Differentiated Non-Fiction Reading

Did you know???

There is a great, free resource for informational reading on current events at Newsela.  Newsela is an innovative way for students to build reading comprehension with nonfiction that's always relevant: daily news. Newsela builds close reading and critical thinking skills. Give your students a new way to climb the staircase of nonfiction reading comprehension, from third grade to college-ready. Newsela automatically gives each student the version of an article that's just right for his or her reading ability, and an easier or harder version of each article is just a click away. Articles are accompanied by Common Core-aligned quizzes to provide quick and powerful feedback. You'll always know whether your students are on track and where they're falling short.

I am SO excited about this site.  I love that you can choose the same article, but get multiple versions of it to meet the individual needs of your students.  What a great tool for differentiation!

If you need help with this or any other media/technology, please let me know!

Read to Succeed!

Did you know???

Read to Succeed is an exciting program that encourages students in grades K through 6 to read for fun. Students who complete six hours of recreational reading earn a free ticket to Six Flags! The program is available to teachers and schools at no cost to participate, and it's a great way to motivate kids to read. The program deadline is March 3, 2014 at 5pm CST.

Registration is now available for the Six Flags Read to Succeed program.  Here is the website:

Read to Succeed Website

There are two parts to the program, the handwritten part and the online part. Both need to be completed to earn tickets.

1. The Student Reading Logs are handwritten by the students/parents as they log their minutes from reading. Students need to turn the logs into their teacher. Starting this year, teachers will NOT have to mail the Student Reading Logs in. However, we do ask that teachers save the completed Student Reading Logs for future reference. We may also conduct periodic reviews of Student Reading Logs, so please keep the Student Reading Logs in your files.

2. Educators will need to register online if they did not participate last year. Once you are registered, you will have an online account. You will need to enter your students’ names and total hours they have read in your online account.

Things to note:

• This is an optional program.  If you registered last year, you do not need to set up a new account. 
• Students can start logging their reading right away, so sign up as soon as you can.
• Once you register, you can download the reading log to copy for students.  (Linking the log to your website might also be helpful!) 

Reading Log

Parent Letter

• If you register at least 1 student and log their reading hours, you will receive one free teacher ticket to Six Flags.
• The deadline for entering your students' reading hours is March 3, 2014.  Any entries made after this deadline will NOT get their free Six Flags ticket.
• Students must complete 6 hours of recreational, NON-SCHOOL-RELATED reading.

Let me know if you have any questions or need help setting up your account.

Flocabulary!

Did you know???

Flocabulary is an online library of songs, videos and activities for grades K-12.

There's a Flocab for that.
Whether you're teaching elementary math or high school English, Flocabulary has hundreds of songs and videos to engage your students and bring your lessons to life.

Tackle the Common Core.
Flocabulary songs, videos and exercises will help you meet Common Core objectives in ELA and math. Their engaging material for social studies and science supports interdisciplinary literacy practice.

Customize your experience.
Flocabulary videos are designed to fit into your curriculum wherever you need them. With the digital subscription, all you have to do is log in and press play. Use the videos and lessons flexibly for introduction, enrichment, differentiated instruction and test prep. Then save videos to your favorites for easy access during class.

Flocabulary has some videos that are free. These free videos change periodically.  There is also a free 14 day trial.

If you would like help with this or any other media/technology tool, please let me know!

Virtual Board with Sticky Notes

Did You Know???

The same tool Leela is using on our staff website can also be used in the classroom with your students? Padlet (www.padlet.com) is a virtual board with sticky notes that can be easily moved, shared, and embedded. There are several views, including something that looks more like a scrollable blog, and it’s easy to personalize the experience and organize notes. The privacy and moderation settings make it easy for students to become members of a board where a teacher can post resources and encourage them to do the same. It’s a great way to quickly share resources with your kids and moderate what they post.  It's also a useful tool for activating prior knowledge, checking for understanding, and providing collaborative opportunities for students.

Check out this link to see a few examples of how a teacher is using Padlet in her elementary classroom:

http://www.techitikes.com/2013/06/sharing-information-with-padlet.html

Multimedia Reading Resource

Did You Know???

GCPS has added a resource to the Online Research Library called TeachingBooks.net.  I briefly introduced the parapros to this resource during our recent professional learning session, and I hope to use some upcoming PL time to work with our teachers using TeachingBooks.  In the meantime, here is some information about what this database has to offer.

TeachingBooks.net is an easy-to-use website that adds a multimedia dimension to the reading experiences of children's and young adult books. The online database is developed and maintained to include thousands of resources about fiction and nonfiction books used in the K–12 environment, with every resource selected to encourage the integration of multimedia author and book materials into reading and library activities.

