May

In order to jigsaw a rather large unit, Ms. Kappel's  8th grade social studies students created  Voicethread projects about a specific topic related to Westward Expansion/ Land Acquisition. Once they chose their topic they researched the who, what, when and where. As a result of their research they also had to answer an essential question - How does my topic relate to Westward Expansion/Land Acquisition and why is it important to know in that context? Students then created a 7 slide voice thread presentation about what they had learned that also taught their classmates, hence jigsawing it together. Every student (with a note taking template) was able to answer the essential question around their peers' presentation. It is a unique alternative to the traditional research paper. The writing that is being recorded must be accurate and succinct while presented clearly and engagingly.   

The students on 6-1 team, under the leadership of their student teacher, Mr. Sedewitz, made their thinking visible using the app Explain Everything on the iPad. This app allows the students to use text, graphics, motion and sound in order to explain a concept to others. Each student was assigned a topic from their physics unit such as friction, gravity, free fall, etc and were asked to "explain everything" about it, so they could learn from one another. Check out a sample project:

 

January/April
Eighth grade math students in Ms. Deschaines, Ms. Hsu and Mr. Timmins classes used Microsoft Excel to create spreadsheets and scatterplots that helped them answer questions like:  Is there a correlation between age and amount of hair on your head?  Is there a connection between shoe size and the amount of donuts you eat?  Why do one-armed goldfish always swim in circles?  Is there a pattern in the game of Monopoly?  Through the use of their spreadsheets and scatterplots, students were able to analyze their data efficiently and accurately. The amount of factors that could lead to misinterpretations (ie. measuring, plotting points, calculating averages, etc.) was minimized by the brilliant use of technology.  Well done eighth grade!

ELL students in Ms. Izrina's 6/7/8 grade social studies classes conducted research, created and presented Glogsters online posters, about American Indian Cultural Regions. Please click on the link to see the projects. Check out a sample project:

Ms. Sacks' Students created Projects about Energy
6^th grade students used the Explain Everything app on the iPad to show how energy travels from the sun to our computers at home. The students were required to show all of the steps from a diagram from the Sepup Energy book and explain what types of energy were present and what transformations were taking place.This project allowed students to use their own words to explain what was happening and showed any lingering misconceptions that they had about energy transfer and transformations. Check out a sample of the project:                                               

Mr. Hunt & Mr. Lyons: Element Projects
Each year students on Team 6-1 participate in the Element of the Year project. Each student is assigned one element from the periodic table, which they research. They write a persuasive essay and create an iMovie app on the iPad and Glogster convincing the people that their element is the most important element. Then each student then presents his or her project to the class.  An award ceremony follows where a student receives a certificate for the "Element of The Year." This year the element of the year was Oxygen. Here is an example:

Ms. Sugerman's Students Blog About the Miracle Worker Book

As part of a unit on the play The Miracle Worker, by William Gibson, students on 7-3 were asked to create a blog to share what they learned from the play and connect it to causes they are passionate about. The blog contained multiple pages of various kinds of media, including audio, video, images, and text, on issues ranging from hunger, climate change, and women's' rights. Each student, working either alone or with others, was responsible for at least three blog posts with different forms of multimedia in each post.  Students made every effort to connect "The Miracle Worker" to their own values, ideas, and passions, and created a steppingstone for others to learn more about worldwide issues and fight for positive global change.

http://kidblog.org/MiracleWorker/

November/December

Ms. Myers' 7/8 ELL English students are using a class blog to discuss chapters from Paul Fleischman's Seedfolks as part of a unit on Community. 

7-8 Grade ELL English Blog

Mr. Bunting’s 6th grade students studied maps in atlas and then used Google Docs to write paragraphs explaining why the areas of certain European countries were densely populated.

See an example:  European Population by Philip

                                       
Ms. Modica’s 7th grade Spanish class created podcasts to describe locations of items in a room using preposition phrases. Students created their podcasts by recording narrations accompanied with images. Here is an example:

                                                                          by Isaac 

Ms. Dempsey 8^th grade sciences students completed a Google Earth project on earth formation. Students create tours of many locations including text, images and links.

