Kidspiration Lesson Plan

Grade 1

Katie R. Barry

 

Introduction

                This lesson integrates a Social Studies unit on community workers and the use of technology.  Thus far, students have learned about the general concept of communities and have been introduced to the fact that community workers each have different jobs but work together so that the group, as a whole, will succeed.  Kidspiration is utilized to help students communicate their understanding of how the community workers within the school work together to help the school run successfully.  Students will use a digital camera and Kidspiration to create a web showing how the community workers in our school are integral parts of the day.

 

Kidspiration is an open-ended program that allows students to generate, organize, and communicate their ideas.  One feature of this program is the webbing mode in which students easily create webs with the click of a few buttons.   The picture mode of Kidspiration will be used so that students can include the digital pictures they have taken in their web.  This lesson was created with the assumption that students are already familiar with the basic mechanics of using computers and Kidspiration.  For students that are new to using Kidspiration, the teacher may want to demonstrate how to properly use the different functions of the program as well as do a great deal of modeling throughout the lesson.

 

Objectives

                Students will be able to:

-          Successfully create a web featuring five (5) community workers from the school

-          Include a digital photograph of each of the five (5) community workers

-          Write one (1) way that each worker helps our school run

 

Instructional Materials

o         Scavenger Hunt worksheet designed by teacher to fit class’s needs

o         Computer for each child

o         Digital camera

o         Printer

o         Pencils

o         Custom-made activity (if desired)

 

Procedure

   Initiation (10 minutes)

o         Brainstorm with children as many community workers as they can think of.

o         Underline and group any workers they have named that work in schools.

 

 

 

Development of Lesson (2 lessons, 45 minutes each)

    Lesson 1

o         Distribute scavenger hunt packets to children and give directions.

o         Have students go in small groups or as an entire class to find the places in the scavenger hunt. 

o         Have students identify the worker(s) in each location and complete the pages.  Students are encouraged to interview the adults if necessary.

o         Using the digital camera, take a picture of the community workers that work in each location (secretary, custodian, nurse, librarian, teacher).   Depending on group size and experience, you may want to have the students get experience taking the pictures. 

o         Upon the completion of the scavenger hunt by all the students, discuss what they found and compare answers.  Did they all list the same adults at each place?  Did they have different descriptions of the way each worker helps the community?

 

Lesson 2

o         Before the lesson is begun, the digital pictures need to be imported into a library on Kidspiration for students to use during the activity.  In addition, the difficulty and length of the lesson can be varied with the following choices.

1.        The teacher may use a custom made web for students to fill in and complete.

2.       The teacher may just give students a blank page on Kidspiration so that students must create and then fill in the web. 

o         Using the program, have students complete their webs.  For each worker, they should include a digital photo and a sentence stating how that worker is important in the community. 

o         Print out students’ completed works.

 

  Closure

o         Have students share their webs.

 

Evaluation

                Students can be evaluated using the following:

-          Informal observation of the skills and strategies students use and any difficulties they may have while creating their web.

-          The written work of each student can be assessed for evidence that students understand what each worker does and the importance they have in the school. 

 

 

 

 

 

KBarry   6/11/03