Category Archives: Connected Learning

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World Read Aloud 2020

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Each year we look forward to connecting with authors and classrooms around the US for Litworld’s World Read Aloud Day.

LitWorld founded World Read Aloud Day in 2010 as an opportunity for people all around the globe to celebrate the joy of reading aloud, and advocate for literacy as a fundamental human right that belongs to everyone. Over the last ten years, World Read Aloud Day has evolved into a global movement of millions of readers, writers, and listeners from communities all across the world coming together to honor the joy and power of reading and sharing stories, and continue expanding the definition and scope of global literacy. ~Litworld World Read Aloud Day

Back in November, I began using a collaborative Google document to find classrooms, libraries, and authors for us to connect with. In each connection, we chose a book to read aloud together. Sometimes we would have a specific kind of discussion planned for our students after the book and other times we just let students ask one another questions to make a connection to another group of learners.

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This year, we made connections with classes in Georgia, Vermont, Maine, Kansas, Michigan, New Jersey, Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Virginia, We also connected with authors Laura Murray, Jess Redman, and Liz Garton Scanlon.

We shared several books with our connecting classes. One favorite was the book Truman by Jean Reidy & Lucy Ruth Cummins. This book tales the story of a brave and small tortoise named Truman who sets out on an adventure in his apartment while he awaits the return of his Sarah. When we connected with Donna MacDonald and her students in Vermont, we got to meet their pet tortoise, Milo.

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We shared the book Just Ask by Sonia Sotomayor with a few connecting classes too. This book is filled with students who learn in many different ways and each page ends with a question. Students in each connecting class shared answers to questions such as “what frustrates you?” and “how will you use your powers in the world?”.

Another thing I love about connections is being introduced to new books.  Two books that were new to us this time were the hilarious Grownups Never Do That by Benjamin Chaude and Davide Cali & Seagull and Sea Dragon by Sydni Gregg. Both of these made great read alouds for a connection. Seagull and Sea Dragon had two voices so each librarian could choose a character to read. Grownups Never Do That riled up students and made them want to share all the things they had seen grownups do that children are told not to do.

Our author connections were fantastic this year. Laura Murray involved the students in reading Gingerbread Man Loose in the School and shared how the book came to be. Jess Redman told us about her upcoming book Quintessence and read a chapter from The Miraculous. Liz Garton Scanlon showed us several of her books and did an interactive reading of Bob, Not Bob.  One of the most special things about connecting with authors is that they answer student questions.  We get to learn about where they get their ideas, how long it takes them to write their books, what the revising process is like, and more. Since they are in their homes, they also can reach over and grab artifacts to go along with their answers.  For example, a student asked Jess Redman what her favorite books were as a kid and she was able to reach over and get the actual copies of the books from her childhood.

As we met new friends via Skype, we always looked at map to see where they were in relation to us. Many of our northeastern friends were experiencing snow, so we got to hear about how they go to school in the snow.  Our Kansas friends were very close to Missouri, so we got to learn about the Super Bowl excitement and how school might be canceled for a parade. We got to share a tornado warning with a connecting class during our week of crazy Georgia weather.

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World Read Aloud always brings great connections to people in the world, shared stories across the miles, and interesting conversation between learners.  We look forward to next year.

 

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It’s Time to Vote for the 2018 Barrow Peace Prize: Who Will Win?

Our 2nd graders have been hard at work learning about 4 civil rights leaders and preparing a project that has become known as the Barrow Peace Prize.

A few details about what has happened before the final products you now see:

  • After learning about people who have won the Nobel Peace Prize, students brainstormed a list of character traits that are needed in order to win the Barrow Peace Prize.

  • Students researched 1 of 4 civil rights leaders using a Google doc from Google Classroom, Pebble Go, Encyclopedia Britannica, Destiny Discover, and books.  All research was done in the library.

  • In art, students created a watercolor image of their civil rights leader.

  • In writing, students crafted a persuasive essay about why their civil rights leaders should win the Barrow Peace Prize (named after our school).
  • Using Flipgrid, students recorded their essays and art.

Now, the students are ready for you!  They need you to visit their videos, listen to & like their work, and most importantly vote on which of the 4 civil rights leaders should win the 2018 Barrow Peace Prize.  In late February, we will connect with Flipgrid via Skype and announce the winner.

Please share this project far and wide so that we can get as many votes as possible.  All videos and the voting form are linked together on this Smore:

https://www.smore.com/dk4z8-2018-barrow-peace-prize

Voting ends on February 23, 2018 at 12PM EST!

