Desktop Learning Adventures

Today is an exciting day for me!  Today is my day to be featured on New Teacher Blog Tuesday over at Fun in 1st Grade .  Never one to give a completely straight answer when I can answer with a math challenge instead, see if you can figure out how many candles were on my last birthday cake.     Actually, I think I was 10 the last time I had candles on my birthday cake, but you know what I mean. :) And for those that just can't get enough, I now have a Facebook page- new followers are always welcome to *like* and comment! OK, Dana, a prize for guessing correctly.... hmmm... how about a Starbucks gift card for the first three people to guess correctly.  Don't post the answer in the comments, send a message to me with your answer, your name and your email address (let's see if I can do this) here .  Contest closes at midnight, MST, Feb. 27th. You need not be present to win! (I always wanted to say that.) :)   I'll announce the winners tomorrow. ...

I've discovered I do my best thinking in the shower. Some people sing, I create. That’s where I came up with this marvelous idea. (It’s really too bad I dreamed this up my last year of teaching, but I have high hopes of being able to convince some of you, my readers still in the classroom, of the merits of this great idea...) For those of you not familiar with the game of Quiddler, it’s a fast word game.  Well, it’s fast when you learn how to play it.  The object of the game is to make the most or longest words you can, given the hand you’re dealt, hoping that your opponents don't go out before you do.  It starts with three cards in your hand and the last round has ten cards. That’s it.  Simple. I knew this would be a great vocabulary building game for the classroom.  It uses all the spelling and phonics skills kids possess, as well as dictionary skills. Directions say to choose one dictionary as the “Official” dictionary. I chose, and purchased th...

It’s taken me awhile, but I’ve finally found my 11 cool new blogs that I’m following and would like to nominate for the Liebster Blog Award.  I’ve thoroughly enjoyed checking in on each of them, and hope you will, also. Again, a review of the rules- (My 1-3 are in a couple blogs below.) Link back to the blog that nominated you.   Post 11 random things about yourself. Answer the 11 questions posted by the nominator. Create 11 questions for the people you nominate. Choose 11 other blogs with less than 200 followers and link to them on this post. (Nominees, scroll down through my blogs to find my answers to the questions posed to me.) Here are my questions for my Liebster Award Nominees.   Would you rather play sports or watch them? What’s you favorite? Is teaching your first or second career? If it’s a second (or third or fourth:), what did you do before this? There’s been a lot of talk about this- MAC or PC? Are you an introvert or extrov...

Etch A Sketch® Ohio Arts I read that Andre Cassagnes, the man who invented Etch A Sketch, passed away.  Raise your hand, if you were a lucky owner of an Etch A Sketch... The story reminded me of how I used Etch A Sketch in my classroom. It started with frustration. That seems to be a recurring theme for many of my great ideas.  This frustration stemmed from students lacking the ability to make connections between greatest common factors and the multiplication facts.  Individually, they “got it” for the day or the week or the test.  Transferring that knowledge to the next concept was like, all of a sudden, I was speaking Latin- blank stares from too many and the usual three or four raising their hands.   I was sharing my frustration with one of my teammates when it hit me.  I quickly excused myself from the conversation, and headed for the nearest toy store.  I finally found one- a little Etch A Sketch.(Maybe I was looking in the wrong plac...

I used to be frustrated with how research happened in my classroom.  The cycle seemed to repeat itself all too frequently.  I knew students had done various forms of research before they got to me in sixth grade, but there were always huge stumbling blocks in the process.  First, they'd amass a large quantity of books on the subject.  This could take an entire day, had I let it!  Next, they'd blindly look at pages of words, copy a few sentences and toss the book aside, as they grabbed the next one.  There was a definite disconnect between the information they were searching for and the process they were using. I developed Guided Research as a survival tool for both my students and me.  Breaking kids of the habit of copying word for word instead of paraphrasing and not understanding a thing they wrote was my driving force.  Here’s how it worked.  Round up all resources  a day ahead.   Introduce Research Organizer...