News Volumne II, Issue 5


A Monthly Newsletter for Midway and Vickery Creek Teachers
Theme: Tis the Season	Volume II, Issue 5 December 1,1999		Kathy D. Adkins Instructional Technology Specialist

December Events! December 1, 2:50-3:50 Vickery Creek Creating Seasonal Materials December 8, 2:50-3:50 Vickery Creek Creating Seasonal Materials December 6, 3:00-4:30 Midway Elementary Georgia Learning Connections Lynn Purcell will present the ins and outs of utilizing Georgia Learning Connections. Teachers will be shown the tools to search for existing lessons and how to contribute their own unique lessons .		It is that special time of year and what better way to spread excitement of the holidays and the new year with the Holiday Greetings Project. This project is one of the simplest and almost painless. How does it work? Your class prepares one holiday greeting card to be sent to classes on the mailing list that will be sent to you following registration. Classes must register by December 8. You will receive a mailing list of all the participants. Your class greeting card must be mailed no later than December 14. Click here to check last year's exchange! If you would like to participate, please let me know so that I can help you post your card properly for the web! Click the title above for more details! Another great project is Tammy Peyton's Email Around the World. The objective is to send and receive a minimum of 100 e-mail messages and visually demonstrate how far reaching learning can be. As you receive the e-mail messages, post them on a map in your classroom. This project could easily be connected to a 100 Days Activity. For more details on this project, click the title above. Click here to e-mail me so that I can be of assistance to you and your students.
Thanks again to all that submitted the online survey! Several of you expressed interest in committing to ongoing sessions that would offer continuous support in creating webpages or developing integrated lessons utilizing available software. These sessions will begin after the first of the year! Thanks again for your participation!		Midway's Frances Mosher and Carol Trusty have truly embraced technology. Frances and Carol, four/five teachers,, utilize technology in very creative ways to improve their student' writing skills. Using Microsoft Word, their students created expanded sentences utilizing copy and paste commands. They have utilized the thesaurus as well to improve their students' writing skills. Click below to check out their handiwork! The file is the activity given to the students. These two veteran teachers, with fifty-one years experience between them are preparing themselves and their students for the future! The expanded sentence activity! This is a pdf file.

Countdown to Christmas This wonderful site is a great way to let individual students take a day and present the activity to the class. There is a student booklet that can become a class booklet as well as a teacher resource page. Activities begin Dec.1!		What is Christmas? A Christmas Webquest Students will try to imagine they have never known Christmas. They will travel to different countries to discover the smell, taste, sight, feeling and sounds of Christmas traditions. This is an extensive sight with procedure, activities, extension and rubric for evaluation. A teacher page is included for extra assistance.
Christmas Around the World Scavenger Hunt Three excellent hunts were created by a media specialist from Henry County!		Students select their graphic and greeting to send a e-card to relatives, friends or a favorite teacher. They then can add a special message. Be sure students write a short message prior to the trip to the computer. At the computer they should have their e-mail address information and message to insert in the form.
Merry Christmas from FLW in 135 Languages! Country anthems and flags are resourced at this site.		Students can listen to parts of the story!
A Primary Internet Activity Click the tree to visit many fun sites your students can visit to practice visual memory skills, visual discrimination and eye hand coordination. It is bookmarked in favorites under holidays as Little Tree!		This is a twenty question scavenger hunt that covers some history of using decorative trees, Christmas tree trivia as well as facts about growing Christmas trees. The students can answer using the online form which will print a two page sheet or use the answer sheet that is provided. The Hunt The Answer Sheet
How To Create Folders Under Classroom Accounts 1. Log on as one of your students. 2. Go to Microsoft Word. 3. Type your name. 4. Go to file and click Save As. This allows you to see the create folder icon 5. Scroll to open your students' H: drive.. 6. Click the create folder icon and type a student's name. Click OK. 7. Click the icon again and add another student's name. Click OK. 8. Do this for every student in your class. 9. When finished, click cancel. You do not need to save your name as a file. 10. Now teach your students how to save! J J J J J J J J J J J J J J J J		How To Delete Old KidPix Files (Keeping the Drives Free of Unused Clutter!) 1. Log on as one of your students. 2. Go to Microsoft Paint. 3. Go to File and click Open. 4. Go to your students' H: drive. 5. All Kid Pix files will have the extension .bmp. 6. Highlight a file and click delete on keyboard. 7. If you are logged in as a teacher you can preview files to delete by right clicking on the file to get a pop up menu then left click to select Quick View.
How do I view the entire screen without the toolbar when I am on the Internet How do I return the toolbars so that I can navigate
Kid Pix Template Using Stamps 1. Log on as a student. Open Kid Pix. 2. Go to the L:\ drive. 3. Select kptemps. 3. Double click Organizer folder . 4. Select and double click categories. 5. Save to your students H:\ drive. Students will: 1. Open Kid Pix Project. 2. Go to File and select Open a Picture. 3. Go to their H:\ drive and select the file category.bmp. 4. They will then use the stamps to stamp pictures to fit the categories.
Have you read The Night Tree by Eve Bunting? This is an excellent book for theholiday! Click the tree to get the lesson plan. If you need a copy of the book, I have one!		Book Buddies can be techno buddies one week and do this quick and easy KidPix together.