Learning About Habitats Through A Reading of, "The Salamander Room." By Anne Mazer: IST668 Lesson 1

 This week in my IST668 we had to start formulating ideas for library lessons.  I'm in a unique situation in that I can develop lessons and implement a few.  This week the 2nd graders at our school have began researching animal habitats.  I decided that I would create a lesson for their research and link it up to language arts.  I've pulled a bunch of habitat books for the students to look at, but I wanted to tie in an Easy Fiction book to introduce the topic of habitats and get them engaged and excited about habitats.  I found the book, "The Salamander Room," by Anne Mazer.  Our library does not own it, so I looked at other libraries on Oahu.  The only library that had it was in Kapolei, but it was not available.  Luckily, I was able to find it on YouTube.  Thank goodness for technology!

Photo courtesy of Amazon.com

The lesson took place in Ms. Soares' 2nd grade class at Daniel K. Inouye E.S.  I started the lesson by asking students what a habitat was to activate their background knowledge.  Many students stated that a habitat was a animal's home and I was happy to hear that some knew what a habitat entailed; climate, plants, animals, etc.  I then further engaged students by asking them if they had ever tried to catch a gecko (these lizards are plentiful here on Oahu).  I connected with the students by telling them about my daughters' experience's catching gecko's and trying to keep them as pets.

Once I felt good about where the students were at, I started the YouTube video of the book.  The classroom teacher helped me by casting the video via chromecast onto the class's TV.  I asked her to pause during certain times so I could ask student's questions about the reading.  The student's enjoyed this activity and this got them ready for the second part of the lesson.

After the reading I asked students to pick a wild animal they would want as their pet.  I asked a few students what their animal would be.  I got such responses as cheetah, grizzly bear, wolf, and shark.  Once students had the animal in their head, I had them think about what habitat their animal might live in.  From there I instructed students to grab their computers, log on, access our library's online database Pebble Go, and go to the animal habitats page.

 I then instructed students to take short notes of the descriptions of their animal's habitat, because they were going to have to draw a picture and write some sentences describing their animal's habitat.  I instructed the students to not write down the whole sentence, but just the descriptive words or "keywords."  I gave them an example of this my note taking strategy, and at first some students were more concentrated on describing their animals than the habitat.  However, once Ms. Soares and I circulated around to see their work, we were able to steer them more towards describing the habitat the animal lived in rather than the animal itself.   To keep students on track, I reminded them that they were making a room for their animal and it would need to look like their home in the wild as close as possible.  So, we needed to research where they lived in order to make their room as real.  This activity took place for about 20 minutes.

After note taking was done and computers were put away, I handed out drawing and writing template paper that the teacher provided.  From there I explained to students that they needed to look at their notes and based on what they wrote draw me a picture of their animal in it's "home" or habitat. Students were also instructed to write a brief introduction of the animal they chose and then describe to me in writing its habitat.  The lesson went off without a hitch and the students were completely immersed and engaged in the activity.  

Sample of my lesson with my daughter Kaydence.

At the end of the day I went back to talk to the teacher about the lesson and she stated that the students loved it!  In addition, because of the lesson they wanted to learn more about the different types of habitats.  She also stated that by providing this type of research students who normally do not participate were not only participating, but fully engaged and creating.  I felt fulfilled after the lesson and honestly felt as though I had found my place.  Now to work on my second lesson.  A post of that lesson will definitely be up in a few days!

Rome loved this activity and knew exactly what he wanted to write about.

3rd Graders Animal Adaption Research

This week I was able to implement a library lesson geared towards 3rd graders.  The focus and goal of this lesson was to introduce the concept of animal adaptations and for students to practice pulling out descriptive or key words and relevant information.  I began by having students sit on the floor and asking if they knew what an animal adaptation was.  I wanted to see if I could get them to access their background knowledge on the subject.   From there I gave them a brief definition on what an adaptation was.  I made the definition more relevant by providing examples of it in humans.  I gave them the examples of teeth and skin color.  They were very interested in both these examples and questions abounded.

Before the lesson began I pulled a few books that had examples of adaptations.  Here is a picture of one of those books, "What if you had animal teeth?"  I had pulled a few examples from each book and shared them with the class.  The kids ate up the information and slowly I began to see them making the connection.  At the end of the reading I asked if they had come up with any examples during the reading.  One girl brought up the fact that whales needed a tail in order to swim in the ocean.  I praised her for making the connection and prepped them for the next activity.

