What did Emperor Quin Shihuangdi Do?

Today in our study of Ancient China we learned about Emperor Quin Shihuangdi. He did some great and not so great things according to our research. After summarizing the good and the bad into our Ancient Studies PowerPoint, we made of model of both the Great Wall of China and a replica of one of the Terra-cotta Army leaders. Students then wrote a summary of what they made and why they are important.
Good job Champion Students!

Can You Make Yourself Smarter (YES)?

This article is amazing!

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/22/magazine/can-you-make-yourself-smarter.html?_r=1&src=me&ref=magazine

From this article I found a free website that has the n back game:
http://dual-n-back.com/

Try it!

Guest Speaker (Thanks Ms. Amy)

Ms. Amy just got back from Japan. She loves Japanese art and shared with us what she did on her trip.
She also shared some great visuals!

From the above image students wrote the following:


chloe h
April 20, 2012:
Anime Girls:
j. This reminds me of myself hanging out with my BFF’s. Normally it is just my three best friends, so these three girls remind me of us going to Simone’s or Surf and Yogurt and gossiping about today’s school day.

b. Purple hair: “Hey where should we go today.”
Blonde: “I don’t know, how about-”
Brunet: “Boo!”
Blonde: “Ahhh! What was that for?”
Brunet: “Sorry, I was just messing around.”
Purple hair: “Common guys, let’s just go to fro-yo.”
Brunet and Blonde: Yepperoni!

Today

Thanks Amy!

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Julia F
Anime Drawing

Friday, April 20, 2012

f. I would title this art The Anime Girls because there are three anime girls in the drawing.

e. I think that the colors in the background make the drawing seem bright and cheerful. The three girls show confusion, happiness, and coolness. One girl looks like she thinks she’s all that, one girl looks happy to be with her friends, and one girl looks like she doesn’t know what’s going on.

n. Brown hair: “Come on girls, smile for the picture!”
Purple hair: “I would look good whether I smiled or not.”
Blonde hair: “Wha..wha…what’s going on???”

m. I think the artist wanted us to look and see three friends together, and give us a happy feel, because it might remind us of our own friends.

Today

Delete

Maritza D
4/20/12
A. I think the artist is a girl and this is a picture representing her and her two friends. Her inspiration was probably the love between the girls as friends. She represents them as girls in
Anime form maybe because all three friends love Anime.
B. I think the girl on the right side would say “oh come on it’s just a photo you look fine!” to the girl in the middle. I also think that the girl on the left side would say “yeah your hair looks fine and who cares that you’re wearing your school uniform?” Lastly I think that the girl in the middle would say “no I didn’t even have time to do my hair today come on I can just take retakes no don’t make me do this!”
C. I see three girls that look like they are friends. All three girls are wearing rundown school uniforms.

Today

Ancient CHINA!

We are discovering the amazing China. This week we studied the teachings of Confucius and Laozi (Taoism). Then students working in pairs created conversations these two ancient philosophers could have had promoting their way of thinking. Next, students recorded themselves (video) having a "debate". Finally, students uploaded the video in their Ancient Civilizations PowerPoint. This was a fun activity that really made the students use the higher order thinking skills.

End of India Studies

We completed our Ancient India studies with students making board games in the theme of Ancient India. It was really fun to watch the students use their imaginations and come up with an original concepts with amazing questions. After making the board games, we challenged the students in another class to play against us. Students looked like they had fun and of course, they seemed to have gained a lot of knowledge about Ancient India.

Journal Writing With Technology

When I was a student we wrote journals on paper. Each day when my students come in I project a powerful image on the screen and they journal about the image using standards based prompts on their netbook. Then we share the responses through a message board on Thinkquest. This gives students a chance to share their amazing thoughts and feelings.

Ancient Indian Art Meets Play-Doh

Today students researched Ancient Indian art, then replicated it using play-doh and construction paper. Then students took a picture of their art and uploaded the picture into the Ancient Civilization PowerPoint with a summary of what they made and why. Students did a wonderful job.

Ancient Indian Summary

We are concluding our studies of Ancient India this week. Today students made an acrostic Poem with the word India going down the page. Then for each letter in India they wrote an interesting fact that they learned. The next step was to go to virtual keyboard.com and make the poem into a song in an "Ancient Indian" sound. Students recorded their songs and uploaded it to their Poem Page in the PowerPoint. Well done students!

Here is an example of a students poem:

From Faith:
India invented many different and useful things like the concept of zero and algebra,
Now we use the same technology as they did long ago,
Discovered that the earth revolved around the sun,
I think it would have been fun to live in ancient India because they did lots of trade,
Arryabhata was the leading mathematician of the Gupta Empire!