http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mlkihaveadream.htm
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The students are working hard on their projects. We are not sure if it is our network or Prezi that is so slow. We used Prezi last year and the kids hated it because so much went wrong. I felt that the kinks had been worked out and our network has been upgraded..... Wifi lately has been horrible. The entire campus is on wifi so, when there is a delay we are all delayed.
This is our first year of being 1:1 with Chromebooks in the 7th grade and going PBL (project based learning) at the same time. The end goal is to be entirely 1:1 for the entire campus. We are having a new middle school built that we will move into next year. I am so excited about this- more on this later! We plan for projects to be about 2 weeks in length. Spend the time before the due date researching and having mini-lessons, asking clarifying questions and so forth. We present our project and then we have a paper assessment on what we learned about our project. I am not by any means doing things "perfectly" in my class room and have honestly changed my teaching method completely. I am loving PBL. I love the accountability it has given the students. It is not just about grades! I am still learning timelines and feel like I am falling behind. But, I see that the students are having the hardest time researching. Again, is it our network or the methods that we are using to research? I am not sure. I am going to have to adjust this due date for sure. I want them to have more time to create to make the project more their own instead of just throwing it together, which they would have to do if we didn't extend it. Now for our new school! I came to Jarrell in 2005 and at the time our district was shared on 1 campus. K-12 all together. 197 kids. Now we have a new high school, new elementary and finally the new middle school! Our middle school has roughly 325 students in it. I have had to the pleasure of being on the same campus as my son since he was in K :). (He may not see it that way, but it sure has been fun for me.) I can not wait until we get into our new building. We will be connecting our field house to the school and the gyms to the school. Our campus has been open and I have never been a fan of that. Change happens. It can be difficult. It can be fun. It can be time consuming. It is definitely needed. I believe that the changes being made in our district our going to benefit the students of Jarrell ISD. I am grateful for the vision of those making the changes and encouraging us along and allowing us to change with them. I am a better teacher for it and hopefully my students are better for it as well. The students are working hard starting their presentations on Prezi.com. We are learning daily that when the internet doesn't cooperate it slows our progress down dramatically. All groups have started. Now they have to collaborate-work together. They must decide how it will look, will they use complete sentences or bullets? Pictures? What about the back ground? And the title of the project??? Those have been the biggest issues that the students have been dealing with. The key is that they work together and learn to compromise and even stand their ground. These projects are more than grades. Its not to get an A. The purpose is real life skills and be able to communicate with others and have the skills necessary to do jobs that these kids will be facing. We will still be graded and do the traditional things of school. We just want the kids to be engaged in their learning.
Today the students worked diligently on finishing their biome research and started on their presentation. They are also looking for pictures for their animals and plants and then the keystone species.
Next week is going to be a short because of the holiday and UIL competition on Friday. We may have to bump our actual presentations to the following week. That will be announced next week if it happens. Thursday the groups must finish their research so that they can all work on the prezi. Friday will be dedicated to our science fair. Hopefully you have seen the packet and signed everything that needs to be signed. We will be chunking our science fair assignments so that the students won't be overwhelmed during the process. Today we talked about Keystone species and realized their importance to an ecosystem. We will visit about that also on Wednesday. This will need to be an addition to our biomes. We have 8 biomes and will need to include at least 1 keystone species for each biome. The students are attempting to finish their research for their projects this week. Then we will spend next week building or presentations and present the following week. Next week will be a 3 day week for some students. Monday is a holiday and Friday some students will be attending the UIL competition in Salado.
Our students at JMS are very busy. They are also very capable of learning how to prioritize their time and realizing what needs to be completed first. Each class is giving class time to work on their projects and minimum time at home. Now, I tell each of my students if they have to the time to spend researching then go for it. We are all learning. I am gauging our timelines and trying to balance my expectations on what they can get done. Many students are learning how to do homework. Many are struggling with comprehension on reading. It is all good practice and will benefit them. I see many good things coming out of our PBL initiative that we have started this year. I can't wait to see how theses kids finish their year. On Tuesday we will be having a vocabulary quiz over all of our vocabulary. We have had several practice quizzes and the students have done very well on them. We have covered the high miss words by doing some mini lessons and re-teaching biomes and biodiversity.
Today we learned about the 2 types of succession and the students are sketching a timeline of 1 of the 2 types in a foldable. Tuesday we will be learning about what a keystone species is. They are covering 8 biomes and learning about the different animals and plants and their adaptations. This will also be included into their biome presentations. A keystone species is one that contributes to the existence of the ecosystem in which it lives. An example of one is prairie dogs. They contribute to the soil and water quality in their plains ecosystem by foraging. Doing this retains water in the soil and forces fresh new grasses to continually grow. The bison and elk feed off of the new grasses. On Monday we will be learning and comparing the differences in the 2 types of succession. The first type is primary. This occurs where there has been no growth before. The best example of this occurring is after lava flow has added to an area. It is the gradual growth of an ecosystem over a period of time. (Wikipedia) The first species is called a pioneer species. There is usually one major thing missing from primary succession. Do you know what that is?
The second type of succession that we are learning about is called secondary succession. This happens with an event of some type. There is a disturbance of an already existing ecosystem. What might the disturbances be? (hint: The Central Tx area specifically Jarrell has had experiences with 2 specific disturbances) Secondary succession occurs in a shorter time period than Primary succession. Can you draw me a picture of what succession in an area looks like starting with primary succession? Fill out note page.... |
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