While today was not our first Skype in Education meet-up with another class, it was our first official Mystery Skype. This educational game was designed by teachers to encourage kids to learn about the world by trying to guess where the other class is located. This is not as easy as it sounds and requires a good deal of thinking and geographic reference material. We met up with a great class from Connecticut! They were sharp and looked for clues on our clothes--one of our students was wearing an Atlanta sweatshirt and that might have been a clue b/c they guessed GA pretty quickly! Our students feel that they should have used the larger map that was put on the wall by Dalila because they missed the fact that CT was just off the border of one of the important clues, and therefore it was not considered as a possibility by the students!

There are a few great videos encouraging students to learn coding but this is my favorite one! It's fun and inspiring! Today, we kicked off the hour of code with a message from President Obama. Kindergarten did a little bit of coding but the the site went down due to high usage! A first grade class came to learn some coding from a 3rd grade class and the code.org site was back up for a little while but then went down so we will do the same activity again next week! Nevertheless, a good time was had by all!

Thanks to my invitation to participate in the Discovery Education Summer Institute (DENSI2014) I met awesome #DEN STARS with big imaginations! While we are on the bus touring around Nashville, the idea for the Agents of Change Global Musical Collaboration project was born. This project is still evolving but the one certain thing is that all100 participating schools are learning the same song, Agents of Change. Mr Arrington has graciously agreed to teach the song to his students but based on his scheduling, this has project is focused on the 4th grade students and they will be performing on video as part of the final production that will be created by the project coordinator and help from the music production industry. Stay tuned for updates! Below is a #DEN STAR showing everyone the timing for the song. This will help schools that are not lucky enough to have a music teacher. We are so fortunate to have someone as talented and generous as Mr Arrington!

Our science author parent,  Jodi Wheeler-Toppen came by to give me a private lesson on squishy circuits as she is preparing to write a new book and has been trying new things out. Squishy circuits involve using soft objects and foods to conduct electricity to create closed circuits. This is the safest way for kids to learn about electricity. I know this sounds a bit odd and I am not explaining it very well so here is a great resource for you to study further! http://sylviashow.com/episodes/s2/e7/mini/squishycircuits

Second grade is working on addition and subtraction.  While computational fluency and automaticity are very important, it's also important for students how to use and interpret the tools around them. Understanding how to correctly use a number line to solve a math problem is a form of literacy. The second graders had fun practicing with this number line, but in the future, we will find one that has no advertising!

Ms Culliver, our new Kindergarten teacher  is really fun to work with. On her first day, we Skyped with Mrs Morgan,  a friend of mine from the DEN (Discovery Educators Network). Our students practiced speaking in complete sentences and learning the difference between a question and a statement. They practiced asking and answering questions with the 6th graders in Illinois! Ms Morgans class was super-terrific in terms of their attitude, knowledge, and behavior! I hope we can see them again soon!

We were invited to collaborate with Ms Robertson's class from the Elkmont k-12 School in Elkmont, Alabama. This school is about 45 miles away from Huntsville, AL! We learned a lot about their school and they shared with us how they are going to "make their mark." We had some sound problems but it was still a lot of fun and a good time was had by all! Happy Dot Day to you!

It was a great day at Hawthorne today! It was International Dot Day and we connected with Mrs. Temske's class in Roswell GA! Her class introduced themselves, asked and answered questions, and showed us the dot art they made. We LOVED LOVED LOVED all of the designs!! Thank you Mrs Temske's class!

You can make awesome noodle head puppets just for fun or as a response to literature!

This 52 page workbooks goes along with the ECON Explorers lesson plans provided by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Financial literacy is not talked about enough! It's not until we are older that we realize how little we really know about how the worlds works with regard to money!

Watch this video to see some new cool Capstone titles and let me know if you think I should order them!

Ms Hahn's class did a couple of  different things. Some students finished the higher levels of Botlogic http://botlogic.us/play, while others started on the Google Blockly programming games  https://blockly-games.appspot.com/. This class is very self directed in their learning and they help each other out a lot. There is a great sense of team spirit and cooperation! The work they do is not easy and it's been such a pleasure having so many students willing to jump in and support one another when there are questions! Nice work guys!!!

Today Ms Chandonia's class learned that an algorithm is a set of instructions. They embarked on the Level 2 Beta version of the K-5 curriculum with code.org. It got a bit complicated at times but the students all helped each other and some great learning took place. Students learn how to solve problems, work cooperatively and think in a logical manner through these activities. Many students do not know it yet, but this exposure will help them when they seek out careers that use the skills that they are learning by practicing these visual coding activities.

Ms Pope and Ms Latour's class started their planet research today. Short research projects are part of the common core standards. Each pair of students studying a planet is the perfect way to learn and produce a great product. This class will be producing Pope's Peeps Planet Podcast! Each student pair will investigate the most interesting facts about their planets and turn it into a short engaging script of a one to three sentences. Students will be recorded and this will be our first podcast for all the world to hear. Remember,  "The World is My Audience"