Book used to give examples of animal adaptations

Before the lesson I had also pulled books on specific animals; bats, sharks, butterflies, sea turtles, wolves, etc.  I bought a pile of books at each table and asked if students could pick a table.  There were about 2-3 to a table.  I told them to investigate the books in front of them and find examples of their animals adaptations.  Once they did this for a few minutes and got a good idea of what they were looking for, I gave them note-card sized paper and pencils.  I asked them to zoom in on those adaptations and draw them.  I chormecasted an example of this from our library's website onto the TV at the front of the room.  From there I had students label what the adaptation is.

Once students had completed this step I asked them to turn in their note cards and I posted them on a chart.  The chart indicated if the adaptation dealt with teeth, feet, hair, ears, or another type of adaptation.  Once all the note cards were on the chart, I had the students gather at the carpet again and we went over the adaptations they found.

Student's pictures taped onto chart paper

The students had a great time working on this activity.  They stayed engaged the whole time and wanted to know more about examples of animal adaptations.  I suggested that they ask their parents to get on the computer and help them to find more examples.  This is just way research can be broken down for students.  I always like incorporating reading, writing, and drawing into students' research.  That way they are incorporating their senses, thus allowing the new information to be successfully incorporated into their background knowledge.  I hope to be able to do this type of lesson with other 3rd grader classes during their animal adaptation research.

Schools of the Future Conference Recap: My thoughts

Last week was an incredibly exciting week for me and my colleague Michelle Colte!  We attend the School's of the Future conference in Honolulu, HI  Mrs. Colte, our technology coordinators, and myself participated in a playground session on makerspaces.  If you are unfamiliar with playground sessions at conferences they basically offer you the chance to learn information in a small snippet, our's was a Smore poster, and engage with either with tech or materials brought from different educators.  Think of it a quick and dirty way to learn either techniques for teaching or lesson ideas.  I particularly like them because they are hands-on.  Anything to get the juices flowing and creating makes me happy.

As I said above, ours was about our school's makerspace and how we created it on a shoe-string budget.  We made a huge call out to the students and parents of our school and got a ton of stuff to get use started.  We literally have everything from bottle caps to quilling materials...literally!  On that note, since our makerspace was first initiated, we also have more high-tech gadgets as well.  iPads, Ozobots, Dot and Dash, and Bloxels are just a few high-tech items.  During the session we demonstrated how an educator could do an activity either using a low-tech or high-tech tool, it's all on your level of comfort and of course your budget.  The session was a success and I had fun working with the ladies to pull it off.  Click on the link here to view our Smore poster!

The conference was two days long and on the second day I mosied over to the librarian's session.  I was super excited to see that Jennifer Lagrade or Library Girl was presenting!  I follow her blog on school libraries and her sessions focused on not getting caught in the cycle of being a zombie librarian.  Basically, she introduced strategies on how you could make your library relevant and engaging to students in this technology driven world.  I loved hearing her words of wisdom, but I think I may have liked it more that I got a selfie with her too!

Me with Library Girl!

I think it's important to get into a subject that she really focused on, and that was that as librarians we must be connected educators.  Since our positions can seem outdated and/or irrelevant it's important that we get connected on social media and network with other educators in order to grow and gain ideas about updating and presenting innovative ideas our libraries.  We have to advocate for our libraries and in order to do that,we have to be connected and show the world what we're doing in our libraries.  This message especially resonated with me because, in the short time I've been in the education world I've seen the importance of being connected and getting ideas from other educators on how to engage students and keep the learning relevant.  The same applies to librarians.  I say this because of the education climate at the moment.  If we as librarians do not connect, become a life-long learners, explore our passions, grow, and become innovative then we can pretty much ensure that our library's will be under utilized and die.  That's right... die.  Now more than ever we as librarians need to bring our roles in education to the forefront and advocate for them.  We need to make our library's connect with student's in a way that is meaningful and challenges them to want to explore the world around them.

The importance of being a connected educator

Podcasting in School Libraries

This week as an additional activity we were asked to brainstorm ideas of how we would use a podcast in the school libraries.  My mind immediately went to students recording book reviews that could be posted on the school's website.  I then thought it would be fun to record our bi-weekly lunchtime Nene discussions.  First, I thought about providing a  podcast of the questions that would be asked during the discussions to get students thinking about them.  They could write answers down or simply wing them.  Then I thought about recording the discussions altogether and providing links to the discussions on our website.  I really liked this idea, and although it wouldn't be scripted it would provide a chance for students who missed the discussion to still feel as if they were a part of it.  In addition, students could share the podcast with their parents or students could provide a link in their blogs so that other family members could experience what they are doing in school.

