TCEA Session on Primary School

These are my notes from the session ABC’s of Technology Integration: Primary Ideas for Primary Teachers at TCEA 2007.

Michelle Heindrick, the presenter, is a first grade teacher at Lee Elementary School.

Basic computer skills for K-2
Scholastic Keys is a program that overlays MS Word, PowerPoint and Excel. It makes it easier to use for K-2 kids.

Give them a sentence strip with their name is all capital letters and have them type it. Having it in all capital letters help them match the letters on the keyboard and eliminates the need for them to translate lowercase letters of their name into upper case mentally. As students get more familiar with the keyboard they can start to add the step of translation.

Spelling Practice in Word
Students work with a buddy. Teacher creates a table with three columns labeled: 1st try, 2nd try and Correct. One student calls out the spelling words and the other types. The typist can see when they have a word spelled wrong because of the spell check “squiggle” that Word puts under the text. On the third trp they are allowed to right click their incorrect spelling and try to choose the right option from the suggested spellings.

Four columns in a Word document
Column 1 and 3 have words that you type. They have to duplicate the words by typing in column 2 and 4.

PowerPoint Descriptive Writing
Insert clip art in a slide. Have students write a sentence describing the picture.

Modified “Creature Feature”
After reading the book “Creature Feature” the class creates their own version. Students each choose an animal and write their description of the animal. In kindergarten may want to have “reading buddies” do the typing. Kindergarteners can create an illustration in KidPix or other drawing software. Import the illustrations into PowerPoint. Print and bind your own class book.

Spelling refresher or high frequency word practice
Put one word in each slide of a PowerPoint slide show. Adjust the timing for the ability and attention of your students. Put it on continuous loop.

Free K-12 PowerPoint presentations are available from Pete’s PowerPoint Station.

Counting
To practice 1:1 correspondence create a template in KidPix with blocks for each number 1 through 10. Student pick a stamper and put the correct number of stamps in each box for the numeral in the box.

Sorting with Kidspiration
Put words for objects from two categories in the middle of the screen. Put a box and label for each group on the sides. Students are supposed to move the objects to the correct box. Then switch to outline mode and the terms are sorted. Older students then can write a sentence about each item and why it is in that category.

Other suggested Web sites
http://www.lil-fingers.com/
http://www.earobics.com/gamegoo/

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