Posts Tagged ‘snow’

Let it Snow!

It doesn’t snow much in Texas – our last major blast of winter weather resulted in the worst ice storm this area has had in many years. Unfortunately, you can not build a snow man from ice!

Looks like snow but it was slick, solid ice!

Looks like snow but it was thick, slick, solid ice!

So, we did the next best thing – we “built” snowmen (and snow women) using Microsoft’s Paint program. The students drew their snow people by answering questions on a Snowman Glyph 2014. (This is adapted from a glyph I saw years ago. Unfortunately I don’t remember where it was found.)

What surprised me is that their were several students who had never built a real snowman! But, if you don’t travel to snowy places, you often have to wait several years before we have enough snow in Texas to build even a miniature snowman!

After the snow people were finished, I uploaded the illustrations to animoto. Enjoy the videos.

Second Grade Snow People:

Third Grade Snow People:

Fourth Grade Snow People:

Two of our second grade teachers wanted to take the project a step further by incorporating writing. They had their students write cinquain poems which they copied into the Book Creator app. (As a side note, this is an AWESOME app and super easy to use!).

Typing the Poem

Typing the Poem

Since the pictures had been drawn on computers, I had to upload them to my Picasa account so that the students could save the image to the iPad. They had no problems at all doing this.

Once the pictures and text were in the app, each student recorded their poem, then emailed it to me.

Recording

Recording

One of the best features of Book Creator is that books can be combined if they are created in the same format. We chose landscape for this project. All of the individual books were then easily combined into one book. I did have to delete some blank pages – quick and easy though.

Finally the books were uploaded to DropBox – ready to share. Directions for reading the books on your iOS device or through the Google Chrome browser are listed below.

Mrs. Shapard’s Snowmen and Snow Women Cinquain Poems

Mrs. Cooper’s Snow People Cinquain Poems

Directions to download books to your iOS device (iPad, iPhone, etc):

  • You will need the iBooks app (free) installed on your iOS device.
  • Click on the book link above (while on your iOS device).
  • Tap on the download button.
  • Choose Open in . . . and then choose Open in iBooks
  • The book is now in iBooks on your iOS device.

Directions to read the ePub book on a computer:

 

Learning About Snow

Since we generally don’t get much snow in Texas (with the exception of the past 2 years!), our students enjoy learning about this topic.

from Microsoft Clip Art gallery

Second graders learn about the water cycle at this time of year so snow is always fun and interesting to discuss (not to mention wishful thinking). The teachers start by reading Snowflake Bentley by Jacqueline Briggs Martin and learn about his amazing work photographing snowflakes. When the students come to the lab we begin the “Snow Quest.” I have them work in pairs as they learn to search for information and write answers to a few questions.

Besides learning about Wilson Bentley, the students explore other winter topics including hibernation, conditions needed for snow, and more. Here are some of the websites we use.

The following site does not contribute to the educational value of the lesson but it’s always a favorite! (It does help develop fine motor and visualization skills!) Make-a-Flake allows viewers to vitually cut a snowflake. Take a look at the gallery to see what other people create.

If our Texas winters don’t always bring snow, at least we have some fun, interactive ways to learn about it!