Friday, December 18, 2015

December 14 - December 18

Mrs. Grau's social studies class have been in the library this week doing research using our database CultureGrams to gather information and images about a specific state.  Students will then take the information they gather and create a presentation for their fellow classmates using either Google Slides or Powerpoint.  Student were instructed in how to use Noodle Tools for their citations as they work on their project.

Ms. Poz's class finished up the week having her students view presentations that students made on Native American tribes and completing an acrostic with information gathered from the presentations.

The Winter Around the World project was compiled and completed.  Mr. Weiler's art classes completed paintings to include in this collaborative book that showcases work not only from classes in the United States, but from the China, Australia, United Kingdom, and Dubai.  Art work by our PVMS students starts on page 99, but check out the work by all the student, it's pretty incredible.

Friday, December 11, 2015

The Hour of Code

The Hour of Code was in full-force this week.  Students were learning coding skills in a variety of classes and the library encouraged all students to spend some time in the library practicing those coding skills.  Students worked in the library coding during study hall, but some high school teachers from the IT academy also stopped in to help the 8th grade math students learn some coding skills. It was great watching as students did problem solving and helped their fellow classmates who were stuck.

A variety of resources were used by the students for The Hour Code, a sample of what students worked with is:

Made With Code
Code.org
Scratch


Thursday, December 3, 2015

December 1 - December 4

Everyone came back this week after a long Thanksgiving break and were refreshed and ready to go.  It was great hearing about all the places the students traveled over break, the books they read, and the fun that they had.

This week Mr. Rixmann's world language students came in to find books for their papers on a German topic.  We discussed the variety of topics they may want to look at, from German cars and animals to cities and countries.  We also discussed how the history and biographies could be included in their paper.  Students then used Destiny to search for a book that was of interest to them, checked the book out, and began reading to gather their information.

Mrs.Nowak's science class came in to work on research on a metallic element.  We went over using techniques for searching online.  We discussion using databases like World Book and Encyclopedia Britannica, as well as how to spot a good website when doing research.

Student were hard at work helping decorate the library.  Students using the Maker Room during study hall helped to create a paper tree on the Maker Room door and a Grinch hand that was displayed with some holiday titles.  It's great to see the creativity that comes from within our building.



Tuesday, November 24, 2015

November 23 - November 24

Even though this week is only two days, due to our Thanksgiving break, they were two busy days.  Mrs. Murphy's Spanish class was in both days working on a project where they used the tool Thinglink.  They uploaded a photo from around our school and then tagged it with different descriptions in Spanish.

Ms. Poz's class was in working on Movenote and when Movenote didn't work exactly as planned we switched to plan B.  Students recorded their audio on audio recorders and the students will be importing their mp3 files into a Powerpoint.

Mr. Weiler's class came it to take photos of their Winter Silhouettes which they painted.  The paintings turned out incredible.  We then uploaded them to a Winter Around the World project to be viewed by students all over the world.  As soon as the final project is completed I'll post the link for everyone to see.  Until then a few of their paintings are below.





Monday, November 23, 2015

Pixton Project

The Pixton project that students worked on in social studies focused on one state in the United States and the 5 themes of Geography.  Some great student examples are below.

Friday, November 20, 2015

November 16 - November 20

Students are in the library getting ready for their finals in Algebra and Spanish, finishing end of the grading period projects, and finishing up writing assignments.  Trimester 1 ends next week and there is a lot to finish up before that time.

Mrs. Honn's students were in Wednesday through Friday working on a Pixton comic relating to a state in the United States.  They spent time researching and finding information, filling out a storyboard, and getting to know their state well.  Then they began using Pixton to help showcase their state.  Students will be able to view their fellow classmates comics next week.

Mrs. Honn's class also finished up doing their second Mystery Vox.  We were able to figure out their location of Buenos Aires, Argentina and they figure out we live in Wisconsin.  The students had a great discussion about their countries, cultures, and traditions!

Battle of the Books participants had their first meeting during lunch to go over basic information about the program and to get students reading.  The meetings were great, the teams are excited to get started!  All future meeting will be during homeroom.


Friday, November 13, 2015

November 9 - November 13

Students have been working hard on all sorts of different assignments during study hall this week.  Students have been finishing up work on their blogs, reading novels, completing their Thinglink projects, and working in Google Classroom on collaborative projects.