Author resources include:
Meet the Author movies
Written interviews
Guest blog posts
Audio name pronunciations
Author interview

Book Resources include:
Book Apps
Book guides and lesson plans
Book readings
Book trailers
Book websites
Movie and TV adaptation websites

TeachingBooks.net can be found in the Online Research Library under Professional Resources.

Creating Lessons Around YouTube Videos

Did you know???

There is a cool tool called TED-Ed (http://ed.ted.com/lessons) that allows teachers to create and share lessons built around YouTube videos.  Within the growing TED-Ed video library, you will find carefully curated educational videos, many of which represent collaborations between talented educators and animators nominated through the TED-Ed platform. This platform also allows users to take any useful educational video, not just TED's, and easily create a customized lesson around the video. The lesson creator allows users to:

1) FIND video content through an integrated search panel
2) SELECT a video or lesson to be customized
3) FLIP a video by adding questions, notes, and content.

The TEDEd library is continually growing and is searchable and browsable by series and subject. Tip: The best lessons are curated by volunteer teachers and TEDEd and compiled under the Best Flips tab. If you're looking for teaching inspiration, look no further!

On a Quest for a Great WebQuest?

Did you know???

There is a free database that contains thousands of WebQuests on a variety of topics.  A WebQuest is an inquiry-oriented lesson format in which most or all the information that learners work with comes from the web.  Visit www.zunal.com to access already created WebQuests or to create your own.  Free features include:

· Choose from 100 Templates
· Add Unlimited Files and Pictures
· Embed Videos from YouTube or other video websites.
· Embed Voki Presentations
· Embed Glogster Presentations
· Add Unlimited Pages
· Add Table / Rubric
· Create a Quiz
· Create an FAQ Page
· Add a Photo Gallery
· Google Map Activity
· Add a WebQuest Game: Hangman
· Add Pre-Test & Post-Test

Check out http://zunal.com/webquest.php?w=4 to see an interesting WebQuest example on The Five Senses.

Love That Book!

Did you know???

GCPS offers some wonderful programming that you can use to enhance teaching and learning in your classroom.  One such program is called, "Love That Book!"  In this program, storyteller and author Carmen Deedy brings books to life on location.  Carmen tells viewers about her favorite books while she visits sites related to the theme of the stories.  For example, in a recent episode entitled, "Carmen at the Library," the author discusses Bats at the Library by Brian Lies, The Library by Sarah Stewart, and Library Mouse by Daniel Kirk.  She also visits and shares information about her public library.  There are several episodes of "Love That Book" available online at http://gwinnett.k12.ga.us/lovethatbook.  Check it out!

How Can We Reduce Garbage?

Did you know???

Garbology (http://www.naturebridge.org/garbology.php) is an exciting and interactive website that answers the question, "Where should my waste go?" It helps elementary-age students better understand how they can reduce trash and stop polluting. In addition to the interactive game, the “For Teachers” section includes nine lesson plans and five fact sheets.  The “For Students” section includes a waste assessment and seven useful handouts. The “For Families” section will inspire families to reduce and recycle.  You'll find lessons and activities to extend your Garbology experience, from how to pack a waste-less lunch to getting the dirt on composting. Plus, read the Trash Talk blog for stories of Garbology in practice.

Looking for High Interest Informational Text?

Did you know??? 

There is a child-centered website called Youngzine (http://www.youngzine.org/) that provides informational articles, images, and videos about world news, science and technology, society and arts, movies, and books. School-age children are encouraged to respond to the content and may submit articles, short stories, and book reviews. All content is reviewed by Youngzine’s editors and updated every two weeks. The site is geared toward students in grades K-8.

 Tip: Do you and your students discuss current events? Use Youngzine as a springboard for these weekly or daily discussions. Students can post comments and reflections in the comments section.

Dress Up Your Lessons in a Tagxedo!

Did you know???

There are some great, free word cloud Web 2.0 tools available online to enhance teaching and learning in your classroom!  My favorite at the moment is www.Tagxedo.com. Tagxedo turns words -- famous speeches, news articles, student generated lists, slogans and themes -- into a visually stunning word cloud with words individually sized appropriately to highlight the frequencies of occurrence within the body of text. What I love the most about this tool is that the user gets to choose the shape of the word cloud.

I have been using Tagxedo with all of my classes this year as a brainstorming tool.  For example, in third grade, we are doing a research project on Georgia habitats.  To kick off the unit, we brainstormed words related to Georgia habitats and created the following Tagxedo:

To use Tagxedo, the user simply clicks on create, chooses a shape, and types or copies text into the text box by clicking the load button.  Click submit, and watch the magic happen!  You can then play with font, color, and other style features to make your Tagxedo exactly what you want.

