Summer School 2011

Today is the last day of summer school.  I am exhausted but very excited over what my students have accomplished.  We had ten third graders, four fourth graders, and 3 fifth graders.  The principal requested that we make summer school fun so using the theme of the Rainforest, students researched and presented their research in a variety of ways.  I would like to share some of their projects:

This is a link to a podcast created by third graders: The Animals of the Rainforest.  This was a reader's theater found on EdHelper.com.

This is a slideshare created by fourth graders.  Students used a site called Build Your Wild Self to create a humanized character that could live in the rainforest.  We took screen shots of their creations and using Smart Board, made the faces of the characters transparent.  These images were layered over pictures of the students.  Another screen shot was taken and pasted onto a power point presentation.  Students added their own comments and we uploaded the presentation into Slideshare.

Children of the rainforest

View more presentations from Melanie Lewis

Fifth graders worked with Voicethread.  Students painted pictures and then scanned them onto the computer.  The pictures were uploaded into Voicethread and students narrated another reader's theater.



Third Graders also used Smart Board to create a book patterned after Brown Bear, Brown Bear.  Since I can't embed the actual Smart Notebook document, I exported it to a PDF document and am sharing the link.

The big project of the three weeks was our claymation video.  These are students who have never done anything like this before and so the final product is pretty infantile.  But then again, I am a process and not a product type of person so I hope you aren't looking for perfection because this is as far away from perfection as you will get. However, the students are quite pleased with themselves!

Playing

Day 27 of My Picture Project

A picture of me and a family member. Here I am with my sister, Wanda. Wanda moved from Lynchburg to Fredericksburg which I don't like! I wish she would come home!!!!!!!

Day 26 of My Picture Project

On day 26 I want to show you something that means a great deal to me; that would be my family. Here is a picture that was taken at my daughter's wedding in May 2010. Most of my family is here. There are a few that are missing but most are represented. In addition to my biological family. My church and work families are much loved as well. The Father has truly blessed me.

Day 25 of My Picture Project

Day 25 is a picture of my day. I am an Instructional Technology Resource Teacher. Most of the time I spend my day stuck in front of a computer. At night, I come home to work on school work. Again I am on the computer. When I am relaxing, I am probably on Facebook. Again, the computer. I think I may be part Borg.

Day 24 of My Picture Project

Day 24 is a picture of my favorite book. I could get all spiritual here and say that the Bible is my favorite. And I do like to read the Bible. However, I don't think God would mind me sharing the book I pick up whenever I need to just have a mindless read. That book would be Gone with the Wind. I have read this story a ga-jillion times but I never get tired of it. My mom named me after Scarlett's sister-in-law, Melanie, but I am not that sweet. I am much more of the Scarlett type: quick tempered, selfish, wanting to have things my way and doing anything I need in order to survive. However, like Scarlett, I am hard working, kind, and loyal to those that I love. Scarlett may not have been perfect but she wasn't all bad either.

Day 23 of My Picture Project

The post for Day 23 is about something I wish I could change. I wish I could change the fact that Pops is gone. I miss him terribly! I know that someday I will see him again but for now it still hurts.