Who is Melvin Bubble - Templates to make a student version - Great End of Term Writing Project

The Book, "Who is Melvin Bubble" by Nick Bruel is such a fun book to read to your students, and is a great template for having them write their own version of the book.

The book template 
Below I have a link to a Google Docs version of a template document that I use with my students. After you have read the book together they will be able to fill in the book with their own information, humour and creativity,
Tap here for a open the storybook template

Learning how to draw yourself as a cartoon
I have also included a copy of the presentation I put together to help students learn how draw themselves as a Melvin Bubble style cartoon. I found the best way to use this was to email the link to the slides to the whole class and then have them go through it by themselves when they get up to the illustration stage.

If you find this useful and get some good results I would love if you could share them with me on twitter mentioning @Shaunyk@shaunyk

Tap here for a open the storybook template

Flat Stanley Aventure Story

A short time ago I posted about creating Choose Your Own Adventure stories using Google Slides, you can view that here. It is such a simple project, but one that is so engaging and fun for students.

After introducing this to some of my colleagues, one teacher asked if we could do the same style of writing for a Flat Stanley project he was completing, if you haven't heard about it you can find out more information here: Flat Stanley Official Project information

We followed the same template as we had before for a choose your own adventure, except this time we themed it for the Flat Stanley Project. Below is a copy of the planning Popplet I created for my own story, and the final version of my Flat Stanley story. You may notice in the planning document that I kept the numbers in each planning bubble the same as the slide number that information is on in the slide deck. This is important as it helps students when they are linking their files.

This was a great project, and a different way for our students to teach someone else about our home of Singapore.

Send out a template file to your class
 Click this link to make a copy of the template file I send out to students. Clicking on this link will create a copy of the document. You can copy and paste this link if you want to share it directly with your students.

The ABC's of Anything - Handy book template for any classroom

I was recently working with a class that was making ABC books, and decided to try and pimp out a Google Slide deck for the job. I'm really happy with the results, particularly the hyperlinked letters around the edge so you can jump to any letter, and the design overall.

Uses for this slide deck could include:

• Unit summaries for any subject
• Classroom guidelines
• Character analysis for literature
• Second language instruction or with English as a second language learners.
• Make a classroom book where each person is responsible for one letter

Click here to make a copy of the slide deck for your own use.

Choose Your Own Adventure stories - How to engage reluctant writers (Pick a path)

I remember reading Choose Your Own Adventure books a lot as a child, in particular the "Your Very Own Robot". I'm sure I read through that book 20-30 times, choosing a different path each time. For that reason I have always liked the idea of giving my students the chance to create their own Choose Your Own Adventure stories using hyperlinks.

Using Google Slides on the iPad or Browser
There are a few ways to do this, but the best way I have found is using Google Slides. It's simple, free and platform agnostic.

Below is an example of a story I wrote myself. The last 3 slides have the planning documents that I use with the students.





Send out a template file to your class
 Click this link to make a copy of the template file I send out to students. Clicking on this link will create a copy of the document. You can copy and paste this link if you want to share it directly with your students.

Planning - The most important step!
Planning out how the story flows is very important when you do this for the first time. I use Popplet with the students, but you could simply use a piece of paper. If you look at the image below I number each step so that it is the same as the slide number in the presentation slide deck. It's important that students can see how the story flows and which step links to the next.

Adding the links on the iPad

Adding links in a browser

Once you have highlighted the text, right click and then click on link. In the link pop up you can choose "Slides from this presentation instead" and click on the slide you want to link to.

Another reason that I like this option for creating choose your own adventure stories is that Google Slides embed very nicely into student blogs, and as I mentioned at the start, are platform agnostic so you can read them on any device.

Using hyperlinks is an important skill for students to understand and this project is a great way to teach students how to use them and gives them some starting ideas on how they can be used.

The fastest way to write your reports - Use a spreadsheet to write your reports

When I was in the classroom report time was not my favorite time of year. I could never think of the words to get started, and it was all a little overwhelming.

At the same time I have always been fascinated with spreadsheets, and so put these two together and over the last few years I have come up with this spreadsheet that basically writes reports for you based on a comment bank that you set up yourself.

This new version puts the student name and gender pronouns using a basic code (### for their name, and #his/her etc for the pronouns.

Here is a direct link to the spreadsheet, and embedded here is a short video that will tell you how to use the spreadsheet.

If you have any questions you can find me on Twitter @shaunyk or leave a comment on this post.

Making the ultimate WANTED poster using Google Slides.

Recently as part of a social studies unit we had class I was asked to help create "Wanted" posters. Given our students have used Googles Slides for many projects this year we decided to create the posters using this tool. As a point of difference we used a custom slide size so that we could create portrait posters. A link to this template is here, as well as on the last page of the slideshow below. (It will prompt you to make a copy)

It was a great lesson and resulted in some terrific outcomes. I also gave students the option to use iPad apps such as "Over" or "PicCollage", but most of them ended up using Slides.

Make a free iPad stand using only cardboard - great for Stop Motion

Having a stable iPad stand is one of the most important tools you need for making Stop Motion videos, and is also super handy for lots of other occasions. Here is a super quick video which will show you how to make your own iPad stand using only cardboard, and a couple of minutes of your time.

This is a great activity as a beginner maker space project with kids.

Getting started with Scratch Jr on the iPad

Recently MIT released Scratch Jr for the iPad, which is a great platform to introduce younger students to the ideas behind Scratch, which is widely used in upper elementary and middle school for game creation and so much more.

For the week of Code, I am using Scratch Jr in our lower elementary classes and created this presentation that you can use in your classroom to get started with the program.

Here are some links to presentations that will help get you started:

Teacher presentation to introduce Scratch Jr

Video presentation that you can simply play for students

Here are the challenge sheets that I used with the kids

The Awesome Fast Report Starter Spreadsheet!

It's that time of year again when teachers need to write reports. When I was in the classroom I always had trouble getting started, so I created the "Awesome Fast Report Starter Spreadsheet"

Click here to get a copy of the "Awesome Fast Report Starter Spreadsheet"

It uses just a few basic functions to compile together, the Vlookup function which searches for information in another table based on a value existing, Concatenate which joins text together, and Substitute which swaps out the wildcard ### for the student's name.

This is a great way to get started on your reports, and a practical way to use spreadsheets to get started with your reports. As a disclaimer putting in high, medium and low comments is not the end of my report writing. Once I have my spreadsheet start I then go and edit the prepared comment, adding personal examples, next steps, pronouns and other individual feedback.

If you find this useful I'd love to hear back from you either on this blog or via twitter where you can find me @shaunyk .

Helping Kids Get Started with Minecraft

School is back in full swing, and so are lots of Minecraft and Minecraft Edu servers. In my situation we are predominantly using Minecraft in after school activities, but looking at ways that we can integrate it into the curriculum.

If you are interested in doing more with Minecraft at your school I highly recommend joining the Minecraft in Education Google + community. Which you can access here. There are lot of inspired people doing great things and heaps of ideas and resources.

In the mean time I have created a simple guide sheet that I give out to kids new to Minecraft on the computer to help them navigate and use the crafting table. It's pretty simple, but a great way to get kids started. I have linked a PDF and a Word version in case you want to edit it and make it your own.

Happy Crafting!

Click here for the PDF of Getting Started with Minecraft

Click here for the Word version of Getting Started with Minecraft