Tuesday, December 18, 2012

Daily Use of the Promethean Board

The 2nd grade students have been enjoying using the Promethean Board to review fact family.

Wednesday, December 12, 2012

4 Holidays in December

Mrs. Bond's first grade class is using the computers this week to do seasonal research. The teacher had created a PowerPoint for each December holiday. The students are writing expository text regarding their studies and compiling their writing in a bound book for their parents.  Mrs. Bond used her phone to share these with us today.



Monday, December 3, 2012

Watch a Venus Fly Trap in Action!

Ms. Kosub, fourth grade teacher at Purple Sage Elementary, discovered in our tech training this past week how neat it is to videotape what goes on under her document camera.  She was able to capture the excitement of her class and that true teachable moment.  Listen to her class answering all her questions as they watch a Venus Fly Trap in action!  What an AWESOME video!!
 Click Venus Fly Trap Video to view.
In language arts, Ms. Kosub's class read a paired passage that had a poem and an article about the Venus flytrap.  The students got really interested and started asking a lot of questions.  Over the break, Ms. Kosub mentioned the enthusiasm to her dad, and he bought her class a pitcher plant and a Venus flytrap (at Lowe's).  When they first got it, all of the pads were closed, but on Friday one opened, so the students caught a beetle at recess.  The rest is in the video.  It is their "pet" project!  Now Ms. Kosub is using the carnivorous plants to model planning a research project in writing.  They were also able to tie this into science because they just finished a unit on soil, and these plants have some very interesting habitat requirements.  

Thursday, November 29, 2012

Robotics at Work for Competition

Our Riderbots Robotics team has been working on programming.  We've been learning to refine our turning and ensure that our programs are executed with precision.  We love building our bots and learning how to write code!
Back when the robotics team did Procedural Texts, students wrote and presented a how-to. Some of them used Vokis, some used digital pictures to go with their step-by-step instructions, and some used digital videos to present. One student even uploaded his video to Youtube, http://www.safeshare.tv/w/yFGaewXCQz, from home to share his how-to.

Tuesday, October 30, 2012

Conceptual Learning in 1st Grade with Kidspiration


Millie Stefonsky's first grade classroom is using Kidspiration software to confirm their learning on Energy.  We love to see technology in action in our hallways!









Mrs. Stefonsky's class has adopted Ohio State in our No Excuse University philosophy to promote Round Rock ISD's goals of college and career readiness.

Creating Webs with Kidspiration

Mrs. Martin’s second grade class was learning about the properties of the three states of Matter.  They went into Kidspiration software and created a web that showed what they learned.  The students were asked to find pictures that showed the three states of Matter. Kidspiration helps students develop strong thinking skills and builds conceptual understanding through visual learning.

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

TAG has Gone Edmodo!

Students, in Ms. Jacks's TAG class, this year are enjoying learning and using the Edmodo program in their daily activities.  This site is where their assignments are posted and are automatically calendared.  Notifications are sent to their parents as assignments are created, as well as when they're late. Students and parents can see when assignments are received, and they can get feedback in order to make corrections on things needing improvement.  It's our blog site, where students are creating higher-level questions, which they post to the group and have on-line discussions about the books they are reading.  They can ask for suggestions from the group when they are having trouble understanding an assignment or need help with an idea.  Edmodo is a safe place to upload links and documents that the students may need to do an assignment, arranged in folders by subject.  Students are able to upload works-in-progress to their virtual "backpack" for them to access at home or school or a homeroom classroom; flashdrives are no longer needed to carry work back and forth.  This safe and secure site has become the TAG group's Teacherweb and Wiki, all in one, in a format that works and looks similar to Facebook. They're having a lot of fun with it in TAG this year!  

Tuesday, September 25, 2012

Interactive Tool for Behavior

Teachers have been introduced to a fun new interactive website, http://neave.com/bouncy-balls/.  It is a "digital playground of interactive tools."  The one program they have used with their students from this site is the "bouncy balls" that works with the microphone in the room.   Ms. Faris used the bouncy balls to determine if the class was too loud during group work.  If the balls are bouncying freely, it tells the students that they need to quiet down.

Sunday, September 23, 2012

Students Create Math Problems on Promethean Board

Mrs. Garcia's 5th grade bilingual class are working with technology (Promethean Board) to create math word problems (subtracting with decimals).  The students were engaged and out of their comfort zones (from the day before's training).  The problems they created....were amazing!

The next day each group presented their word problems to the class to solve.  

Monday, September 17, 2012

Technology is UP and Running for another Great Year!

Purple Sage has successfully started another year.  Most of you know we moved back into the building on Saturday and with great help were able to start school on time that Monday.   Other district Instructional Technology Specialists helped Bunny Barnard, our Instructional Technology Specialist on campus, as well as one parent brought three from his office, so they were able to get every computer in place and back up and running on that Saturday for the teachers.
Teachers were surprised last Friday when our principal, Cindy Walker, called us down for a quick meeting, only to find our assistant principal, Autumn Hebert, using http://www.classtools.net/education-games-php/fruit_machine to randomly select teachers' names for a drawing for 10 $100 gift certificates from Wall-Mart!  Teachers were loving the Random Name Word Picker almost as much as being a gift certificate winner!

Thursday, May 10, 2012

Photo Story3 Used as Background for Live Performance

Students in Mrs. Bond's fifth grade were to research a nonfiction topic. They wrote six questions that
they wanted answered. Then they researched using references: 2 print books + 3 other resources. The library online resources, such as SIRS and GALE were used. Students had to cite all sources. Students illustrated 9 panels for Photo Story3 for Windows. They wrote their information on index cards and presented "live" while the audience viewed their Photo Story. Photo Stories had to be timed so that each slide was timed to the information on the index card. Photo Stories were presented to the class and parents.
Here is an example of one of their "background" Photo Stories.  Keep in mind, there is no sound since the students presented "live."

