Title: Using OSMO to Improve Spelling and Partitioning

Curriculum Development Assistance Fund Grants 2016 - 2017

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Name: Angela MacInnes

Title: Using OSMO to improve spelling and partitioning

Materials: iPad mini: Osmo Wonder kit:

Description: A goal at Dutch Settlement Elementary has been to improve student’s ability to partition numbers as well as developing their spelling ability. The Osmo technology provides students with a fun, hand on means to practice and improve in both of these areas during stations time in the classroom. The numbers section helps students to look at how they can make a number using both dot cards and the actual number. The words section helps students to spell words. You also have the opportunity as the teacher to create your own word lists so that you can relate the spelling to units in the classroom.

Name: Kellee MacKenzie

Title: QR Codes

Materials: 1. iPad Air 2 2. Trident Case Kraken A.M.S. iPad mini 2 Rugged Case

Description: I would like to purchase one iPad with cover for the purpose of using QR codes in my classroom. A QR Code is a type of barcode that is readable by dedicated QR barcode readers and camera telephones. The code consists of black modules arranged in a square pattern on a white background. The information encoded may be text you want students to read, websites, audio clips or video. There are so many uses for QR codes in the classroom. They can be linked to virtually anything from vocabulary, websites, items in my classroom, book reviews, etc.

My initial use is in Reader’s Workshop. Students would read a book, discuss the book with a reading partner, take notes on the book in their Reader’s Notebook, and plan a video script. The script would include opinions, text connections, recommendations, genre, and why the book caught their attention. Students would then record their book talk on an iPad. Once the book talk is recorded, a QR code can be created that links the QR code to the book talk. This QR code would be printed and attached to the back of the book. Students can then use the iPad to scan the QR code and get a direct link to the video book talk. Students will then hear what others who have read the book have to say about it.

QR codes have infinite uses. Some other ideas I would like to try would be to attach vocabulary or audio instructions for my students with adaptations. Any task can be assigned a QR code, making the teacher a facilitator to learning instead of being the only voice heard.

Consider a photo of Martin Luther King Junior posted in a classroom with a QR code attached to it. Students could scan the code and instantly be taken to the “I Have a Dream” speech!

Name:Eileen Lunney

Title: St. Margaret’s Bay Players: Bringing Reader’s Theatre to Life
Materials: 1. Role play theatre kit2. Costumes- variety

Description: This project will combine students’ skills of reading, writing, and speaking into an artistic representation of movement and expression. Students will learn not only how to improve their reading and speaking skills , they will be able to express their comprehension of reading through aesthetic expression, one of the tenants of the Essential Graduation Learnings, in the form of drama.

Name: Matthew Tucker

Title: Breakout EDU – Transforming the Classroom into an Escape Room

Materials: Large Breakout EDU Kits Each kit includes:

• 1 hasp
• 1 word lock
• 1 three-digit lock
• 1 four-digit lock
• 1 directional lock
• 1 key lock
• 1 UV light
• 1 invisible ink pen
• 1 small lockable box
• 1 USB thumb drive
• 2 hint cards

Description: Breakout EDU creates highly engaging learning experiences for students by presenting them with challenging problems that promote teamwork, critical thinking, and troubleshooting – igniting their natural drive to solve the problem.

Breakout EDU is a kit that provides the tools and materials necessary to solve the problem. The kit consists of lockable boxes, key locks, combination locks (word, number, and directional), a UV flashlight, and an invisible ink pen. The teacher “sets the stage” by telling a story to the class. The story presents a problem and students must solve the problem within a set time limit. Within the main task are several smaller problems that must be solved in order to attain the next clue. For example, solving a mathematical equation to gain the numbers needed to open a combination lock. The Breakout EDU website contains several lessons that can be used or adapted to fit any classroom at any grade level.

I would use grant money to purchase two kits from Breakout EDU in order to provide my students with this incredibly engaging and memorable learning experience. Two kits would ensure that a manageable number of students are working on a problem at one time.

Name: Morgan Woodman

Title: Coding Made Easy

Materials: 4 Osmo Coding kits / Osmo Genius Kit

Description: These kits would allow me to incorporate Coding through the use of Information Technology and Communication into our daily routines. Students could work on coding for brain breakfast, during learning zones and as well as free time.

This project lines up with the new curriculum of coding and allows children of a young age to partake. Most resources available online, are for 6+. These young students of 4-5 years of age to date have only been able to do coding on a very basic level, using objects and our bodies in the classroom/gymnasium. I will continue to introduce Coding in this way, however I think it is essential that I can connect Coding to technology, for them to truly grasp the concept of how it is used in today’s world. I am able to stretch our lessons on coding beyond just the concept, and putting their learning to real use. Students would receive immediate feedback on the codes they create, allowing them to be creative. Check out the Osmo website for yourself, it truly is neat and will allow my project of Making Coding Easy truly make coding stick for our young learners in Primary.

Name: Preman Edwards

Title: Big Brother is Watching, Always Watching

Materials: DJI OSMO MOBILE W/3 AXIS GIMBAL

Magicpuck 256gb Sdxc Memory Card with MicroSd Adapter

Description: My idea is simple I would like to purchase a GIMBAL mount to record instructional videos for students. The mount I would like, has tracking capabilities and a Bluetooth microphone to track the teacher (myself) while I present my instruction. This will couple sound and video to my notes to make more of a multi-media presentation. This could be accessed by students to either repeat missed instructions and/or receive instructions when absent, at no additional time or work on my behalf. It will encourage students to become independent learners by being asked to see the video(s) first; especially, as many students are visual learners, but the audio will help auditory learners as well. These videos when combined with the notes that I have available can only increase my success.

