COSI on Wheels

COSI on Wheels recently came to Creekview Intermediate School to support what students have been studying about energy. It began with students meeting Dr. Kilowatt, who helped students learn about creating energy with both renewable and non-renewable resources. Students volunteered to help demonstrate various forms of renewable resources, like wind and solar power. Other students showed various forms of non-renewable resources, like coal and oil.

After meeting Dr. Kilowatt and listening to her presentation, students broke up into groups of 8 to explore the different energy stations around the gymnasium. Thank you to our wonderful parents who helped run these stations. Without your help, we would not have been able to make this happen.

In the various stations, students looked at several different forms of energy. Students experimented with wind and water power and how they can be alternative sources of energy. They had to try different materials to build their water turbines and test them to see which materials worked the best. Students had to look at wind patterns to decide where to best set up their wind turbine. They also looked at electrical energy by building circuits and using a variety of components for their power supplies. Another station had students looking at what materials (solids and liquids) conducted electrical current the best. Students looked at potential and kinetic energy by building a domino-like structure and seeing how energy changed from potential to kinetic. 

It was an amazing, fun filled day for students and staff.

Blogging Experience

So far, I have enjoyed the creation of my blog. I have wanted to start a blog for a couple of years now, but wasn't sure that I could keep it updated enough to make it interesting enough for my audience to continue following. That truly was my biggest fear- to start a blog and get a following and then not be able to keep it updated and people not come back to the blog because they weren't finding the information they wanted. I have set aside a chunk of time to dedicate to updating my blog. I had to dedicate time to blog or it would not get done. Between my teaching, coaching, and family responsibilities, there is little time for anything else. I figure if I can dedicate a slot of time to blog each week, it will become easier to blog more regularly as this becomes habit.

My blog provides a simple way for the parents of my students to keep informed of what we are doing. My goal is to make this the main information page for students and parents to come to when they need to find information about my classes. Currently, I send out a weekly email to my parents. Once I have my blog rolling with current information on a weekly basis, I hope to eliminate the weekly email. One of the widgets I added allows parents to subscribe to my blog and receive email notification of when there is a new post. I want to constantly reference the blog so that it becomes second nature to students and parents to go to the blog when they need to find something out.

I really like the capabilities that the widgets bring to the table. As my students finish projects, I will be able to post them so that they have an audience other than their classmates. I see myself using the YouTube gadget to showcase my students' video projects from the Geometry Project that they have been working so diligently on. I also hope to have the Picasa feed up and running soon. I left my camera at school, as I had planned to have that up and running to show off some of the things we are doing in class. These are great opportunities for parents to see what we are doing as students do not always share what is going on at school.

Geometry All Around Us Project

My students started the Geometry Around Us Project this week. Students will go out looking for geometric shapes in the world around them. Students will capture pictures or video of the objects they find using a digital camera or camcorder (or the camera built into their personal devices) and put them all together into a multimedia presentation. Students must include the definition along with the shape in each sequence of the project.

Students were randomly assigned to their groups and given the project packet. Students then began working in their groups to define the 14 geometric shapes in the packet. After defining the terms, students decided on what type of multimedia presentation they were going to create. Defining the terms will help them to discover the different geometric shapes. Students will then be able to explore the school in search of these geometric shapes. Explicit directions will be given to the students so that they understand the boundaries of where they may go and appropriate behavior while exploring for their geometric shapes.

Students will use a variety of different tools to create their presentation, including Loopster, ScreenChomp, PIXnTell, or iMovie. Each group will pick what app they are using and meet with me during their Flex period to learn how to use the app. Students will develop engaging presentations with these apps. Students will evaluate themselves with a rubric and after I have graded them on the same rubric, I will meet with each group to compare the ratings. Once students are finished with their projects, I will post them on this blog. Check back after Spring Break!

How I Want to Use My Blog

Welcome to my blog! My name is Chris Terzis and I am a Math and Science Teacher on the 6th Grade Blue Team. I intend to use my blog for:

1. Communication with Students: In today's classrooms, I see more and more students bring their own devices to school. These students are used to being connected to Internet at all times. I want to take advantage of this and establish another way to communicate with my students. I believe, as an educator, the more connections we can make with our students, we establish a trust between each other. This is essential to push students to their potential. I will be posting homework assignments, project descriptions, rubrics, notes, and videos to help support what they are doing in the classroom. Are you not fully understanding what we discussed in class? Were you absent? Did you forget something at school that you need to complete an assignment? Stop by my blog and you should be able to find all of this information here.

2. Establish Another Connection With Parents: I am constantly searching for ways to connect with my students' parents/guardians. Most of my students have working parents and they are not always available on a school schedule. By keeping my blog up-to-date, it can provide parents with a way to stay on top of what is going in their child's education. They can access everything that we are working on and know the due dates of assignments. This also allows a parent to keep informed with a student that is reluctant to share  or that does not bring home any type of communication (not that this would be any of my students). Parents can subscribe to my RSS feed so that they can be alerted when the blog is updated and stay current with what we are doing.

3. A Place to Showcase Student Work: With the flexibility of a blog, it can easily become a portfolio of student work. With it's ability to display a variety of digital formats, just about any project I do with students can be displayed on a blog. I believe that when students know that they have an audience, they produce their best work. If students know that their work is going to be displayed on the blog (even if not directly identified), they put extra effort into what they are creating because they want to show what they are capable of. It would also provide for peer feedback as students could post responses to what other students have created. Students learn so many different communication skills by practicing giving feedback to others and they learn to think critically.