Global Read Aloud: Chopsticks & Meeting 2KG

Today our Global Read Aloud books by Amy Krouse Rosenthal arrived!  We were so excited to see our set of books for this reading project. 

Right away, we decided to read aloud this week's featured book, Chopsticks.  Our class thought it was funny and we enjoyed the beautiful illustrations.

We also met another GRA partner classroom today!  The 2KG class in Bangkok, Thailand sent us a video to say hello.  Using Bing Maps, we added their city to our map and looked at how far away they are from us! 

We were also surprised to learn that at 11AM this morning in Canada it was already 11PM in Thailand.  In order to share our ideas and learn with our new friends, we will have to use messages and videos rather than live video calls.  We started by sharing ideas on this Padlet board created by 2KG teachers Ms. Jennifer Baccon & Ms. Kathryn Grossi.  Their focus question for us was "How did you connect to this book?"  Many students in our class could relate to being separated from a special person (just like the Chopsticks decide to spend time apart in the book).

We are looking forward to learning more about the 2KG class and sharing our ideas about our read aloud books!

Global Read Aloud: Kickoff Day!

The Global Read Aloud starts today and our class is a part of this awesome project!  This collaborative project was started by a teacher in the United States, Mrs. Pernille Ripp.  Her idea was to use books to connect people all over the world.  This year, over 500,000 participants will be reading and learning together, sharing author studies and books selected for the 2015 Global Read Aloud! 

The Global Read Aloud (GRA) author we are studying is Amy Krouse Rosenthal.  Using technology such as Skype and Twitter, we will work together with other classrooms to learn and share.  This is a great opportunity to develop our skills in so many areas.  Not only will we be building our literacy skills, but we will also practice skilled communication, learn about other communities and people, explore digital citizenship and more!

Today, we kicked off with our very first Skype in the Classroom call!  We met Mrs. Grodek's first grade class from Brooklyn, Ohio and had the chance to ask them some questions.  It was exciting to meet our first GRA partners! We found out about their community and we noticed some similarities and differences between our communities.  Our class practiced active listening when Mrs. Grodek's students answered our questions. 

Before the call, we decided on some Skype rules for our class: 

 

Then, we used Bing maps to find out where Brooklyn is and how far it is from our school!  

 

 It was a great Skype call and a great kickoff to the GRA!

Kids Who Code: Scratch Jr. Tutorials

The Kids Who Code project continues in our classroom.  My grade 2s have become proficient coders using a number of student-friendly coding tools.  We wanted to help others learn to use Scratch Jr., especially our Kids Who Code partner classrooms - Mrs. Lowe's Class & Mrs. Caldwell's class.  Since these students are in Kindergarten, my students tried to pick coding activities that would help them learn about numbers, letters and colours.  Students chose the learning activities they would like to design tutorials for and they used Book Creator to develop their instructions.  Here are the finished products: 

How to Change the Background Color
by Wyat & Peyton

Video: http://youtu.be/UpvFkg-SzS0
PDF instructions: http://1drv.ms/1Fgs35y


How to Create a Picture using Scratch Jr. 
by Addison, Sev & Martin

Video: https://youtu.be/zMUnjo4VuGc
PDF Instructions: http://1drv.ms/1bsRD9w



How to Code a Character to Count - Recording
by Haily, Connor & Charlie

Video: https://youtu.be/A-wnqxgWOvM
PDF instructions: http://1drv.ms/1K2ETpo


How to Code a Character to Count - Speech Bubble
by Kylynn

Video: http://youtu.be/_XkFELylp7o
PDF instructions: http://1drv.ms/1EIIrp0



How to Code a Character to say a favourite colour - Recording
by Landon & Jaxen

Video: https://youtu.be/Ci5_lJF16-o
PDF instructions:http://1drv.ms/1HddW1e



How to Code a Character to say the Alphabet - Recording
by Kayleigh, Madison & Sarah


Video: http://youtu.be/SA_evLnwMC4
PDF instructions: http://1drv.ms/1Eudi9G


How to Code a Character to say the Alphabet -Speech Bubble
by Camryn

Video: https://youtu.be/4VN8rWNUEvU
PDF Instructions: http://1drv.ms/1zWdRNk