A New Twist on an Old Idea

Mrs. Coole, a Grade 1 teacher, always launches her Reader's Workshop by asking students to bring their favorite book to school.  Students have the opportunity to identify if it is fiction or nonfiction, give a brief retell of the story, and explain why it is their favorite book.

This year, Mrs. Coole wanted their work to be presented in a more engaging way, have more longevity than a pencil and paper version, and to share them with a wider audience (i.e. Parents at Back to School Night).  So, Mrs. Coole used this as a perfect chance to seamlessly integrate technology with the lesson.

First, students planned out their retell and reasoning why the book is their favorite.

Next, the tech teacher, me, delivered a discovery lesson on how to take clear photos and edit photos so they are cropped and rotated.

  

Then, I worked with students on exploring the functionality of the Doodlecast Pro app.  After, the app was used to record their planned 'book talk' with the clear, cropped, and rotated photo they took in the previous lesson.

Finally, Mrs. Coole's IA worked with me to create the QR codes for each student's book talk.

Embedding Digital Citizenship Lessons into G1 Q1 SS Unit

Grade 1 Social Studies committee members have been working with their tech coach to develop an updated Our Community unit in order to embed digital citizenship lessons.  Our Community is a unit that focuses on:

• both 'real-world' and 'online' communities
• student roles and responsibilities within these various communities (classroom, school, neighborhood, online)
• the variety of ways people within communities communicate with each other

Four digital citizenship lessons will be explicitly taught either by the classroom teacher, tech coach, and/or librarian.  Optional follow up lessons are also provided for teachers to reinforce these key concepts and skills.