 

 

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Celebrating Picture Book Month and Remembering Dianne de Las Casas

This marks the 5th year that our school has celebrated Picture Book Month. This wonderful event was founded by Dianne de Las Casas, author and storyteller extraordinaire.  The children’s book world sadly lost Dianne this year in a tragic fire, so it makes this year’s Picture Book Month bittersweet.

I came to know Dianne through Picture Book Month. Each year I host a Picture Book Smackdown at the close of November which brings together students in multiple states via a Google Hangout to share favorite picture books. We also invite authors to join us and share their favorite picture books too. For the past few years, Dianne has also joined us.

When we connected with Dianne, she was always full of stories and blinged out with her tiara, sparkly attire, bright nails, and bubbly personality. We always laughed because no matter how much we tried to keep the smackdown moving along, Dianne was always hard to contain.  She wanted to share so many picture books with students and read aloud her favorite texts. Dianne was such a sweet and giving soul.   She even sent us autographed copied of her book to thank us for celebrating picture books.

We will greatly miss her this year. Katie Davis, another member of the Picture Book Month Community, posted a nice video remembering Dianne and her picture book legacy.

Even though we are sad, we are remembering, celebrating, and honoring Dianne by continuing to carry on the Picture Book Month legacy.  One way we do this is by book talking picture books every day on BTV, our morning broadcast.

Another way is by hold a Picture Book Month Challenge. I encourage students to read as many picture books as possible during the month of November. During the challenge, they must read at least 10 picture books, which includes some picture books from specific genre sections of the library plus a couple of “student choice” sections.  Every picture book section is labeled with a Picture Book Month logo so students can easily see where picture books are located in the library.

This year, I’ve also made a picture book Flipgrid where I hope students, teachers, and families will share picture books during November and beyond.

I’m also planning this year’s Picture Book Smackdown where students from multiple grades will book talk picture books with students in other states.

I hope you’ll consider celebrating Picture Book Month in your own school.  There’s no right or wrong way to do it.  Just read picture books and celebrate their importance in the world. They are a powerful window and mirror into the world.

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The Winner of Our Global Book Talk Challenge

For several weeks, people around the world have been contributing to our 30-second book talk Flipgrid.  In March, we narrowed the videos to 16 and have been inviting a global audience to listen to the videos and vote on the brackets each week.

After many, many votes, we have a winner!  Congratulations to Evin for her book talk of It Came in the Mail by Ben Clanton.  Adaline’s book talk of I Dissent by Debbie Levy was a very close 2nd place.  Both of these students will receive a special recognition on our morning broadcast as well as gift certificates to our local bookshop, Avid Bookshop.  Please help me in congratulating our winners, but more importantly, continue to share great books with one another!

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Preparing for Mystery Skype with Centers

Our 3rd grade classrooms love to mystery Skype.  Have you tried it? In a mystery Skype, 2 classrooms connect with one another but don’t say where they are from.  The two organizers of course know, but the students don’t.  By asking a series of yes or no questions, students try to narrow down to a country, state, city, and even school if there is time.  Mystery Skypes work best when students are prepared in advance and every student has a job to do.  There are many example of jobs to assign in a mystery Skype such as greeter, researcher, questioner, scribe, and photographer.

Ms. Haley, a 3rd grade teacher, met with me to talk about some skills she hoped the students could work on in advance of a mystery Skype.  I started planning a series of 5 centers for students to rotate through.  Ms. Maher, our tech integration specialist, worked on scheduling mystery Skypes via Twitter and Skype in the Classroom so that all 3rd grade classes had a connection.

Two classes at a time came to the library to engage in the mystery Skype centers.  This meant that me, the two classroom teachers, my library intern, and a parent or collaborating teacher could run one center each.  This also meant hat about 8 students would be at each center for 10-ish minutes.  It was very fast-paced, but it introduced to students to many aspects of a mystery Skype and they continued the work in their classrooms throughout the week leading up to the connection.

 

I made a Google doc with all 5 centers and teachers shared the doc with their students through Google Classroom.  Each student had a copy to edit.  Here’s a look at what happened at each center:

Center 1 Question Writing

I reference Pernille Ripp’s great post on good mystery Skype questions.  Students read her examples and then worked on writing their own possible questions from narrow to more specific.  My intern worked with students to think carefully about the kinds of questions they were writing.

