I had planned an activity for middle school homeroom teachers to deliver tomorrow, but with our online learning, homerooms are currently cancelled. I don't teach on Wednesdays, so won't be able to use this....but maybe some of you will?

The activity starts off looking like it will be a serious session about Multi-Tasking. They first watch this video:

They should hopefully realised half-way through watching this, that this is an April Fools Day Video!

We will then watch this short video about the history of April Fools Day:

After this students will see some April Fools videos made by Google, the BBC and Burger King! They can also share out ones they know and we would have explored pranks that came out that day.
Here's a link to the presentation - feel free to use|!

I thought I'd host a few Zoom chats next week for MYP educators to discuss current difficulties and successes. Let's use this current challenge as a chance to come together, share ideas, ask questions and support each other.
I've set up three ZOOM meetings for the following times:

It's the end of the week and our students have probably been on their computers/laptops for more than usual! I decided to put together a quick scavenger hunt, where students, in teams, would have to solve riddles, then find the objects in their houses and photograph them.
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We are using Microsoft Teams. I have a team for each of my classes, then within that, I have put channels together for each of my classroom teams (3-5 students). Students can work in their teams and have video calls in the teams and I can pop in and out of them! Before the class began, I made a copy of the scavenger hunt doc for each team, which they could edit. I made sure I had each of these open, so I could give them hints, praise student work, etc. 

Here's the scavenger hunt document and the answers. Feel free to use this with your students! Let me know how it goes!

This is another activity I had planned for Grade 6 homeroom, but we not have homeroom during our online sessions... I might get my Grade 6s to do this with me, as we are just finishing an educational game design unit anyway.

This session introduces students to the UNDRR (United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction) and has them play a game about preparing for environmental disasters, including tsunamis, earthquakes, floods, wildfires and hurricanes.
First they are introduced to the UNDRR:

Then students will think a little bit more about natural disasters and who they impact. Students will also have a chance to talk about any natural disasters they have been involved with (I was in NYC during hurricane Sandy, and lived in Atlanta when we had some mini tornados...)

At the end of the game I was going to use the following reflection questions for a think-pair-share/class discussion, but as we are moving online, I will turn this into a little exit ticket. I'll also add some space for them to upload screenshots of their game play.

Here's  the:

• Link the play the game
• Link to my presentation

This is one of the activities I had planned for Grade 6 to complete in their homerooms, because of the emphasis on critical thinking skills. As we are doing online learning now, we are not doing homeroom/core classes any more. I will most likely get my students to do this activity, in our online Design Class, when we finish our current unit next week (game design) 

This game also built in support for EAL students, and allows students to also translate text if they need!

After students have played the game (link here), I will get them to reflect on the critical thinking skills they used on a FlipGrid.

Presentation Link

I've seen a lot of MYP Design teachers stressing out online and wondering how their students will work at home. For our Grade 8s we are postponing our animation unit, and instead doing a unit all about the current Coronavirus. In this unit students have to identify a problem with being locked in - this could be anything from not getting enough exercise, to running out of fresh food. Students will have to use the resources available to them to make their solution.

This is a very real design situation and problem, and I am excited to see what they come up with.

Some additional things: Students will be encouraged to use their family as their target audience, but could also text/email/call of other people locked in (their friends). At the end they will be encouraged to take action by sharing their ideas/plans online.

Some things to note:

• We are doing this with Grade 8s. There is already some anxiety about the current situation, so I've put in light-hearted suggested for problems, including: 
  • Finding it difficult to do physical activity in a small apartment
  • Getting easily annoyed with the family I am stuck indoors with this
  • Struggling to find a quiet place to do online learning.
• With older students, or students who have already been on lockdown, you could get them to think about bigger problems, or problems which might happen if this situation escalates.
• The presentation is quite bland - mostly just text. My students are familiar with the design cycle, so this just guides them through each step.
• This activity will go through every strand in the MYP Design Cycle.
• We will be doing a lot of face to face online learning, so my students will be chatting with me on Microsoft Teams, and will use this to share their ideas with peers. They will also use Jamboard and Padlet, and we will do little fun, warm-up activities too.
• I created a worksheet for my lovely Grade 8s, but don't worry I made some available for you too, regardless of if you are teaching this to 11 year olds or 16 year olds
  • Worksheet for MYP 1 / Grade 6
  • Worksheet for MYP 2-3 / Grade 7-8
  • Worksheet for MYP 4-5 / Grade 9-10

Here's a link to the presentation too.

How wonderful would it be if our young designers used this global problem to really innovate and come up with solutions? I would love for other schools to also run this project - then we can maybe one place where we can share examples of student ideas? Let me know if this is something you might use!

On Friday afternoon we got the email - school will be closed till April 20th, with us starting online learning on Wednesday. I've used a lot of technology with my students before and my last job, was mostly tech integration. I have confidence with my technology use, but want to make sure I keep pushing myself to try new things...

SO...I recorded a bunch of videos, in 'character', as Doctor Dutton and Ms Lenny. In this videos I get my students to learn about the Coronavirus and to teach Ms Lenny!
Some of the activities:

• Researching what the Coronavirus is, and putting the information into their own words, in an easy to understand, and non-intimidating way
• Learning how to stay safe and protect others
• Thinking about surfaces they might want to clean (DIRTY PHONES!)
• Learning about ways to promote hand-washing, then making a hand-washing meme!
• Considering false information, and looking at some credible sources
• Finding out how the Coronavirus is reporting around the world
• Doing something social, while still social distancing!
• Staying active indoors - completing some indoor exercise, like yoga or dancing!
• Finding a new skill/a new topic to learn at home while school is closed
• Completing a kind activity for a family member (Avoiding getting mad at your family when you are stuck indoors with them)
• Reflecting on what they missed about school and what new habits/skills they have learnt at home.

The videos are totally dorky! While school is closed, I will have a bunch of activities with my students where they have to record videos and we will also be doing some video conference calling... I know that in middle/high school students can be terribly self-conscious and hate this...so I wanted to role model myself. I don't really like the way I look or the way I sound, but I want to show students that it doesn't really mater. Hopefully this will make them less self-conscious when they see me being a total dweeb!

One of my worries about online learning is that our classes will lack the human interaction that students need. I am going to make sure that instead of using other people's videos, I will record my own when appropriate. When using other people's videos, I will use EdPuzzle, to drop in questions and make it more personal/interactive. Of course, we will also have video calls during class time (though mostly it will be check in/instructions, then students work, while I help them one on one, then a class check in at the end of our 90 minute lesson).

My students will be completing this activity on ClassCraft. I use Classcraft all the timeand often create extra-credit, self-paced activities for students in their quests. I blogged about ClassCraft usehere. 
Last week ClassCraft announced they are making their pro accounts free till the end of the year!
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If you have Classcraft, click here to make a copy of my quest, (it will be available in the market place soon)

As much as I love ClassCraft and recommend it, I know you won't all want to use it...so I made two other options.

• A Google Slide Deck (I actually made this as I went, then dragged that info into ClassCraft)
• A Google Doc

Feel free to use any. You can of course ignore the videos, and just use the resources too!