 

I am excited to start the new school year with new technology, new ideas, and more!  We have been very busy getting the lab and classrooms up and running.  Here are some new things to look for this year.

 

Classrooms Updates: Classrooms are being updated with LCD projectors and ELMO Document cameras.

Library Updates: Computers in the library have been updated as well. We now have 20 new iMac computers and a cart with 10 MacBook Air for students to conduct research with their classes.

We are thankful to Newton Public Schools for making this happen for the start of this year.  These tools will facilitate interactive and hands on learning, and we hope that you ask your students how they are being used in the classroom!!

Lab Orientations: In addition to setting up our new equipment and getting new teachers situated, we have also had orientation all grade 6 students.  They have all reviewed our acceptable use policy, created new passwords, and logged into both the computers and Google docs.

Examples of  tech projects students are creating

Ms Cadigan's 8th grade sciences classes used Google Docs to present brochures
Students researched and created a brochure including images, facts and information about their planets.  

OurNewton in 8th Grade English Classes
Ms. Legare is using an OurNewton discussion to teach and enrich classroom discussion with their reading and analysis of The Outsiders in her 8th grade English classes. As part of using this tool, she is teaching building students' skills in participating, sharing and collaborating online

 

2012-2013

For  the iPad pilot project, Ms. Legare's 8th grade English classes created projects about the 1960s using the iPad .  Check out the project below and other terrific projects.
.

                              by Abby & Maisie   

Mr. Golden's 7th grade Sciences classes learned about mitosis and some of the students created projects using the iPad Explain Everything App.

by Carina & Rebecca

   

 by Adi & Benjamin

Ms. Aliaga’s 6th Grade Spanish Class Uses Glogster to Present their School Schedule
Over the past two weeks, students have been examining their school schedule and learned how to use Glogster to create their school schedule in Spanish using text, images, audio, video and links.

Ms. Kappel’ 8th Grade Socials Studies  A Block Uses VoiceThread to Learn About the Westward Movement

Ms. Kappel's A Block class created VoiceThreads that were products of research around particular topics related to the Westward Movement. VoiceThread is an interactive tool that allows students to include images, text and audio comments in their presentations. Using the jigsaw method, students were able to learn from each other in order to gain a broad understanding of this period of the US history. Here is an example:

Ms. Swedberg's 8th Grade Math Classes Uses Microsoft Excel to Complete a Project which Extended the Game of Monopoly Beyond Boardwalk.

Students used data from the Monopoly game to create scatter plots, make lines of best fit for the data, and write equations for these lines. The equations were used to find the dollar values (cost, rent, rent with 1 house, etc.) for properties that were beyond (further from GO than) Boardwalk. While working with Excel, students learned to organized data in a spreadsheet, make and label a graph, and utilize the macro feature to do least squares regression.

Ms. Clarke's 8th Grade Spanish Class Use Pixton to Learn to Use Verb Tenses and Other Basic Grammar in Speaking and Writing.

For this project "La tira cómica", students were using their knowledge of how to conjugate (AR) verbs in the preterite tense and how to replace direct objects with direct object pronouns. The requirements were to conjugate at least 8 (AR) verbs in the preterite, put in at least 2 direct object pronouns, have at least 6 boxes with text, and to have cartoons speaking with bubbles in the present tense. At the end, students were able to record their voices reading each narration box. Click on image to view project.

Ms. Myers ELL Social Studies Class Use VoiceThread to enhance their learning
Students use VoiceThread to create projects on westward expansion. Students practice their listening, speaking and writing skills as they developed their projects. They presented projects at the lab and received feedback from teacher and peers.

Using Skype to Collect Weather  Data from Brazil
A student in Mr. Golden 7th grade Sciences class used Skype to connect with a student in Brazil to compare and contrast weather conditions between the two countries. The students were able exchange ideas about global warming and climate change.

