A Tour of Room 17 at Lewis Elementary School...

Pamela Kennedy ( @pamelakennedy17 ) is a 3rd grade teacher at Lewis Elementary School. Through donations and repurposing, she has created an engaging and flexible learning space for herself and her students. The video below offers a quick tour of the various spaces and seating options for students. Since this video was first produced, she has added 3 nooks to her classroom, providing additional spaces for students to work. They are pictured below.

A tour of Pamela Kennedy's 3rd grade classroom at Lewis Elementary School in Portland, Oregon. http://lewiselementary.org http://mskennedy17.wordpress.com/

Cubicles... Room 17 #lewis #twitter

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Nooks in Room 17

Print Making in Mr. Hansen's Classroom

Mr. Hansen’s students have been working on print making. From his classroom blog...

“The other day the Google home page paid homage to the artist Corita Kent which was incredibly timely because we are about to start a new art exploration based on print-making.  Students are going to decide what important messages they have to tell the world and then turn them into poster prints.”

You can learn more about this project and other happenings in Room 5 by visiting Mr. Hansen’s classroom blog. The results of their work are now hanging in our hallway. 

Classroom Visits: Ambient Logging with iBeacons

iBeacons....

As principal of Lewis Elementary School, I try to visit each of my classrooms every morning to check in and say hello. In addition throughout the day, I spend more extended time visiting classrooms, talking with teachers and students, and gaining a better understanding of the work taking place, and looking for ways that I can provide helpful feedback and support.

I try to document these visits and I have used various methods to do this, including tracking them on spreadsheets and web forms. Recently, I have become interested in a technology called Beacons, more specifically, iBeacons and how they can be used to help me keep track of my movements around my school, and provide me with ambient logging of my classroom visits.

Screenshot of the Proximity Log app...

iBeacons are small, battery powered Bluetooth devices that emit a low power radio signal. Smartphones, equipped with various apps, can connect with these beacons, and as a result things can happen based on proximity to the beacon. For example beacons, and apps on your smartphone, can be used together to initiate alerts or notices based on proximity. There is much discussion currently about how these beacons can be used in retail settings to alert customers to products and services based on proximity. I have been thinking about a school setting and how the technology can be used in interesting ways in our classrooms. Several examples of this were recently written up over at Educate 1:1 (The Potential of iBeacons for Schools)

Recently, I placed an Estimote iBeacon in my office. Using an iOS app called Proximity Log, I started having Proximity Log track my time spent in my office based on proximity to the beacon. Whenever I enter my office, Proximity Log connects with the beacon, and begins to keep track of the time I am near that beacon, and thus in my office. Proximity Log keeps track of the number of visits and the duration of each of those visits. The data is exportable and can be used in programs such as Excel or Google Sheets. 

Screenshot of the Proximity Log app...

I am working to place additional iBeacons in my classrooms and set up the Proximity Log app to interact with these specific classroom beacons. Once set up, Proximity Log will note when I enter a classroom, and how long I stay in the room, and keep track of those visits. I can then analyze this ambient logging and make sure that I am visiting all my classrooms on a regular basis. One of my professional goals is to spend extended periods of time in classrooms, providing feedback and support. With the use of iBeacons, and Proximity Log, I hope to do a better job keeping track of these classroom visits. 

Paper on the Gym Floor...

Over the weekend we held our annual Holiday Bazaar. Part of the set up for this involves covering our gym floor with heavy paper in order to protect the floor as we turn the gym into a space for setting up tables and booths for our vendors. Each year the paper gets put down and then at the end of the bazaar, volunteers take up the paper for recycling. This year our PE teacher, Millie Layman asked that we not pull up the paper at the end of the bazaar, but rather leave it so she could use the paper on the floor the first day back after the bazaar. 

On Monday she had all of her students work on creating charts and signs that she plans to use in the gym. These include skip counting banners to help students learn to count by 3s, 4s, and so on, rather than just counting off by 1s when doing their PE warm-ups. In addition she worked with our special education team to create some opportunities for some special needs students and their classmates that involved painting with pendulums, and using a special swing as a pendulum to create spiral art.

All in all a nice way to change up the regular PE class. Nice work Ms. Layman.

Reed Cooley Art Gallery

Recently our 5th grade classrooms have been visiting the Reed College Cooley Art Gallery. On Friday, Mr. Colvin’s students took a walk over to the gallery. Upon their return, they spent some time writing their reflections of the experience. Below I have quoted from one student...

Lilyana and I were looking at one of the paintings and Lilyana got scared of one of the paintings because on one of them it looked like there was blood on it! She is no longer scared of it anymore (I don’t think). I saw some of the Reed College students there and all of them look very busy and smart. When we made our own art out of tape and paper, I made a car (out of one piece of paper). This was a really fun experience for me and I hope to do it again!

By McKela

You can read their reflections on the experience on Mr. Colvin’s classroom web site.

Supports/Surfaces Exhibit at Reed College’s Cooley Gallery!

Mr. Carl Deiz

Last weekend, Lewis Elementary kindergarten teacher, Ms. Ashley Rollins, lost her grandfather, Carl Deiz. Below is a link to an article from The Oregonian outlining his remarkable life and service to our community. 

Carl Deiz article