1/2 Hour Activities--Mrs. Wadsworth Dances

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

1/2 Hour Activities

Okay, it could take a bit longer than a half hour, but it's something the kids will really enjoy. Another kidpix activity, this is a perfect way to let kids create their own holiday greeting cards using photographs of themselves and their artistic abilities.

1. Take a photo in photobooth.
2. Drag the photo into iphoto and touch up the photo as desired. (omit blemishes or red eye, blur background, etc.)
3. Drag the re-touched photo back onto the desktop.
4. Open kidpix
5. Click on top of the screen to reveal the toolbar.
6. Select Import
7. Select Background, then select the photo on the desktop to import.
8. Decorate the photo as desired. Make sure the students are careful and use the undo button rather than erasing when they make mistakes. In order to start over, the picture must be imported again. If students are young, save their project once the photo is imported in case they delete by mistake.

Have fun!

1/2 hour activity

Here's one activity I've come up with--though I must admit it wasn't my idea. One of my colleagues created a mystery in Neighborhood Maps, and I had difficulty opening it and making it easy for the students to open, so I created my own. Here's a map I made of Santa's Village at the North Pole.


Neighborhood maps takes the students through a mystery, giving clues at many of the stops throughout the map, till they find Santa and Jimmy's yellow bike. At the end of the mystery, the children can link to a site with tons of Christmas stories they can read.

Enjoy!

A new season!

The Holidays are officially upon us! I've been working hard to come up with a few new activities for the kids to do on the computer. I've discovered some fun kid pix activities. A colleague of mine did a Christmas activity in Neighborhood Maps, so I decided to try to create one of my own. (After all, the best way to learn a program is to try to create something new in that program.) I've also begun looking through the resources from our training meetings to try and come up with new ideas for projects with digital cameras. We'll have plenty to do in the lab this holiday season! I, for one, am looking forward to it! If you have any ideas to share, please send them my way!

Thanksgiving Menu

Let your kids create a menu for Thanksgiving! Tell them what you'll be serving and have them describe the food items or write what process they think you need to go through to prepare the food. (Younger children have funny ideas about how long to cook things, for example. These could become wonderful reminders of how innocent our children are!) I made one with cooking directions for three of my favorite menu items. You can also write your feelings about the holiday, make a list of people who will attend, and list the activities planned for the day. I used a Pages template to create this menu. Parents can laminate these and use them as place-mats for the meal!

1/2 Hour Activities

With Thanksgiving coming, here's an idea if you're looking for an educational project to do with the Holiday. One Thanksgiving tradition in my house has been watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. My favorite part of the parade is the numbers from shows on Broadway. I also like seeing the huge helium balloons float down the streets of New York. Take this link to the tourist site about the Thanksgiving Parade and have the kids do some research on their favorite parts of the parade. What is required for the balloons to be in the parade? How much helium does it take to fill them? How many people are required to handle the balloons? Do a short research project and have the kids answer some questions about their favorite parade elements.

Today in the lab...

We discussed Internet Safety in Mrs. Tripp's class. Check out the activities on Netsmart. I added another link to the November links about the bad guys to avoid on the Internet. Check it out and go over these important rules with your child! Keep our kids safe!

Sensational Student Writing

Last month in Mrs. Haynes and Mrs. Smith's fifth grade class, we finished up the stories we worked on through September. I'm thrilled to include the best from those stories. Thank you, Erika, for your creativity and your hard work! Get a load of the fun first line, word choices like "blurted" and details like speaking through a mouth full of bread. Notice the character progression as she overcomes her fears. Keep it up!



Reader, if you don't want to read about Alex and her CRAZY Uncle Bertha, you don't have to, but your missing out! (No, it's not "Her CRAZY Aunt Bertha." It's uncle, all right?)

Now Alex is just a eight year old city girl who is terribly afraid of bugs, ball sports and math.. Here's her story.

"Alex you'll be late for school!" called Alex's Mom.

"I'm still eating!" shouted Alex froma mouthful of bread.

"Well bring your toast to into the car!"

Alex hated being rushed. she picked up her backpack and ran out the door.

"Finally home again" thought Alex.

"Aleeeeeeeex!" shouted Mom. "I need to talk to you!"

Alex walked into the kitchen.

"AlexdadandIaregoingtoEuropeforavacation.Soyouaregoingto staywithyour.......UNCLEBERTHA!!!!" blurted mom.

Alex couldn't believe it, who was Uncle Bertha?

Here we are at uncle bertha's barn. Thought Alex.

"Hi want to see my bug collection!!!!!!!"

"Yuck" said Alex when she saw the bugs.

A month later..."Alex!!! Where are you?"

Alex was on the ground playing with the bugs.

"I love 'em!!!"

1/2 hour Activities

Here's a fun link for some daily activities. A click on "National Geographic Photo of the Day" could open a great discussion on current events. On "This Day in History", students can read articles about events throughout history that happened on today's date. Not only a good brush up on history, but a unifier that illustrates the human condition. Teachers can brush up their own skills with "Braindrops", or "The Official SAT Question of the Day". I especially liked "Game a Day" and "Astronomy Picture of the Day". Enjoy!

Internet Safety Month

Actually, Internet Safety Month was October, but I missed it. So, here are a few great links to help teach your children how to be safe on the Internet. With all the accessibility to information, it's important our children learn these skills.

