USA Treasure Map Alive and Well!

The USA Treasure Map continues to evolve here at the Atlantic Home School Assistance Program.  The map now has a clear overlay with student's initials in the states they have visited. 

Most students have also started their USA Treasure research project.  It is really exciting to see the topics students have chosen.  If you remember, they are each doing research on something they believe is a treasure to our country.  At the end of their research -  when they are experts in their topic - they will create something to put on the map.  Perhaps a model, a small booklet or the link to a movie uploaded to YouTube. 

Here are some of the topics so far:

• The Henry Doorly Zoo
• Mt. Rushmore
• The Washington Monument
• Soil
• Sheep
• Disney Princesses (and how they were created)
• The Iowa Capitol building
• Busch Stadium
• The Underground Railroad
• The Panama Canal (although in Central America, the USA built it and it is beneficial to us)
• Mt. St. Helens
• Hachi the dog
• Bethany Hamilton

Students are learning about the importance of citing references and the definition of plagiarism.  They have picked topics that excite them and it's fun to see their innate curiosity.  

Spring Break next week, then hopefully progress and pictures in the weeks following!

Smiles,

Linda

USA Treasure Map Progress

National Treasure Map

Here's a little update on the progress of our really big map of the USA.  Lots of trouble shooting going on the first hour today.  Nate was my go-to guy and he solved some major roadblocks.  We realized that the power cord for our projector was not long enough.  After searching the entire school building, we found a power strip in a closet and a HUGE extension cord in the basement.  We decided to try the power strip.

After plugging the projector into the power strip, we had zero power.  Trial and error showed us that the power strip wasn't working, so it was back to the basement for the giant extension cord.  Nate drug it upstairs and that problem was solved.

We had other problems; picture was projecting upside down, wood trim was making it hard to trace, Texas was blocked by the shadow of some books, fabric marker was "dead".  More trouble shooting,  taking apart a large box to make a smooth surface behind our sheet, using a pencil, moving some books and we were finally tracing states.

In the next hour, Caleb and Hunter fixed a couple of new technical difficulties with the computer/projector and were able to finish the pencil tracing, take the fabric down and begin to go over the pencil markings with a marker.

Abraham and Chris joined me next.  They finished the marker tracing.  As they were admiring the map one of them said, "Wait, where is the rest of New England?"  Alas, a few states had not been traced in pencil.  So, we hung the sheet back up, turned the computer and projector back on, realigned everything and put New England on the map.

Labeling the states was the next step.   Abraham and Chris found some maps on the iPads that helped them with abbreviations for each state. 

When Kassidy and Kaler came at the end of the day, they designed a compass rose to add.  They also labeled the Great Lakes and the oceans.

Wow!  We made a lot of progress today.  The kids were great trouble shooters and problem solvers. 


Linda

An Adventure in Student Directed Project Based Learning

Good morning all!

I am really excited to share with you a new project here at the Atlantic Home School Assistance Program.  As you know, in our enrichment time we have been exploring and learning around the theme, National Treasure.  I have been trying to come up with a large project that the students can do sort of cooperatively this spring.  That is a little tricky, since we have 20 families, students of many ages and stages and you aren't all physically here at the same time.

A couple of years ago, you might remember The Castle.  We managed to build a HUGE castle in the classroom and each family became an expert in one aspect of medieval structure or life and added their section.  It just kept growing and expanding until it looked something like this:

So here's my big idea for this year... A HUGE map of the USA.  That's the first step.  A really large floor map of the country, but then, families or individual students will choose something that they want to become an expert about.  It could be a landmark, a National Park, a famous person, a building or institution.  The possibilities are endless and will be directed by the student's interests and passions.  Once they choose that special person, place, or thing to research, the end product will be some type of scale model that will be placed on the map.

All throughout this project, I will attempt to blog, tweet and do some video recording of the process.  I hope to make a short movie at the end.  

The first step is going to be deciding how to make an accurate floor size map of the USA.   In an attempt to make this an authentic experience, I plan to have students propose plans on how we should do this.  In the real world that adult live in, different firms make bids for jobs.  So, students can give me their ideas and proposals on how we should begin.  Once a process is chosen, then we will all work together to construct the map.  When the map is finished, it will be time to commence becoming experts in a narrower field.  The trick for me will be asking leading questions to quide learning without telling them how to do it.  If students take ownership, their learning will be higher.  I know it will be hard sometimes to keep my mouth shut.  I am confident that they will come up with better ideas than I have right now if I just let them and keep an open mind.

If you are interested in our progress, keep checking the blog.  Or, you can follow me on Twitter. (@mom43rs)  OR, you could also stop by and see our progress.  This is exciting!

Linda

Using Pinterest in Education

How many of you are familiar with Pinterest?  How many of you are guilty of letting time slip away while you browsing pins and ideas?  I have to admit I am hooked.  It's a great place to find recipes, craft ideas, inspiration, wardrobe ideas, household gadgets and on and on and on and on.  I find it rather addictive at times. 

For those of you who are unfamiliar with Pinterest, it is basically an online bulletin board where you can save (or pin) things that interest you.  It makes it easier to re-find things that you discover on the web.  It also works as a type of social network, in that you can follow other pinners and see what they are pinning. 