Mrs. Honn's class came in to finish up working on their "create a country" project.  It's great to see the creativity that the students can showcase in their work.  Mr. Hoppers' social studies class came in to work on journal writing relating to their Living Through History project.

This month we're encouraging students to complete the Doodle for Google.  What a fun way for students to show off who they are.

All of the homerooms worked toward a goal of collecting items for the food pantry.  The Mustang TV homeroom collected 158 items to donate, great job to those students, and the rest of the students in the building who are helping those in need.  Kudos to the Mustang TV homeroom for broadcasting 13 announcements on Friday, they did a great job information out to their classmates.



Friday, November 6, 2015

November 2 - November 6

What a beautiful week of weather we have seen this week!  Seventy-two degrees in November is a great way to start a new month and we're all enjoying it while it's here.

Mrs. Turk's students have been in the library for the majority of the week.  They are working on doing research on a topic of their choice that relates to the book they are reading, either The City of Ember or Gathering Blue.  The students were shown different tools for doing research as well as how to be website detectives.  Noodle Tools was explained and students synced up their Noodle Tools accounts with google so they can easily gather their citations throughout their research.  Students took their research and then made a project using the web tool Thinglink.

Students continued to come in to do some independent reading for Mr. Pratt's language arts class and study hall students were busy completing projects in Publisher and working hard on a variety of collaborative projects for their classes.

Friday, October 30, 2015

October 26 - October 30



This week Ms. Poz's classes came in library to finish up their Country projects.  It was amazing to see the creative ideas the students incorporated into their projects, and they did a great job working together.

Mrs. Murphy's Spanish class worked on creating an acrostic using their name and words that describe them in Spanish using Google Docs and Google Drawings.  This was a great chance to install the Add-on Open Clip Art as well as discuss when it's beneficial to use a drawing in your document.  The students found out that the drawing tool saved them a great deal of frustration!  Some great examples of this project are below:

Español Example One
Español Example Two


Wednesday and Thursday I spent working with Mrs. Honn's class doing a Mysery Vox with another 7th grade class from an unknown location.  The students from both classes asked questions to try and figure out the location of the other.  I was impressed with the mental mapping and deduction skills used by the House 7C students. We were able to figure out their location early on Thursday, it was San Jose, California!  They figure our location out shortly after we did, so we then shared information about our cities and were able to ask and answer questions together.  A big thank you to Ms. Kirwin's class in California!

Friday we had some visitors from the fifth grade classes at Clarendon.  They presented their speeches on Famous American.  They did a great job and our students had fun learning from them.  Since it's the day before Halloween students were able to dress up.  It was fun to see the creative students.






Monday, October 26, 2015

Tellagami Examples

 The students have finished using the Tellegami App to showcase their Spanish speaking skills.  Below are a couple of great examples.


Friday, October 23, 2015

October 19 - October 23

This week started off with Mrs. Honn's Geography classes coming in the library to learn about how to use QR codes for their Around the World project that will be starting shortly.  Some students have used QR codes in the past and some haven't, so this was a great opportunity for students to get on the same page.  When they were done learning about QR codes they began working a project where they create a country.
A House 7C student trying out a QR Code


Mr. Rixmann's students from WLEX came in if they needed materials for their Spanish reports.  They students used Destiny and accessed the resource lists to complete this task.  Mrs. Lynch also came in with her Read 180 students to choose picture books to read to some of their fellow students.

Mrs. Murphy's Spanish class used the iPad app Tellegami to make avatars, or gami's of themselves.  Once their Gami's were created they used their Spanish speaking skills to describe themselves. The students have had a blast learning this new app.

The end of the week I had the chance to work with Ms. Pozolinski's Geography students.  They are working in small groups and creating a country.  They're using  Google Slides to create a collaborative presentation with the different cultural, political, and economic traits of their countries.  These presentations will then be shared with their classmates.

Ms. Horne's sent small groups of students to do book studies, and what an amazing job they did discussing their books and being on task.


Ms. Horne's students completing book studies 
Students hard at work on their book studies





Thursday, October 22, 2015

Math Smores

Ms. Boushley's Algebra class created Smores, which are online flyers. They were able to choose a topic of their choice, but it needed to relate to math, so it could be a person, a job, a math tool, or something else of their choice.  Some examples of their flyers are below.


Wednesday, October 21, 2015

Teen Read Week!