Other possible uses of Tagxedo or other word cloud tools include:

•  Brainstorm a topic or create a discussion either inside the  class or online                       
•  Teach vocabulary                                                                                               
•  Use them in reading activities to promote comprehension                                                                    
•  Students can use them to feature important ideas from a  discussion or a video content                                     
•  The entire class can use word clouds to react to a certain topic                                                           
•  Have students create word clouds that generate understanding of a concept, standards or vocabulary word.         
•  Illustrate classroom thoughts or views using a word cloud to survey students.                                              
•  Create a class word cloud that highlights class expectation                                                                

Innovative Civics Resource

Did you know???


There is a valuable website available to help you teach your Civics AKS.
www.iCivics.org was founded by Justice Sandra Day O'Connor to prepare young
Americans to become knowledgeable, engaged 21st century citizens by
creating free and innovative educational materials.  The site offers the
nation’s most comprehensive, standards-aligned civics curriculum that is
available freely on the Web.  Order in the court. Hail to the chief! Roll
call…yea or nay… iCivics is a game, activity, and resource filled website
that helps people of all ages learn about branches of government,
citizenship, separation of powers, media influences on government, the
budget, and the Constitution and Bill of Rights. Games can be accessed by
topic or playing time. In addition to games and webquests, iCivics provides
lesson plans with supporting resources for teachers. Check it out!

Did you know???

There are so many Web 2.0 tools that will encourage your students to
research and write by giving them a creative way to share this writing.
The most recent tool I have discovered is called Blabberize.  On this site
(www.blabberize.com), you can upload a photograph to the site, add a mouth
to the picture, and record text so that the picture moves its mouth to the
words.  It's hard to describe, so take a look at these two samples:

http://blabberize.com/view/id/1049

http://blabberize.com/view/id/1001146

Can you imagine a student sharing their animal research by having a picture
of their animal share facts about itself?  Can you imagine a student
sharing their famous American facts by having a photograph of the famous
person telling information about him or herself?  The possibilities are
endless!

Measuring Readability of Online Texts

Did you know??? 

There is an amazing tool available to you when trying to determine the readability of digital text. Read-able.com (http://www.read-able.com/) is a website where you can input the url for the text you would like to use with your students. Click "Calculate Readability" and a grade level readability score and suggested ages will appear for the text. If you scroll down a bit further, you can see the scores on various indices such as Flesch Kincaid, Gunning Fog, etc. You will also get statistics such as sentence count, number of words, number of complex words, etc. Finally, you get an explanation of the various indices used to score the text.

For example, I put in a Scholastic News article I found online. I entered http://www.scholastic.com/browse/article.jsp?id=3758216.  Following are my results:

Readability Test Results
Web Address: scholastic.com/browse/article.jsp?id=3758216
This page has an average grade level of about 7.
It should be easily understood by 12 to 13 year olds.

Readability Indices
Flesch Kincaid Reading Ease 75.3
Flesch Kincaid Grade Level 5.2
Gunning Fog Score 7
SMOG Index 6.5
Coleman Liau Index 10.9
Automated Readability Index 4.9

Text Statistics
No. of sentences 80
No. of words 733
No. of complex words 87
Percent of complex words 11.87%
Average words per sentence 9.80
Average syllables per word 1.43

Encourage Your Students to Burst Out Their Stories!

Did you know??? 

There are numerous free web tools to help encourage and inspire writing in your students! One such tool is ZooBurst (http://www.zooburst.com/). ZooBurst is a digital storytelling tool that lets anyone easily create his or her own 3D pop-up books. Using ZooBurst, storytellers of any age can create their own rich worlds in which their stories can come to life. Authors can arrange characters and props within a 3D world that can be customized using uploaded artwork or items found in a built-in database of over 10,000 free images and materials. Students can add speech bubbles, titles, and text to their pages. ZooBurst authors can share books with readers using a simple hyperlink, and books can easily be embedded in any website. As an educational tool, ZooBurst provides students with new ways in which they can tell stories, deliver presentations, write reports and express complex ideas. ZooBurst contains a powerful “classroom management” feature for teachers that lets them easily set up protected, safe spaces for their students. Teachers can assign usernames and passwords to their students without having to input any sensitive or personal information and can manage and moderate student work in a protected environment.

The best way to learn more about ZooBurst is to give it a try! I did! Check out this link! http://www.zooburst.com/book/zb02_51fc58817659b

Let me know if I can help you in any way!

Welcome!

Welcome to the Simpson Monday Media Minute Blog! My goal with this blog is to provide resources and teaching tools that will help enhance teaching and learning for teachers and students at Simpson! Teachers, each week I will continue to email you a Monday Media Minute. I will then post the Media Minute on this blog. You will no longer need to try to keep up with the resources and tools described in the emails, they will be right here on my blog in a searchable format! Simply type your search term in the box found in the upper left corner of the blog to find the resource for which you are looking. As always, please let me know how the media center can better help you meet your teaching and learning needs!