Did you know that Pinterest is a great education tool as well?  There are many pinners out there pinning great resources for teachers of all kinds.  It can actually be a little overwhelming to start with.  I have found a few ways that make finding and pinning teaching ideas a little less time consuming. 

First, it has been helpful to me to follow a few teachers on Pinterest.  That happened accidentally, I must admit.  I have a couple of crafty friends I follow who also happen to be teachers.  Their educational pins started popping up and I started repinning some of them on a board I called, Education Ideas.  (pretty generic and boring name, I know)

Then, I found out through our district's technology guru, that Tina Wahlert, the education consultant for Green Hills AEA, has quite a following on Pinterest.  You can find a link to her boards here.  Tina has 127 boards as of today, with over 10,000 pins.  She has over 5,000 followers and most of her boards are very specific to education.  You might want to browse through some of them.  It is an amazing resource!

So, with a wee bit of inspiration from Tina, I started doing a little bit of an overhaul to my own Pinterest boards.  I now have 4 of them for education.  (and none of them are named Education Ideas any more)  I am not anywhere near as inspirational as Tina, but I am trying to collect some things that you may be able to use in your homeschooling.  A link to my Pinterest boards is here.  If you are already on Pinterest yourself, you can repin interesting ideas to your own boards, or follow me if you want to see what I am pinning.  If you prefer to stay away from the addiction, you can always bookmark pages or ideas that you find interesting.

I have been having fun finding lists of great books for children, websites that list great iPad Apps, art projects, math and science ideas and online storybooks to name a few.  When you have a few spare moments, take some time to browse around and get some new inspiration.  Who knows, you may find just the thing you need to spice up the lesson plans this week.  You may even stumble across a great new recipe for supper along the way ;-)

Happy Pinning,

Linda

Happy New Year!

Happy 2013 to all of you!  Hope you had a great holiday and are excited to get back into the swing of school in each of your homes.  I don't know if you have made any resolutions.  I have decided that one of mine is to make better use of this blog.  Feel free to hold me accountable!

In December HSAP students were quite busy illustrating the poem Twas the Night Before Christmas, by Clement C. Moore.  We read the poem and then analyzed some of the artwork of Thomas Nast, who provided illustrations for this famous poem annually for years in Harper's Weekly.  I thought you might enjoy seeing some of the artwork done by our HSAP students.

In addition, Nate M. and Anna I. both made an iMovie in the month of December.  A link to each movie is found below if you are interested in viewing either of those movies.

Nate's iMovie

Anna's iMovie

Hope you enjoy these!  See you soon.
Linda

Are You a Technology Native, Or A Foreigner?

Just as soon as I think I am all tech savvy, my savviness is obsolete and I am back at square one.  I confess, I am not a native.  I think by virtue of my birth date, I am excluded as a technology native.  However, my children are fluent in the language of tech, so I keep pluggin' away and learning new things.  I try to keep up.  I am not ready to throw in the towel and be left behind quite yet.

Like it or not, our kids are growing up in a technological world.  It is a wise parent who navigates the world of technology and doses it out to her children in an age appropriate fashion, mindful of the bad that comes with the good.  None of us want to have children with mush for brains (think hours on end of fast paced video games etc.)  but on the other hand, I don't want my children to be ill prepared for the world they will live and work in as adults.  So, I am on Facebook, Pinterest and Twitter.  I blog, use a Kindle and have an iPad for work.   I have been through the Google App Training and have my whole life synced to the Google calendar.  (Lucky for you, you can only see the work part of the schedule.  No need for your blood pressure to rise with mine.)

I say all of that so that I can tell you this; there are a lot of cool resources out there in cyber space.  Really.

When I was in college, the best way to do research was to haul yourself to the Way Big University Library and make a home for yourself near the Reader's Guide to Periodical Literature and the micro-fiche film.  (some of you probably are young enough that you have no idea what I am talking about)  A type writer and a bottle of white out were your best friend, unless you had a friend that could type better than you for a small fee.  Finding information was tedious.  It took time, and you took lots of notes.  Fast forward 30 some years and my son has an ipad he takes to class which records the lecture while he takes notes on the same device.  If he needs a file on his computer, the ipad connects to it remotely and he doesn't even need to walk back to his dorm room.  Everything he needs to know is in his hands as fast as he can "google" it.

So, back to the really cool resources.  I have found that following certain educational tweeters on Twitter is a great way to learn new things.  Melissa Edwards is one home school mom I follow.  I also find encouragement as well as some great ideas from blogs.  There are some excellent home school web sites to visit.  Facebook can also be used as more than just a way to connect with family and friends.  There are pages to follow that will plop little messages of encouragement, great ideas and new blog posts right into your newsfeed.

So, I think this might be a great place for you all to share with each other some of the great cyber resources you use on a regular (or not so regular) basis.  If you are a technology native, share your expertise with those of us who are a little more seasoned in life.  We need a push once in a while to feel more comfortable with all of this.  We also need some mentoring to learn how.

Your turn!  Make a comment and share your thoughts.  And if you would like to have a little workshop to learn more, let me know and maybe we can get together and help each other out!