It is hard to believe that our quarter is ending so soon! My superstar 6th grade classes have worked so hard since the beginning of the school year. From coding to food trucks, we have been through so many different technologies over the past 10 weeks!
We started out the quarter learning about Canva, a graphic design program that you can use to create fun and innovative designs. While learning about Digital Citizenship, we learned about Prezi and Powtoons. While coding, we learned about the Circuit Playground Express, an external circuit that has lights, sounds and so much more! We used Makecode to create a code for Harry Potter's Sorting Hat, Digital Literacy style. We also learned how to code using MIT App Inventor. As a group, we struggled with this technology, and learned that sometimes troubleshooting a technology can be very frustrating! We also completed some very fun coding projects in Code.org.
Our quarter is ending on a Food Truck Design Challenge. In groups, we are working on completing the concept of a Food Truck. The students are currently working in groups to create a concept, logo, truck design wrap, menu, slogan and presentation. We learned a new vector-based software called Vectr. Vectr allowed the students to create logos. We also learned about a great resource for finding colorful and interesting templates for Google Slides called Slides Carnival. All of these software programs are accessible to students here at school, and may help your student create some really impressive projects in classes throughout middle school!
Finally, encourage your students to keep exploring technology and working on those great fundamental skills we have been practicing all quarter. Typing Club, Newsela and Readworks, Quizlet and Code.org are all available to your student through their Google Classroom and Clever, and they can certainly keep practicing! Thank you for sharing your students with me! If any of your students are interested in continuing to explore technology, you are welcome to check out the after school clubs. I will be running a Robotics club for four sessions. The first one starts this evening, but there will be opportunities to join in January, March and May. Please feel free to email or call to get more information!
Tuesday, November 5, 2019
Friday, September 20, 2019
An exciting few weeks in Digital Literacy!
The past three weeks have just flown by, and we have already accomplished so many things in 6th grade!
First, the students showed a little bit about themselves while learning a new program called Canva. Canva is a graphic design software that can be used online and includes templates, images, different fonts and layout ideas. It is a great program that students can use when creating projects for other classes throughout middle school and even into high school. Each student had to create a poster about themselves adding images, text, and even small animations that told the story of who they are and what they like. I learned so much about all of them as they shared their work with me. Everyone did a fantastic job! Take some time to ask your student about their poster, and look at the wonderful graphic design work they completed while becoming Empowered Learners (one of our ISTE standards. The link is included here if you would like to review) and exploring a new technology.
Last week, the students again were able to become Empowered Learners by working in a program called PowToons to create an engaging slideshow about the 7 Habits for Highly Successful people. The students have been learning about the 7 Habits in their Norski and Advisory times. If you are not familiar with the habits, I have included a link to a resource here. We talked as a class how to use different resources and tools to learn new skills, and we used our best perseverance skills to trouble-shoot and collaborate. It was a hard task for the students, and there were many opportunities to learn how to ask a good question when they were stuck! Next week, I will be posting some great examples that the students created!
Finally, this week we started work on our Digital Citizenship projects. The students will be learning yet another presentation software that they will be able to use in other classes called Prezi this week. We will be working more on the instructions for Prezi, because it needs a lot more explanations. This platform will be used to show what the students are learning about being Safe, Respectful, and Responsible online.
As always, I am happy to answer any questions that you might have! Feel free to email, call or stop by. I am still looking for more parent volunteers as well. If you have the time, I would love to include you in our classroom!
First, the students showed a little bit about themselves while learning a new program called Canva. Canva is a graphic design software that can be used online and includes templates, images, different fonts and layout ideas. It is a great program that students can use when creating projects for other classes throughout middle school and even into high school. Each student had to create a poster about themselves adding images, text, and even small animations that told the story of who they are and what they like. I learned so much about all of them as they shared their work with me. Everyone did a fantastic job! Take some time to ask your student about their poster, and look at the wonderful graphic design work they completed while becoming Empowered Learners (one of our ISTE standards. The link is included here if you would like to review) and exploring a new technology.
Last week, the students again were able to become Empowered Learners by working in a program called PowToons to create an engaging slideshow about the 7 Habits for Highly Successful people. The students have been learning about the 7 Habits in their Norski and Advisory times. If you are not familiar with the habits, I have included a link to a resource here. We talked as a class how to use different resources and tools to learn new skills, and we used our best perseverance skills to trouble-shoot and collaborate. It was a hard task for the students, and there were many opportunities to learn how to ask a good question when they were stuck! Next week, I will be posting some great examples that the students created!