Teen Read is being celebrated in the Park View library, not only this week, but through the end of the month.  We are challenging students to participate in a reading scavenger hunt.  There are many options of what students can do to participate including reading books, magazine, and newspapers. They can also listen to audio books, take a shelfie, create Halloween poetry, find interesting facts, check-out ebooks, and use Destiny to search for an author with their first or last name.  Below is a link that shows some of the different activities the students are participating in.

Teen Read Week Scavenger Hunt





Tuesday, October 20, 2015

Storybird Student Samples

Mrs. Murphy's Spanish students created incredible picture books showcasing their knowledge of Spanish vocabulary and sentence structure.  Below are a view great examples of their work.

Mis Amigos y Yo - Sample One
Mis Amigos y Yo - Sample Two
Mis Amigos y Yo - Sample Three


Wednesday, October 14, 2015

October 12 - October 16

It's hard to believe that it's already been six weeks since school started and the end of our first grading period is over!   To mark the end of the grading period conferences were on Wednesday.  The students had the day off of school for conferences and hopefully were able to enjoy the beautiful fall weather.  Since this was the end of the grading period that library wasn't busy with as many classes, but the study hall students have been working hard on completeing assignments and chekcing our our Maker Room.

Mrs. Grau's class was in on Friday.  They experiemented with QR codes since they will be starting their Around the World project shortly.  Students downloaded a QR app if they needed and they were able to test our how QR codes work.  They also found out their group for Around the World and used Google Slides to make a flag for their team.

Battle of the Books kicked off this week as well. I hope students are excited to have the opportunity to work with their friends and read some awesome books.  To view the books on this year's list take a look at the video below.


October 5th - October 9th


Students in Ms. Boushley's algebra class learned some research strategies and databases to use in doing research on a math topic, anything from a famous mathematician to a math product, to pi.  Students also made an account with the web tool Smore so that they can begin creating an online flyer on their topic.

Mrs. Murphy's Spanish class will be in the majority of the week using the web tool Storybird to create a story in Spanish that shows he daily activities of themselves and their friends using a variety of vocabulary, conjugating verbs, and adding detail to sentences.

Monday, October 5, 2015

September 28 - October 2

It's homecoming week so that means Park View starts up spirit points!  Students came in Monday with their Packer wear, Tuesday they were superheros, On Wednesday yellow was everyone to showcase our character theme of respect, Thursday was the always fun neon, and Friday ended with super blue and gold for our rooftop pictures.

Monday students from House 7A were in the library and were able to visit with the Germany students that were in town visiting.  They learned about different cultural aspects of Germany by meeting with the students in small groups.  The students learned a great deal and had a blast.

Ms. Horne's classes visited the library on Tuesday and Wednesday.  Students were working on their poetry using the app Haiku Deck to create beautiful presentations.  They also began doing research on Cambodia to help the understand the background of the book The Clay Marble which they'll begin reading next week.  Students used CultureGrams, WebPath Express, and Encyclopedia Britannica to help them research.

Thursday Mrs. Capen's students from Academic Support came in the library.  They received an in-depth tour, searched for books, learned about the databases available for research, and got any question they had about the library answered.

Friday I went and visited Mrs. Serkowski's classes in her classroom.  Our focus was e-mail.  Making sure students could send an e-mail with an attachment and understand what CC and BC mean, the difference between reply and replay all.  Students left with a better understand of how e-mail works and when they should use e-mail.

Wednesday, September 30, 2015

Mustang TV



Wow! I'm so impressed with our Mustang TV Crew this year.  It's our largest group of students to date and they are all willing to help at the last minute if they're needed.  They have learned the jobs of the soundboard, video mixer, computer, broadcast, and camera work quickly and have helped teach their fellow students.  Mr. Hopper, Mr. Cochran, and I are looking forward to great year of broadcasting with this group!



Friday, September 25, 2015

September 21 -September 25

This week was a week of STAR testing, which is now officially completed so that teachers may take a look at where students strengths and weaknesses in language arts and math are.  Students were also working hard during their study halls on their Movie Maker project for Mrs. Kelly.  All 8th grade language arts classes have been working on desktop publishing for their All About Me poems, which look fantastic.

Mrs. Schreindl's students came in and out of the library all week to finish setting up some different accounts to use in their science class. On Friday, Mrs. Witte's class came in to work on resume so they could be prepared for their jobs interviews that will take place in the next few weeks.