After I got to thinking about podcasts more and after reading Lori Atkins Goodson and Matt Skillen's article entitled, "Small-Town Perspectives, Big-Time Motivation: Composing and Producing Place-Based Podcasts, I started hatching another idea.  My passion for education involves helping military children. Before I went back to work I was heavily involved with the Army's Family Readiness Group.  This group helps to foster a sense of comradery and community among the wives and families of a particular unit.  Since I've started working I still hold onto that passion of bringing people together and giving them a voice.   I now work at a military school located on the army installation Schofield Barracks on Oahu.  Ninety-five percent of our school population is military children.  All year children are constantly coming and going.  I also live on the base and many of the children I see at school I also see in my neighborhood.  Each child has a story they could tell you and each of them has a secret to share with you about how they have overcome the stresses and challenges of being a military child.  Giving these children a chance to tell their stories and provide them a voice would be a course of action I greatly want to pursue.

How I would structure it would be it give students the prompt of, "Tell me about a time when it was hard to be a military child?"  I would suggest telling me about when a friend moved, or a deployment, or them moving, or being away from family.  From there I would ask them to write down their story which will also act as their script.  I would once again give them the prompts, "The most challenging experience I had as a military child was.....",  and "I got over this by....."  I would also ask for them to do a drawing to go along with their picture that way we could display their work either in the library or in their classrooms.  I think this activity would get kids talking and writing who otherwise do not.  I would try to want to do it during the month of the military child in March.  I know the students would love doing this especially if they knew they would get to display their work to an authentic audience, say the general of the base.  This activity could really get students to show off their resiliency in the face of challenges.

Here I've provided a link to the podcast and pictures of an example I did with my eldest daughter Kaydence.  She followed the prompts above and did a great job!  She loved working on this and was excited to be able to record and listen to herself at the end.

Kaydence Stone's writing and drawing.

QR Codes and Your Library

Have you ever heard the phrase, "Big things come in small packages?"  Well that's a QR code in a nutshell.  It's a 2D image jam packed with information for your user to access.  I basically equate it to a wormhole for your computer or digital device.  Once you've downloaded a QR scanner onto your mobile device the possibilities are endless for the type and range of information you will find when you scan a QR code.  All you do is use the QR scanner app to capture an image of QR code through your devices camera.  Once this is done the information (i.e. website) instantly pops up and you are reading, viewing, or listening to content directed specifically towards you.  I especially enjoy using them when it's time for myself and the teachers at our school to sign into our Seesaw accounts.  Instead of having to go through the hassle of signing in, you scan the QR code for your class and your logged in and directed to the class attached to that specific code.  This is especially handy if you have multiple classes like me!  

This week in my technology in libraries class we were asked to create a QR code for a designated purpose for a specific library-related activity.  Before I even really sat down and thought about this discussion I had thought of one activity that could be linked to a QR code in libraries.  Mainly I'm thinking of student book reviews.  What a neat way for student's to be able to use technology and create something they can use for later!  Plus they could take the QR home to parents or display it on their blog and family members could see what their doing in other areas of school, specifically the library.

In our library at Daniel K. Inouye E.S. we have Nene book discussions during lunch.  Nene books are a list of books that have been chosen by the students of Hawaii.  We have bi-weekly book discussions for each book that is on the list, usually a list can range from 15-20 books.  I think it would be a great idea to link up a QR code to our library's website in regards to our Nene discussions.  Another use for a QR would be to have one linked up to our library's makerspace page.  We could either link it up through our library's website and direct users specifically to the makerspace page or we could direct users to our Instagram page where we showcase much of our makerspace creations.  This could be especially useful when displaying information at conferences, either a lecture session or a poster session.  Attendees can scan the code and go right to our makerspace page and see all the fun and engaging items are students are creating.  I also think linking a QR up to a blog would be an effective tool to increase traffic towards one's blog.  This would be especially useful if your looking to get your name out a conference!

The possibilities of QR codes in education and specifically in libraries are endless and the sky is the limit!  Use your imagination and come up with creating and exciting ways to share information with your students and users of your library!  Scan my QR code below to see what we've done in my library's makerspace!