What's New and What's Coming Up

We are blessed in our media center to have added quite a lot of new technology pieces within the last year. The PTF generously provided funding for six new DVD units to allow our emerging readers to read and hear their favorite stories at the same time. These units are available for check out by teachers for short term or long term use. In addition, we have added 10 netbooks to bring our computer total to 16 in the media center. These were added through our book fair profits. The netbooks are allowing us to explore a lot of cutting edge technology such as wiki-spaces, glogster, and blogspot in our media classes. I would encourage teachers to check out these sites; they are simple tools that will really enhance your teaching. Find them at: www.wikispaces.com; www.glogster.com; and www.blogspot.com. Both 7th and 8th graders are in the beginning stages of projects on glogster; when they are finished, I will be posting samples.

Look for information coming soon about our spring book fair; the book fair will run from April 20-22 and will include a special family night. The picture above is from our fall literacy night.

2nd Graders Enjoy Asian Art

Today, we finished our special studies to align with the 2nd grade unit on the Chinese New Year. 2nd graders have spent library time hearing stories from Asia, exploring web sites about China, and creating hong bao for their Chinese New Year coins. We concluded today with a visit from Mrs. Green and one of her friends from Japan. Our guests helped second graders create origami birds to align with the story "The Origami Master." See photos above of the exciting learning experience.

New Projects in the Works

We are busy in the media center with several new research and technology projects. First of all, 3rd graders are finishing up a research unit on U.S. regions. Currently, they are placing the information they have researched into a newspaper format. These should be complete within a couple of weeks.

4th graders have been busy with digital storybook projects. They have created their own stories with themselves as the main characters. The illustrations are still shots of them that will align with the story. A couple of great pics are show above.

8th graders have been busy meshing critical thinking skills and deepening their Biblical worldview by doing comparison and contrast research of the major world religions. From the questions that they have raised, I have no doubt that this has been an amazing learning experience. I appreciate all Miss Rudolph's effort in setting up this project. It is quite amazing for me to work alongside someone that I previously taught. Makes me know it is all worth it.

4th Grade Parodies

4th graders had a great time studying, reading, and writing their own parodies. In addition, I created a wiki-space to showcase the best ones. Go to
http://4thparodies.wikispaces.com/ to hear them. Enjoy! Shelly

Holocaust Study/Project

Recently, the 6th grade has been studying the Holocaust. This cross-curricular project spans the literature/language/computer/and library classes. As a part of the wrap up, students studied an individual child of the Holocaust and created a memorial butterfly for the child. This project was used in conjunction with the poem "I Never Saw Another Butterfly" written by Pavel Friedman while he was interned in one of the concentration camps established specifically for children. The butterflies will be sent to the National Holocaust Museum in Houston as a part of their effort to collect 1.5 million handmade butterflies in memory of the 1.5 million children who died during the Holocaust. See more information about this global project at: http://www.hmh.org/ed_butterfly1.shtml

New Technology Items for Emerging Readers

Thanks to the PTF, we have received several new mini-DVD players to be used along with the Treasury of Storybook Classics. The DVD players will be available after Christmas to teachers in grades Kindergarten and 1st. In addition, players were purchased for our sister campuses. We have also been blessed with new CD and cassette players for each campus library to be used with audio books. Thank you, PTF

New Fun Tech Resource

I have found a new online resource that is both free and fun. It is called glogster.com. It allows students to create online projects that include text, pictures, video, and audio. It reminds me of e-scrapping booking meets blogs. Check it out at www.glogster.com. Click on the edu tab for a free subscription and up to 200 free student subscriptions. Miss Rudolph and I plan to use it in the spring for Great Depression projects. When the projects are complete, I will let you know. Shelly