Classroom Google Summit (Day 2) and Glenbrook Gobbler

Today we completed the second day of our 1st Annual Classroom Google Summit.  Today's focus was largely to do with using Google Docs and learning some new command keys, which simplify certain commands.  We tried to put a Thanksgiving twist on our activity, so write when students came today they had to log into their Google account, create a new document, and then begin producing a list of as many "things" they could think of, of which they are thankful for.  Many students surprised us with lists that were over a page long within just 10 minutes!  

After specials, we moved our class into our school's Library Media Center to use the mini laptops.  We did this, because the next activity involved printing.  Our students did not know that the end result would be a word cloud on Wordle, but were curious when we began asking them to copy (Ctrl+C) and paste (Ctrl+V) words that were most important to them.  We also taught our students how to undo (Ctrl+Z) mistakes, since they sometimes over copied or deleted when trying to paste.  We suggested that the most important items be copied and pasted 5 times, next 4 times, and so on.  Eventually, all of our 28 students created some great lists.  Another tip, we introduced our students to the tilde (~) key, which we renamed the "Squiggle Key," which is used in the place of a space bar when trying to keep two words together.  

Next, students selected all (Ctrl+A) of words, copied them, and then pasted them into a blank Wordle canvas: www.wordle.net/create.  We chose to go right to the create page, in order to avoid the gallery and other random clouds.  With the click of the Go button, students had a unique way to see what they were most thankful for.  Within a word cloud, the words that students typed in most often were very large.  The less times they typed in a word, the smaller it appeared. Students were able to print two copies, one for school and one for home.  Below a look at our hallway "Thankful" word clouds and the example I created for our students(to the left):

The starting line

This afternoon our phyiscal education teacher held our school's 1st Annual Glenbrook Gobbler.  It was a 1-mile run/walk, promoting health and wellness.  We had two waves.  The first wave consisted of 3rd, 4th, and 5th graders who qualified with a mile time under 9 minutes in gym class this fall.  The second wave was for all other 3rd, 4th, and 5th graders.  It was an excellent way to send our students off for their Thanksgiving break.  Check out some of the action below:

Runners giving it their all

Mr. Slempkes racing towards the finish!

Happy Thanksgiving!

~Mr. Hendricks and Mrs. Olson

Google Summit - Classroom Style!

Last week Monday and Tuesday, Mrs. Olson and I had the pleasure of traveling to Wisconsin Dells to the 2012 Midwest Google Summit.  The summit was a gathering of educators from all over the midwest, even one from India, who came together to grow professionally with Google Apps for Education.  While attending, we both had the opportunity to listen and learn from many fantastic educators on topics such as: Google Apps, Chrome extensions, sharing features (beyond typical Document sharing), using Sites for ePortfolios, and more!  The two days turned out to inspire the both of us to try something a bit different within our classroom.

On our road trip home, we planned and organized our first ever Classroom Google Summit.  We figured, two days of school (prior to Thanksgiving) and we still have some major Google "Things" that we wanted to get our students familiar with.  So, this morning, our summit began, with one student in particular very excited to get our "Geek Week" underway (to the left).

Our first order of business was discussing in detail our Gmail accounts.  We know our students enjoy using their email accounts, but to what extent we were unsure.  We would like them to use their accounts for communication purposes, as well as in an educational manner.  I found a great article from Education World which provided the "ABC's of Email Etiquette."  We discussed each of these.  Afterwards, each student received one of the letters, of which they then attempted to create a "Glogster" poster of their letter.  Later in the morning, students each selected another student in the class to email their letter and description to.  Their email had to include a descriptive subject, a salutation, a brief description/body, and a closing.  They then replied to their classmate who wrote to them.  Our simple email etiquette lesson went well.  Hopefully students will use some of the rules they learned.


After emailing, we took some time to set up personal blogs.  We used Blogger, which is one of Google's educational apps.  In setting up the blogs, we secured them from the outside world.  While students did not get any time to play with "design" features within Blogger, they did begin their first blog post.  They had to write a post describing similarities and differences between the City of Ember movie and book (which we recently finished).  Their post also had to include which they would prefer, if only one choice, the movie or book.  Not that surprised, because it is very good, many students opted for the book only.


So, our first day of our Classroom Google Summit has come to a close.  Tomorrow our agenda will include better Google search strategies (including finding images that can be used or modified), getting to know Drive, and using the research feature within Docs.  Should be fun!