Hello All,
We've had a very busy April month. All of K-4 have started new projects. Here's a recap:
Kindergartners are continuing with their TTL4 practice. Many have downloaded this wonderful program at home and are continuing their typing practice. If you haven't yet, I strongly encourage you to download TTL4. The instructions are on your child's teacher's website under the document section. In addition to typing, they were introduced to the MS Paint program. They learned to zoom in on a page and create wonderful abstract art in which they learned all about in Ms. Leggit's classroom. I loved seeing the great designs created. They are pretty much a pro on the program as they used most of the tools such as paint bucket, shapes, text, paint brush strokes and the paint dropper.
First Graders were introduced to a great software that lets you create home pages. Ask them about it! They learned about tabs and links and dividers. They created a home page of their favorite topic. I was amazed to see so many animal home pages especially dogs (my all time favorite animal). Many used text to explain their topic and used voice recordings to introduce their topic. This program only allows 3 seconds to record and you should have heard how fast these 1st Graders can talk!
Second Graders were introduced to video animation. We went on a wonderful site called domo animate and they created 30 second videos. They had a blast using the functions to create several scenes. They added background, chose characters with various actions (you must ask them about some of these actions), props, music and speech bubbles to name a few. In order to save work, this web 2.0 tools needs user logins. I did not create individual logins but advised the kids that if they wanted to continue at home and save their videos, they needed parent permission to set up an account and to continue this wonderful program at home. Please ask them to show you the site.
Third Graders were introduced to digital storytelling. We use a web 2.0 tool called Story Creator 2 and they are writing great myths and legends. They have their own accounts and are free to continue their stories at home. This program is absolutely free and amazing. Creator lets them create chapters, add background, tons of characters, props and voice recordings that they can create or take from the program's library. The site is totally secure. They have their own login name and password and only I can publish stories on the internet. Please ask them to log on and show you what it is all about!
Fourth Graders were introduced to Logo programming language. They love this program as they can create wonderful geometric designs using real code. The user controls the turtle by inputting various commands. You can also edit the turtle into whatever you like. They used background color and then created beautiful geometric shapes such as pentagons, hexagons, septagons, and decagons to name a few. They loved using the 'define procedure' utility to simplify their code which is what programmers love to do!
As you can see a very busy April month. Stay tuned for the next update to find out what else your child has been learning here in the Mouse Pad!
Regards,
Rasha Sachdeva
