And This Is What It's All About ...

I was having a look at some of my student glogs tonight, and I came across this one that one of my students made. I just had to share it here (right click to see the full screen glog):

This is really what teaching's all about. Hearing that a student loves school and is excited to learn is so important. A special thank you to this student, and all of my students, for reminding me daily why I love what I do!

Aviva

Sharing Our Learning And Trying Something New

Today, my class had the amazing opportunity to learn about Mardis Gras from @plnaugle and her Grade 4 students in New Orleans. Paula's class Skyped with ours, and using a combination of words and visuals, they taught us all about this special celebration.

My students decided to share what they learned by working alone or in partners to create a Common Craft video. Here are various examples of these videos:

Students were excited to try this out, as for the next couple of weeks, they're going to need to make Common Craft videos for Show and Tell.

For a first attempt, I was amazed by what they did: the students were creating, applying, and connecting, and having fun too! Watching what my students did today makes me wonder in what other ways the class can create Common Craft videos to share their learning with others. Have your students created Common Craft videos before? On what topics did they do so?

A special thank you to @plnaugle for inspiring today's activity, and @kathycassidy and @mariak for sharing their students' Common Craft videos (see here and here)! I love learning from all of you!

Aviva

When Technology Doesn't Work

When I got to school this morning, the wireless network was down. Oh no! It's Tuesday, and my students always do a blog post for our Word Wall and Word Family activity. I knew that they would be disappointed.

Sometimes technology doesn't cooperate though. We all needed to be flexible. Instead of doing a blog post, students got to work on their own or with a partner to write a number story. The Grade 1's needed to use a selection of numbers from one to ten, and the Grade 2's needed to use a selection of numbers from one to twenty. We read a bunch of number stories together as a class, and we even wrote one together too. The students could be as creative as they wanted to be though!

They really wanted to still share their work with an audience, so I decided to take photographs of their stories and share them here in a Slideshare Presentation. I will never win any photography awards,:) but hopefully you can still read their work, and enjoy their number stories too!

My class would love to hear some of your number stories and number sentences as well. Please feel free to add a comment with your own. Thanks for your help with this special activity!

Our number stories

View more presentations from adunsiger.

Talking About Math

I love to get video footage during classroom activities. It's great to hear what students have to say, and I really enjoy listening to them explaining their learning. During math centres today, I took short video clips of three students explaining "symmetry."

How would your child define symmetry? What objects can you think of that are symmetrical? Please help us learn together!

Miss Dunsiger and Her Grade 1/2 Class

Blogging: A Student Voice

Tonight I uploaded a video that I took of a Grade 2 student explaining blogging. He was completing a blog post during math centres today, and when I asked him what he was doing, he shared his blog post with me, and also explained what he was going to continue to write about.

After uploading the video, I tweeted out the link, and within minutes, I received mentions from @langwitches and @_zebrastripes:

I love what they had to say here. We really do need to hear from more students about their definition of blogging. This student does make blogging sound so easy, as blogging is a regular part of his classroom routine. He's excited to blog, and he sees the power of sharing his thoughts online.

Let's see if we can get some more students sharing their thoughts on blogging. What would your child say about blogging? I can't wait to hear!

Aviva

Explaining Symmetry

During math centres today, I went around and talked to the students about what they were doing and what they learned. Below is a video clip of a child explaining her symmetrical picture. I like hearing her explanation of symmetry.

What do you know that is symmetrical? What does it mean for an object to be symmetrical? My class would love to hear your thoughts!

Aviva

100th Day Lino It Wall: 100 Things We Know

We didn't quite make it to 100 posts on this wall, but with your help, we might. Please feel free to add a sticky note of "something you know."

Let's see just how many different things we know!

Aviva