Bake Sale!

I'm afraid this is another post that doesn't have a whole lot to do with technology, although I will post some picture recipes that I've made to use with my students. There is an explanation of the recipe format with the recipes as well as links to two very good cooking in the special education classroom resources. I have loads of cook books, including Emeril and Rachel Ray cooking with children books, Better Homes & Gardens, but the ones I've listed were specifically designed for special education.

I've always run a community service club of some type at the school where I teach. I have already shared my belief that volunteering in the community you live and work in is incredibly important, but I actually think it might be just a little more important for students who receive special education support. Often, students have low self-esteem, or problems with social skills. Volunteering is a good way to improve all of these skills, plus get some good experience for job applications, college essays, etc. But, beyond that, it gives the volunteer a sense of ownership and pride. The something to point to that makes the other things we do that aren't so fun possible. A sense of pride for these accomplishments can go a long way with students.

Anyway... I am one of 3 sponsors for the Key Club/Community Service club at my high school. We are having our first fund-raiser this year for the club on Wednesday. The club officers decided that Halloween was the perfect day to have a bake sale. I have always enjoyed cooking and baking, but I can't eat most baked good anymore, and so I don't bother. This gave me a chance to go a little wild...
3 pans of brownies: plain, white chocolate & mint, and white chocolate
12 pumpkin raisin/cherry/white chocolate muffins
12 plain date muffins
1.5 loaves of banana oatmeal cinnamon bread (I was a little shy on the batter for some reason, hence the "half a loaf".)
20 mini-star shaped Funfetti (the Pillsbury mix stuff) cakes

I hope it all sells so the Key Club students can attend the division conference in April, and the Red Cross Convention/Roll Call in March. I've never been to a Key Club conference, or the Red Cross Conventions, but I know the latter has a lot of networking opportunities for youth volunteers. For those that can't make it to the bake sale, here's a picture...

Expectations

I had to go over to the public library this afternoon to pick up our books for the Bread All Around Us project. I had worked with my school librarian to find the books, then to make my life easier, just did a reserve request at the library near where I live. I made it to the check-out desk with one minute to spare. The librarian found the books, and as she brought them over, she commented on the quantity. I explained that my class was studying different kinds of bread as part of our History/Geography unit this year, and that they were going to produce a podcast. Then, I shared I taught high school students with significant special needs, and so that was why the books were of a much lower reading level. In fact, many of the books were picture books. The librarian wondered if, maybe, I was expecting too much from my students. I told her that I didn't think so, and explained about the digital camera project (This Is My Life) from last year, and that the project was incredibly successful. More so than any of the staff that helped with the grant and project would have thought. I also told her about going to Microsoft.
So, are my expectations for my students too high? Maybe. But, they are living up to my expectations with the material they are producing. I see so much growth, and more independence in some of the students, particularly in using technology. I don't think my expectations are too high; what do others think?

Connecting Outside the Classroom

In a previous post, I shared that I was an active volunteer for Red Cross Disaster Services. I have always, in some way, involved my school & my students in that part of my life which takes place outside of school hours and the building. Last year, my students worked at the local chapter one day a week, mostly doing office tasks, but also getting involved with disaster services. All of my students formed a good working relationship with the staff at the chapter, especially with our disaster services staff member. The students that I have this year ask about the people at the chapter frequently. This has also led to more awareness of what is going on and how those events can change lives. So, it was really no surprise today when they asked me whether or not anybody from our chapter was in San Diego. One student asked me if I were going to go (even though he knows I won't go during the school year, he always asks!). After we talked about people we knew who were going out there with the Red Cross (only one from our local chapter, but there were several from other area chapters), we looked at the KPBS Google Map. We counted the number of shelters, and talked about how wildfires spread. We figured out about how far our classroom was from San Diego, and we talked about things that we can do to make a difference (that was our classroom theme last year; this year's theme seems to be "Sharing Who We Are", which also lends itself nicely to community involvement!).
We definitely did not get any work done on Bread All Around Us, even though my students made sure tell me that they knew the Red Cross was giving out bread... But, for today, my students were connected with the millions of other people who are looking at the fire coverage and they were able to get, understand and share information at a level that allowed them to comprehend what was happening. Amazing, truly...

Google Images to the Rescue

I think I may have mentioned that my class is learning about the foods of different cultures. Today, as we were taking notes, we reached the part about yeast making bread rise through leavening. At this point, I think I made the mistake of trying to help the students understand how bread rises by asking them if they knew about carbonation One of my students throws her hand in the air, and says, "Oh! Yes! I know that bread has carbonation because its on the back of the label!" It was extremely difficult to keep a straight face, and I'm afraid to admit that I didn't manage it very well. It took lots of explaining with pictures at Google images, plus shaking up some left over diet soda in a bottle before they understood that carbohydrates and carbonation were different! But, I know that every time I look at the nutrition label on food packages, I'll think "carbonation" instead of "carbohydrate"!
I've put a few of the supporting files for the first part of this project. In fact, the project now has a name thanks to one of my students: Bread All Around Us.

