November Happenings

What did you do this weekend? 

Each week kindergarten students in Mrs. Barnes' class have shared their "Weekend News" by drawing a picture of something they did over the weekend and dictating a sentence to an Instructional Assistant. To improve on their verbal communication skills, students have started taking a seat behind our "news desk" to broadcast an event from their weekend. This project is a fun way for students to practice speaking in complete sentences and providing details that allow their audience to better understand an event. Check out this example! 

Behind of scenes of Weekend News

York River Organisms 

Students in Ms. Ferment's 5th grade class have been learning about organisms that live in or along the York River. This research project has been a collaboration between Ms. Ferment and our school librarian Mrs. Churchill. I had the opportunity to join in on the action when students began creating their digital products. Students were given the choice to create a Pic Collage, Shadow Puppet (here's an example), or TV Show to share what they learned through their research. It was great to see students' creativity and I learned a lot by working with them. And not just about the organisms! I picked up a few helpful hints in Pic Collage from a student too!

A student works on his Pic Collage

Mrs. Churchill works with students on their Shadow Puppet creations

It was a beautiful day for recording outside

Pic Collage example

Change is in the Air
Over the last week in our area fall has made its presence known. First graders in Mrs. Cox and Mrs. Dingman's class have been learning about fall. To apply what they've learned in class, students created Pic Collages with signs of fall and sentences about the changes that fall brings.

Students capture a bit of frost lingering in the mulch

Leaves and acorns are beginning to cover the playground

Time to write about fall 

A student's work

A student's work

An ITRT Does What?

So what exactly does an ITRT in Hanover County do? Well in addition to collaborating with teachers on awesome projects like these, there are a lot of "behind the scenes" projects I've been working on the last two weeks. 

On November 1st the ITRT team had our second "Tech Take-Out" at our district's central office. During this day employees could request help with their technology use. Requests ranged from how do I create a district benchmark to how do I correctly share Google Docs and much more. I'm excited that JGES will be having the first school version of "Tech Take-Out" on December 9th. Teachers will have the opportunity request support on their own use of technology tools or lesson collaboration. 

As you may have noticed I, and teachers at both of the schools I work at, LOVE Seesaw. We've been looking for ways to have our resource teachers use the app to increase communication with families and Seesaw for Schools may just be the answer. Each school is piloting the program for four months. In order to get us up and running each student's ID number had to be tied to their accounts so that no matter what class work is uploaded in, parents will have access. I'm excited that this tedious work is now behind me and we (students, teachers, families, and administrators) can take full advantage of the perks Seesaw for Schools has to offer. 

HCES's STREAM Night will be held on December 6th. Families will join us for an evening of hands-on activities that involve Science, Technology, Reading, Engineering, Art, and Mathematics. We had a productive planning meeting last week and a flyer will be going home to families on Wednesday with more information including how to RSVP. 

What should a kindergartner in HCPS be able to do in regards to technology? How about a fifth grader? The elementary ITRT team has been working on developing a set of Technology Competencies for students. This project is in the infancy stage of development and there will be much more information to come.