Wordle

Last thoughts about my placement this semester.....

(Caution: might be a bit cheesey)

Above is a representative of my students that I worked with this semester. They differ individually by personally, talents, abilities, and more. In the last few weeks I have caught myself observing and appreciating their different sense of humor and mannerisms. Realizing their interesting traits and qualities has caused me to become sad because I will miss them when I leave. And because they are in fifth grade there isn’t even a possibility that I will see them in the halls of the school next semester because they will be moving to middle school. In the past I have always been in lower grades and I have been able to go back and visit to get my “fix” when I started to miss them. I have learned so many valuable things from my students this semester. One is that 5^th graders really aren’t that scary after all. For the most part my experience is with the lower grades of elementary school, so when I found out in the beginning of the semester that I was in fifth grade I thought they would act like middle school kids, but they aren’t. They still have their innocence and sweetness, really not that intimidating at all. I have also learned from my students that flexibility and honesty is very important. When things didn’t go right they were able to sense if I was frustrated or stressed, so with honesty I was able to tell them how I was feeling and how I felt the lesson was going so that we could work to improve the current situation. This honesty also helped me gain respect with my students. I am so sad that this week is our official last week in the schools.

Comments4Kids

Search: #comments4kids on Twitter

Then: You can comment on a wide variety of student's work found online through their blogs, word documents, etc.

Here are my comments:

http://kidblog.org/stortz/lexi71/bully-prevention-week/#comment-1187

http://kidblog.org/Powell4thGrade/claireh10/if-i-could-move-some-where-new/#comment-767

http://year6l.blogspot.com/2011/04/our-collection-of-prezis.html

Origami Cranes for Japan

Beth told my LLED class about this special origami crane fundraiser for Japan.

http://studentsrebuild.org/japan/

I was totally and completely intrigued by this idea and so that week in my collaborating teachers classroom I decided to have my students create origami cranes. This activity for them was a little bit difficult, but I believe that they really enjoyed.

Before the activity I showed my students news clippings and videos about the earthquake and tsunami in Japan so they were more aware of the needs and struggles they are faced with.

Because the activity took longer than normal it went into their recess time however, one of my students said, "I wish we could go outside to recess, but i'd rather be make these for Japan." That comment was really sweet!

Here is the aftermath of the activity!