Winter 2013

Team 6-4 Sciences  Use Glogster to Create the Periodic Table Elements:
Mr. Sullivan's students researched and learned to create digital posters on the periodic table elements using Glogster. They will present their elements information in a glog using text, images, and video as well as a link to their Google Docs essays.

                                                                by Javid

Team 6-1 Sciences  Use Glogster to Present the Periodic Table Elements:
Mr. Hunt's students came to the lab to learn how to use Glogster, an Interactive multimedia digital poster and then presented their information in a glog, using text, images, links, video, and more.

by Hannah

Ms. Dempsey's Students Use Google Earth to Learn about Types of  Volcanoes
Students used a Google Earth Volcano tour to analyze, collect information and make decisions about the types of volcanoes displayed on the tour and gave justification for their answers.

Students created stories and used Microsoft Excel to generate data:

Ms. Finegold asked her 6^th grade students to write a story about a trip (fictional or real) with at least 3 stops before reaching the destination. The next step was to use excel to graph the time and distance information to see the difference in slope as speed increased or when they stopped. The final step was to copy and paste their excel graph into a word document and type up their story. The final product was a type-written story with a graphic visual of their changing speed over the course of the trip.

Fall 2012

Mr. Bunting's Social Studies Classes Use Video and Google Docs to Enhance Their Learning:

                                                                                                   
Students in Mr. Bunting's classes watched a video of Spencer Wells' Journey of Man.  They then used their notes to create a Google Docs presentation showing how humans moved from Africa to populate almost all the land on earth.

                                                                                       By Aly

Understanding Food Labels

Ms. Chmielinski health class used food labels (e.g., cereal, candy, doridos, ice-cream, yogurt, etc.) to identify the total number of grams of fat, sodium, carbohydrates and sugars and entered those values into an Excel spreadsheet. 

Students presented their generated charts to their peers and also discussed why it was important to learn how to read and understand food labels.

Planets

The year is 2050, and space travel is no longer science fiction.  Ms. Cadigan’s 8^th grade sciences classes created a travel brochure for another planet in our solar system!  In this project, your job is to create a travel brochure that will entice vacationers to visit your planet. They need to convince people that their planet guarantees tourists the ultimate spring getaway! Every planet is different, so it is their job to give as many interesting facts, pictures and information as you can so that vacationers will pick your planet as their vacation destination over any other planet.

New Technology at Oak Hill 

Oak Hill is benefiting from new technology received from the Newton Public Schools to help teachers incorporate 21st century classroom technology to create interactive lessons that enhance learning, collaboration, creativity and increase the academic performance of students.

A new iMac lab with 26 computers to be used by classes for projects

Elmo Document Camera

All English, math, science, social studies, world language, tech engineering, art, and health classrooms are receiving an interactive ELMO document camera.

Students participated in the technology orientation program at the computer lab. The orientation sessions topics included the NPS Acceptable Use Policy (AUP), logging into computers with their usernames and passwords. Students created folders for their subjects in their student home folders and received guidelines for naming their files. A file structure gives students an organized, consistent place to save their files. Students also accessed the Newton Public Schools Google Docs (Google Drive). Google Docs allows users to create and edit documents online, while collaborating in real-time with other users. The free cloud storage allows users to store and access files anywhere.

May

Mr. Lyons’ English classes use GarageBand to create their record album Podcast/Vodcast projects Record albums can sometimes set a mood with music, art, and words. The students on Team 6-1 listened to many albums that give a sense of how figurative language and descriptive words and phrases are used to prepare the listener for the music he or she is about to experience. For their project, students created a title, artwork, and a descriptive piece for a mystery concept album we listened to. They were aware of the songs, lyrics, and artist but not of the album's intended concept. Each student designed a record album cover based on their own interpretations and descriptions of the mood they felt the record was trying to set. Then students created podcast with narration and music using GarageBand software. Check out some of their finished products:

