Kids and Candidates

I have been so in awe of my students this week. My fifth graders have an assignment to research presidential candidates' stand on three important issues. They used their iPads to research using Google, YouTube and timeforkids.com as their main sources, though several went beyond that. The students got to pick the issues and the candidate. After researching, they wrote persuasive essays, which required them to understand the position of the opposing candidate. They wrote their essays collaboratively using Google Docs, or Drive, mostly on the iPads, though some chose to use the Dino-PCs since google apps are still a bit glitchy in mobile mode. Finally, they are in the last step, creating presentations. Some students are choosing to make commercials or skits using iMovie. They are story boarding, script writing and filming ...editing starts next week.

I am impressed by their ability to collaborate, to move effortlessly between the high tech tools and communicating face-to-face in a meaningful way. They are problem solving, negotiating and demonstrating creativity in meaningful ways. They are able to integrate tools and are finding new ways to show what they know. I am so proud of my 21st century learners!

An excerpt from EL's essay

Site/people: http://www.education.com/magazine/article/Barack_Obama/page=1/ My mom and my partner Paul helped too.

This issue is important to me because is leaning is an important thing.

Barack Obama promotes an assessment program called “Race to the top,” this new assessment is different from the original one because it asks the students to problem solve, it is more in depth so they can’t just memorize everything. Obama supports charter schools by providing more funding for them. This causes healthy competition between the public and charter schools and makes them try harder to keep the students. Obama believes that in order for the quality of education to rise, we need to improve raise the quality of the teachers by sending them to professional training. He also helped the “American Opportunity,” a program that makes going to college easier, give 4,000 dollars tax credit to help low-income students go to college. Obama thinks that teachers should get paid according to how well they do. That will motivate them to do better.

Will post more samples soon!


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Location:San Jose, Ca