My 4th grade students are an awesome bunch who love to learn from the world around them and from one another! Some of my students are English Language Learners coming from various Spanish speaking cultural backgrounds. They all come from various socio-economic statuses. My students are interested in what makes them special and different from one another and what they have in common to build a strong and positive classroom community. They problem solve positively and communicate their differences respectfully.
My students are diverse in learning styles: they express their understanding of concepts through the visual arts, drama, dance and technology.
They learn in a large group setting, in small groups, partnerships and independently. They form opinions about their learning and support their thinking with evidence from different sources. They are deep thinkers, debaters, collaborators and builders of a strong and positive learning community!
My Project
For the past few years, I have used my personal Apple computer and a school projector to teach whole class lessons and have encouraged my students to come up and share their thinking. At the end of this past year, I was fortunate to have the opportunity to get Google Chromebooks for each of my 30 students! As I'm planning for the upcoming school year in a new role as a math and science teacher with a passion for computer science education, I am looking forward to having my students use their Chromebooks to learn how to use different Google Apps and other basic computer literacy skills. I am also looking forward to introducing some computer science through coding! However, the problem lies when they get excited to present their work from their Chromebook but their model doesn't have the necessary ports to hook up to the school projector. So they need to use my computer which does not match Chromebook's interface. As a result, they get confused and frustrated since I need to constantly set them up and help them navigate their own presentations.
Having a shared Google Chromebook in our classroom would allow me to directly guide my students' learning of basic computer literacy and computer science skills as well as allow them to easily share their presentations confidently.
Students would be able to easily walk up to the shared Chromebook already connected to the projector, know how to find their work on the computer and not waste any time getting to their presentations. I would be able to directly show students how to navigate their Google Chromebooks' in order to access certain apps and programs.
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As a teacher-founded nonprofit, we're trusted by thousands of teachers and supporters across the country. This classroom request for funding was created by Ms. Manocha and reviewed by the DonorsChoose team.