Friday, September 18, 2015

September 14 - 18


The month of September sure is flying by.  The new 7th graders seem to be finding their way here at PVMS and are off to a great start!

The library has been busy with students coming in to check out books for their German paper with Mr. Rixmann.  The variety of topics has been interesting to see....everything from the Berlin Wall to the Holocaust, to BMW's and Porsche's.

Mrs. Kelly's students have been scanning pictures so they can work on their Where I'm From Poem and the movies that go along with their poems. Along a similar line, Mrs. Turk's 8th graders have been using Photostory to create their movies that go along with their poems.  This project is great way to start the school year.

Ms. Schriendl will be was in the library Friday to do App loading.  We'll went through the sign-up for a variety of apps that will be used in her science class and then helped the students load those apps onto their devices.





Thursday, September 10, 2015

Welcome Back!

It's the beginning of the school year, a time when everything is new and fresh.  Students are excited to start the school year, teachers are making sure everything is set up for their students. The library started the week out with orientation for House 7A and House 7C and 7B will take part in orientation this week.  Mr. Stillman and Mrs. Turk's classes are working on the writing assessment this week.

The Mustang TV homeroom is 28 students this year, which is our largest group so far.  Today was their first day on-air and they did a fantastic job!  Mr. Hopper and I are so excited to be working with this great group of 8th grader.


Wednesday, June 10, 2015

The Last Day of School

Another school successful school year has ended.  This was an amazing year working with students and watching them learn new technology and literacy skills.  A few highlights from the library that I remember fondly from this year are:


  • The Battle of the Books Competition - so much fun!
  • The Mustang TV Crew - the student really developed an amazing talent for broadcasting, using picture-in-picture, and the new background is a great improvement
  • Helping student use the green screen to create videos
  • Watching creations in the Maker Room and seeing the excitement on students facing
  • Using Google Classroom for the first time - what a great tool!
  • Working with individual students on their many projects
  • Helping students pick out new books to read and giving them suggestions
  • Here about the books students loved reading
  • Reading Wonder and blogging with Mrs. Somer's class
Now that summer has arrived I encourage all students to find some great books and read while they have a little extra time.

Friday, June 5, 2015

June 1 - June 5

Even though it's the last full week of school, the projects and assignments haven't ended just yet.  Mrs. Kelly's class was in finishing up their 6 word memoirs and I have to say they were powerful.  It's amazing what six words and a photo can do to capture someone's attention and to want to know more.

Mrs. Grau was in working on interactive Southeast Asia notes.  The students were engaged and worked incredibly hard on the assignment.  Mrs. Wendorf class finished up editing the poems that they've been working on throughout the school year.

And finally, Mrs. Turk's class came in to work on creating a character scrapbook.  They used the Scholastic website to create a character scrapbook on their favorite character from the novels that they read in class this year.

Thursday, June 4, 2015

Makey Makey in Action

Students have taken an interest in working with our Makey Makey in the Maker Room.  The Makey Makey is an invention kit that turns everyday objects into touchpads and combine them with the internet.  It's a great way for students to begin creating and exploring.  The boys below were able to make different video games work using play doh as the controllers! 

When the Makey Makey is out, students tend to congregate around and see what's happening and they want to try it out.  It's been such a fun tool for the students to explore!
:


Friday, May 29, 2015

May 26 - May 29

As the rain comes down outside, the students are inside finishing up projects for their classes. Students are finishing their independent novels for several language arts classes.  The projects for the social studies independent project are also in the process of being completed.

Mrs. Grau's social studies class will be in Thursday and Friday to use an interactive e-book on Australia.  After reading the e-book they created either a blog, wiki, or storyboard that incorporated the text, videos, photos, and captions from the e-book.  The students did an outstanding job gathering the information they needed and created excellent projects.

Tuesday, May 26, 2015

New Creations in the Maker Room


Students continue to use the maker room and find new uses for the items in the room.  Over the past few weeks a few students have been working with the mindstorm lego sets to create different things with chains and pulleys.  It has been fun watching the students troubleshoot the problems that they had.  It's also been great seeing the students work together to create.


Thursday, May 21, 2015

May 18- May 22

Even though the weather isn't getting warmer here, the year is starting to wrap up.  Students are working on their Asia Menu for social studies and coming up with some creative and innovative ideas for their projects.  I can't wait to see the finished projects!