Also, the video camera could be used by students to create how to videos of their own, as well as reports for their Grade 12 Math Projects; if they should choose to report in video format. The key is that the use is not limited to only teacher led videos, although it would be used by the teacher first.

Name: John Munro

Title: Weather Balloon

Materials: 1200 g balloon, 2 SMS locators, Parachute, Radar reflector, Cord, Launch pad, Hose, Space box- Styrofoam container

Description:Students will learn about calculations to determine how long the balloon will take to rise and fall. Using this information students’ will determine approximately where the balloon will land for retrieval. Once the balloon is retrieved students will analyze data and create graphs showing the relationship between temperature and altitude. They will also create a short video highlighting the whole process.

Name:Lawrence Rigby

Title:Using Arduino's to teach computer programming

Material: 10 Arduino Development Kits

Description: Computer programming has been traditionally taught using computer software without producing any physical artifacts of student learning. I am looking to add a hands-on component to the Computer Programming 12 course. To achieve this goal I would like to purchase several Arduino starter kits. Arduino microcontrollers can be programmed through the Arduino IDE software to perform tasks. Students will get the chance to use their programming skills to write code that causes the Arduino board to perform tasks such as blinking a light or getting a small motor to turn at different speeds. These kits will add an authentic learning component to the Grade 12 Computer Programming course.

Name:Rhonda Ayres

Title:Science and Exploration of Technology

Material: 2 Osmo game systems for Ipad, 2 sets of STEM Robot Mouse Coding Activity Set, K’Nex Levers and Pulleys, Lego Simple Machines Set, K’Nex Investigating Solar Energy, STEM Simple Machines Activity Set, Tall Stacker Pegs Building Sets, Primary Science 3 Way Magnifier, Elementary Microscope with prepared slides, LED Activity Light Tablet-

Description: In 2014, the concept of learning through play was introduced in the P-2 classroom. Teachers were encouraged to “engage learners in experiences that encourage their personal construction of knowledge, for example, hands-on, minds-on science and math”. (From Learning Through Play Viewing Guide NSDOEECD 2014) I would like funding to help provide these opportunities to my students, particularly by providing materials in the Science and Technology field. The students can use, learn, create and share their discoveries with each other. This new generation of learners, learn best through exploration and the materials I am requesting will enablethem to use and grow their knowledge of coding technology, machines, pulleys, etc. The Osmo will also allow students to combine their love of using technology with practice of a second language in my French Immersion classroom, as I will design activities that practice and build their French vocabulary.

Name:Paul Wozney

Title: The Power of Perspective: Reading & Writing Memoir

Material:Girl Soldier, Faith J. H. McDonnell & Grace Akallo 40 copies

Description:In the English 10 program at CPA, one of our units involves a genre study (looking at a range of existing examples) of memoir, and writing original memoirs that students have the option to enter into a contest sponsored by The Learning Partnership, a non-profit organization that operates a number of initiatives to enhance and support quality public education.

Our school has recently procured a class set of a memoir entitled A Long Way Gone, by Sierra Leonean former child soldier Ishmael Beah. This text serves as the anchor of understanding the component parts of an effective memoir. Given its first hand perspective on what it is like to be kidnapped, forced to commit atrocities as a child and then undergo a process of rehabilitation as a late teen to reclaim a better life, it is a text that connects to current, ongoing global issues, addresses a cultural and ethnic perspective beyond our community and broadens the purpose and value of memoir beyond celebrity recollections of lives of fame and excess.

My goal is to procure another class set of memoirs around the same issue. Grace Akallo was a high school student at a boarding school in northern Uganda when she and all the girls at her school were abducted by Joseph Kony’s Lord’s Resistance Army several years ago. Her memoir Girl Soldier describes her experience of being taken, circulated between rebel commanders as a slave/wife and her eventual return to society and rehabilitation. My intent is to show that this issue affects both male and female youth in many areas of the world.

I have been able to establish contact with both authors to attempt to arrange a skype/facetime conference with students at CPA as a component of helping students realize/appreciate the value of writing (memoir in this case) as a mechanism for exercising their voice, and that as youth, they have experiences and perspectives to offer the world that have the power to impact and transform the lives of others.

Name:Frank McMahon

Title:Modeling Math with Machines

Material:Sphero Robotic Toy with Nubby cover (Qty 2), Parallax BOEbot for Arduino

Description:The Math12 and PreCal12 curriculum cover a variety of math functions that can model real-world behaviours. Quadratics can model a ball thrown; sinusoidals can model waves or repetitive motion, etc. Actually using moving objects to generate these patterns, capturing the pattern with software and then representing the patterns in algebra will strengthen comprehension and retention.

Name: Peter Myatt

Title: The Circus Comes To School

Material: Devil sticks, Juggling balls, Diabols

Description: In an attempt to bring non conventional activities to my healthy living classes, I’ve decided that a great idea would be have the students get involved in juggling. This will include a variety of juggling devices such as juggling balls, devil sticks and Diablo’s. These activities require the students to develop agility, hand eye coordination and endurance. It also introduces students that are not the traditional athletic type to pursue another avenue that doesn’t involve competition and it’s also something that can be done at any age.