Practicum Week 1

The technology most readily available to my teacher is the six computers in her classroom. She actually used them the first day I was there to give math pre-tests to her higher level students. I was surprised by this because she is an older woman, and stereotype says that she would be adverse to computers. She doesn't have to instruct about computers because they go to a specialty class once a week in the computer lab. I don't believe that she uses technology other than that. She lets the children play math and reading games on the computers, but I don't think she uses them instructionally.
Several classes combined to watch a movie on fire safety yesterday afternoon. This was a good use of the particular kind of technology, but it is shared with the entire school, and would probably be difficult to use consistently.

I finished both the midcourse evaluation and the consent form.

Hands on Science

Grade 2

Standard 3: Students will have an understanding of the environment

Objective 2: Observe and describe weather

~observe and describe patterns of change in weather

I will use the thermometer probe and kidsperation

We will begin this project in the fall, when the weather is likely to have a noticeable change. We will “create a storm” where the children use a serious of hand motions to create the sounds of a storm, such as wind, light rain, heavy rain, and thunder. We will discuss how weather can change in an area, and what weather they have seen in their lives. The students will then keep a class weather journal for two weeks, observing the temperature changes using the thermometer probe, as well as observing what the clouds and winds are doing. We will collect the data and plot it on a graph using kidsperation, making it look like a weather report they might see on TV. We could make predictions using the trends we see, and past knowledge we have of weather from last year. We will see how this compares to the previous years for the same area. We will also compare it to other areas of the country and the world.

This activity will occur both inside the classroom and outside, observing the weather and discussing climate.

Google Earth Review

I looked at the google earth projects of Sarah, Alli, and Nancy.

It was really fun learning about Google Earth. In the end, it was a lot easier to manipulate than I would have thought. The gadgets are super cool, and would interest elementary age kids even more. The down sides were that it might seem a little more complicated for them to use alone that I would feel comfortable letting them do as a teacher. I think if it could somehow be teacher lead at first, then let the students loose on it after a while of modeling how to use it. Also, I found it challenging to write it in such a way as to have in understandable for young kids. It would be a great tool for the older grades to enhance the curriculum.

Google Earth Tour

I made a tour on Google Earth to explore the differences and similarities between urban and rural communities in various locations of the Earth.

Google Earth Plan

2 Grade core for Social Studies:
Standard 2
Students will develop a sense of self in relation to families and community.
Objective 2
Examine important aspects of the community and culture that strengthen relationships.

1. Compare rural, suburban, and urban communities.

I chose to do a virtual tour on this subject because it interests me to see all the differences there are between people and locations within the same area. I will be looking at three locations in Utah, to show that they are all fairly different and contain different kinds of people. Then the fourth location will be of my home in Southern California, and it will be up to the students what kind of location it is.

For each area, the students will choose a house they see, and tell how they know that it is in a rural, urban, or suburban local.

I have put the outline of my lesson activities on the table below, but will expand them and make them more specific when it is time to create the tour.

Google Earth is a good tool for this assignment because it shows the students where they are relitive to to the rest of the world, and helps them see that even in Utah, there is a wide range of places to live and people to know. It gives them a better glimps at the reality of their location, rather than looking at a globe or a regular map.

Location:	Activity Description:	Google Earth Content:
Salt Lake City	Look at how many buildings there are, the size of them, and what they might be used for.	Population and ethnicity layers of SLC. Also, the 3D versions of the buildings.
Provo	How does this differ from SLC?	Look at pictures of actual places, such as BYU.
Payson	Are there more fields or houses? How is this different from the previous locations? What do the people in payson likely do?	Locate different kinds of landmarks, like big buildings, houses, fields, etc. from the pictures
My home (2 Dale Lane Redlands CA	What kind of a town do I live in: rural, suburban, or urban? How can you tell?	population layer.