Finally, this week we started work on our Digital Citizenship projects. The students will be learning yet another presentation software that they will be able to use in other classes called Prezi this week. We will be working more on the instructions for Prezi, because it needs a lot more explanations. This platform will be used to show what the students are learning about being Safe, Respectful, and Responsible online.
As always, I am happy to answer any questions that you might have! Feel free to email, call or stop by. I am still looking for more parent volunteers as well. If you have the time, I would love to include you in our classroom!
Tuesday, August 27, 2019
Welcome to 6th Grade Digital Literacy!
I can hardly believe that the beginning of the 2019-20 school year is just around the corner! It seems as though I just said goodbye to all of my wonderful 5th graders and now suddenly they are coming back to me as 6th graders!
For those of you who did not have me for Digital Literacy last year, let me share a little bit about myself. My name is Angela Flickinger-Pierce, and this is my second year of teaching at the Deforest Area Middle School. I love it here! I love the students, the other teachers, the community, the parents, I just love everything about being here! Before I was a teacher, I worked as a Marketing and Fund Development Director for non-profits in the Madison area. I realized my true passion was working with children, and I went back to school to become a teacher. I was certified in 2018, and just completed my Masters of Education this past May. I live in Poynette with my husband, daughter, son, chihuahuas and chickens. My human family (minus chickens and chihuahuas) can be seen below!
This year, Digital Literacy is going to be a little bit different. Instead of having class every other day like last year, we will be meeting everyday for a quarter. For 6th Grade, we will explore;
-Digital Citizenship, or learning how to be safe online
-Coding, using different programs
-Robotics
-Graphic Design
-Engineering Design Process
We will also work on everyday skills such as vocabulary, typing, collaboration, reading comprehension, and becoming learners that problem-solve, think creatively and know how independently attack whatever work we are doing. Digital Literacy is a Standards Based class, meaning that the grades earned in this class show what we are able to do according to a standard or skill. The standards used for grading in this class are the ISTE Standards, or International Society for Technology Education linked here. We will start our quarter by breaking apart these standards, and thinking about what each of these standards means. Every project completed by your student will include a rubric outlining the ISTE standards that they will be graded on. You may have questions about these standards-please feel free to ask!
I will be sending a parent letter home with your students on the first day of class with some other basic information about homework, missing assignments, one-on-one mentoring or tutoring time, and grades. Additionally, I will be sending home a document with a Digital Literacy Wish List and Volunteer form. I welcome anyone willing to give their time, from ten minutes to hours! If you are at all interested in getting involved in the classroom, please fill out the form. I have linked the form here as well.
Finally, as we start out this new and fresh school year, I just want to say that your student's hopes, dreams, happiness, comfort and sense of self is my first priority. If there is anything that you would like me to know about your student, please reach out! I am here before and after school and can be reached by email and phone. It's going to be a great year!
For those of you who did not have me for Digital Literacy last year, let me share a little bit about myself. My name is Angela Flickinger-Pierce, and this is my second year of teaching at the Deforest Area Middle School. I love it here! I love the students, the other teachers, the community, the parents, I just love everything about being here! Before I was a teacher, I worked as a Marketing and Fund Development Director for non-profits in the Madison area. I realized my true passion was working with children, and I went back to school to become a teacher. I was certified in 2018, and just completed my Masters of Education this past May. I live in Poynette with my husband, daughter, son, chihuahuas and chickens. My human family (minus chickens and chihuahuas) can be seen below!
This year, Digital Literacy is going to be a little bit different. Instead of having class every other day like last year, we will be meeting everyday for a quarter. For 6th Grade, we will explore;
-Digital Citizenship, or learning how to be safe online
-Coding, using different programs
-Robotics
-Graphic Design
-Engineering Design Process
We will also work on everyday skills such as vocabulary, typing, collaboration, reading comprehension, and becoming learners that problem-solve, think creatively and know how independently attack whatever work we are doing. Digital Literacy is a Standards Based class, meaning that the grades earned in this class show what we are able to do according to a standard or skill. The standards used for grading in this class are the ISTE Standards, or International Society for Technology Education linked here. We will start our quarter by breaking apart these standards, and thinking about what each of these standards means. Every project completed by your student will include a rubric outlining the ISTE standards that they will be graded on. You may have questions about these standards-please feel free to ask!
