Fantastic Fifth Grade

Hey there everyone! My name is Martha Young and I teach fifth grade! Before I taught fifth grade I was a computer lab manager, so using technology is kind of second nature to me. It's the way of our world these days too, and I try to find that balance in education. Today's kids are so more tech-savvy than they were just 10 years ago. The changes are happening so fast.
You know those people who are always staring at their phones for everything? Unfortunately I'm one of those; Yep, I'm sorry; I do almost everything on my phone, from Facebook, to  Pinterest, to keeping up with appointments and setting my alarm, to using the GPS on my phone.I really am addicted and I know I can do better. I think in today's world it's finding that balance between the old and the new. I read books on my tablet, but sometimes nothing beats a dog-eared novel I can take to the beach.

No, this isn't me, but you get the idea, right?

All the students I teach have an iPad issued to them, so we use technology every day in the classroom. The challenge that I am finding is to use those tablets in an engaging way, not simply utilitarian, such as having your textbooks on your tablet, but fun ways!
I have an older daughter who teaches 9th grade science and she has been tech-savvy since she was little. She worked on web pages in middle school using HTML, which blows my mind. So, every so often she is sharing a website or an app that she uses in class. That's where I get many of my ideas from. Her latest craze was using the app/website "Padlet".

Padlet is a virtual bulletin board that can be used by anyone! There is an app for it, but for use in the classroom, or with co-workers, the internet is just fine without using an app. A teacher can create a free account and create "padlets" which are virtual bulletin boards almost instantly. The site is very user friendly and allows for creativity too. My daughter used it for test review in her class, so I though I would do the same. I posted a QR code so my students could find the one I created, which was about Weather. See the code below to see what we did:

This particular "padlet" was a review on weather for our 5th graders, who will be tested on science in just a few weeks. My students are reviewing many things right now, so I see myself using this app again soon. I like it because it is very user friendly. I created a "padlet" called Weather and gave each of my students a weather related vocabulary word that they had to define while using their notes, or even through Google definitions. They also had to find an image and download it to their camera roll and then insert it into their comment. 

The comment they posted was also super easy. They just had to click on the screen and a text box would appear where they typed their word and the definition. Then they clicked on another button at the bottom of the same box that allowed them to put a picture in. Other types of media can be added as well, such as videos, or other links. As the owner or moderator of this padlet, I have the power to let them freely add their comments, or I can preview them first and then post them or have students edit their comments if they didn't quite get it.

Another nice feature is that once I'm through with the activity, I can "stop" the posting, so the "padlet" becomes static. It can be a study guide for my class, and I can even save it as a PDF if I desire. This app can be very powerful in our digital world. People can have a virtual meeting where they are all contributing through this app on one board. It can stay "secret" so no one else sees it except those that need to. I love all the implications that this app can provide. Collaboration, book reports, vocabulary review, and the best part; it's so user friendly. 

Another time I used several QR codes was when I created a gallery walk in my classroom for an introduction to a unit on oceans.  A gallery walk is an activity in which small groups of students work together and walk to different stations in a classroom environment and at each station they have a task or a question to answer. I created a gallery walk in which each station the students would have a question to answer on their sheet, but they also had a QR code where the answer to their question was provided. I had participated in these walks when I was a student at Radford, but I did some research and was advised to keep the time limit short for each station, so I did keep each station to about four minutes. It may not sound like a lot, but we all know it doesn't take a lot of time for students to get bored or into something other than what was assigned!! Here are a couple of the codes I used, along with the questions:

When students came to the first code, the question on their paper looked like this: How much of the Earth is covered in ocean water?

List all of the oceans and one interesting fact about each ocean:

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

Here is the code that they scanned to provide them with the answers: This takes them to the Ducksters website. 

They had great fun with that activity and it was a very engaging way to introduce a new unit.I do have plans to create more gallery walks using QR codes.