Every second week, “Aunt Math” sends a math word problem in the form of a letter to students recounting math experiences she has had with her neices and nephews. These stories are usually seasonal or center around another theme. The stories are easy to read, in large print and entertaining. At the end of each story, Aunt Math poses a math problem for students to figure out. Within the site are also tips for solving math problems, information on how these problems are related to math curriculum for parents and teachers and Aunt Math also provides solutions to each problem. The site also provides easier math problems for younger students or students who are having difficulty with the math concepts creating a nice scaffold for the various levels of students in your class. As the easier problems share the same storyline, students don’t have to feel that they are doing something different because they are “dumb”.

Unfortunately, the thing that really made the site neat and interactive has been discontinued. When students were done with their solutions, they could write in to Aunt Math and explain to her their solution and how they figured it out. The responses from all the students would be listed on a seperate page like comments on a blog. Aunt Math would write back giving them tips or encouragement. My students really enjoyed that aspect and would take the email home to show their parents. As I checked back prior to writing this, I discovered that that is no longer being done. Citing a “commitment to promoting responsible use of the Internet for children,” the site has stopped responding to individual e-mails. Now, I am not sure how this is promoting a responsible use of the internet as it seems to me that they are just advocating that students should not be using the internet as a communication tool at all instead of teaching how to use it safely. Also, if you were advocating a safe and responsible use of the internet wouldn’t you just set guidelines as to how comments were placed on the site along with a way to filter comments instead of going completely to one end of the spectrum and banning any communication at all? I think the site is just taking the easy way out.

Having said that though, the site is still useful and I enjoy the stories and challenges. It makes word problems that are more interesting and relevant for students.

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening

By Robert Lee Frost

Whose woods these are I think I know.

His house is in the village, though;

He will not see me stopping here

To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it’s queer

To stop without a farmhouse near

Between the woods and frozen lake

The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake

To ask if there’s some mistake.

The only other sound’s the sweep

Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,

But I have promises to keep,

And miles to go before I sleep,

And miles to go before I sleep.

Be A Kid Again

1. Do a cartwheel.
2. Sing into your hairbrush.
3. Walk barefoot in wet grass.
4. Play a song you like really loud, over and over.
5. Dot all your “i”’s with smiley faces.
6. Read the funnies. Throw the rest of the paper away.
7. Dunk your cookies.
8. Play a game where you make up the rules as you go along.
9. Step carefully over sidewalk cracks.
10. Change into some play clothes.
11. Try to get someone to trade you a better sandwich.
12. Eat ice cream for breakfast.
13. Kiss a frog, just in case.
14. Blow the wrapper off a straw.
15. Have someone read you a story.
16. Find some pretty stones and save them.
17. Wear your favorite shirt with you favorite pants even if they don’t match.
18. Take a running jump over a big puddle.
19. Get someone to buy you something you really don’t need.
20. Hide your vegetables under your napkin.
21. Stay up past your bedtime.
22. Eat dessert first.
23. Fuss a little, then take a nap.
24. Wear red gym shoes.
25. Put way too much sugar on your cereal.
26. Make cool screeching noises every time you turn a corner.
27. Giggle a lot for no reason.
28. Give yourself a gold star for everything you do today.

I Can’t Write a Poem

Forget it.
You must be kidding.
I’m still half asleep.
My eyes keep closing.
My brain isn’t working.
I don’t have a pencil.
I don’t have any paper.
My desk is wobbly.
I don’t know what to write about.
And besides, I don’t even know how to write a poem.
I’ve got a headache. I need to see the nurse.
Time’s up? Uh oh!
All I have is this dumb list of excuses.
You like it? Really? No kidding.
Thanks a lot. Would you like to see another one?

-Bruce Lansky

Today I am going to provide you with another resource that I use time and time again. Whenever I need graph paper, I always you this resource to print out paper for my students to use. The resource is a series of graph paper with the intersecting lines at various sizes. You choose which type of graph paper to use depending on the size of the squares you want to have. I don’t remember where I obtained the resource but it is one I use over and over again. They come as one .pdf file.

linedgrids.pdf

Just as a teaser, here is one of the videos on education which is very relevant to where our education system needs to go.

This site has downloads for a “March Madness Poetry” contest. It is set to coincide with the NBA tournament but really could be used anytime. You can download the information in separate portions or download the whole thing in one download. Teh downloads include the directions, an information thing on how to effectively read poems, a set of 64 poems (which I use all the time and includes the great spiderman poem), a tournament bracket layout page and other things. I highly recommend these resources and I have used them for my own Grade 3 poetry unit every year.

While the poetry information takes most of the page, there are also other resources that may be useful including a mystery unit literature study, To Kill A Mockingbird resources, a package on Costa’s questioning and some literature circle information. All in all a handy site though I wish they would continue to add to it.

To get to the site, click here.

This was/is exactly what I think about Twitter. Now, the author did become a fan of twitter after having used it and listed their reasons and now there is wiffiti; a sort of cross between a wiki and a twitter. However, I still do not understand what the fuss is. Who has the time to do this? I don’t get to my computer enough during the school day to keep a Twitter going effectively. I have a hard enough time keeping my personal blog and my classblog going let alone get home to my wife after planning, etc to have some quality time.  Having other educators commenting on your thoughts of the moment and sharing their thoughts is appealing. In our classrooms all day, it is sometimes hard to have conversations with other teachers that really reaches deep into the core of teaching and learning. So, having a group of educators at your fingertips you can follow and converse with is appealing. However, I believe that it is missing the meaningfulness of actual interactions that are longer than the instant, quick response twittering enables. Don’t we want to develop deeper understandings of what it means to educate and be an educator? Can we have those types of conversations in the small amount twittering allows us? Or are we moving more into what seems to be the domain of media where everything needs to be in quick soundbytes of information? Don’t we want to teach our students to reflect and develop deeper understandings? Can these be done using twitter? Me personally, I would rather spend the time trying to interact with other educators through e-mail, wiki’s or blogs.

The other thing I wonder about Twitter is how do we bring in the other educators who have just as much expertise and information to share but don’t want to be bombarded with constant messages. It’s too distracting. Sometimes I wonder if what we do as educational technologists is not so much bring ideas and learning together but increasingly seperate ourselves from those who don’t have as much skill with technology thus creating this division. I don’t think Twitter as a tool as to bring the two groups together.

Anyway, that’s my thought. I would love to be convinced otherwise. Maybe somebody out there can convince me.

Today’s site is a very informative one and one I especially used while working on my Master’s. The site is called Funderstanding. As you can see from the image on the side, it has great information and explanations of all the different learning theories from multiple intelligences to constructivism. Clicking on the theory takes you to a detailed definition and description of that theory of learning. Clicking on the other areas takes you to information on emotional intelligence, instruction and assessment amongst other things. Great site and lots of great information. I like how the information is simply and explicitly given so you do not have to wade through jargon. This can also serve as a good starting point for further explanations, giving a good overview of theories before encountering further resources that may be more indepth and technical.

This week, I thought I would highlight the site Letterpop. This is a really neat site to help with creating newsletters that are eye-appealing and fun. It is a simple tool to use with easy step by step directions. There are numerous templates to choose from and the creators are constantly adding new ones. Editing is somewhat limited but you can move text boxes around to create a better placement of images and text. It is also easy to add new pages. When you are done, you can either print it off or display it publicly on the site for everyone to see.

This is no Microsoft Publisher, Pages or other desktop application that creates newsletters. You are limited in your editing capabilities. When I have gone to create a newsletter, I have had some difficulties getting the edges of the page to align with what the printed version is supposed to look like. Also, there were some small issues with the ability to change sizes and types of text. You are also limited in the types of pictures you can use. It does have a supply of clip art like Microsoft does. You are using pictures that you have downloaded yourself or images from Flickr. I used yotophoto which worked nicely but it also means more time looking for an effective picture that fits with what you want.

This site is still in Beta so these kinks are to be expected. However, I am not sure I would use this yet for full newsletters. I have used it mostly as reminders or requests for help; a quick note to send home to parents. I visited the site today and saw that they are going to be making some improvements soon so hopefully some of these issues have been dealt with. I myself would like a little more flexibility with the text option. However, the site is easy to use and fun and I don’t mind using photos as I think itgives your newsletter a sharper presentation and more professional look to your newsletters.

Tell me what you think of it and how you have used it!!! Let’s start a conversation!