ELP Mo. Valley

ELP (Extended Learning  Program) for K-7th is up and going....with a few bumps, potholes, swerves and detours along the way......learning to navigate whatever life throws at you, is what I remind the students of when changes come to our class. Below are pictures and/or video clips demonstrating what our students are currently working on.  We are beginning our year by delving into abstract reasoning, visual/spatial learning, potential energy, kinetic energy and chain reactions.  In addition students are continuing with building coding skills and early computer programming processes.  Check out www.code.org and www.playcodemonkey.com for additional ideas. For the Middle School students we are also venturing into an independent study called "Genius Hour" (www.geniushour.com).  Students began with an interest inventory and then developed a driving question to research based off their results.  We are nearing the completion of the 1st set of research and beg...

Mission/Vision/Belief Statements-- -2017 Mission (per web page) : The Missouri Valley Community School District will create an engaging environment that fosters inquisitive learners who can effectively apply their skills in an ever changing world. Mission for ELP: Missouri Valley Community Schools will create qualitatively differentiated instruction in core curricular areas for students who exhibit high performance or potential to achieve in intellectual, creative or artistic areas; or excel in specific academic fields. Students will be considered for the program based on multiple assessment pieces, both standardized and informal,  and services will be reevaluated on a regular basis by parents, classroom teachers, administrators, and the extended learning program instructor. It is the goal of the Missouri Valley ELP (extended learning program), along with all educators, staff and administrators, to foster inquisitive learners, expand their knowledge and...

Over the last couple of weeks the 5th ELP group has departed from basic coding/computer programming skills to focus on sensory robotics with an activity called "Cubelets."  The students collaborated to create small scale sensory robots:  the cubes stack together in certain orders to perform certain tasks as programmed by the color of the cubes.  Below are pictures and/or video of the early trial and error phase of the robot building.  In the next few sessions students will be given challenges to complete with the robots and cubes allotted.  Stay tuned for more pictures, videos and evidence of STEM being applied in all areas of learning..... Standards CC.K-12.MP.5 Use appropriate tools strategically. CC.K-12.MP.6 Attend to precision. CC.K-12.MP.1 Make sense of problems and persevere in solving them. trial and error....take 1..... The very beginning of stacking cubelets... collaborating in a larger group to create a hypothesis for ...

In early December Mrs. Jenny Stessman, Instructional Coach, contacted Mrs. Christensen, ELP Instructor, regarding an Iowa Space Grant Consortium.  Teams submitted an application and those 4 teams selected would go to Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, AL for the Professional Development of a lifetime.....NASA Educational Instructors would create professional development geared toward STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics)! On January 3, 2017 the 2 teachers received word they were 1 of the 4 teams from Iowa selected!!! The NASA PD was from February 8-February 11, 2017.  Below are pictures from their experiences: Mrs. Stessman and Mrs. C.  ready to lift-off into learning.... teamwork to develop a model of  a lunar landing module Mars, the next giant leap create a plan, prepare the plan, test the plan, revise as needed:  engineering is always evolving, not just the "right answer" the first testing phase.....yes, Mrs. C. w...

The 5th Grade ELP have been working on coding and creating original scripts/storyboards/games at www.code.org.  Below is a link created by Brody Lager, Miss Larson's 5th Grade class, about the importance of teamwork.  He took our character education and Family Group lesson on teamwork to design a "video game" themed storyboard. The 20th Century Learner in me isn't quite sure how to activate the link within this blog.....so, please copy and paste the link in to your web browser and ENJOY!  I love the amount of learning/collaboration and problem solving I witness in this group of scholars.  I also, LOVE, the amount of learning they share with me, so I can become a more 21st century thinker too : ) copy and paste: https://studio.code.org/c/282516767 Brody, in the yellow, was the creator and navigator for the visual script created.  He collaborated with Dane Janssen, Ben Hansen and Vincent Larson on character emotions and dialogue.   TEAM--Togethe...

At the end of last year, I have several students who kept talking about this "coding thing" and www.code.org.   Not one to be left out, I decided I needed to learn about this coding thing.  In early October I attended a code.org training class and left feeling completely "hooked"!   The 1st-5th grade ELP students will be working their way through the various stages of www.code.org (a free website established to strengthen computer science skills in a fun, sequential and visual way).  The students and I work our way through building visual coding scripts to complete a variety of tasks.   Below are a few pictures of our current endeavors.  And the link at the bottom is my very first attempt at coding a storyboard/game.  You can cut and past the link into your web browser and, hopefully, it will play the short message I programmed. Stay tuned for further coding adventures...... 5th Grade students brainstorming the next step in creating their first...

The 2nd grade ELP group began the year with the folktale "John Henry" and discussed how John had a problem......he could break the rocks faster than the machine BUT the demolished rocks couldn't be cleared away faster enough...SO, engineers design a process or product to solve a problem or meet a need..... Below are a few photos showing how we have brainstormed solutions, revised our plans using feedback from others, tested the ideas and begun the creation of a solution with the resources we have available. A very special thanks to Mrs. Jenny Stessman, our Instructional Strategist, for co-teaching and helping our students develop even stronger questions, strategies and products.  Our problem and the original creations/solutions What is an Engineer? "Thank you, Mrs. Stessman" for helping us rethink our thinking! With COLLABORATION we can create amazingly strong solutions! Below are standards in Mathematical Practice/Reaso...