I will be sending a parent letter home with your students on the first day of class with some other basic information about homework, missing assignments, one-on-one mentoring or tutoring time, and grades. Additionally, I will be sending home a document with a Digital Literacy Wish List and Volunteer form. I welcome anyone willing to give their time, from ten minutes to hours! If you are at all interested in getting involved in the classroom, please fill out the form. I have linked the form here as well.
Finally, as we start out this new and fresh school year, I just want to say that your student's hopes, dreams, happiness, comfort and sense of self is my first priority. If there is anything that you would like me to know about your student, please reach out! I am here before and after school and can be reached by email and phone. It's going to be a great year!
Thursday, April 25, 2019
A visit from a Web Developer and a whole lotta apps!
It has been awhile since I have posted an update on our class. When the weather turns warm, the days seem to race past!
Earlier this month, we had a visit from real web developers from Noble Applications. I have included a link to their website here. Steve and Brandon brought an interesting new app that they have been working on for knee surgery patients. The kids were able to try out the sensors and see how their movement was recorded in the app. Steve and Brandon also answered many of the questions that the students had about what an average day was, their favorite parts of their job, and what sort of education they had to have to be a developer. We appreciate all the time and effort that Steve and Brandon gave us and hope they will join us again next year!
In class, we have been working on building apps in MIT App Inventor. We have worked on creating small apps with tutorials such as a drawing app called Paint Pot, and some larger apps using some code that was given to us such as the Germ Guide app. We learned the different between the Designer View, which shows us the user interface (what it would look like on our phone) and the Blocks View, which shows us the code. It has been a tough project, but I am super proud and impressed with the hard work that all of my students have done! They have struggled with some of the concepts, but are continuing to work and make progress!!!
With our day off added back in due to the snow days this winter, we took a day off from coding to practice the Engineering Design Process by building bridges in class. I had so much fun watching the students create, problem-solve and collaborate to build a bridge strong enough to hold a bucket of blocks. I have included some of the pictures from that day as well.
As always, please let me know what you have for questions! As we work through some of these projects, you may hear your student voice some frustration about the process. I have been reminding everyone that sometimes the most meaningful lessons we learn is when we fail, and that learning how to fail and try again, is the best lesson of all!
Earlier this month, we had a visit from real web developers from Noble Applications. I have included a link to their website here. Steve and Brandon brought an interesting new app that they have been working on for knee surgery patients. The kids were able to try out the sensors and see how their movement was recorded in the app. Steve and Brandon also answered many of the questions that the students had about what an average day was, their favorite parts of their job, and what sort of education they had to have to be a developer. We appreciate all the time and effort that Steve and Brandon gave us and hope they will join us again next year!
In class, we have been working on building apps in MIT App Inventor. We have worked on creating small apps with tutorials such as a drawing app called Paint Pot, and some larger apps using some code that was given to us such as the Germ Guide app. We learned the different between the Designer View, which shows us the user interface (what it would look like on our phone) and the Blocks View, which shows us the code. It has been a tough project, but I am super proud and impressed with the hard work that all of my students have done! They have struggled with some of the concepts, but are continuing to work and make progress!!!
With our day off added back in due to the snow days this winter, we took a day off from coding to practice the Engineering Design Process by building bridges in class. I had so much fun watching the students create, problem-solve and collaborate to build a bridge strong enough to hold a bucket of blocks. I have included some of the pictures from that day as well.
As always, please let me know what you have for questions! As we work through some of these projects, you may hear your student voice some frustration about the process. I have been reminding everyone that sometimes the most meaningful lessons we learn is when we fail, and that learning how to fail and try again, is the best lesson of all!
Thursday, March 14, 2019
March-ing on towards spring with Apps!
It has again been busy these past few weeks, and I realized that I had not posted an update on our 6th Grade Digital Literacy classes in more than a month! While I am not sure how that much time passed, there are many things to share with everyone!
Now that we are past our Algorithm work, we have been exploring MIT App Inventor through tutorials that we have been working on in our flexible classroom groups. If you are interested in looking at the platform that your students are working in, the link for MIT App Inventor is here. The students have been very involved in creating an app that you can doodle with, an app that you can program to talk to you, and another simple game app that involves a ball bouncing around the screen.
I think that your student will tell you that getting to this point has been challenging. Between logging into two different sites at once, connecting tablets through a code, and downloading a companion app on our Chromebooks, there has been more than enough opportunities for trouble-shooting and problem-solving with technology! I appreciate the patience that the students have showed, and how they have been working together to help each other out.
