Skype Call with Ramona and Beezus Star, Joey King

Today we had a really special guest Skype into our 4th period math class. Joey King, the star of the Disney movie Ramona and Beezus Skyped with us. She was on the set of her new movie, Oz, The Beginning in Detriot, Michigan and she Skyped us from her trailer while she was on a break.

I had seen a tweet at the end of September telling teachers that they could sign up to get a celebrity to Skype into their classroom during October to talk about bullying. I signed up and after several emails between myself and Jeff Rivera, the coordinator of this project, we were fortunate enough to schedule Joey for our Skype call.

My students were thrilled and did a fantastic job of being a great audience and asked Joey lots of good questions. Below is a small part of the half hour Skype call. Joey King is so adorable and my students learned from her how to deal with bullies. Thanks, Joey.

We Hosted a Blog Commenting Party

This past Wednesday from 3:30-6:00 after school, my students and I held a Blog Commenting Party. What is that you might ask? Well let me explain what it is and how it came about.

Last year for the first time I had my fourth graders blogging using kidblog.org. This is something I have wanted to do for a couple of years and finally felt I had found the right platform for us to use since the students don't need email addresses and everything is moderated through a teacher dashboard.

Since I teach math and social studies, not English, I had to find a way to use blogging with my students. I decided they would use their blogs as reflective learning journals. I wanted them to post about once a week, telling about something they learned in our classes. I don't grade their posts, but we set up blogging guidelines. It was agreed upon that proper English would be used when they posted. Yes, I do make small corrections to their spelling and punctuation before I make their posts "live", but it was understood that I would send back posts that didn't make sense or didn't contain enough information for the reader to understand what they were talking about.

I learned about using the hashtag #comments4kids to generate over 1,800 comments for my students' blogs last year. And while that was very exciting, I was disappointed that the parents were not commenting on their kids' blogs. As I reflected on the year of blogging over the summer I decided to try and get more parents involved this year.

That is when the Blog Commenting Party idea was hatched. I realized that maybe the parents didn't really know how to comment. So I decided to work on fixing that this year.

This year we began blogging during the first week of school by doing a paper blogging activity. My students are writing about their passions as well as using their blogs as reflective learning journals. My students and I learned how to leave a quality comment by viewing a video from Linda Yollis. She had her third graders make an excellent video that teaches others how to comment. My students created our own version of her video to share with our parents. I put together a flyer to send home to the parents inviting them to our party. We asked everyone who came to bring a snack or something to drink.

I was excited that 12 parents came and so did our principal, Brenda Breithaupt. In fact she was our official photographer. (Thank you, Brenda.)

First we showed them our video. Then I explained the safety features of the kidblog.org platform. The parents were visibly relieved when I told them that I moderate everything - posts and comments have to be approved by me before they appear on our blogs. I also showed them TweeetDeck on our interactive white board and explained the #comments4kids column. Next, we showed them our paper blogs that were on the bulletin board and I explained the lesson I taught to introduce blogging to my students. Then I shared my classroom blog with them and showed them the posts and comments I have gotten since school started. Finally the kids got out the netbooks and shared their blogs with their parents. You can view our blogs here and here.

As I circulated around the room, I loved the comments I was hearing.
"Son, I didn't know you knew how to do this."
"Wow, you know how to add a picture to your post!"
"I didn't know you remembered that. You were so little when that happened."
"You're going to have to show me how to do this. Maybe I'll start a blog."

There was so much pride flowing from both the parents and the students. My heart was singing. The parents read the posts and the kids showed them how to add comments.

I was supposed to Skype in our best commenter, JoAnn Jacobs from Hawaii. JoAnn leaves such great comments on all of our blogs and we wanted to personally thank her, but I totally messed up that one. We didn't connect with her because I got confused with the time zones. I did Skype with Jodi Judd in California for a few minutes to show the parents how a Skype call works.

As the party was winding down, I had several conversations with different parents about how much I love learning about my students' passions by reading their blogs. Several parents said they had learned something new about their child by reading their blogs too.

Needless to say, I left school that day like I was walking on a cloud. Our Blog Commenting Party had been a great success. How do you encourage parents to comment on your students' blogs? What else do you think I should add to the list of activities for our next party?

Our Video - How to Leave a Comment

We made this video to teach our parents how to leave a quality comment when they visit our blogs. We are hosting a Blog Commenting Party for our parents today after school. We will show them this movie and then help them get on our blogs to leave us comments.

Our First Mystery Skype Call

On Friday the students in my 5th period math class got to participate in our first Mystery Skype call this year. Joan Young, a 4th grade teacher and member of my PLN (personal learning network), and I planned our call via Twitter and email. We used this post and this post to help us learn how to do a Mystery Skype call.

About half hour before the Skype call, Joan sent me an IM on Skype reminding me to remove my city and state from my profile. I quickly did so. The Mystery Skype call would not have been much fun if I had placed the Skype call and Mrs. Young's students could see where I was located. This is how my Skype profile looks now. (Click on imagine to enlarge.)


We decided which students would be greeters and questioners, and which students would be researchers and helpers. Then the call was placed and the questioning began.

Mrs. Young's class graciously let us go first. We asked if they were located in the United States. Yes, they answered. Are you located east of the Mississippi River? They answered no, and I was so caught up in the game that I forgot a no meant our turn was over. As we tried to ask another question, Mrs. Young reminded us of the rules. So it was their turn. They asked if our state touched an ocean. We answered no and got a turn again. And so it went back and forth.

Mrs. Young's class asked such great questions, they were quickly able to determine that we were located in Louisiana. It took us a little longer to discover that they are located in California. We tried to extend the activity by trying to figure out the city each other is located in. Again, Mrs. Young's fourth graders beat us and zeroed in on New Orleans rather quickly. My kids kept commenting about how well they played and how smart they were.

Mrs. Young's Class Cheer Their Victory

We thoroughly enjoyed the experience and learned some important geography skills along the way. We can't wait until our next Mystery Skype call.

If you are looking for a class to connect with to do a Mystery Skype call check here or here.