Our Romeo & Juliet Story May 19, 2008
Posted by anne marie in ELA, Our Classroom.Tags: ELA, Romeo and Juliet
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Today we completed our Romeo & Juliet unit by writing our own synopsis of this Shakespearean saga. I believe our students captured the true essence of these troubled lovers.
Romeo and Juliet were friends.
Romeo gave her flowers because he loved her.
Romeo played Juliet a song on the guitar.
There is a fight with swords.
Juliet is gone and Romeo is sad.
Romeo is dead with a sword.
Juliet comes back and is sad.
She wants to marry Romeo.
She is crying because she wants Romeo and he is dead.
Juliet drinks the poison and she is dead.
THE END
Romeo and Juliet May 18, 2008
Posted by anne marie in ELA, Our Classroom.Tags: ELA, Romeo and Juliet
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Last week our class was invited to join Ms. G.’s 9th grade English class, in the courtyard, as they acted out Act 3, the fight scene from Romeo and Juliet
. Here’s Ms. G. directing the scene, where Mercutio and Tybalt are about to fight when Romeo enters. Romeo and Benvolio try to stop the fight. Tybalt stabs Mercutio under Romeo’s arm and leaves as Mercutio dies. Anyway, my students loved watching the scene unfold, especially the excitement of the sword fighting (aka: wrapping paper tubes) and enjoyed the opportunity to demonstrate their acting/dueling skills! Take a look…
We kept the fun going when we discovered a production of Romeo and Juliet on Musearts Cartoons, otherwise known as the Guinea Pig Theater. This video is just too funny, but at the same time it helped my students synthesis the main idea of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. So thank you, again, Ms. G., and your students, for including us in this activity- it was both educational and fun!
Disability Law Lowdown ASL Podcast May 17, 2008
Posted by anne marie in Sign Language, Special Education.Tags: American with Disabilities Act, ASL Podcast, Sign Language, Special Education
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I learned about this first ever Disability Law Lowdown ASL Video Podcast from the Blog Talking Books Librarian and wanted to share the information.
“The Disability Law Lowdown ASL podcasts will bring a new level of service to the Deaf community by expanding traditional audio-only podcasts to include video that allows subscribers too see native Deaf speakers signing the show’s content. The podcasts will deliver the latest in disability law information every other week via American Sign Language, captioning, voice-over, and transcripts to maximize accessibility. Free subscriptions to the ASL podcasts are available to have shows automatically delivered to MP3 players. The hosts for the ASL Disability Law Lowdown are native Deaf signers Danny Warthling and AJ Roupp. They will provide the latest information about disability rights and obligations under the Americans with Disabilities Act, and other disability-related topics.”
The ASL Video Podcasts can also be viewed at YouTube.
Wizard Text Generator– making writing FUN! May 16, 2008
Posted by anne marie in ELA, Special Education, Websites.Tags: ELA, Spelling
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I love to have fun while teaching and the Word Text Generator does just that! Spelling, letter identification, and alphabet review are not always on the student’s top 10 list of things to do, so anything I can find to make it more motivating and fun is a HUGE PLUS! Students think it is “way cool” to see what they type animate, especially on the SMARTBoard (and so do I!!!). It is very user friendly- you just enter your text, press the generate button and like magic, the wizard will write your text. We use the SMART On-Screen keyboard to type- just have to make sure the cursor is in the text box.
Oops- almost forgot to thank my friend and fellow SpEd Teacher, Cheryl, for passing along this great tool.
Adapted Books May 15, 2008
Posted by anne marie in SMART Board, Special Education, Websites.Tags: Adapted books, Boardmaker, PowerPoint, SMARTBoard, Writing with Symbols
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I’m always creating and using adapted books with my students, so needless to say when I came across the NYCDOE website that offers several pre-made adapted books in several formats, including PP, which works great on the SMARTBoard, I started to do the teacher happy dance!!
“These are adapted books and materials created with Boardmaker picture symbols, Writing with Symbols, and MS PowerPoint software. You must have Boardmaker and/or Writing with Symbols software installed on your computer to view or open those files.Many books have been converted to Adobe Acrobat (.pdf) format as well. “
Click on the “complete catalog” link to see an alphabetized listing of the available books or the “catalog by level” link to view the books according to reading level. Explore and enjoy this great resource!
BrainPop discount May 15, 2008
Posted by anne marie in General, SMART Board, Special Education, Websites.Tags: Brainpop, SMARTBoard, Videos
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A colleague informed me that as part of a Teacher Appreciation promotion, Brainpop is offering a 25% discount on all classroom subscriptionsuntil May 30th.
“We’re pleased to offer a 25 percent discount on all Classroom Subscriptions(formerly called Teacher Subscriptions) to BrainPOP, BrainPOP Jr. and BrainPOP Español purchased between now and May 31, 2008.
You’re eligible for the discount whether you want to renew an existing Classroom Subscription or subscribe for the first time. Please note that this offer can’t be combined with any others and is only valid on Classroom Subscriptions.”
So if you are thinking of purchasing a subscription or need to renew one, this may be the time to do it!
Color In Motion May 14, 2008
Posted by anne marie in SMART Board, Websites, art.Tags: art, colors, SMARTBoard
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Wanted to share this wonderfully colorful website called Color In Motion.
“An Animated and Interactive Experience of Color Communication and Color Symbolism.”
My students love this site, especially the movies and the kaleidoscope activity in the lab. It’s a fun, out of the box kind of site, I use to review colors. It’s very engaging visually, with cool sound affects/music and is awesome to watch on the SMARTBoard, which all adds up to an A!!
Germs & Hand Washing May 13, 2008
Posted by anne marie in Our Classroom, SMART Board, Science, Special Education, Websites.Tags: hand washing, health, Science, SMART Board, Videos
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Each and every day, whenever the opportunity arises within the classroom, we discuss the importance of good hygiene to battle the war against germs- especially the importance of washing your hands! Today our school nurse, Ms. Charlotte, followed up with her lesson on when, why and how to wash your hands. 
When she was finished we then switched gears to the SMARTBoard so we could reinforce Ms. Charlotte’s lesson by using the website Find the Germs. To play this interactive activity students drag the magnifying glass over the hand to find the 5 different germs and learn about them. Great to use on the SMARTBoard. To incorporate even more fun, while learning, I used the NSF Scrub Club Games Page which has 6 games to explore, most appropriate for the SMARTBoard. The Scrub Club also has a webisode: “The Good, the BAC, and the Ugly” about hand washing and bacteria. Three of the Scrub Club games are also part of the webisode- the first two games work great with the SMARTBoard.
If you’re not lucky enough to have a Ms. Charlotte to come and speak to your class about germs and hand washing I did find a few free videos that might be helpful. Public Health Hand Washing Video: you can watch the entire video or view video clips.
A fun, quick 30 second video to review how to wash your hands can be found at Did You Wash Them from the Kansas Department of Health and Environment.
Henry the Hand Visits School is a cute video for younger aged children, reinforcing the how and why of hand washing.
Animal Riddles May 12, 2008
Posted by anne marie in ELA, SMART Board, Websites.Tags: Animal riddles, ELA, SMART Board
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Animal Riddles is a fun site by Chateau Meddybumps I use with the SMART Board for listening/comprehension skills and to review animals. We read the clues and ask students for their guess. They check their answer by touching the question mark in the box to reveal both the name and picture of the correct animal.
Happy Mother’s Day! May 11, 2008
Posted by anne marie in General.Tags: Happy Mother's Day
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I wanted to wish every mother a day filled with love and peace and happiness. Happy Mother’s Day!