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

QR Codes used at our Book Fair



Last week was our Spring Book Fair at Purple Sage.  Check out our QR codes Vanessa Stenulson, our librarian, displayed regarding our Summer Reading program at the fair.  Also watch an Animoto slide show recapping all the activities on our library blog:  http://purplesagelibrary.blogspot.com/

Intervention Software

Intervention is happening at Purple Sage!
Here are Second grader students working on computer interventions:  Ticket to Read and Earobics.  This program is run smoothly by Stephanie Vaughan.

Student Created Newsletter

Wendy Lee, a third grade teacher at Purple Sage Elementary, had her students create a classroom newsletter recently. She printed the newsletters out for her students to read, and it's also posted on the TeacherWeb for parents to read at home.  They used Microsoft Publisher to created the newsletter. 
Mrs. Lee's Newsletter

New Technology at Purple Sage

This year Purple Sage was scheduled for new technology from past bond money.  Recently, our fabulous technology department seamlessly installed 80+ desktop computers in all the classrooms, office, library, and computer lab without a hitch.  Teachers were able to keep their old as an additional computer for the classroom too.  Everyone was thrilled with the new equipment and were complimenting the team who pulled it all off for us.

Monday, April 9, 2012

National Library Week Spotlight

Check out the Glogster created by our librarian, Ms. Stenulson, on her librarian blog.
http://purplesagelibrary.blogspot.com/  Author Visits, Book Club, Special Reading Spot contest, Literacy Night, Reading Programs, Book Fair, Battle of the Bluebonnets -  It pretty much sums up her first year at Purple Sage!  Way to go, Ms. Stenulson.

Students at Work on Netbooks

Ms. Stefonsky's second grade class hard at work on their grade level netbooks. 

Timelines with Inspiration



Ms. Stefonsky's second graders were learning about chronology by reading a biography of a historic person.  While they read, they took notes and composed a timeline of the important events of that person, especially what their contribution was.  After that, they went on the software program, Inspiration, and made a timeline of their historic person. They were able to add graphics to enhance their timelines.  The students enjoyed learning about different people in history, as they shared their timelines.

Thursday, March 29, 2012

Numbers EVERYWHERE!

Cute! Cute! Cute!  Check out this Prezi our librarian, Ms. Stenulson, did with the first graders!  She based her lesson on the book, Missing Math by Loreen Leedy.  After seeing all the numbers the students found, come check out the book in our library.  Missing Math

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Purple Sage takes 2nd Place in the Bluebonnets

Vanessa Stenulson, Purple Sage's new librarian, encouraged students in grades 3-5 to read the 20 Bluebonnet nominee books.  The librarians met together to create questions from the Bluebonnet books and set them up in a PowerPoint to be used with The Turning Points clickers.    Ms. Stenulson had the students of Purple Sage who had read at least ten books get together for a quiz  to select the top five students. As a team, they represented Purple Sage in the Battle of the Bluebonnets at Sommer Elementary.  This was the first time Purple Sage went to the Battle of the Bluebonnets, so we were excited to win 2nd place.  There was only one missed question!!  Pictures were taken at the Battle.  Watch this Animoto created by Ms. Stenulson to see how excited the students were over their win!
http://animoto.com/play/WuBcdNlRKUOCzBC1lndl2A

Thursday, February 16, 2012

Help Clean Up the Park

On February 11, 2012, Ms. Jacks' 4th grade TAG class had their culminating Service Project for their independent study.  They chose to help clean up the park adjacent to our school and surrounding areas.  To show off the pictures, they have used a PictureTrail http://www.picturetrail.com/ Puzzle format.   Before the big event, they created flyers using Microsoft Word to promote the day and time.  Right after the brainstorming stage in the beginning stages, they investigated websites to check age restrictions for some of their ideas.  They are also in the process of creating a Prezi to show the steps they went through to select this service project. Check out the pictures and see how much fun they actually had serving others!

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

EXCELlent Mathematicians!


Ms. Garcia's 5th grade bilingual students worked hard to integrate math, science, and technology! They used their results from their science fair experiment to create graphs in EXCEL. Creating their graphs really helped them to analyze their data thoroughly and create an accurate conclusion based on their results and hypothesis. Through the science fair process, the students' did an EXCELlent job integrating math, reading, writing, science, and technology into one AMAZING project and experience!

Thursday, January 19, 2012

Surveying Students using Google Docs

Erin Martinez, teacher at Purple Sage Elementary, had her students fill out a survey, which she designed using Google Documents. This gave her students a chance to provide feedback on what they enjoy about their class, suggestions about things that need to be changed, and what type technology they find the most engaging.



Tuesday, January 17, 2012

Activoting Going Strong












After an Activote refresher training by Ms. Barnard, campus instructional technology specialist, Ms. Scott, a second grade teacher, created a Activinspire flipchart to engage all her students in answering money questions. Here are pictures of some of the students voting. Ms. Scott says now not two days go by without voting with the Activotes. If she is not creating flipcharts, she is finding places to vote in our district math program, Envision.

Monday, January 9, 2012

More Third Grade Biographies

Students in Ms. Lee's third grade class also completed the research assignment on biographies. Then, they too created Vokis to share the information they learned about the person they researched. The students loved creating their Vokis. Ms. Lee loved it because it incorporated technology and was interactive. View her class vokis on her TeacherWeb: http://www.teacherweb.com/TX/PurpleSageElementary/MsLee/apt2.aspx