This week, we will be starting to build a Germ Fighter app using our PLTW instructions. The students will have parts of the app already built for them, and they will work together to create the rest of the app during class. For this lesson, students will be able to work at their own pace to complete the project. If your student needs any additional help from me, I am more than happy to work out a time after school, during Norski Time, or even during lunch/recess to help. Sometimes, a little one-on-one time can help make the projects go better during class.
As always, please feel free to reach out with any questions or concerns. I am here to help in any way that I can!
Now that we are past our Algorithm work, we have been exploring MIT App Inventor through tutorials that we have been working on in our flexible classroom groups. If you are interested in looking at the platform that your students are working in, the link for MIT App Inventor is here. The students have been very involved in creating an app that you can doodle with, an app that you can program to talk to you, and another simple game app that involves a ball bouncing around the screen.
I think that your student will tell you that getting to this point has been challenging. Between logging into two different sites at once, connecting tablets through a code, and downloading a companion app on our Chromebooks, there has been more than enough opportunities for trouble-shooting and problem-solving with technology! I appreciate the patience that the students have showed, and how they have been working together to help each other out.
This week, we will be starting to build a Germ Fighter app using our PLTW instructions. The students will have parts of the app already built for them, and they will work together to create the rest of the app during class. For this lesson, students will be able to work at their own pace to complete the project. If your student needs any additional help from me, I am more than happy to work out a time after school, during Norski Time, or even during lunch/recess to help. Sometimes, a little one-on-one time can help make the projects go better during class.
As always, please feel free to reach out with any questions or concerns. I am here to help in any way that I can!
Wednesday, February 6, 2019
An algorithm a day...
Happy February!
We have come through our snow days, our extra day off on Monday, and are working on getting back into our routine in class (in between ski trips of course!)
This week, we started the PLTW App Creators course. I sent out an email with details about this new unit. In case you missed the email, for the second semester, we will be working on the Project Lead The Way App Creator course. This course is designed for 6th-8th grade students to learn how to design, program, test, and possibly publish their own app that solves a problem. The following link is the website for the curriculum, and shares information on PLTW and what it means to be a PLTW school. Project Lead The Way Gateway Programs
We have come through our snow days, our extra day off on Monday, and are working on getting back into our routine in class (in between ski trips of course!)
This week, we started the PLTW App Creators course. I sent out an email with details about this new unit. In case you missed the email, for the second semester, we will be working on the Project Lead The Way App Creator course. This course is designed for 6th-8th grade students to learn how to design, program, test, and possibly publish their own app that solves a problem. The following link is the website for the curriculum, and shares information on PLTW and what it means to be a PLTW school. Project Lead The Way Gateway Programs
The App Creators course has been completely created by Project Lead The Way to be the entire curriculum for one quarter (one semester for us, since we only meet every other day). This means that we will be working on this unit almost every day, but will have a warm up to practice their fundamental skills and vocabulary. Project Lead the Way courses are specifically designed to provide the student with challenging and engaging lessons and projects that require students to work together, problem solve, analyze, lead and create at their own pace. It follows an instructional model called "Project Based Learning". Here, through collaboration, real world resources, guidance, and problem solving the students learn by doing and exploring. This is different than many of the traditional models of education in that the teacher functions as the facilitator of learning rather than the deliverer of content, while the students direct their own progress.
This week, the students have been working on writing a linear algorithm for how we start to our warm-ups. We had a few laughs as the students tried to guide me to the white board to write. Without the correct directions, I ended up walking into students, the desks and even the wall at one point!
Our class is working up to the students created their own app, and all of these ideas and concepts help the students understand the building blocks. Some of the activities might be a little frustrating as they are designed to help the students learn on their own, and to discover their own way. I continually remind the students that the important part of this is the process, not the end result. So if you finish, fantastic! If you don't finish but continued working at it, also fantastic!
Please let me know if you have any questions. I love to have visitors! You are welcome to reach out to me by email or phone.
Friday, January 18, 2019
Coding, coding and MORE coding!
This week has flown by! It has been a busy few days in 6th Grade Digital Literacy!
We started independent coding projects in Code.org this week. Many of the students have enjoyed using their developing block coding skills to program games, dance parties, Minecraft worlds and more! Overwhelmingly, the favorite was the dance party. I have included links to a few of the more advanced dance party codes. Not only did this coding project provide the opportunity for the students to choose a project that they were most interested in, it also created a great sense of classroom camaraderie! Students were collaborating on bits of codes, pooling their collective knowledge and marveling at each others projects! It has been a great week watching the students grow in their tech and coding skills, and I can't wait to see more.
