This project was the most difficult movie an 8th grade had ever done before at this school.  It had an introductory video clip, a book jacket, their book review, a closing video clip with credits, the conclusion video clip, and added music.  The movie was then converted to play on both the computer and on the Internet.  The students followed directions well and their movies turned out really great!  The audio was the only problem.  We'll overcome that next year. 

The 7th grade finally finished their "Famous Women" project.  This project was to make a newsletter using Microsoft Publisher and should have finished in March, which was Famous Women's Month.  The spring is a difficult time to do a project because of spring break, testing and practicing for testing.  Because of the length of time this project took, the teachers and I are going to try to alleviate some problems with this project.  This took way too long. 

     After the filming, the 8th graders will take their film that has been put into their file and make a movie (or podcast) out of it.  This movie will have an introduction, a book cover, the film itself, credits, and a conclusion.

     This entire process will not be finished until at least March, maybe April.  With all the holidays, and coming to the library only one day a week, this is a time-consuming project.

      In November, the 7th Grade went to work on writing stories to honor veterans.  After writing, typing and printing their stories, they made a cover for their work.  All members of the class voted on their favorite cover for the books.  They voted electronically through Quia after seeing all the covers.  Ms. Gann then made took the pages and the cover chosen and made it into a book.  Therefore, all seventh grade classes had a book made for Veterans' Day.  They are located in the office for perusal. Above, you see one of the covers for a book done by the seventh graders.  Didn't they do an awesome job?

      First was discussed basic Internet Safety.  This included safety with personal information that includes not giving out your name, address, parents' names, phone numbers, social security number, and definitely no pictures!

      Next, viruses, worms and trojans were discussed to keep your computer safe from hackers getting your personal information and destroying your computer.  Free preventive software was discussed.

      Then cyberbullying and bullying was discussed.  What is a bully?  What to do if you are being bullied?  Also, some articles were read from Scholastic magazine as well as from off the Internet about recent deaths caused by bullying incidents. 

       Finally, copyright and plagarism were discussed in detail.  A movie was shown from the "Copyright in the Classroom" program (www.copyrightfoundation.org).  A book review will be written using cited material to show how to prevent plagarism.

     Then the students started working on the Dewey Decimal System and the ten categories.  Using a list of titles of books, students would tell into which category the book would be categorized. 

      Practice on decimals then took place.  It was determined by playing a game on the computer that students did not remember their decimals.  After re-teaching decimals, students did much better on the game.  Then a matching activity with the Dewey Decimal System and its numbers finished the study of the D.D.S.

  DVD

     All 7th and 8th graders are finishing their concept maps.  Then the 7th graders will research and do Power Points of their person.  We have already studied and discussed the color wheel and the importance of the visual representations of their reports in Power Point.  The Power Point medium is for group interaction and must be seen and enjoyed by more than the author.

     All 8th graders will do their reports in Microsoft Publisher.  Their reports will, of necessity, have more content value and less pictures.  More indepth information of the person's life is required.

     These reports will take about two months to finish, probably.

     In the meantime, because of so much snow and the schedule inconsistencies, I've read the book "The Necklace" to some of my classes.  This is a favorite of mine about a women unhappy in her life because, even though she has a relatively nice place to live, she wants to be wealthy and feels she deserves to be.  After a night at a party, her entire life changes!  If you don't remember this book - it is a great story for a 20 min. read that has a great moral and provokes discussion.

   "Aunt Chip and the Great Triple Creek Dam Affair" by Patricia Polacco is a fantastic book by itself.  However, I read this book to my students for them to compare their lives to the lives of the people of the town.  Do they read today or watch TV and play video games?  Is there library going to be torn down because of disuse?  What will be the consequences of such an event?

Debates

   We had the debates again this year. The students were grouped into 4 or 5 with 2/3 for the Pro/Yes and 2/3 for the Con/No side for the 7th grade, but the groups for the 8th grade had only two, with one for the pro and one for the con.  The subjects were chosen to be of interest to the students.  Each group had two weeks to look up information to support their viewpoint before the debates began and I showed a 3-minute video and explained what I wanted them to do.  

   The first person for the Pro/Yes viewpoint was to stand at the podium, state her/his name and list all the reasons why he/she supported their viewpoint.  Then that person would clarify one or two reasons from the list.  The next person on the Pro side would then clarify the rest of the reasons from the list.  This would be repeated by the Con/No side - The first person for the Con/No viewpoint was to stand at the podium, state her/his name and list all the reasons why he/she supported their viewpoint.  Then that person would clarify one or two reasons from the list.  The next person on the Con side would then clarify the rest of the reasons from the list.

   After both sides had stated all their viewpoints, the Pro side began the debate.  The debates for the 7th grade were on such questions as:

Should the government rate music?

Should schools have dress codes?

Should laws be stricter for teenage drivers?

Are teen curfews a good thing?

Should teen criminals be locked up in adult prisons?

Should you change the way you dress because of what other people might think?

   The debates on the 8th grade were on such subjects as abortion, stem cell research, animal testing, etc.

   After the students heard some good debates, they really enjoyed this.  I filmed these and it went much better this year than last year.  I still have to work on the sound and have been working with the Technology Dept. for the county to try to find a solution.  The films that could be heard were put on the school website under "Students' Work - Projects - Debates".