 

Center 2 Google Tour Builder

Ms. Haley wanted students to have a sense of where they were in relation with the rest of the world, so I had students start a Google Tour Builder at either their home address or our school address. Then, students built a tour of places they have lived, visited, or want to visit in the world.  This allowed them to be able to reference their current place in the world with other locations

Center 3 Georgia

A big part of a mystery Skype is sharing facts about your city and state with the connecting class.  Students of course love to learn that there are McDonald’s in multiple places in the world, but it’s also fun to share unique facts that make your state what it is.  A pulled a large stack of books about many aspects of our state from Weird Georgia to books about each region.  Students gathered facts that they could share with our connecting class at the end of the Skype.

Center 4 The United States

Ms Haley wanted us to review cardinal and intermediate directions.  I have a small set of National Geographic Kids Beginner’s United States Atlases.  The atlas divides the country up into regions such as northeast, southwest, etc. so I asked students to look at each region and count the number of states in each region, name some of the states, and pick out some facts about those states.  My hope was this would give them some familiarity with how the US is organized and lead to questions about specific regions or help them answer questions from our connecting class about the regions.

Center 5 Landmarks

Our 3rd graders study several important rivers and lakes as part of their social studies, so this center included books about all of those rivers and lakes as well as other landmarks around the country.  Students used these books to identify landmarks and then write questions that could be asked using those landmarks.  Example:  Is your school west of the Mississippi River?

This was my first try at doing this kind of preparation for a mystery Skype.  Each center was based on past experiences and skills that I saw a need for as well as the skills brought up by the 3rd grade teachers.  We will see how this translates into our connections this week.

Looking back, I wish we had more time at each center in the library, but it was also nice to quickly go through the centers to get an understanding of each one and then independently work on them back int he classroom over several days.

What have you done to prepare for a mystery Skype? Leave a comment!

 

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Announcing the 2017 Barrow Peace Prize with Flipgrid

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Our 2nd graders have been working on an interdisciplinary project since the beginning of January. The Barrow Peace Prize has become one of our favorite projects each year in 2nd grade.  Students select 1 of 6 people from history to research through online & print resources such as Capstone’s Pebble Go, write a persuasive piece about why that person represents various character traits, create art to accompany their writing, and record their work using Flipgrid. For the past two weeks, we have been inviting people to view the students’ work and vote on a winner.

Part of our tradition in announcing the winner of the Barrow Peace Prize is to connect with our friends at Flipgrid via Skype. Last year, we even had the great fortune of having Charlie Miller and Brad Hosack join us at our school for a red carpet event.

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Each year, Flipgrid enhances their product and it makes our Barrow Peace Prize videos even more powerful.  Ahead of the connection, the teachers and I select some student award winners.

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Dynamic Designers are students who create powerful art work to accompany their persuasive essays.  Outstanding Openers are students who created opening lines in their persuasive essay to hook their audience.  Prolific Persuaders are students who create the complete package of persuading their audience to vote for their person from history.  I print certificates for these students and send the list of names to the Flipgrid team to announce during our Skype.

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Also in advance of the Skype, I 3d print enough student-designed medals so that every student who researched the winner of the peace prize gets a medal.  Each classroom also gets a medal to display and the teachers create plans for how each student will have a chance to wear the medal.

When the Skype begins, the Flipgrid team gives the students a greeting and our students take time to explain the project to them.  We also take some time to look at some statistics.  I share the analytics map from Smore so that students can see on a map where people have viewed their work.

The Flipgrid team also share some statistics like how many seconds of engagement students have and how many views.  Then, we launch into awards.

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With 100 students, it is hard to individually recognize each student during the Skype, but we encourage students to consider the Skype and winner announcement to be a celebration of our collective work.  Even if  you don’t hear your name called, you should be proud to know that your voice was heard by people around the world and made an impact on individual viewers of the project.  Your voice came together with all of the other 2nd graders to create a  project that inspires.

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Joey Taralson at Flipgrid organized different members of the team to announce student winners.  Each person told a bit about what they do at Flipgrid and slowly announced each winner.  We had to take our time because of the roaring cheers and applause for each student. This was a powerful moment for us all because students really were cheering for and supporting their classmates even when they didn’t win themselves.

After individual students were announced, I introduced our student designers of the 2017 Barrow Peace Prize.

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Then, it was the moment of anticipation.  For the 2nd year in a row, the winner of the 2017 Barrow Peace Prize is…

Ruby Bridges!

We passed out 3d-printed medals to all Ruby Bridges researchers and then attempted to get a photograph of the winners from our perspective and Flipgrid’s perspective.

