Oregonians are a pretty hardy lot when it comes to rain, but every once in a while we have to call an inside recess. When that happens our some of our students have the option of going to the gym. There are PE teacher, Ms. Layman, has several activities set up for them including one that involves an iPad running YouTube, a Chromecast a data projector. With this setup she projects dance videos on the wall and the kids get to take part as the did today dancing to the Gummi Bear song. Click the image above to take a look.
This week at Lewis
A few images from this week at Lewis...
Source: http://instagram.com/timlauer
Makey Makey
timlauer's photo on Instagram
Today I was able to visit with Mr. Vestal's students while they were working in the tech lab. Recently they have begun to create game controllers using MakeyMakey circuit boards.
End of the day...
Working in Mr. Vestal's Classroom...
Working in Mr. Vestal’s classroom.
Rainy Day Recess
One of the decisions that I have to make is calling a rainy day recess. Basically if it is raining significantly during our lunch time recess, we do not send the students out for recess, but rather call a rainy day recess. A rainy day recess consists of various indoor activities for students during lunch. This involves the movement of students to various locations such as our library, our gym, our technology lab, the music room, and classrooms. Basically rainy day recesses are harder to organize and involve the moving of students from the cafeteria to their particular rainy day recess location. It is a lot of work.
For the past few years I have been using an iOS app called Dark Sky to help me with my decision making process regarding whether to call a rainy day recess or not. Dark Sky is an app that provides a macro forecast for a particular location and provides a visual representation of the probability of rain or snow for the upcoming hour. It calls upon local weather stations to predict precipitation for your particular location. From my experience it works very well. I use it daily in the winter months to help make the rainy day recess call.
A companion web site that provides similar information is called Forecast.io. I highly recommend both.
Lewis Elementary School Audio Postcard: January 7, 2013
Lewis Audio Postcard: Nov. 24, 2013
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Cafeteria Workers: Annual Beavers vs. Ducks cookie survey.
Annual Beavers vs. Ducks cookie survey:
Each year before the Oregon State vs. Oregon football game, our school district Nutrition Services department provides a cookie treat as part of lunch before the big game. Students are offered a choice between an orange OSU cookie, or a yellow University of Oregon cookie. This year, our informal survey concluded that Duck fans edged our Beaver fans by just a few crumbs.
Lewis Audio Postcard: November 10, 2013
Accessibility Workshop with our Occupational Therapist Pete Carpenter
Lewis Audio Postcard: November 4, 2013
A few photos from Lewis: Week of October 28, 2013
Audio Postcard: October 27, 2013
A semi weekly audio update on news and events taking place at Lewis Elementary School in Portland, Oregon.
via tumblr:
in Random
"It’s important to note that none of this is about the technology. It’s all about providing teachers and students access to the resources that are taken for granted everywhere else in the modern world but in our classrooms. It’s about preparing districts for the 21st Century and Common Core. It’s about building schools and school cultures where students want to learn. It’s about empowering teachers through technology to become better teachers. It’s about preparing kids for their unknown futures and districts for the unknown challenges yet to come."
Cabinet or bust! by Andrew Schwab @anotherschwab
Via Tumblr http://timlauer.tumblr.com/post/65139450012/its-important-to-note-that-none-of-this-is-about
Lewis Audio Post Card: October 18, 2013
Run for the Arts
We had a great day for our annual Run for the Arts. This is our major arts fundraising event, helping us to raise money to bring artists to our school. Our students did an outstanding job today with the run. I would also like to acknowledge the work of our PE teacher, Ms. Layman and our parent volunteers who worked to make the event possible.
This past week at Lewis...
Rain Garden...
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Lewis Depave Project Update
On Saturday, September 14, 2013 we started the first phase of our project to remove approximately 1800 square feet of pavement on our playground in order to create space for a rain garden. The rain garden will create green space for plants and habitat of insects and bird, while also providing a space for rain water that runs off of our playground. Currently this rain water is running off into a sewer drain, and when we get heavy rains, a small lake forms.
This past week a crew came to excavate the area where the pavement was removed. Next new soil will be brought in and then on October 12, 2013 we will plant our rain garden.