21st Century Reading and Literacy

What our Teachers are Saying About Gizmos!

What are Gizmos?  Watch this Video

On March 21st our teachers in grades 3-6 were trained by an expert Gizmo trainer on how to set up their class and use Gizmos to help their students learn Science and Math concepts.  We received a Gizmo subscription and expert training through the NH Digital Resources Consortium Grant.  

Here's what our teacher's are saying about Gizmo.  

"That was super fun! Gonna try it at noon!"

"I love Gizmo! My class is using it now on Monday and Fridays during our mobile lab times in the classroom. Our first adventure is using a line hopper game. We downloaded a hard copy and are recording our answers on them. The kids seem to really like it!"

"I've used Gizmos for both math and science.  The interactive simulations allow for differentiated instruction at it's best as students are able to manipulate the Gizmo in different ways to address their learning needs.  I love it!"

Puppet show about Federal Government

Grace Sylvia and Sarah Heatherton created a puppet show as summative assignment to show their understanding of Federalism

World Studies Video On Egypt

Kirsten Ray and Logan Webster produced this short film on Egypt.

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The Use of Google Apps and Haiku at LHS

Here is a short movie Andrew Gamble made for a TLC grant that he was apart of about the use of Google Apps at LHS

Canterbury Tale's Ms. Seymour Class

Here are a couple of video's from Western Literature Honors. It is a modern-day interpretation of the Franklin's Tale from the Canterbury Tales by Chaucer.

Taylor Friedman

Amelia Gage

Megan Willeman

Hannah Gariepy

Kang-Chun Cheng  

ELL at Seminary Hill School - Using IPADS to Demonstrate Understanding

An excellent example of UDL (Universal Design for Learning- Watch this video) - ELL students in Rebecca Wurdak's classroom created these outstanding videos.    The students first read Carl Sandburg's poem "Chicago" then they watched the Chrysler TV ad about Detroit and wrote their own city riddle and put it to pictures.  

Submitted by:  Rebecca Wurdak, ELL Teacher, Seminary Hill School

Students at Hanover Street School Skype with Governor Lynch on Digital Learning Day

Governor Lynch, Allison Mollica & the Hanover Street
Third Grade Class (still online!) at the State House.

Ask Susan Desrosiers, Pam Cantrell, or Kathy Wetzel if Digital Learning Day was a significant day for them and their students!  They'll tell you quite a story.  The children were delighted to have the opportunity to chat via Skype with Governor Lynch.  He told them, "I have three children that live in three different states and I see them everyday because of Skype!"  One student sat down prior to the chat and said, "This is the most important day of my life!"  It was really the ultimate way to celebrate the FIRST IN THE NATION, Digital Learning Day in New Hampshire!  Thank you Governor Lynch and the Third Grade Team for creating such an exciting venue!

Art - Digital Animations - Seminary Hill School

Students at Seminary Hill School Create Digital Stories with Original Artwork.  This is a "You Tube Channel" so if you move your mouse over the video you will see a scroll that goes left to right where more student work may be viewed.  


Submitted by Todd Renninger, Art  Teacher, Seminary Hill School

Martin Luther King Jr Writing Project @ MLS

Using our Mobile Lab and Flip Cameras, students publish and produce a video - using 21st Century Tools students are engaged in the learning process - of listening, comprehending, analyzing, and synthesizing information.  Here are the steps we went through during this unit.

1. We listened to the story, “Martin’s Big Words”  by: Doreen Rappaport.
2.  Students answered the following questions:
   *How can you use “Really Cool Super Rule” to be like Martin Luther King?
   *How can you solve problems at school in a peaceful way?
   *Martin said,  “Everyone can be great?”   What does that mean to you?
   *What words do you think of when you think of Martin Luther King Jr.?
3.  After proofreading their work the students published their writing using the mobile lap top unit.  Teachers were editors.
4. They drew a portrait of Dr. King
5.   Using the flip cameras students partners taped each other reading their work.
6.  This video can also be found on our website and the writing and portraits can be found outside our room in the hallway.


Submitted by Mary Skiffington, Grade 2 Teacher, Mount Lebanon School

Project Adopt A Country - NH Ed 306.42 ICT Literacy Portfolio for 8th Grade

Project Adopt A Country is a year long 8th Grade Social Studies Project.  All of the instructions and resources are posted online. 

