Category: 3rd Grade

Book Review: K-8 Digital Citizenship Curriculum

Education has changed. No longer is it contained within four classroom walls or the physical site of a school building. Students aren’t confined by the eight hours between the school bell’s chimes or the struggling budget of an underfunded program.

Now, education can be found anywhere, by collaborating with students in Kenya or Skyping with an author in Sweden or chatting with an astrophysicist on the International Space Station. Students can use Google Earth to take a virtual tour of a zoo or a blog to collaborate on a class project. Learning has no temporal or geographic borders, available 24/7 from wherever students and teachers find an internet connection.

This vast landscape of resources is available digitally, freely, and equitably, but before children begin the cerebral trek through the online world, they must learn to do it safely, securely, and responsibly. This conversation used to focus on limiting access to the internet, blocking websites, and layering rules upon rules hoping (vainly) that students would be discouraged from using this infinite and fascinating resource.

It didn’t work.

Best practices now suggest that instead of protecting students, we teach them to be good digital citizens, confident and competent in the use of the internet.

This 70-page text (click for a peek inside) is your guide to what our children must know at what age to thrive in the community called the internet. It’s a roadmap for blending all the pieces into a cohesive, effective student-directed cyber-learning experience that accomplishes ISTE’s general goals to:

- Advocate and practice safe, legal, and responsible use of information and technology

- Exhibit a positive attitude toward using technology that supports collaboration, learning, and productivity
- Demonstrate personal responsibility for lifelong learning
- Exhibit leadership for digital citizenship

(more…)

24 Keyboarding Websites for Summer

Did you promise that this summer, your child would learn to type with more than two fingers, keep his eyes off his hands, and learn to like keyboarding? Your teachers consider that important–Common Core requires

students type between 1-3 pages at a sitting without giving up from boredom, frustration, fatigue. To do that requires a knowledge of where the keys are on the keyb oard and what habits faciliate speedy, accurate typing.

It doesn’t have to be rote drills, drudgery. There are a lot of options that make it fun. Here are 32. I think they’ll find a few they like:

(more…)

Dear Otto: How do I prevent printer pandemonium?

[caption id="attachment_7341" align="alignright" width="176"]

Do you have a tech question?[/caption]

Dear Otto is an occasional column where I answer questions I get from readers about teaching tech. If you have a question, please complete the form below and I’ll answer it here. For your privacy, I use only first names.

Here’s a great question I got from Cheryl in Indiana:

It seems that my well-structured primary tech classrooms fall apart when it is time to print. Some students just keep pushing Print & end up printing multiple copies, 25 students scramble to the printer to collect their printouts. Total chaos! Any ideas?

I have a two-step solution to that:

Teach students how to print. I take lesson time to show them the print box, the varied spots where things can be changed, and how to do it right. After that, I know it’s not lack of knowledge causing problems
I don’t let them go to the printer. First, it gets to be the lab water cooler–everyone hanging out back there, chatting, while they wait for the stuff to print. That’s no good. Second, I’ can’t monitor that everything printed is appropriate if they’re taking papers from the printer. Third, if they print more than one, I want to chat with them about it.
Consistent offenders aren’t allowed to print. I’ll email it to parents/teacher, but they lose the privilege

(more…)

Dear Otto: Any Ideas for Tech Ed Benchmark Assessments?

Here’s a great question I got from Lisa and Tamma:

My district is asking us to create assessments. I was wondering what you have included in them and how/when you administer them. Thanks!

Hi Lisa and Tamma

Keyboarding is always good, but there are some other excellent choices. I have an exercise I run students through called the Problem Solving Board. They teach each other how to solve the 20 most common problems (you can get them from this book or from the tech tips on my blog). Follow up with a quiz to see how much they remember–in groups or from a student-generated web-based problem-solving page.

I also have assessments for Word, Publisher, Excel, and hardware (click links for ideas). Students can take these at the beginning of school and then later in the year to assess improvement. And finally: Here’s a link from The Innovative Educator with some ideas.

(more…)

Great Websites–Stories

Check out our latest addition of great websites–Stories. There are 45 websites for grades K-5, everything from audio to international to write your own. Enjoy!

5 Favorite Websites for K-5

One of the biggest problems I face as a technology teacher is the wealth of information out there for teachers, parents, students. I try to stay on top of it (as you who subscribe to my Weekend Websites know), but there is so much more than I can cover with one-a-week.

So, this week, I’m giving you 5. You will love these. I find myself sharing them with colleagues in answer to their tech ed needs so decided it was time to share them with you also:

BrainPop Game Up

BrainPop offers a great group of games for science, math, social studies, and health–all easy to maneuver, age-appropriate and fun learning. The gamification of education is alive and well at BrainPop

Fly Across America

This is a gorgeous eight-minute tour across America via biplane. It took my classes by storm.

~~Knowmia~~

Filled with Free video tutorials and interactive materials for your students. This is a website and an app with tutorials, over 10,000 lessons, ‘knowledge maps’ for chemistry and biology, even a how-to for creating video lessons.

(more…)

Read Across America Day

Many people in the United States, particularly students, parents and teachers, join forces on Read Across America Day, annually held on March 2. This nationwide observance coincides with the birthday of Dr Seuss.

Here are some great reading websites for students K-5:

(more…)

Now Available: K-8 Digital Citizenship Curriculum

Digital Citizenship Curriculum for K-8 (print or digital)

Why do teachers need to teach Digital Citizenship?

It didn’t work.

Best practices now suggest that instead of protecting students, we teach them to be good digital citizens, confident and competent in the use of the internet.

What’s included in K-8 Digital Citizenship Curriculum?

This 70-page text is your guide to what our children must know at what age to thrive in the community called the internet. It’s a roadmap for blending all the pieces into a cohesive, effective student-directed cyber-learning experience that accomplishes ISTE’s general goals to:

(more…)

How to Thrive as a Digital Citizen

Thanks to the pervasiveness of easy-to-use technology and the accessibility of the internet, teachers are no longer lecturing from a dais as the purveyor of knowledge. Now, students are expected to take ownership of their education, participate actively in the learning process, and transfer knowledge learned in the classroom to their lives.

In days past, technology was used to find information (via the internet) and display it (often via PowerPoint). No longer. Now, if you ask a fifth grade student to write a report on space exploration, here’s how s/he will proceed:

Understand ‘Digital Citizenship’

Before the engines of research can start, every student must understand what it means to be a citizen of the world wide web. Why? Most inquiry includes a foray into the unknown vastness of the www. Students learn early (I start kindergartners with an age-appropriate introduction) how to thrive in that virtual world. It is a pleasant surprise that digital citizenship has much the same rules as their home town:

Don’t talk to bad guys, look both ways before crossing the (virtual) street, don’t go places you know nothing about, play fair, pick carefully who you trust, don’t get distracted by bling, and sometimes stop everything and take a nap.

In internet-speak, students learn to follow good netiquette, not to plagiarize the work of others, avoid scams, stay on the website they choose, not to be a cyber-bully, and avoid the virtual ‘bad guys’. Current best practices are not to hide students from any of these, but to teach them how to manage these experiences.

(more…)

Weekend Website #116: Google Street View Locations

Every Friday, I share a website (or app) that I’ve heard about, checked into, been excited to use. This one covers anything on your mind and uses the quintessentially-popular Google Earth. I know you’re going to enjoy this review.

[caption id="attachment_9802" align="aligncenter" width="614"]