Google Map and Google Doc Link (Group Assignment Week 1/28)

We as a group chose to explore the different vegetables and best environment for these in Kalamazoo Mi and Costa Rica. Students will be able to write to their penpals trough email about what kind of vegetables we grow here and what grows in Costa Rica. Students will then be able to analyze how the environment affects what we grow. The link to our google doc is below the map! The google doc is set up so anyone with the link has access to it!



Link For Google Doc: 
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1sH4c4ZHXfBCctUnRiamWzfP6kU7qxQ6w5PhLrUmhpvQ/edit

Cora Langdon, Rachel Bontrager, Dakota Keating

Google Map- PenPals

https://goo.gl/maps/egiws5E1djz Hey guys! Here is the link to our google map. If you copy and paste in a search engine our two points will come up. We as a group chose to explore the different vegetables and best environment for these in Kalamazoo Mi and Costa Rica. Students will be able to write to their penpals trough email about what kind of vegetables we grow here and what grows in Costa Rica. Students will then be able to analyze how the environment affects what we grow. Dakota

Virtual Pen Pals and Google Map

Hello Everyone,
Hope you're having another good snow day! I'm not sure if you saw the email from Sharon, but Briana dropped the class so it's just us 3 now!
I wanted to get started on the Virtual Penpals as quickly as possible so that we aren't stressed on Saturday and Sunday like we were last time... so here's the post we will use for this assignment!

The Google Map is to be embedded into the blog and the Google Doc about the Virtual Penpals will just be a link on this post of the blog! I attached the Template for the Lesson Plan for the Virtual Penpals so we can get started. Under each question that needs to be answered for this assignment, I already put a few answers. Under questions that I didn't answer/understand/wanted your input, I just put in two question marks. Please, add, change, or delete anything I already put in. Besides, this is for brainstorming!

This is supposed to kind of go along with our concept map project (Greenhouse) so I was thinking the lesson for this could be the Greenhouse Effect! I know we already put it that on our concept map before but we can already modify anything. Let me know what you guys think!!

Audience: 

• What age/grade are your students? 
• 1st-3rd graders 
• Who will they be communicating with? (Age, location...etc.)
• 1st-3rd graders 
• Location: Costa Rica

Objectives: (check out bloom's taxonomy)

• Apply, Understand, Analyze 

Timing: 

• When will this take place in your unit? Before or after another lesson etc.? 
• At the end of a lesson, to wrap up the lesson
• Is there prior knowledge they must have? 
• Need to have no prior knowledge
• About how long will it take? (Weeks, days, hours?)
• Weeks- allow students to explore and research and have a chance to connect with penpals.

Technologies: 

• List technologies that will be used in this lesson. 
• Computers and an email site

Format: (Interview style? Free-form?..etc.)

• How will the penpal discussion take place?
• Through email
• What will you provide to guide discussions? 
• Small lecture, visual aids, 
• What types of questions will students be asking? 
• What is it like where you live? What do you do on a day to day basis? What is farming/gardening like by you? What are the best and suitable vegetables in your area? Do you have greenhouses or other sorts of gardening practices/techniques? ...
• What type of information will they have to share? 
• Where they live, farming/gardening practices/techniques, what they do on a day to day basis. ...
• How will you be sure that students are being safe with sharing their information?
• Having the students only share the general location of where they live. Especially if they are talking to someone across the world, something as simple as West Michigan is sufficient for the other to know where in general they are talking about.
• Only sharing their first name or maybe even a nickname with their penpal.
• How will you check in with students as they proceed?  
• Monitor each email before sent. 
• Have a rubric to fill out to monitor what students ask from their penpal.

Product: (Outcome - Assessment)

• What physical project will students produce from their penpal interactions? (Informal reflection, final presentation, vlog, blog article...etc.)
• Final presentation to show reflection and knowledge 
• How will they synthesize and share the information they have learned from this activity? 
• Create a presentation for the class- a little more complex for 4th or 5th graders. OR even create a story/picture book for younger students
• How will you assess students?
• I think a rubric would be a good starting point to allow students to ask certain questions and gain knowledge. Also, will be able to compare and contrast.
• How will this tie into the larger PBL unit? 
• This will allow students to learn about different vegetables that grow in these areas and why they grow here. Students will learn that the environment is very different and these vegetables grow best in certain circumstances. This covers greenhouses in PBL research project. We address the facts and reality of the greenhouse and it's effects in and outside of the environment/atmosphere.

