Author Archives: Matt Caratachea
The “Life Cycle” of a Snowman in Pixie
Mrs. Reed’s third grade class at Short Pump Elementary had a great time making snowman “life cycles” using Pixie. Before the lesson, I shared pictures that I had found with the students by putting them in their Server Shortcuts folder. The students imported all of the pictures into Pixie and then put the pictures in …
Hour of Code at Kaechele
Today we started the Hour of Code at Kaechele Elementary and it was a blast! I went into three fifth grade classrooms and a fourth grade room as well. We had the students working from Code.org and the students LOVED it! I quickly showed them how to start and they were ready to roll. It was …
VSTE Highlights!
This past Sunday and Monday several Elementary ITRT’s traveled to Virginia Beach to attend the 2014 Virginia Society for Technology in Education’s Annual Conference. While there participants were given the opportunity to sit in on various concurrent sessions, listen to awesome keynote speakers, visit various exhibits, see student work from around the state and collaborate …
Dumbarton Student Lighthouse Team Survey
At Dumbarton Elementary they are going through the Leader In Me process. This is a great program that supports student leadership and ownership in everything they do in addition to many other things. The student lighthouse team serves as a leadership beacon in the school for both teachers and students. As a group they decided to …
Everything Is Awesome At Glen Allen Elementary!
Everything is Cool When You’re Part of A Team! Jessica Robinson and I visited Julie Smith at Glen Allen Elementary to do a couple of lessons! First we worked in a first grade classroom using the iPads and then in a second grade classroom using the laptops. In Mrs. Taylor’s first grade class we had a blast …
Arrays in Google Drawing and Movie Maker
Today in Mrs. Reed’s third grade class at Short Pump Elementary School we made arrays! They are just beginning their multiplication unit, so they are familiar with arrays and how they work. I paired the students up and made a Google Drawing for each group before the lesson and put them in the teacher’s folder …
#TechTakeout Getting Some Screen Time
The #TechTakeout Crew made it to TV! Check out our segment on School Matters! Starts about 40 seconds in. Check out the Tech Takeout Crew’s segment on HCPS-TV’s School Matters. This was from our trip to Trevvett and Fair Oaks Elementary. Our segment starts about 40 seconds in. http://henrico.k12.va.us/hcpstv/2014-15/SM/sm-111914-3.html Thanks Jim for posting about …
Letters as Ancient Greeks
Each student in Ms. Jessee’s third grade class is using Google Docs/Google Classroom to take on the role as an ancient Greek. They are using Google Docs to write a letter discussing important aspects of ancient Greek life such as occupation, voting, architecture, etc. This week when I go back to Ms. Jessee’s room the …
Tech Takeout Delivers Some Piping Hot Learning to Kaechele Elementary
The ITRTs kicked off the session with a brain warm-up by using the classroom response system, Plickers. Plickers is a POWERFUL tool that allows teachers to collect real time formative assessment data WITHOUT the need for student devices. The Tech Takeout crew then divided the students into groups. Each group of 5th graders worked on …
Taking AR To The Next Level
Accelerated Reader, or AR, has had some mixed reviews throughout Henrico County. With the county no longer paying for the quizzes I feel like the topic has been coming up more as well. Some teachers believe that AR is a great way to motivate those students who are reluctant to read, but love competition or …