Ms. Kappel’s Social Studies Classes Created Projects using Voicethread

Ms. Kappel 's students used Voicethread, an interactive presentation tool, to share the information they researched on a particular topic related to land acquisition/westward expansion. First they spent several days in the library, compiling their research, and then they created Voicethread project which included images, text and dialogue.  When they finished, they shared their Voicethreads with each other and took notes to piece together the complete study unit. Here is an example:

Ms. Dempsey’s Science Classes used Google Docs and Ms. Publisher to Present Brochures
Ms. Dempsey' students created a travel brochure to entice vacationers to visit a planet of their choice.  Students had to convince the reader that their planets guaranteed tourists the ultimate spring gateway! Students included pictures and described facts and information about their planets like statistics, climate, geography and special attractions so tourists could chose the planet for their vacation destination over any other planet.

Ms. Mulligan 8th Grade Spanish ClassesCreated Digital Stories with Pixton After learning how to use Spanish to complete a gift-buying transaction, Ms. Mulligan's assessed her student's oral and written presentational communication skills by having them create a cartoon using Pixton. Pixton allowed students to create their own cartoon characters and scenes, and then narrate their stories about a past shopping adventure in text boxes and speech bubbles. Ms. Mulligan was able to use the comment feature to provide feedback to her students. Once students incorporated the feedback into their revisions, they then recorded their voices narrating the story in Spanish. Students  self-assessed their work using Pixton's rubric feature and Ms. Mulligan incorporated students' assessments into her final assessment of their product. Using Pixton, students were able to publish a very professional looking product and share their comics with other classmates. Students agreed that Pixton was both fun and easy to learn, and that the project was more helpful to language learning than taking a chapter test. Here are some examples:

 

April

Team 7.1 - Ms. Marks 7th grade Sciences classes researched, created and presented a Google Docs presentation on a disease or condition that effects a system of the body that students studied in Sciences.  Students also created this project to see real world aspects of microbes, in this case bacterium. Students learned about microbes and their different roles in their lives. Here is an example: 

 
 Team 6.5 - Students in Mr. Janow’s English 6th grade classes are reading the book, The Giver by Lois Lowry and using Moodle Online Forum. Students are conducting discussions using the online forum in our course management system, Moodle. Students are engaged in complex discussions about topics in the book and developing interpersonal and online communication skills through face-to-face and forum-based interactions. The forum allows students to reflect and respond critically to questions outside of the school day.

March

Ms. McCann's 8th graders created To Kill a Mockingbird Google Docs Presentations 

In the study of Kill a Mockingbird, students in Ms. McCann English classes successfully read and responded to the novel.  They discussed the novel in small groups, wrote in response journals and participated in class    discussions. In the library, students used databases and other internet resources to research topics related to the historical and biographical background of the novel. They examined the novel to discover how prejudice affected the characters. They also examined the novel to discover that they can combat prejudice and discrimination. They demonstrated their understanding by crating Google Docs Presentation in the computer lab

https://docs.google.com/a/newton.k12.ma.us/presentation/d/1EQmLcMpq-Xgf-7aypt5xc0Z6oD15jIDgt9PBfcfNvoE/edit#slide=id.p

Team 6-1 Mr. Hunt's students demonstrated knowledge of the periodic table with Glogster

Mr. Hunt 6th grade science students studied the periodic table by identifying elements, writing, researching and using visual and oral presentations. Students created digital poster using Glogster with images, text, web site links and video to describe the elements assigned to hem. Projects were posted on the school web site for students, teachers and parents to view.

Anna:  http://steb5nv.edu.glogster.com/oxygen/

February

Ms. Sacks’ students spent some time in the lab learning and creating poems 

Ms. Sacks created the poetry lesson with resources and handouts that are posted on the school web site. Students were asked to illustrate their poems by using the software drawing tools.They were not allowed to use images from the Internet.  Ms. Sacks worked with the students using guidelines and a revision checklist to edit and revise until they created polished finished products. This project gave students opportunities to use their creativity. Drawing also helps children make their ideas visible. Check it out!