Websites

Hey guys!
Hope your week is going good. I have found 3 websites and here they are:
Greenhouse technology
Teach engineering: model greenhouses
Garden guides: best types of greenhouses
I also found a website on for a bottle greenhouse that is a good activity for students to grasp the concept and understand how it works.
Thanks,
Dakota

3 Greenhouse Website Evaluations

Hello Everyone!

Here's my post to let you guys know what 3 websites I'll be evaluating for this assignment!
1. Planet Natural: Greenhouse Gardening 101
2. Greenhouse Gases & Greenhouse Effect: Kids Environment/Kids Health, by NIEHS
3. Advance Greenhouses

Don't forget to submit the evaluations all at once, not in 3 separate ones!
Thanks, like Cora said, STAY WARM!
Rachel Bontrager

Week of 1/21 & My 3 Websites

Hey Everyone!!

This week we do not have a group assignment that we have to all work on together! However we do have to communicate what websites we each are going to evaluate because we all have to do three different ones! I think it will be easiest to see everyone's 3 websites if you create your own post stating the 3 websites you will be evaluating! (In my post from the other day I explained how to create your own post in case you are unaware! 😃)

I think the type of websites we should be looking for are ones that tell us how to build a greenhouse and any information surrounding that process. We also would have to research what plants work best in greenhouses, how greenhouses work, how to take care of a greenhouse. Pretty much everything that is in our concept map!! Let me know if I missed something that you think we should also be finding sources on!

Here are the three websites I am going to be evaluating as of right now! I will let you all know if I end up not using one of these!!

- The Greenhouse Catalog
- Gardening Know How
- Climate Kids ran by Nasa 

Thank you! Stay warm this week!!

Cora Langdon

Concept Map - Part A (modified)

Here is our modified version! This is our concept map for what the students will be building, a greenhouse. We have 3.5 subcategories to begin along with a separate topic about the invitations and how the students will be getting their Greenhouse's name out there!
Rachel Bontrager

Using Our Blog

Hey!

I hope you all had a relaxing weekend!! I just had a few thoughts regarding the way we use the blog this semester. Don't miss what Sharon posted in response to our concept map! Her post doesn't have a title, it's the one right below this one!

As the semester goes on, I think it is going to be super important that we are all (at least trying to make the effort) to check the blog once a day if not every other day! I know we get points for using the blog each week, but because I'm sure all of our schedules are hectic it, and we all have different times throughout the week where we can do the work for this class, I think it will be most efficient if we are checking it everyday! For example my weekends are usually very packed and so during the week is when I have the most time to do the work for this class!!

I also want to encourage you all to make your own posts! So when you log on at the beginning of the week and there isn't a post for that week yet go ahead and make the post! To make your own post: if you are on our blog on the top right of the screen next to your email should be a 'new post' tap. When you click on the tap it will bring you to the page to compose a new post!

I hope this doesn't come off as me demanding anything from you all! I just want to make the best use out of this communication platform and make sure that we are getting our stuff done with enough time to spare and not waiting till the end of the week to start working on that weeks assignments we have to submit as a group.

Let me know of any thoughts you have regarding this posts!! Thanks!

Cora Langdon

Are you building a greenhouse? It cannot be just learning about one. Your students would be building one. Therefore, they have to learn lots of things before they could. It is a great idea. These are the things you need to have the students learn before building it: how to build, materials needed, tools needed, safety for using tools, the kind of plants you would grows, the care of plants. Also,your students will need to have an Open House. They will need to plan it, learn how to create invitations, flyers, posters to invite family, friends, and community members. You have a lot missing in this first concept map. Sharon Peterson

Starting Our Concept Map

Hi everyone!

I hope all of you are having a good week! I think we should start using the blog and working on our concept maps since those are due on Sunday! But anyway here is what I am thinking so far along the lines of the concept map and our big project:

I think the easiest  online software for our concept map is going to be Bubbl.us because it's free and doesn't require us to sign up for a free trial! 

The only idea I have for our big project is to have the students come up with a plan to build a greenhouse. I think that could be a good starting point, however I don't know what you are all thinking! If you all have different ideas that great! I don't just wanna go with my idea because it was the first one put out there. 

What are you guys thinking for our big project??



Cora Langdon