Mrs. Andrews students finished up their poetry to go along with the book A Long Walk to Water by Linda Sue Park.  To tie in with many of the students will be taking part in a Walk for Water challenge after school.  Students will be walking two miles with jugs of water to get a better sense of what the characters in the book had to deal with.


Wednesday, May 13, 2015

May 11 - 15

This week will start off and end with STAR testing for our 7th and 8th grade students.  Mrs. Honn will be bringing her students in to kick off their Asia unit on Wednesday with students gathering information on Southwest Asia and completing their Around the World activity for this week.

Mr. Chitwood will be in later in the week so that his students can finish up their Smore projects and then use them in helping them complete their test on Chapter 10.


Wednesday, May 6, 2015

May 4th - May 8th

This week will finish up Badger testing for our eighth graders.  The students have all done a great job at focusing on their testing over the past couple of weeks.

There are lots of projects that are being finished this week.  Mrs. Andrews students are putting the finishing touches of their "Day I Was Born" movies, Mrs. Witte's math students are finishing up their music creations.  Mr. Chitwood's class will complete their Chapter 10 Smore flyers, and Mr. Rixmann's foreign language class will be searching for books on a Spanish topic to write their papers.


STEM Toys


The STEM 8 students took their pull toys and put motors on them to see how they would run.  The students we did a Google Hangout with wanted to see the toys with motors, so we compiled a video for them.  Take a look and enjoy some of the creative toys the students made.


Monday, May 4, 2015

Children's Book Week

Did you know that May 4-10 is Children's Book Week?  Well, who doesn't remember their favorite book as a child?  We decided to showcase a few books that most students here at Park View will remember from their childhood.  What we've found is as the students look at the display they've been having great dialogue about books they loved reading as children.





Friday, May 1, 2015

Hanging Out with New Glarus Elementary/Middle School

Mrs. Arenz's STEM classes used Google Hangout to present their pull toy projects.  Students in 1, 2, 3, and 5th grade viewed the presentations and then voted on the projects they thought fit the criteria that was given to them.  The PVMS students did an excellent job of presenting their projects and the New Glarus students had great questions for our students.  An awesome day!



Thursday, April 30, 2015

European Commercial's

The European commercials that House 7C completed turned out really incredible.  The students had a fun time learning about the countries as well as using Animoto to complete their projects.  Take a look at a few great examples below.

Spain Example

Czech Republic Example

Iceland Example

France Example

Tuesday, April 28, 2015

April 27 - May 1

It's a busy week in the library and with technology use in the classroom.  Students across a variety of contents are working on some great projects.

Animoto video projects are underway in Mrs. Honn's World Geography class.  Students are creating incredible "commercials" on a European country to share with their classmates.  I'm amazed at the creativity the students have shown with their projects.

Mrs. Grau's World Geography class will be creating QR codes that will showcase the African country they are learning more about.  Students have been working on creating a Google Document with where they will include information about their country.  We will then use QR stuff to create the QR code so that others can view their information.

Lastly, Mrs. Arenz's STEM class will be hangout out with New Glarus Elementary School.  The STEM students have created pull toys which they will share with the elementary students via Google Hangouts on Friday.  The elementary students will decide which group of STEM student created the best pull toy.

To finish the week, Mr. Chitwood's 8th grade math students will get their introduction to Smore so that they can create online flyers on Chapter 10 as was done last week with the 7th grade group.

Friday, April 24, 2015

Digital Citizenship Thinglink Projects

The Communications students Thinglink projects on digital citizenship turned out fantastic.  The students amazed me with the concentration and hard work they put into this project and the end results gave us all new information.  A few student examples are below.


Thursday, April 23, 2015

April 20 - April 24

This week I'll be spending  a large portion of my time traveling to other classrooms to help with projects they are working on while the library is being used for Badger testing.

Mr. Chitwood math class will be creating Smore online flyers that correlates with Chapter 10 of their textbook.  They will be gathering videos, pictures, drawings, and information to make the chapter come alive and to better understand their topics.

Mrs. Murphy's class will be using either Prezi or Google Slides to work on a summative assessment for Spanish. Students will also learn about the Easy Bib add-on to make creating citations much more simplistic for them.

Mrs. Honn's class will be Animoto this week to create a short tourism commercial about a country. I'm looking forward to the time I get to spend in the classrooms this week.

