Collaboration Friday: Questions & QRs

Dogs, cats, and Abby, oh my!  CE Kindergarten students enjoyed Facetime with a community helper today in the library -  My sister, Abby Morton, a Veterinarian Technician at Athens Animal Clinic in Athens, Texas.  Students learned about all of the different operations within a Veterinarian clinic. They saw teeth cleaning tools, an x-ray machine, boarding areas, examination rooms, and some "really cute animals".  

Some of my favorite questions the Kindergarten students had for Abby were "Which animal is easier to care for, dogs or cats?" "What is your favorite part of your job?" "What do you want to be for Halloween?" and of course many of them let Abby know that her "Animals were cute!"

Abby - Vet Technician at Athens Animal Clinic

Abby and Mitt

   

A picture of an x-ray

Following the Facetime with Abby, Kindergarten teachers sent the students on a QR scavenger hunt around the library!  Students were to Identify the different community helpers found when the QR codes were scanned.  They did a great job identifying all of the different members of our community that help us everyday.

Their favorite community helpers were Mrs. Lancarte and Mr. Johnson!  They loved finding a picture of their Principals!

Thank you so much Kindergarten teachers for collaborating with the library to create an interactive, technology infused lesson for our students!

Thank you Abby and Athens Animal Clinic for sharing your clinic, knowledge, and love of animals with Castleberry Elementary School students!  We appreciate your service to the community!

QR Codes Made Easy!

QR Codes are a fun and interactive way to get our students engaged.  They are also fairly simple to create, however http://www.classtools.net/QR/ has made it even easier!

You type all of your questions into their form,
they create the codes immediately, and the codes can be used without internet connection!!












Additional QR Code sites to check out:
http://qrcode.kaywa.com/
http://www.qrstuff.com/ - color and shape QR codes
http://goqr.me/
http://www.qrexplore.com/generate/ - bulk generator
http://qr.snipp.com/
http://www.qrcode-monkey.com/#maps - QR codes using maps
http://www.visualead.com/  allows for photos, but only 3 codes created a month- example below

Great Resources for using QR Codes in the classroom:
http://www.schrockguide.net/qr-codes-in-the-classroom.html

Collaboration Friday: Spending Time with The Grouchy Ladybug

Thank you Fabulous First Grade Teachers for joining me for Collaboration Friday!

 This week CE First Grade students were working on telling time to the hour. As an extension activity, the students came to the library and spent some time with the Grouchy Ladybug by Eric Carle.  While watching a reading of this wonderful book, we set our own clocks to the time depicted at each stage in the story.

Following our practice of keeping time with the book, we then played a game to see if we could match time represented in both analog and digital formats,

Each student received a card with either a digital or analog clock and had to find a person with the same time.

Collaboration Friday: Puppet Show!

Do, doo doo do, do do doooo! A Royal Announcement from the Town of Left & the Town of Right:

Students at AVCato, Joy James, and Castleberry Elementary School enjoyed a puppet show this past Friday, The Marshmallow Incident written by Judi Barrett. Being the first puppet show for many of the students, laughter and enjoyment seeped out of the library! Our puppets - Bob, Sally, and the Ambidextrous Knight, showed students that reading is fun!

Check out one of the 10 performances below.

Not only did students see the joy in reading, but also discovered that they are scientist!

TEKS covered: Matter and energy. (5.C) The student knows that matter has measurable physical properties and those properties determine how matter is classified, changed, and used. The student is expected to predict, observe, and record changes in the state of matter caused by heating or cooling.

Following the puppet show the students hypothesized what they thought would happen to the physical properties of a marshmallow in -heat -water - and ice.

They discussed: the size, shape, texture, temperature, and color changes in each environment.


Check out the video showing how the physical properties changed below: