Clouds and Getting the RIGHT Fit

 This week has taken me to new places with technology.  My technology Project Launch buddies met on Monday and Tuesday with Ken, a trainer from Apple, to discuss Challenge Based Learning.  It was a wonderful two days.  (More will come from those days than this post.)

Student showing that he picked the
"right size" book!

Yesterday, my first day back in class my students took a benchmark test.  It was in reading.  As they were taking it, I was thinking about things I can do to improve their love of reading.  After school, I brainstormed with two of my techno friends about what we were going to do to relate reading and writing to their lives.  We want to help them develop that love while still bringing out the concepts of context clues, setting, character traits, summary.....(the list is quite long.)

Picture captured from Pinterest

Today, I began implementing one of the many things that was brainstormed by the three of us last night.  I began with a youtube video on how to pick the "perfect fit" book.  It details that you need a book that fits the purpose, one that you seem to enjoy, and one that fits you.  For example - Green Eggs and Ham is a wonderful book, I could summarize it, I could read it and look through it for 30 minutes, and I LIKE it - but it isn't a good fit for me because I really need something that has more depth to it.  The teachers in the movie compared picking a "right fit book" to picking the right pair of shoes.  After watching the video and discussing what WE thought might be ways to look for good fit books we came up with this:

• Good fit books for our classroom and this project probably need to be found in the chapter book section of the library.
• I Spy books and comic books would not work for today.
• Good fit books might be ones recommended by our friends.
• Good fit books would be something that we could read the first page or two and not stumble on more than five words.

Excited to go pick out their new books I walked my class down to the library.  We searched high and low to find the right fit books for us.  Some searched keywords in the computer, others asked each other or me if we knew of any good books.  Some kids even went and found old books that were their favorites.  One child when walking back into my room held a book up to his foot and said, "Look - this is a good fit book for me!" 

Google Doc App Picture

Picture captured from Pinterest

Back in class I decided to use Google Docs as the "app" they will use.  Google Docs is also on a website and available everywhere.  All they have to do is log in.  They created their document with their first name, title of the book, and the words "book journal."  Then they shared this document with me.

After giving my students time to read today, they were asked to open their Google doc and write a summary of what they read.  They also had to answer the question, "What about this book was interesting to you and made you want to read it?  How did you pick this book today?"  As their little fingers fly over their ipads I am noticing how engaged they all are.  They WANT to share what they read.  They know I am going to hold them accountable and care about what they are typing.  In a few days I will allow them to share their document with a friend and they will begin to peer edit.

Picture captured from Pinterest

I am excited about this teaching in the cloud.  Google Drive saves everything into a "cloud" so that it can be accessed anywhere.  This account will not just be on the ipads in my room everyday.  It can follow them wherever they go.  One student even asked as they were typing in my email if they could type in the email of their parent's email!  The kids like to share and to get feedback!

I found the picture to the right (of the clouds) one day on Pinterest.  It got my imagination going.  Everyone's cloud is a different size.  Some are more full with information than others.  Everyone can just instantly pull information down wherever they might be (as long as they remember their passwords).  It might be difficult for some to visualize where their information is going- this picture might make it a little bit more visual. Before, we stored information on disks and flash drives.  Now - it just goes up and somehow someone knew how to make the information come back down on command!  WOW!  I love this!

The point is - we need to keep pressing forward.  Moving onto things that work with new tools that are given to us.  We will engage learners, partner with families and communities, and change the future with just small steps...  Today's step was a new found book and sharing in "the cloud".