Tuesday, April 21, 2015

Global Read Aloud 2015

I can't tell you how excited I am at the announcement of the Global Read Aloud books for the 2015-2016 school year.  I have been waiting with great anticipation to see what books would be chosen for next year so I can get my planning started on reading some of these great books with students.

If you're interested in the Global Read Aloud take a look at the website that includes information on all of the chosen books.

http://theglobalreadaloud.com/

Since I'm in a middle school the categories that I focused on were the younger middle school and upper middle school categories, therefore the books that I get to look forward to sharing with students are:

Fish in a Tree by Linda Mullaly Hunt     



Fish by L. S. Matthews









Friday, April 17, 2015

April 13 - April 17th

Mrs. Leanna and her Communications students were in the library finishing their projects on Digital Citizenship and they are turning out fabulous.  The students used Google Classroom to submit all of their projects and peer reviews.  We really enjoyed using Google Classroom and plan on using it in the future.

Mrs. Somers' students have continued their blogging on the book Wonder with students from New Glarus.  It's been great reading about their thoughts on the book and sharing ours.

This week is also the start of Badger testing for students, so the library will be full of test takers they showing off their excellent math skills.

Wednesday, April 1, 2015

April is National Poetry Month


To help celebrate National Poetry Month we have placed books that have spine poetry.  We've started this out and hope that the students create their own spine poetry.  It's addicting once you get started.





Monday, March 30, 2015

March 30 - April 2

Mrs. Somer's class started reading Wonder last week, which we will continue again this week.  They meet their blogging buddies and had a great time introducing themselves through words.  Thursday will begin our first blog on the book.  If you haven't had the time to read Wonder yet, it is a fantastic book about differences told from multiple perspectives.


Mrs. Leanna's Communication class will begin a unit on digital citizenship this week where they will be doing some role playing.  Then they will each create a project using Thinglink on a variety of topics that focus on digital citizenship.  I'm looking forward to working with this group of students on an important topic.

Thursday, March 26, 2015

March 23 - March 27

This week the 7th graders are working on their writing assessments.  Students are busy gathering information and putting that into a six paragraph opinion response.  Teachers will be reviewing these in a few weeks and focusing on the six traits of writing to help our students become better writers.

Mrs. Somer's class is starting to do a class reading on the book Wonder by R.J. Palacio.  The students will be reading the book and then blogging with students from New Glarus.  This will continue until we have finished the book, hopefully at the end we'll be able to skype and discuss the book.

Mr. Weiler's art class has their Oaxacan art sculptures on display this month.



Mrs. Leanna's class just finished their brown bag projects about themselves, take a look at them while they're here.



Friday, March 20, 2015

European Videos

Mrs. Grau's class worked on videos about European countries last week.  This week the students were able to view each others videos, here are a few examples of what the students created.


March 16 -March 20

This week students have been practicing for the Badger Exam that they will be taking later in the month of April.  So, part of the week was preparing the students and making sure they were comfortable with the feel of this new test.

To accommodate our testing situation, I'll be spending more time in the classroom with the students instead of having them come to the library.  Mrs. Grau's class finished up their video projects on European countries this week.  We learned that rendering a movie is not as easy as it seems.  I was so impressed with how hard the students worked on their movies and the end result paid off, they were fantastic!

Mrs. Murphy's class came in on Wednesday to work on their interactive story.  Students were captivated by the story and tried to figure out the mystery.  Ms. Horne's students were also in on Wednesday to pick out independent novels.  It was great helping these students find the perfect book.

Thursday, March 19, 2015

African Wix Projects

Mrs. Honn's students finished up their African websites and man was I impressed with the great work they did.  Students worked hard to make sure they had all of the criteria they needed but many went above and beyond to add things like videos and photo galleries.  Students were able to view their fellow classmates website to see some of the challenges that countries in Africa are facing as well as the beauty and positives that are happening.

Students Samples:

Republic of the Congo

Liberia

Madagascar

Chad

Uganda

Friday, March 13, 2015

Digital Learning Day!

March 13th is Digital Learning Day and Mrs. Serkowski's 7th grade Computer Applications classes have been working on creating some awesome presentations about how technologies have advanced over the years, some of their favorite technologies today, and technology innovators.  Below are a few students samples of their completed videos.



The video presentations ran throughout the day in the library for Digital Learning Day. Students could also take a look at a Digital Museum that was created with technologies from the past.

Students are able to see how telephone evolved.

It's hard to believe that this is how we stored data....No iCloud!