Next week, as the semester comes to a close, I will be meeting with each of my students to talk about their code. We are going to look at what they found difficult, and what was easier in this project. They will also use the rubric to tell me what they feel they deserve as a grade, and I will give them their final score.
We also will be transitioning into our next unit, which will last us until the end of the year. Together we will be learning about coding phone Apps using MIT App inventor. This is a free program, and I am including the link here if you would like to check it out yourself. With this program, we will be completing the App Inventor project through Project Lead the Way.
I hope you can take a look at some of the Dance Party codes below. They are very impressive! Take a look at the coding by pressing the "How it Works" button, and peek at what is behind these animations, and see if you can figure out how to interact with the Dance Party!
Dance Party Student Example
Dance Party Student Example Two
Dance Party Student Example Three
We started independent coding projects in Code.org this week. Many of the students have enjoyed using their developing block coding skills to program games, dance parties, Minecraft worlds and more! Overwhelmingly, the favorite was the dance party. I have included links to a few of the more advanced dance party codes. Not only did this coding project provide the opportunity for the students to choose a project that they were most interested in, it also created a great sense of classroom camaraderie! Students were collaborating on bits of codes, pooling their collective knowledge and marveling at each others projects! It has been a great week watching the students grow in their tech and coding skills, and I can't wait to see more.
Next week, as the semester comes to a close, I will be meeting with each of my students to talk about their code. We are going to look at what they found difficult, and what was easier in this project. They will also use the rubric to tell me what they feel they deserve as a grade, and I will give them their final score.
We also will be transitioning into our next unit, which will last us until the end of the year. Together we will be learning about coding phone Apps using MIT App inventor. This is a free program, and I am including the link here if you would like to check it out yourself. With this program, we will be completing the App Inventor project through Project Lead the Way.
I hope you can take a look at some of the Dance Party codes below. They are very impressive! Take a look at the coding by pressing the "How it Works" button, and peek at what is behind these animations, and see if you can figure out how to interact with the Dance Party!
Dance Party Student Example
Dance Party Student Example Two
Dance Party Student Example Three
Tuesday, January 8, 2019
Spheros, Playgrounds and Cubelets, Oh, My!
It has been a wild few days back from our break exploring different robots and a fun coding explorations using a Circuit Playground which plugs directly into the Chromebooks and can be coded to do all sorts of fun things with lights and sounds. If you haven't heard of a Circuit Playground, take a peek at the some of the projects that you can make with them below.
Circuit Playground Projects
For our exploration with the Circuit Playground, we had the challenge of trying to turn our Circuit Playground into Harry Potter's Sorting Hat! Though it is a tricky bit of coding in Microsoft's Makecode program linked here, several of our students were able to complete the project, and were able to sort their classmates into the different Hogwart's houses!
We also explored a few different types of robotics, learning about how to troubleshoot technology that we do not understand every step of the way. One of the important aspects of this class is to find ways to use new technologies. For this station, we looked at Ozobots, Cubelets, and the Spheros to try and figure out how to get them to work! Many of the students had some frustrating moments when the Bluetooth did not work the way they wanted it too, or they didn't understand the direction cards they were given. By working together, the students continued to work through their frustration, and were able to get the robots to do a few things!
This week, we will be looking at another new technology, virtual reality. We will be exploring how it works, and taking turns experiencing it. We also will be starting an independent coding project, which the students will be able to bring together all of the skills they have been learning about coding to create a project that is unique to them. I hope to be able to share a few of these projects in a future post.
Circuit Playground Projects
For our exploration with the Circuit Playground, we had the challenge of trying to turn our Circuit Playground into Harry Potter's Sorting Hat! Though it is a tricky bit of coding in Microsoft's Makecode program linked here, several of our students were able to complete the project, and were able to sort their classmates into the different Hogwart's houses!
We also explored a few different types of robotics, learning about how to troubleshoot technology that we do not understand every step of the way. One of the important aspects of this class is to find ways to use new technologies. For this station, we looked at Ozobots, Cubelets, and the Spheros to try and figure out how to get them to work! Many of the students had some frustrating moments when the Bluetooth did not work the way they wanted it too, or they didn't understand the direction cards they were given. By working together, the students continued to work through their frustration, and were able to get the robots to do a few things!
This week, we will be looking at another new technology, virtual reality. We will be exploring how it works, and taking turns experiencing it. We also will be starting an independent coding project, which the students will be able to bring together all of the skills they have been learning about coding to create a project that is unique to them. I hope to be able to share a few of these projects in a future post.
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