Pre-K

Pre-K students LOVE coming to the computer lab. For the next few weeks we will be learning how to properly handle a mouse and how to turn off and on the CAPS LOCK key. Students enjoy finding the letters of their name on the keyboard. It won't be long before we have some projects to showcase where students will have changed background colors and text colors. You can best help your child at home by helping him/her type his/her name on the computer. Letter recognition is a critical literacy skill that Pre-K students are working on.

Kindergarten

It is absolutley amazing to me to watch the growth of new students at Gibbs. The Kindergarten students will begin learning how to turn CAPS LOCK off and on. Students will type their names wit CAPS LOCK on and a second time with CAPS LOCK off. You can help your child at home by allowing him/her to type his/her name which will enhance letter recogntion skills. For students who have already mastered letter recognition, try giving them a flash cards with pictures and labels to type. Students in Ms. Robbins' class, the nation of Australia, may be intersted in a link about Australia from the National Geographic Kids website. The blog includes pictures and facts about Australian animals and other native aspects. http://kidsblogs.nationalgeographic.com/handsonexplorer

1st Grade

I am eager to see what skills our students have retained from last year. First grade students will begin technology classes with some refresher work. Students will be reminded how to type upper and lower case letters with both the CAPS LOCK key and with the Shift key. They will select their names this week and change the color. Want to help at home? Try letting your child change each letter of his/her name to a different color. The skills will come back very quickly.

2nd and 3rd Grades

Today, 2nd grade students in Mrs. White's classroom visited a web site and used a rubric to rate its effectiveness. They judged the kid-friendly site on graphics, time it took to load the games, and if it looked "fun". One student rated his site poorly because it took too long for his game to load. They're learning excellent, authentic vocabulary!

4th Grade

I am so excited for Mrs. Johnson's class...they will be the first to publish their writings in a class web log (blog) where they can leave comments to one another through their class blog. It's empty now, but it won't be for long. You can check it out by following this link: http://4thjohnson.21classes.com/.

Fourth graders are also gearing up to create mystery "movies" using PhotoStory3, a free software through http://microsoft.com/. The students will learn to save pictures into a designated folder and then upload them into their presentations with creepy music. They will also narrate their stories and present them for everyone to "see" their writings. Here is an example from a previous fourth grader, Thomas H.

5th Grade

The fifth grade students have been studying data collection in their classrooms this first nine weeks. In the comptuer lab, they have learned to generate graphs and charts with data they collected for math class. Our ACTAAP scores showed that we had some weaknesses in analyzing graphed data so I see a need for us to hit that topic hard in the computer lab where they can learn both the math content skills as well as the technology skills. You can help at home by talking about graphs that you may see in magazines or newspapers. Point out, in particular, when you see a graph key. Our students often overlook and, in turn, misinterpret graphs when they view graphs where a picture indicates something other than "1".