Netsmartzkids This site has games the kids can play that teach kids how to stay safe.

WiredSafety has all kinds of resources to teach parents/teachers about the dangers to watch for in cyberspace. This is especially helpful for parents who are technologically challenged and aren't familiar with the various websites kids use.

Disney also has a web safety site. This is a good one to sit down with your kids and talk about cyber bullies, viruses, and Internet predators.

The key to Internet safety is PARENT INVOLVEMENT. Know the sites your kids go to. Know their online friends. Get on their friend lists and know their passwords. Use parental controls. Keep your children safe!

Today in the Lab

Ms. Goodfellow's class created a monster in kidpix. I gave them instructions and they created their pictures according to their answers. For example, I told the students to give their monsters purple bodies if their favorite subject was recess, green bodies if they like math best, and orange bodies if their favorite thing to do is read. They gave their monsters four heads if they had at least one brother and one sister, three heads if they only had sisters, two heads if they had brothers. They added eyes, ears, mouths, and objects as they chose. It was a fun activity and the children worked on their listening skills and their creativity. Great job!

Today in the Lab

Mr. Sharp's class did our sudoku game with scary faces taken in photo booth. The kids had a great time and I was really pleased with how quickly they caught on to the pattern. We printed them and the students were able to take them home. Thanks for doing such a great job!

Today in the Lab

Today in the lab, Mrs. Pendley's class put together a sudoku pattern with scary photos they took in photobooth! They had a lot of fun! Thanks to our parent helper!

1/2 Hour Activities

As the Crow Flies.

Using Google Earth, explore your city. Have the children learn roads and how to navigate from one place to another. Start by typing your zip code in the "fly to" window.



Then, find major roads. Follow those roads, looking for things the students will find familiar, such as schools, malls, stores, libraries, etc. Explain addresses and how they work. Use directions, street names, and as many details as you can to show the children how maps are made. To make finding specific locations easier, open "Layers" on the bottom of the tools window in the left hand side of your screen. Click on "Places of Interest." In the newest version of Google Earth you can select which places of interest to show, such as "major retail", "schools", "hospitals", and "tourist spots." You can move the map by grabbing it and dragging your mouse.

You can do a scavenger hunt and create a list of places you want your students to visit. Give them directions to help them find the places and check them off of their list when they've found that place. Try double clicking on a location. Some locations have pictures and even histories embedded in a pop-up window.

You can even have the kids make their own map in Neighborhood maps to show the places they visited. These maps can be printed and taken home. (This option will take more than 1/2 hour.)

1/2 hour Activities

Sudoku is a popular game that teaches pattern recognition. Whether you use pictures or numbers or shapes, this fun logic game teaches a useful mathematical skill. For Halloween, I created a sudoku puzzle with scary photos I took in photo booth and placed them in a 4X4 grid in comic life. Students can create their own sudoku puzzles, print them, and take them home! Enjoy!

1/2 Hour Activities

Fabulous Fall--Discuss what happens in our environment when the weather gets cooler. Which trees stay green all year long? What happens to grass? To water? Using KidPix, change a bright summer day to a crisp, cool fall day. Add gray to the clouds. Add color to the leaves. Show some leaves dropping to the ground. Add yellow to the grass. Export the picture as a jpg and use it in a different project, or just print and hang in your classroom. Enjoy!

Today in the Lab

Mrs. Weichers's class started typing in Keyboarding for Kids today. We have booklets to help the kids know what to type, and they are timed as they do their drills. They will make great progress with this program once they get used to logging in. Please help your students remember where home row is so that they can learn to type properly. They'll be able to type much faster when they learn this skill! In this modern, technological world, typing is a necessary skill!

Thanks, parents and teachers for all you hard work for our children!!!

1/2 Hour Activities

On wordle.net you can create art with words! I had fun creating this wordle for Halloween. To make one word bigger than the others, simply type it in your list more than once. To make sure multiple words stay connected, type a toggle (~) between them! Have fun!

Today in the lab...

Today, Mrs. Alvord's class studied basic formatting. We learned how to change fonts, spacing, and alignment in Microsoft Word. We also learned how to copy clip art from Inspiration and paste it in the word document. We will work on copying and pasting again next time in preparation for a Halloween story.

Today in the lab...

Each day, I will describe at least one class's activities in the computer lab. This will give you an overview of the kinds of things we do in the lab.

Mrs. Tripp's class explored Neighborhood MapMachine. We learned about the compass and the directions North, South, East, and West. The students were able to explore two maps and various places on the maps, such as fire stations, libraries, police stations, and homes.

Mrs. Haynes' class worked on the stories they are writing for our fiction unit. They finished their character graphic organizers and began writing!

Yay for computers!

Hello, Bella Vista students! I've had many of you ask if you can check out the websites we use in the lab when you're at home. ABSOLUTELY! I think you are all wonderful students and I love your enthusiasm and curiosity! Make sure to ask your parents before you visit any sites and follow the rules of using the internet:

1. NEVER share personal information over the internet.
2. Use a search engine you can trust, like kids.yahoo.com
3. Type web addresses in the search engine rather than in the address bar so that you are sure to go to the correct site.
4. NEVER download anything unless your parents are there with you.

I love using technology to teach at Bella Vista! You are wonderful children who learn quickly and learn well! Keep clicking!