The social studies teachers collaborate and create a common curriculum and technology experience for all eighth graders just prior to entering high school.  Students interact with a virtual teacher for support blended with computer instruction in the lab at the school so they learn how to communicate and problem solve online while independently managing their time to complete each project which then results in a cumulative online portfolio!

The PAC Project is Lebanon Schools District's approach to meeting the 8th grade portfolio requirements of NH Ed 306.42 Information and Communication Technologies Program
"(5) Create digital portfolios which:
a. Address the following components: 

1.  Basic operations and concepts;

2.  Social, ethical, and human issues;

3.  Technology productivity tools;

4.  Technology communications tools;

5.  Technology research tools; and

6.  Technology problem solving and decision-making tools;
b. Represent proficient, ethical, responsible use of 21^stcentury tools within the context of the core subjects; and

(b) The local school board shall provide opportunities for students to demonstrate ICT competency by the end of 8th grade using assessment rubrics applied to the contents of digital portfolios as required in (a)(5) above. Students who successfully demonstrate knowledge, skill, and understanding of these competencies shall have the opportunity, as high school students, to take a higher level computer course to meet the ½ credit requirement."

Students complete a series of projects focused on an individual country of choice - that combine information literacy with the National Educational Technology Standards (NETS), NH ICT Literacy Standards and Universal Design for Learning.

Sample:  Adopt A Country Portfolio Using Google Apps "Sites"

IPADS in the 21st Century Reading & Literacy Classroom

"This is a picture of my reading students taking a NWEA type
test- my version - as a way to practice & develop good test
taking skills, improve reading comprehension skills.  This is
done using our 21st Century Learning Management System -
Haiku."

Stephanie Karabaic applies best practices of instruction for 21st century learners using a blended (online) classroom with IPADS and computers.  She integrates a variety of resources and interactive tools to help students develop skills and literacy while being engaged and excited about learning!

Students reading from IPADS in class - the reader on the
IPAD allows student to bookmark and annotate, take notes,
and make comments in an effective and motivating way.

Voki - Online Communication For A Variety of Uses

Our ELL teacher, Anne Morin used Voki to record an introduction to herself and her program to place on her website (Hanover Street School>Classrooms).  This is a great way to support text with audio/visual.  Voki's can be used by teachers as a way to differentiate instruction, provide multiple means of instruction, and engage today's learners.  It is FREE and EASY.  Students have created an posted Voki's in Ms. Karabaic's 21st Century Reading & Literacy class to demonstrate their understanding of a topic and share with others!  Make your own Voki at www.voki.com


Submitted by:  Anne Morin, ELL Teacher, Hanover Street School

Skype - Communication Tool for Many Purposes

We use Skype in our district for a variety of different things.  We are expanding our use of Skype in the elementary classrooms.  What is great about Skype?  We can connect to people thousands of miles away or even a few miles away in seconds.  We can "ask experts" or connect with our sibling classroom across town.    Our Mount Lebanon students are able to collaborate with students in the same grade at Hanover Street on curriculum projects.

Using Google Docs "Presentations" Grade 3 - MLES

Gloggin' at Seminary Hill School

Glogster offers creative expression of knowledge and skills in the classroom and beyond with the creation of GLOGS - online multimedia posters - with text, photos, videos, graphics, sounds, drawings, data attachments and more! For more information: What is Glogster?

Shared by: Fran Gere, Media Specialist, Seminary Hill School

Haiku Online Learning Lebanon High School

Lebanon School District has as the opportunity to pilot Haiku, an Online Learning Management System.  Our teachers and students in this pilot have been highly successful. 

Haiku Teaching at Lebanon High School:
Andrew Gamble, Social Studies
David Wallace, Social Studies
Natalie Perriello, Freshman Foundations, Computers, Business - Freshman Foundation Course
Brenda Rowland, Freshman Foundations, Computers, Business

Haiku Teaching at Lebanon Junior High School
Stephanie Karabaic, 21st Century Reading & Literacy
Liam Coyle, Social Studies
Brendan Armstrong, Language Arts

ELL Creating a Digital Report Version of a Written Report

These third grade ELL students wrote a report on a holiday from their culture and then wrote a "script" to summarize their report accompanied with images using Windows Movie Make and IPODS to record their voice!  You can view these projects in their entirety:  Day of the Dead   |  Chinese New Year

Shared by :  Anne Morin, ELL Teacher, Hanover Street School

        

Digital Animation Grade 5 Seminary Hill School

IPAD's in Intensive Needs Program at Hanover Street School

The Intensive Needs program has found dozens and dozens of IPAD and IPOD apps for their children.  Here are a few examples of applications they use and how they use them.

