A Virtual Museum of Earth's Changing Surface by Mr. Harper, Mr. Wire, Mrs. Barnhill, and Mr. Hoskins

Students in Mr. Harper’s and Mr. Wire’s class created Thinglinks to show how the Earth’s surface is constantly changing. The goal of this project was to compare catastrophism with uniformitarianism and show how both types of events can change the surface of the Earth. First they had to research different global events and determine if the event was catastrophic (happened quickly) or uniform (happened over a long period of time). Once this was determined the students then had to describe how the event impacted the surface of the Earth, and how the event occurred through scientific processes.

When their research was completed students then created a Thinglink to display their research. The students then created a QR code, so that their projects could be easily accessed by others. The QR codes along with a little bit of advertising were printed out and displayed in the hallway creating our virtual museum.

After viewing one another’s projects, the students then created a Venn diagram using the iBrainstorm app. Using this app gave students the opportunity to collaborate as they compared the similarities and differences of their event with that of a project opposite of their own.  With so many examples in our virtual museum, it enabled students to understand the numerous ways the Earth’s surface can change, whether it be through catastrophism or uniformitarianism.

Reed Flute Cave THE GREAT CHILEAN EARTHQUAKE

Uniformitarianism Catastrophism

Muscular System Thinglink by Coach Pickett

Lifetime Fitness is a physical education class devoted to teaching students how to be involved
in physical activity throughout life and why this is important. One of the units covered in this
class involves the students being exposed to weight training and functional movement
exercises. During this unit, the students also spend time learning major muscles in the body.
To start this unit, students were asked to upload an image of the muscular system into the iPad
application, “ThingLink.” This project ultimately includes 3 different tasks. First, the students will
use the muscular system image in ThingLink to find and label the major muscles they are
required to learn. Muscles include the biceps, triceps, abdominals, latissimus dorsi, obliques,
etc.

After they find and label the muscles, students will spend a few weeks utilizing equipment in the
fitness center to learn exercises to help build and strengthen these muscles. Once the students
spend some time in the fitness center, they will return to their ThingLink projects and add an
instructional video for one exercise for each muscle they identified and labeled.
The final part of the project requires the students to participate in some research to find at least
one functional movement of each muscle they learned. For example, the quadriceps muscles
helps us bend and straighten our knees, which helps us walk up the steps, run, balance, etc.
They will add one final bullet point to each muscle they learned and include what that muscles
helps them do in their lives daily. This will ultimately lead us into a functional movement lifting
unit.

Once this project is complete, students will be asked to write a reflection on what they learned
from this project and why it is important to keep these muscles strong throughout life. This
project not only provides an interactive study guide, it also helps students personalize this
learning experience.

        

Google Expeditions in World Cultures by Mrs. Skiles

Students in Mrs. Skiles World Culture's class completed Google Expeditions as an introduction to human and physical geography. The goal was for students to explore Rio de Janiero and Sao Paulo, Brazil and discover the human and physical geography of those places. This is the first time the student have worked with human and physical geography.  First in their Google docs warm-up page, they created a statement on what they think are human and physical geography.  Next, students are given a t-chart with physical and human geography.  Using Google Expeditions the students explore scenes from Rio and Sao Paulo.  As we explore the students listed what they think are features of the human and physical geography.

During the next class students will continue to explore but this time having a class discussion over the lists they created.  Students will then develop personal definitions for human and physical geography.  (Personal definitions in my opinion are better than standard because they own the definition and can remember it better.)