January

Señora Aliaga’s 7^th grade Spanish classes have been answering survey questions using Google docs related to favorite foods and restaurants. They have also been answering questions on their weekly blog and interacting with their classmates by responding to their comments about food, favorite meals, and how to stay healthy. 

Mr. Bunting's 6^th students worked together to create a slideshow illustrating a Grand Tour of European landmarks.  Each student contributed two slides about a landmark to a group presentation in Google Docs,  Students used Google Earth to create a map illustrating the location of a landmark and used online resources to create a slide describing and illustrating the landmark.  As an extension, some students found videos on YouTube related to the landmark.  The final slide was a bibliography giving sources for the information in the slide show. 

Ms. O’Keeffe’s 7th and 8th Ell Social Studies students created digital posters using Glogster. They created posters on the role of slavery in a southern colony during the 18th century. They learned about the profits that were circulated between Britain and the colonies by the trade triangle.  Check it out!

December 

Team 6.3- In Ms. Boyle’s 6th grade Science-Math lesson “Why is it important to learn about water consumption”, students collected data on the amount of water that their family used in one Saturday. Students entered the data on Excel spreadsheets, generated charts and analyzed and interpreted their charts by looking for comparisons, patterns and trends in the data. They also shared their charts with a partner in a Think-Pair-Share activity to show how much water their families used in one Saturday.  Using their findings, students made suggestions for minimizing water usage and discussed the importance of water conservation.

 Team 6.4-Mr. Bunting- Europe Graphing Economics Lesson
Students pulled data on economics from the C.I.A. World factbook on the web to create graphs comparing GDP of selected European countries, the European Union and the U.S.A.  Students then interpreted those graphs in a document on Google Docs.

November

Team 7.1-Ms. Mark's Science Classes - Food Menu

Students created a plant structure food menu using Google Docs to develop the projects. Students researched the web or used cooking books to find a vegetarian recipe and wrote the recipe ingredients. For each ingredient, they needed to find out what structure of the plant it comes from – for example mustard is a seed. Then they explained what the function of the structure is. They included a legend of function and color-coded the ingredients according to the structure. 

Team 6.3-Ms. Ditman’s Social Studies Classes - Continents

Each group was assigned a different continent. Students create an overview of the continent's native resources, physical features and aboriginal peoples.  Each group used different technology to create their presentation: Ms. Publisher, PowerPoint and Google Docs.  

Team 8.1-Ms. Dempsey - Google Earth for the Emperor-Hawaiian volcanic chain
Students used Google Earth to research age and formation of islands and check for current volcanic activity. They also used Google Earth to measure the distance of several islands to the Kilauea volcano.

October 

Ms. Izirina’s 7th and 8^th grade ELL Social Studies Glogster Project:

Students studies Native American regions and peoples.  Students researched in the library where they took notes using a graphic organizer. In the computer lab, students created interactive online digital posters with Glogster by adding text, images, and recording their comments on the poster.

Ms. Olivar 8^th grade Spanish students participated on a Blog Project: ¿Quiénes somos?

Students participated in an interview to get to know each other and review material from 6^th and 7^th grade. The interviews included questions about activities students enjoyed doing after school and on vacation, healthy and not-so-healthy habits, and family celebrations. After each interview students used the blog to describe their partner. Then, students read each other entries to find out more about their classmates. ¿Quiénes somos? blog facilitated student collaboration as well gave the opportunity for students to improve their writing skills in Spanish. 

Team 8.1-Ms. Swedberg’s Excel Math Project

Students used Ms. Excel to solve equations by guessing and checking. Students learned to enter expressions into cells so that the spreadsheet can understand how to interpret our math expressions. After finding a solution to the equation (two expressions that are equal to each other), students used Excel copy features to look at several guesses simultaneously. From this information we made graphs of the 2 expressions that formed each side of our equation. They also related the intersection of the two line graphs to the solution to our guess and check process.

http://www.pixton.com/schools/group/137730/comic/t0t7xhf4