After the connection ended, the excitement continued as congratulations and pictures poured in from Flipgrid and Capstone, creator of PebbleGo.

https://twitter.com/capstonepress/status/835217366481002496

These are the kinds of projects that I hope to continue to inspire in our school.  There are so many parts of this experience that I love.  Every student is involved.  Every student has a voice in the collective project. Every student gets to showcase an area of talent whether it’s writing, research, art, stage presence, design, and more. Every student’s voice reaches beyond our school walls to inspire projects in other schools around the world. Multiple teachers are involved in the success of the project from the classroom teachers to the librarian to the art teacher to the many support teachers in our school.  Finally, the company that gives us the tool that propels our voices into the world takes time to learn about, celebrate, and amplify our project.  Thank you, Flipgrid, for always supporting our work and for constantly thinking about how to empower the voices of students in bigger ways.  We look forward to next year’s project and the many projects that will develop in the future.

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World Read Aloud Day 2017

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Each year we looking forward to celebrating the joy of reading aloud during LitWorld’s World Read Aloud Day.  This year’s official date was February 16, but we celebrated the entire week.

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It takes a lot of organization to pull off a week full of Skypes and Google Hangouts.  Planning began back in December.  Shannon Miller and I created a Google doc where people could share their World Read Aloud schedules.  Kate Messner also did a great blog post with a list of authors willing to do Skypes during the week.

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I got my teachers to sign up for slots, and then I started looking for connections on the Google doc.  Other librarians also signed up on my schedule.  Once all of the slots were full, our connecting authors and schools started communicating to decide which books to read.  I made a separate spreadsheet for myself to keep times, books, Skype names, and email addresses organized.

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Of course, weather and illness was a factor and caused a few cancellations during the week. Even with some cancellations, we still had a full week of connections.

We also experienced many technical difficulties with our internet filter and I had to communicate with our technology director on a daily basis to make sure that Skype and Google Hangouts was not being blocked by the filter.  A growth mindset and perseverance really helped push through the issues.

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Over the course of the week, we connected with schools in Georgia, Washington state, Missouri, Vermont, Connecticut, Michigan, New Jersey, Maryland, South Carolina, Kansas, Texas, and Illinois.  We also connected with authors Dee Garretson (Boxcar Children), Hannah Barnaby (Bad Guy), Paul Fleischman (Seedfolks & Joyful Noise), and Jason Chin (Gravity & Grand Canyon).

The week was filled with many special moments.  Students were able to ask one another questions about their lives and make connections to students in another location.  Each connection helps us realize we are all part of the same world and have more in common than we realize.

We wove in a lot of map skills my looking at Google maps to see distances from Athens, Georgia to our connecting schools.  Students were able to talk directly with authors and ask them questions about the writing process.

Authors like Paul Fleischman turned around and open his filing cabinets to show us the original version of poems like Whirligig Beetles.  We had fun performing stories with students in two schools and hearing special songs performed by PreK students.

We were entertained by middle school students reading Ballet Cat and chanting out the text of Yo! Yes! with students in Seattle.  We also got to connect with Caitlin Ramseyer who was a teacher at our school last year and moved to Maryland.  It was fun to reconnect with her and her Kindergarten students.

If you’ve never tried Skype or Google connections, I highly encourage you to do it.  These events lead you to collaborative partners around the world and help our students step outside the bubble of their everyday lives.

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We Need Your Votes for the 2017 Barrow Peace Prize!

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It is time once again for the annual voting on the Barrow Peace Prize.  This award was established 3 years ago by our 2nd grade.  Each year students select up to 6 nominees from history.

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We hold a Google Hangout with the entire 2nd grade to decide what criteria someone must exemplify in order to win the prize.  This year, we read the book Peace is an Offering by Annettee LeBox before brainstorming our list on a Google doc.

Each student in 2nd grade selects one of the nominees to research.

Students research these people using PebbleGo, Britannica School, Destiny Quest web resources, and books.

Using Google Classroom and a Google doc graphic organizer, students gather facts about their person and use those facts to write a persuasive essay during writer’s workshop.

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In art, students create a watercolor image to represent their person.

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Back in the library, students use Flipgrid to record persuasive essays and showcase their art.

Now those videos are ready for you to view.  We need you to view, vote, and share!

Instructions:

  • Visit this Smore
  • View videos for each of the nominees.  This can be done as a class, individually, and can be shared with anyone you know.
  • Feel free to click the heart on any video to “like” it because the kids love that!
  • To vote on the Peace Prize, use the Google form here or on the Smore to select one of the 6 people who you were convinced deserves the prize

Voting will end on February 24th where we will announce the 2017 Barrow Peace Prize in a Skype with Flipgrid.  Two 2nd grade students designed a 3D peace prize that was printed on our 3D printer and every student who researched the winner will receive one of the medals along with each 2nd grade classroom.