 There are many apps that can help students with speech, cognitive behavioral therapy, motor skills, social skills, communication, reading, math, and much, much more. As a way of getting students involved in this process, teachers ask these youngsters to evaluate "four apps of the week!" - Here is one of the recent apps students evaluated and "reviewed."

Letter School App
Letter School offers different fonts to practice - D'Nealian, HWT and Zaner Bloser; practice capital letters, lowercase letters and numbers ; reinforces phonics and meaning of letter; entertaining visual feedback ; two levels

Z writes: "I like the LRS because you have to get all of the gifts. The math app was too hard."

Smiley Sight Words
This application can accomodate a class of 30 students, includes over 1600 high frequency site words.  The teacher is involved in the process by giving the "thumbs up" or "thumbs down" for pronounced words.  The app tracks performance and provides progress reports that can be saved, emailed, etc.  Flash cards sets can be customized.    Here's what another teacher has to say about it "This is the best app on the market for teaching children!"  Theresa tells us that "Kids would so much rather do this than flashcards."  Engaging children is essential to teaching.



Check out Mom's with Apps - excellent resource of apps for youngsters, teachers, and caregivers.

Shared by, Theresa Hunnewell, Special Educator, Hanover Street School

Global Warming Prezi -Student Work From Middle School Reading & Literacy Class

Students created their Prezi presentations after we read two informational articles on Global Warming. Their prior knowledge of the topic, as requested in the first reading packet proved that the only “fact” most students knew about Global Warming was from the commercial on television with the polar bear mother and cub on the disappearing ice flow. 

As a result, we began our informational research with highlighting the most important facts in the article. Then, students typed each original fact in their own Google Doc. We practiced paraphrasing and rewording each fact, and talked about “plagiarism” and what it means. Students typed each paraphrased fact under the original fact their Google Doc. Next, we evaluated and read through a more advanced informational article about global warming on the web at www.nationalgeographic.com, Students learned about the quality of websites and how websites vary in their authenticity of facts. Students learned that “Bob’s website” as a source, as compared to nationalgeographic.com, might not be a good source since we don’t know who ‘Bob’ is.

Our strategy included reading chunks of the National Geographic article. Students worked semi-independently pulling out facts of importance and practicing the paraphrasing of those facts,as we had done together earlier with the previous article. Finally, students were introduced to a Prezi by watching a Prezi that was embedded in their online course site in Haiku.

The topic of my Prezi was about Good Reader Strategies that good readers employ when reading. Next, students watched an introductory video and completed a hands-on Prezi tutorial and then they were off and running, adding their global warming facts to their own “Global Warming Prezi. Their final presentations were posted on our Haiku site for all of their other classmates to see. Each one is an individual as the students are!  


Shared by Stephanie Karabaic, Reading and Literacy Teacher, LJHS

View:  Global warming by Timmy 
View:  Global Warming by Ki 

4th Grade Online Book Review Project

View the entire project here!

Your mission, secret agents, is to write a book review and publish it online!   Letting the world know about a great book is hard to do, but knowing the parts of a good book review will help. The three parts of a book review are a hook, a brief summary and recommendation(s).   Mrs. Stone's PowerPoint presentation

Project Adopt A Country

Project Adopt A Country is a year long 8th Grade Social Studies Project.  All of the instructions and resources are posted online.  The social studies teachers collaborate and create a common curriculum and technology experience for all eighth graders just prior to entering high school.  Students interact with a virtual teacher for support blended with computer instruction in the lab at the school so they learn how to communicate and problem solve online while independently managing their time to complete each project which then results in a cumulative online portfolio!  

Students complete a series of projects focused on an individual country of choice - that  combine information literacy with the National Educational Technology Standards (NETS):  and Universal Design for Learning.

Sample:  Adopt A Country Portfolio Using Google Apps "Sites"

21st Century Learning