So what do you do when you teach in a computer lab and rely on having electricity and access to the Internet and the power’s out? That was the case today at school. So were the computer classes canceled for the day? Absolutely NOT!

1st Grade: Pumpkin Life Cycle

1st Grade uses iPads this year and though what had been planned for the day needed the Internet, Plan B was quickly put into place. After a quick discussion about the life cycle of a pumpkin, 1st grade got to work drawing pictures of each of the 6 parts of the life cycle. Next class, they’ll finish those up and then create short animations or maybe animated GIFs to show off the pumpkin life cycle. Anyone know of a good app for creating animated GIFs for 1st graders?

Pumpkin Vine with Flowers

2nd & 8th Grades: Algorithms with Legos

Both 2nd and 8th grades were given a small Ziploc with 5-6 Lego pieces. They were told to build something with them (while not showing it to others) and then to write an algorithm that they could give to someone else to rebuild the same thing. This is based on this Activity Guide from Code.org. 2nd grade got through the building and mostly through the writing process. They will try the rebuild during their next class. The good thing about this for 2nd grade is that they participate in the Monster Project every year and that also has them create something and then describe it so someone else can recreate it. 8th grade completed this activity with a few “almost” successful algorithms but mostly non-successful ones. It’s tough to be that detailed even for 8th graders!

7th Grade: Power Back!

The power came back on before 7th grade came into the lab so they did their regularly scheduled lesson (using EasyBib to create a bibliography for their DAR Essay). They were very disappointed that they didn’t get to play with Legos but that will happen later in the year for them!

Mrs. Sedgwick has decided that she needs to have more “unplugged” activities ready to go just in case!