Sunday, December 7, 2014

Problem Solving and Programming

Problem Solving


Bubble Ball-  You use wood and metal pieces to get the ball to roll to the flag.  This game was developed by a 14 year old kid.  You can pay to add-on a pack with multiple balls, springs, gravity, and even teleports.


I used the Bubble Ball app and easily went up the first few levels.


Cargo-Bot- is a puzzle game where you teach a robot how to move crates.

Then I played Cargo-Bot and it was a little more challenging for me.  Of coarse, I'm not into video games at all so the students would probably breeze through it.  I like that there was a little more thinking involved in this game.

I know it said to decide on one but we as teaching know one is not always a good fit for everyone.  What I would do is start everyone on Bubble Ball as a beginning or introduction to problem solving apps.  Then as they feel confident or bored, I would be able to say here, try this (Cargo-Bot).  It's a little more challenging but just like when you play video games at home, keep trying until you figure it out.  At first grade students don't realize there are usually several steps in solving any problem.  That is another plus to Cargo-Bot, it shows you how many steps you have to take to solve the problem and that you don't always solve it on the first try.



Programming


As I mentioned above, I think it helps students to see there are several steps to problem solving and that solving a problem may not always work the first time.  I had the all set up then played it and was like what?  The characters were talking at the same time.  Well that didn't work so I had to work with it until I had that fixed.  It took me several try but I finally figured it out.  When I was talking with another teacher this morning about the troubles we were having completing some of the assignments for this class and we talked about how we would then go ask someone else how they completed the task.  Which made me realize, that some children are also better problem solvers then others and when they showed their finished product, they could show others how they got their problem solved.

Saturday, December 6, 2014

Research and Reference

Online Bookmarking








The good thing about this is that you can narrow down to what you find useful.  If you're limited on time, you can go back and read it later or if it's a subject you teach ever year, it's right there and you don't have to search them out the next year.  It's on your iPad so you don't have to worry about losing papers or remember where you put it.  This would be more for me then my first graders though.


Dictionary 



I would recommend Dictionary.com. Because of its ease of use.  I couldn't even get the microphone to work on the other app.  With first graders the microphone is a necessity, since they won't be able to spell most words they are looking for.


Citations



This is much easier than the old days (hand writing), my high schooler used to use citation machine online and was AMAZED at how much better this was.  He said, "we've had iPad's at school for two years now, why didn't we learn about this app for our English papers?"  It's easily enough that a first grader can use it!





Study Skills and Visual Thinking

Study Skills


http://quizlet.com/_10kf2p

I have used Quizlet before to make Spanish flash cards for my high school son.  I didn't know you could add pictures though.  This could be great for first graders to learn vocabulary, syllables, definitions, spelling, and other stuff I haven't imagined yet.  This is taking flash cards to a whole new level.


Mind Mapping


I wasn't sure how to get it all in one picture.

We could use mind mapping for mapping out a writing idea, describing the word in the middle with interesting vocabulary words, or organizing a group of pictures that they want to turn into a story.