WonderBox EDU

I am lucky enough to be working with WonderBox as a beta tester for the EDU version of their app (coming soon)!  Yesterday I used this app in Mrs. Chase's 2nd grade, and it was so.  much.  fun. Wonderbox gives students a variety of activities they can choose from, to explore a topic and then use their imagination and creativity to create a project.  The teacher can send a specific assignment to students, or students can explore options and choose what they'd like to work on.

Students and teachers can also view each other's work and comment back and forth.  Yesterday, we were just learning the app, so students weren't given many instructions.  I assigned them all a Make a Snowflake project, and then let them explore.  They had to submit what they had done to me so I can view their work.  In the future, I would ask students to be sure to add some writing to their project before it's submitted (there is an area that says "write about your project here" before they submit anything).  I am also unsure how to save the projects, so I had to take screenshots of their work.  But I wanted to give you some examples because I thought they turned out so fun!

When I know the release date and cost, I will pass it along!  Happy wondering!

Happy Snow Day!
In honor of our day at home, today I am sharing one of my favorite digital resources, Wonderopolis. 

Wonderopolis is an amazing site for kids to explore wonders and ask questions. In kindergarten, we kept a Wonder Journal.  Each morning I would display a photo from Wonderopolis, and ask kids to write their wonders about the photo into their journal.  We then spent some time exploring the Wonderopolis site to learn more about the topic and answer some of our wonders.  I absolutely loved this activity, and was really impressed by how good the kindergartners became at asking questions.

The Wonder I wanted to share with you today is What's the Best Thing to do on a Snow Day?  I thought this would be a fun way to greet your students when they return, and talk about snow days and why they happen.  There are also lots of other great wonders about snow, snowflakes and winter.

Julie Dannenberg had a great idea to have her students graph what they did during their snow day. You could do this on chart paper, or to "tech it up a notch", try one of these options:

• If you have a Mimio interactive projector (this will also work on a Hitachi), you are welcome to download this graph I made and use it with your students.
• If your students use their D2 apps, you can use a form to collect their data. I made a very simple one-if you'd like to use it, CLICK HERE to make a copy, and then distribute to your students to complete.  It will auto-magically (as Ann likes to say) create a spreadsheet for you! Wahoo!  You can make this into a graph by clicking the "insert chart" button in the toolbar.

If you have another idea, leave it in the comments!

QR Code Wonders

Love this idea for using QR codes to promote wonder and inquiry. Mrs. Caskey's library features QR codes stuck on foam snowflakes around her room. When students scan, they're taken to a site or video that answers the question on the snowflake, or encourages them to think and wonder about the question. These are changed throughout the year with different topics and themes.

QR codes can be made so easily. I like using qrstuff.com or the Google URL Shortener extension. This is such a simple and fun idea! Thanks, Mrs. Caskey!