's when they giggle).  I tell them that something must happen to the brains of 2nd graders over the summer because every year I teach this same lesson and every year the second graders know how to do it and every year, the third graders look at me like I am crazy when I tell them to find something.  They assure me that this will not happen to them and they WILL remember.  They are so excited about this and for the rest of 2nd grade, they quiz me about where different favorite books are and I love to see how proud they are when they find them.  Then they become 3rd graders... and look at me like I am crazy... but this year I have proof... I have pictures! 

Veteran's Day

Just a quick "Thank You" to all our veteran's and families of veteran's and active duty military who serve for our freedom.  I realized that I have quite a few nonfiction books about Veteran's Day in my library collection, but besides Eve Bunting's The Wall, I didn't have any other picture books about today.  If you know of any picture books for elementary students that address veterans, Veteran's Day or maybe even military in general, please leave the titles in the comments.