Changes

The other day, I asked one of my students if they had ever seen a cassette tape, because I was trying to explain about how magnets can erase data. She could not recall ever having seen one. And that had me thinking: We still had records when I was growing up, and 8-track tapes came out then. One of my favorite toys was called 2XL, which was a talking robot that used 8-track tapes for questions. You answered by punching a button on the body of the robot, and the tapes had little cards that went over the standard buttons. There were lots of choices, including an exercise tape!
But, even before I was in elementary school, we had cassette tapes.
In any case, today's Baby Blues Cartoon is very appropriate to this topic:

Podcasting Project

Podcasting and video are two elements of Web 2.0 that I haven't fully explored. With video, there are issues with student images and also equipment. I know that you can do video with a webcam (thanks to my email friends who reminded me of this!), and we can do video clips with our digital cameras. Of course, there is the old standby of digital still photographs in PhotoStory... And, I just learned today that you can take pictures that are in the Windows Photo Gallery (a Vista feature) and there is a "Make Movie" button on the screen. And so, I've decided to explore podcasting with my students.
My first step was to get the district policies, which also required assurance on my part that I knew how to use Audacity. My second step was to find a topic that might hook my students enough for them to get through the much more difficult pre-work and research before they get to put together the project. Since most of my students are teenage boys, and 3 of them are taking Gourmet Foods right now as an elective, I decided to have them explore food. My initial idea was exploring foods in different regions of the United States, but I'm worried that might be too broad. And then I remembered a wonderful project that the Family & Consumer Science teacher at a middle school I worked at did with the students (I helped my students with the project) on bread. Each culture, everywhere in the world has bread. Pita, white bread, matzoh, naan, pancakes, crackers, tortillas.
Now, I need to come up with how I want them to do the projects. As I looked at podcasting, I realized that the all of the poetry projects they completed could be considered 'screencasts' or 'videoblogs'. That really makes me want to come up with a way to have the students do this without the "picture" (screen, video etc). I'm just not sure how to make that happen.

Bookmarking

My students always have problems getting to a website that I want them to use for a class. We have tried using a variety of on-line sites and lists in Microsoft Word. Last year, I was introduced to a site called PortaPortal, which I liked because it was available at school (not blocked!) and because I could set up categories to put the bookmarks in. By using categories like this, my students can find "pictures" and look for the specific link, or "free time" and choose a game without my help. The only thing that would make it better is if the bookmarks had pictures! I've considered using del.icio.us as well, but I am worried it might be too complicated. Today, I discovered that I could export the PortaPortal links, by category, to a document which will then open in IE! I can now send my students to our global drive, and they can just find the link instead of having to retype it.
When I have, I think I'll add some Boardmaker pictures to ease the reading requirements, which then adds the pictures that I figured would make it better. You can look at the text list here
On other fronts, just about everybody has finished their Illustrated Poems, and I'm looking forward to introducing the next unit & project. The students surprised me today when I told them we'd be moving forward on Thursday by wanting to know NOW what the next project would be!

Independent Computer Use

Since the students that I work with have difficulties with organization, language and short-term memory, it is very difficult for them to use the computer independently.
One of my priorities in my classroom, and a wish that I have for all of my students is that they are able to work as independently as possible, and be successful as adults. Obviously, successful as a goal means different things for different people, but for most jobs computers & technology are important. If my students can learn some basic computer skills, including some of the creative skills like scanning items, using a digital camera, and PowerPoint, they are that much farther. It is even better if they are able to use the tools on their own without additional live support.
In my classroom, I often require that they ask a peer, and retry before they ask me or our teaching assistant (if there is one). To this end, I've created a set of Computer How To files that students can refer to in order to use the computer on their own.
There are how-to pages for logging on the school network, saving to a flash drive, printing a digital photograph, and posting to their blogs. Here is a link to the computer howto files on my wiki: Computer How To's

AAC Awareness Poems

A few days ago, Samuel Sennott posted a request to the QIAT listserv with an idea about creating "electronic" poems in PowerPoint, IntelliTools Classroom Suite, Clicker or another similar program. The idea was to choose a public domain poem available from Project Gutenberg or Google's Public Domain books, and illustrate it using pictures from Flickr's Creative Commons.
A truly intriguing idea, at least to me... so I signed up. I created two poems, both by Robert Louis Stevenson, and from his A Child's Garden of Verses. I grew up with a battered copy of that book covered in some kind of red fabric, so reading it again to choose poems was like visiting an old friend. Here are the two I made:




And, I discovered that I liked the idea so much, I wanted to try it with my students. For those that have been reading this, you'll know that we participated in the Salute to Seuss project from Jen Wagner, and created People Poems AKA 'To Think I Met Them On Park View Street'. This project seemed a perfect way to wrap up our unit on Poetry before moving forward... We did not use public domain poetry, instead we used classic Shel Silverstein (students chose: Sick, Eighteen Flavors, and Dancing Pants), and one Robert Frost (a rather ghoulish poem about a boy who gets his hand cut off). I've posted the student checklists and rubrics on my wiki here