Free Kids Books

There are several websites listed on this blog where you can access free audio books for kids.  Another site where you can get free books would be http://freekidsbooks.org/.  You can read online or download the pdf version.
 A friend mentioned this site.

Solar System Exploration.......NASA

In January 2013 I mentioned the NASA site:  The Solar System Exploration site.  It's worth mentioning again  that it offers an education and kids section, video gallery, a multi media section that students would find interesting.  As well as a gallery of images, videos and an interactive section.

OR         NASA

Science 360

Science 360 is sponsored by the National Science Foundation.  This site is a video library on up to date view of current science, engineering, technology and math from around the world.  The website features video of the day and videos are embeddable.  There is a list of topics to select from and a search box.  This site is free to use.  It is also available as an app for ipad and android.

I

Code

Give students the opportunity to learn computer science.  There are courses that consists of about 20 lessons that are available that can be used as young as kindergarten.  These tutorials are self paced and self guided.

Student Interactives

Read Write Think website has many student interactive tools that help accomplish various literacy goals.  Some examples are:
Letter generator
Postcard generator
Timeline generator

You can find all of their generators at this link,

Storify

A web tool that can be used to write and share stories. You can collaborate, it has drag and drop features as well as create text.  Storify stories can be embedded anywhere on the web.

Scratch... coding

Young people are learning programming languages from the earliest ages and up. There are many tools, web sites and apps that teach young people how to program using the Java programming language, and Java-based languages developed for ease of use.

One such site is Learn Scratch .  This site has self paced tutorial on programming for ages 5-15.  There are teacher lesson plans available in PDF.

Bookemon..... Online e-books

Bookemon is another Free online tool where you can write on line and create books.  The Edcenter is a secure and private environment for students.  Teachers can add student accounts for their students for privacy and ease of oversight on students' works. http://www.bookemon.com/educator-home

Thank you Isabel for sharing this site.

How Stuff Works

How stuff works is a subsidiary of Discovery Communications.  It is a great site with comprehensive articles on how things work on various topics.  It is worth checking out.  How Stuff Works

Movie Posters..... student examples

I decided to post a few examples of their finished products.  They recreated the posters in Photoshop using pictures from the internet.  The images used are used for education purposes under the fair dealing for education and in no way belong to me nor my students.

The students were excited to use Photoshop because it gave students that have a difficult time drawing to produce something they visualize and it gave them an opportunity to manipulate elements to come up with a product that is very different.

Below are the goals and success criteria my students came up with prior to beginning their posters.

What are your learning goals for today?

I want to learn…….

1. To create an attractive movie poster that kids ages 5-10 want to see.

2. To use contrast, colour, size, balance, texture and text to entice and communicate a message from a story.

3. To use Photoshop to create a poster that “grabs” people’s attention.

I will be successful if…..

1.  A successful poster uses the Elements of Design to grab my classmates attention, uses most of the design elements

2. I used the elements of design to create emotion, feeling and to make a connection to the story and to the world.

3. I can use the tools in Photoshop to make it look professional—almost realistic.

Movie Posters..... Media Literacy

Showing a DVD does not mean that Media literacy is being taught.  It is teaching students how media messages are being constructed, who constructs them, the audience, why they are constructed and how they are constructed.  We cannot expect students to produce effective media if we do not equip them with the necessary skills to understand media.  To Understand Media Literacy better visit Center For Media Literacy where you will find a post written by Neil Andersen where he discusses the importance of Media Literacy Education.

I have surfed the net looking for some  instructional model on how to teach Media Literacy. I realized that to teach Media Literacy is to understand the Media, the messages conveyed  and how these messages in some way guide us in the decisions we make. I also realized that its more than just tv. Its newspapers, magazines, graphic novels, films, photographs, posters, songs, radio, music, etc. 

So I decided to begin my lesson on Movie Posters. 
The following is a synopsis of my lesson.  This lesson took about a month and half from start to its completion. 

 My students deconstructed movie posters and then they produced their own.  Students were given opportunities to self-regulate, communicate through class discussions and presentations, to use ICT for learning, critically analyze, synthesize and evaluate posters.

To see a more detailed lesson synopsis (not a detailed lesson plan), click on the links to view everything I used.
Movie Poster Activities
Power Point Activity
Video Tutorial for Photoshop

I used the ideas on http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2011/02/7-elements-of-a-great-movie-poster-design/  to help put my lesson together for when my students critically analyzed their movie posters.  I changed  the posters on this site to accommodate for the age  level of my students.  I also borrowed ideas from various websites.

Thank you to Sandra Mustacato for her support and resources.

Now where do I go from here?  Like I mentioned, there are other Medias to help students understand and deconstruct.  We will build on this lesson and move onto understanding advertisement and its marketing tricks.
What do you think?