Friday, July 26, 2013

Getting to know you.....

I'm all about making kids as comfortable as they can be when school resumes in the fall. Students that are new to the school are probably very nervous because they don't know anyone and are not familiar with the layout of the building. 

During the first week, I am going to introduce students to the iPad app Book Creator and ask them to create a several page book that includes pictures, text and if they'd like, video. The material should tell us something about them: how many siblings they have, if they have pets, where they live, what their favorite fun things to do are, their favorite subject, what their goals are for the year, and so on.

Once they complete their chapter, I will have them share it with me via Google Drive and I'm going to combine all of the chapters into a single volume that is named Our Homeroom 2013-2014. Each student will get a copy and they can become acquainted with their classmates by reading about them. In addition, I will share this with all of their teachers so they too can get to know the kids as well. 

Book Creator is a very simple app to use and is unlimited in its utility. Students can work independently on collaborative projects and chapters can be inserted and moved around very easily at any time. Students can create a book that contains book reviews about all of the books they've read throughout the year. They can create an instruction manual on any topic either for a class assignment or their own reference. If they choose, they can share these instruction manuals with other students.