Welcome, February! [a week of updates!]

This past week has given us some new challenges and many successes....

The Jenny K challenge has led Sarah Armstrong and I into a dark abyss where we have had to let go of some of the control in Math and truly allow the students to be responsible for what they have learned. Sarah and I both decided that for the first "Flipped/Video" lesson, we would sit back and observe how the kids do. I watched some students in my class flourish and truly enjoy being able to watch and go through things at their own pace. However, I did have a couple of students truly HATE it and one of my students had a slight breakdown [one who doesn't handle change well]. After talking with Jenny, we thought it best to pull a small group of kids [particularly the ones that hated the style of the flipped lesson] and just do a regular lesson with those 5-6 kids while the others led themselves along with the video. When I pulled my group back, I still felt like they weren't feeling the video style. So for the future, I will pull that small group back and just do a regular lesson, with no video involved. They, of course, will have the option to refer to the video when needed/as extra instruction...but that will not be the basis of that lesson for them. We shall see how it goes....Has anyone else done flipped math lessons? Elementary teachers? What are the MUST HAVES or the AVOID DOING THIS parts of it? Advice is welcome!

iMovie gallery.....my students created [in partners] a short iMovie trailer covering/summarizing a health lesson they read on neglect/abuse. Once everyone was finished, we set up the iPads and groups rotated around in a "gallery style" of sharing. The kids benefited from the movement AND everyone was able to see and watch each group's trailer. Once we finished, we talked about what people did REALLY well and what we can all improve on in the future in regards to serving educational purposes. We talked about the expectations that come along with having these iPads in the classroom.

eduClipper.....Coach Cat stopped by to get the 6th grade students in Mrs. Armstrong's class and my class all set up with their own account. Due to some network problems, we weren't able to get through adding/following other students, etc. Jennifer Manning's post on eduClipper really inspired me and I see a LOT of potential from this app. I look forward to students creating their own portfolios for subjects or just for the culmination of 3rd quarter. With conferences coming up, what a great thing to show parents!

Brochures....today I had my students read through a topic in Health over friendship. I asked them to create a brochure in PAGES. Pages has a brochure template. I thought students would easily be able to manipulate the sample....quickly delete what was pre-set with their own information. We found it to be some work and a little frustrating. Text boxes would disappear, students weren't able to type where they wanted, etc. So after doing some quick researching via Google....I found and downloaded an app called QUARK DESIGN PAD. It allows the students to personalize and manipulate the brochure in SO many ways. I played with it for 10 minutes and found it to be SUPER user-friendly as well! I told the kids to play with both and see which one they would prefer to use for their assignment. I walked them through the app and the tools and all the kids truly felt like this was an app they could use in the future. It has more than just brochures too...kids can make business cards, posters, and SO many more things. GREAT app!

I will try to include screenshots and pictures later....my iPad did not travel to basketball games and my house tonight. 

Thanks for any and all advice about the flipped classrooms or any ipadacademy related info!