The Adventures in Mrs. Ripp's Class

It would be a huge help to me if you would take the end of year survey.  This survey greatly helps me grow as a teacher.  Thank you so much.

Mrs. Hyland was nice enough to share some pictures from art club, looks like a lot of fun!

I hope this is helpful this summer; happy reading!

Yesterday the students did their egg drop build, tomorrow we throw them off the roof to see if they protect the egg. 

Angela Watson published this great list of educational websites for students and I thought I would pass it on.

1. Utah Education Network has curated a collection of free games from all over the web. Basically, the UEN has done the hard work for you and pre-screened the sites so every game they link to is useful and developmentally appropriate. There’s something for every subject and every grade, and the interface is attractive to kids and easy to use. Look in the sidebar on the righthand side and click K-2, 3-6, or 7-12 interactives.
2. Sheppard Software has top-quality games for every subject spanning preschool through middle school. Fun and easy to use. There are ads on the site, so be sure to teach young students not to click on anything to the left or right of the game.
3. BrainPOP’s GameUp is a collection of free games for grades 4-12 in social studies, science, health, and math with no advertisements and no login required. The team at BrainPOP looks through hundreds of online games by various publishers and selects the ones that are of the highest quality, so only the best games make it onto the site. BrainPOP also lists corresponding movie topics you can play if you have a BrainPOP subscription, and provides a lesson plan (written by yours truly!) to show how you can integrate the game into your instruction.
If you like a particular game on GameUp, click the game developer’s icon on the game page to see their full list of offerings. Most of the partners have a bunch of additional high-quality games on their sites that are available for free. I particularly recommend:

• Numbaland (gr. 3-8 math)
• NCTM’s Calculation Nation (gr. 3-8 math)
• Manga High (gr. 5-12 math)
• Explore Learning (gr. 3-12 math and science)
• Taking IT Global (gr. 6-12 seriously in-depth games on important real-world topics)
• NOAA (gr. 3-6 life science and environmental science games)
• iCivics (gr. 5-12 civics: really amazing simulations and teaching resources that all civics teachers should be aware of)

Awesome sites that your students will want to use on a daily basis

4. ABCya has K-5 games on language arts and math, as well as various other topics (both educational and just for fun.) There’s also a large collection of games available as apps if you have an iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch in your classroom.
5. BBC UK features a kid-friendly landing page which makes learning look like all fun and games, or use the schools-games page which organizes activities by subject area.
6. Hooda Math is an up-and-coming site for gaming that also has a separate section for interactive whiteboard games. There are also some PDF worksheets for some of the games and some math tutorials for grades 3-7.
7. GameStar Mechanic not only offers free games for students to play, but allows kids to make and publish their own games. Very cool!

Other fantastic sites worth mentioning

8. PBS Kids is great for younger students. There are educational and just-for-fun games, which you can sort by subject area and skill. Be warned that some games are premium and require a subscription. I also like the PBS CyberChase collection of math games.
9. FunBrain makes the list because I see kids return to the site again and again even when they have the choice to play non-educational games. My own students were always obsessed with FunBrain, especially Mad Libs Jr. and Grammar Gorillas. The online books and comics addition is wonderful. It’s not the easiest site for kids to navigate independently if they’re looking for a specific game, but that’s mostly because there’s so much there.
10. IXL allows students to practice a variety of math skills online. These are not so much games as they are timed drills and practice sessions, which means it’s not particularly fun and doesn’t have a lot of higher-level thinking questions. What makes it worth mentioning here is the fact that it spans practically every math skill and concept from PreK-12 for free.

Goal:  To teach the rest of the class about your selected biome and assess their understanding.

Products:  Research report to Mrs. Ripp, hands-on extension project to use as teaching tool, assessment for class (can be verbal), self-evaluation based on class assessment.

Process:

1. Determine the top 3 biomes you would like to research with your group:  Savannah, desert, tundra, rainforest, grasslands, or deciduous forests.
2. Within group, research the various parts of your biome, such as: people, climate, plants, animals, locations.  You decide what the most important parts are.
3. Use sources from the library as well as from our LiveBinder to research.
4. Once research is completed, write one report as a group - double spaced, Times New Roman, sz. 12.
5. Work on extension project for teaching, ideas are: PPT, Prezi, Animoto, Posters, diorama, terrariums, movies.  You are the teacher, how would you like to be taught about a biome?  Make it interesting.
6. Work on how you will assess the students learning.  How will you know you did a good job teaching them about your biome?  Ideas for assessment include: question sheet, asking questions, have students write what they learned,  have students draw/diagram their learning, have them write a song, create a concept map, do a compare/contrast, check their pre-knowledge and then their post-knowledge, true or false, word search, definition match, crossword, write a blog post that talks about your learning, solve a problem, student choice
7. You need to know your facts as the teacher, figure out who will do what etc.

These beautiful flowers showed up one by one yesterday morning carried by very happy children; thank you so much, what a wonderful start to the week.