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Thank you for participating in our project, and we can’t wait to see who you pick!

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Flipgrid Global Connections & the Epic 30-second Book Talk

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Flipgrid continues to be one of my favorite tools for getting student voice out into the world.  They are constantly listening to users and working to improve the functionality of this tool.  Now, in the paid version of Flipgrid Classroom, there is a section called “Global Grid Connections”.  You can establish any of your grids to be accessible to other members of the Flipgrid Classroom community. As an administrator, I can browse the available grids and look for opportunities for my students to connect and collaborate with other students around the world as well as offer my grids for students around the world to contribute to.

 

Prior to this release, I would use social media and online communities to seek out collaborating classrooms.  I’ll of course still do this, but I love that Flipgrid is taking one of the big barriers to global collaboration and trying out a solution. They are helping me push my grid out to more users so that my students have a chance to have a larger audience as well as hear from other perspectives around the world.  They’ve made it so simple to reach out and communicate with classrooms around the world.

Right as all of this update was being announced, Jennifer LaGarde and Brad Gustafson launched the 30-second book talk challenge.  Lead Learners and Literacy Legends submitted their 30-second book talks and a competition brackets was setup for voting.

At the bottom of the post, they offered resources for creating your own 30-second book talk challenge.  I thought this would make a perfect global connection question on my grid.  I started collaborating with Melissa Freeman in 5th grade, and all of her language arts classes came to the library to select books, read, and create 30-second epic book talks.

We started by listening to some book talks, including some vintage Reading Rainbow!

We looked at Jennifer & Brad’s tips for book talks.

Then students identified some important pieces of an epic book talk.  We constructed this sheet as a framework for our talks.

Next students chose a book that they recently finished or selected a book from the library to read.  I pulled a diverse collection of picture books, especially ones that our 5th graders might overlook because so many feel the pull to read only chapter books.  They spent the first day reading and writing their script.  Ms. Freeman, Ms. Mullins, and I all walked around and read with students as well as conferenced with them on book talks.

On day 2, students continued working on their scripts, practiced, and recorded.  We reminded them that Flipgrid has a feature to pause the recording along the way so that they could pick up a prop, turn to a page in the book, etc.  We didn’t want them to waste any of their 30 seconds with transitions.  As they submitted their videos, they began watching other people’s videos.

Now, it’s your turn!  We hope you will join us on our 30-second book talk grid.

You are welcome to add your own student voices alongside our students sharing favorite books in 30 seconds or less.  Let’s unite our student voices through Flipgrid and inspire a global community of readers.

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Let’s All Connect for World Read Aloud Day 2017

It’s time for us all to start making plans and building excitement for World Read Aloud Day 2017 with Litworld.  This year, World Read Aloud Day takes place on February 16, 2017, but many of us will celebrate the entire week of February 13-17, 2017.

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World Read Aloud Day “calls global attention to the importance of reading aloud and sharing stories.”  When we connect our students through Skype, Google Hangouts, or other web tools, they experience the power of the read aloud and realize that they are connected with a bigger world that is both the same and different from them.  By connecting our voices through reading aloud, we are reading on behalf of the 758 million people who cannot read.

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Shannon McClintock Miller and I invite you to start posting your schedules on our shared Google Doc.

 

http://tinyurl.com/wrad17

 

When you share your schedule, be sure to include:

  • Your name
  • Your contact info such as social media, Skype, and/or email
  • Your role
  • Your school and grade levels
  • Your location
  • List your time zone when posting your available dates and times

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After you post your own schedule, take a look at the other schedules and sign up on someone’s schedule to connect your students.  We’ve found that it doesn’t matter if same grade levels connect with one another. Often times, an older grade can read aloud to a younger grade or younger grades can find parts of a books that they can read aloud to an older grade.  There’s not just one way to connect.  Part of the fun is meeting new friends, planning your read alouds, and seeing what magical things happen during your connection that you weren’t even expecting.

We have many ideas from previous years on our blogs.  You can read more about previous World Read Aloud Day connections on Expect the Miraculous and The Library Voice.  Litworld also has several resources for you to use in your planning and connections including:

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Please let us know if you have any questions.  Happy connecting!

Shannon McClintock Miller @shannonmmiller & Andy Plemmons @plemmonsa