Students were amazed that the keyboard hasn't changed.

Many students have never seen records before.

The fact that phones and cameras are not combined was a new concept to many students.

Tuesday, March 10, 2015

March 10 - March 13

The school writing assessment is taking place in the library this week.  Students will be researching and writing a persuasive essay.  Eighth grade students will complete the assessment this week and seventh grade students will be completing their assessment in a couple of weeks.

Mrs. Grau's class will be in on Friday to continue work on their video project on Europe.  Students will be downloading their citations from Noodle Tools and then turning their citation page into a jpg so that it can be loaded into their movie.  Students will also learn how to properly render a video.

Tuesday, March 3, 2015

March 2 - March 6

Mrs. Serkowski's classes are working on making Animoto videos on a technology related topic to share with the school on Friday, March, 13th, otherwise known as Digital Learning Day.  A variety of topics have been chosen, a few topics have been Netflix, Amazon, Steve Jobs, Pinterest, and YouTube.  The students are researching how and when the companies were formed, the pros and cons, and how they've helped other companies develop over the years.

Students spent a few days doing research and were introduced to the Animoto program on Tuesday, they'll finish up the projects by Thursday and be able to few all of the videos on Digital Learning Day in the library next week.

Mrs. Grau's class will be in the library Wednesday through Friday where they are studying a European country which they will then use the program Photostory to make the a video representing their country.

Friday, February 27, 2015

February 23 - March 1

Wix is the big project on board for this week. Students in Mrs. Honn's class spent last week researching and African country and are making a website about that country this week in class.  The majority of the students have not used this program before and have picked it up quickly. The design skills that students are showing are fantastic.  Below some pictures of the students working on their websites.





Mrs. Andrews's class will be the library on Thursday to get an introduction to the web tool Thinglink. They'll get an introduction to how this tool is used and then they'll be working on creating a Thinglink to go along with the novel they're reading City of Ember.

I'll be popping into Mrs. Serkowski's on Thursday and more later next week to work on a project for Digital Learning Day.  The students will beginning brainstorming ideas for their project which will deal with technology evolution, more on this next week!

Wednesday, February 25, 2015

House 7A Smore Project

Ms. Pozolinski's students finished up the Smore project focusing on a country in Europe.  Some examples of their project are below.





Tuesday, February 17, 2015

February 16 - February 20

This is an exciting week for House 7A!  They will be spending the week in the library during their social studies class with Ms. Pozolinksi where they will be creating an online brochure using the web tool Smore.  Each student will be focusing on a specific European country for this project.  I'll be posting some of the students projects online next week.  To end their week House 7A will be going on a field trip to the Domes in Milwaukee and then the Pettit Ice Center.

Students have been working on videos that they will embed in their Smore projects, which involves a great deal of team work since they have to work on a script together, find a background, and decide which member is going to take on which part.  Overall, this group has shown fantastic teamwork, I'm looking forward to seeing their final projects.




Teams participating in their first round battles.


Since we had a double elimination bracket students were able to work their way back to the top of the competition, which is exactly what happened.  Our winning team Insert_Name_Here had to beat Ravenclaw twice in order to become Park View's winning team!


The Final Battle!


Our winning student team - Insert_Name_Here
Our winning teacher team - Bookends

Thursday, February 12, 2015

February 9 - February 13

Mrs. Grau's class will be coming to the library for most of the week.  Similar to what House 7A and House 7C did in social studies, the students will be creating a Movenote video to go along with a presentation on who of the elements of culture in regards to Native American tribes located in Wisconsin.  Students will be researching their information, creating a Google Slide and then making a video presentation using the Movenote app.

A huge thank you to Mrs. Coopman who has been helping out this week.  As she completes her student teaching hours she has been a great help to the students on their Movenote projects.  Thank You!

On Friday, the Battle of the Books Sweet Sixteen battles will be taking place.  Students will participate in head-to-head battles throughout the day in a double elimination style bracket to find out who the winning team at our school is.  The winning team will then have the opportunity to compete against the other winning teams in the state of Wisconsin.  We'll have the results of the battles next week!





Wednesday, February 4, 2015

Join the Conversation!

We're challenging students to join the conversation this month by making a conversation heart that goes along with a book.  The book can be their favorite, the last one they finished, one they want to read, or simply a cover that catches their eye. Students are able to stop in before or after school or during their study hall to create their conversation heart.

Some examples of students conversation hearts: