Week of Dec 3

This week was a crazy week, friends! We didn't have school Monday because of professional learning, and then Tuesday we got a surprise snow day because of some freezing rain! Then, Wednesday and Thursday we had the 1st & 2nd grade music concert practices, so several classes didn't make it to library this week. But, we made the most of the time we did get.

Preschoolers in Mrs. Meade's class listened to Do You See a Shape? by Donna Herweck Rice. Then, they had the Ozobots follow different shape patterns and watched the lights change colors. I also showed them how to make the robots go faster and slower.

I had promised AK students last week that they could use robots, since we read Boy + Bot last week but ran out of time to play. So we got out the Code-a-pillars this week and had so much fun! I love watching kids' reactions to robots for the first time. I wish I could have gotten them all on camera, but I did catch this one! Needless to say, we had a great time!

 

Kindergarten students played with the Code-a-pillars again this week after listening to When Edgar Met Cecil by Kevin Luthardt. Next week we'll move on to Ozobots or Blue Bots.

 Two first grade classes and Mr. Schneider's second graders (they were the only 1/2 grade kids who had library) listened to Gingerbread Man Loose in the School by Laura Murray. Then, they either used Blue Bots to guide the robot through the story or they used Ozobots dressed up like gingerbread men and drew a story map with main events for the robot to drive through.

Third graders started with Ozobots, learning what codes were represented by  different color combinations. Next week, we'll start a puzzle where kids have to fill in missing codes to get the robot to where he goes.

Fourth grade worked on their bibliography slides during library. We cited CultureGrams, our online information resource, as well as the books they've been using during art class to make the posters that accompany their research. Our states museum is coming up soon!

 

Happy Coding Month!

December 3-9 is officially Computer Science Education Week. However, we usually decide to take the whole month between Thanksgiving break to winter break to celebrate coding. We started off last week and had a blast already!

Preschool students listened to Beep, Beep Robot which is a book about how gears spin. After reading, the kids played with gears of their own. They thought it was cool to see how they all turned when they were touching each other.

AK & kindergarten students listened to Boy + Boy by Ame Dyckman. Since AK has such a short time with me, they didn't get to play with robots this week, but I promised they would next week. The kindergarteners played with our Code-a-pillars, experimenting with how to put the pieces together to make a code. 

First graders listened to Clink by Kelly DiPucchio and then they played with Code-a-pillars, also!

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Second graders listened to Oh No, Or How My Science Fair Project Destroyed the World by Mac Barnett. These kids have seen our Ozobots before, but all they really knew was that they follow lines. I drew out several codes for them to test out with the robots. Their goal was to determine what each code made the robot do. Next week, I'm going to give them a puzzle to solve using the codes that have a function. The kids were pretty amazed at this new aspect!

  

Third graders finished up Global Read Aloud 2018 by listening to the end of A Boy Called Bat. We also received our letters from our penpals near Chicago. It was fun to see how excited the kids were about getting the notes! 

Fourth graders are continuing to research a state for our upcoming states museum. They are making lots of progress finding information! Next, we're going to work on finding images and citing sources.