For the past several years, our students have been engaged in becoming a culture of thinkers, a place where a group’s collective as well as individual thinking is valued, visible, and actively promoted as part of the regular, day-to-day experience of all group members. We recently adopted the Leader In Me program that helps teach our students leadership, accountability, adaptability, initiative, and self-direction, cross-cultural skills, responsibility, problem-solving, communication, creativity, and teamwork.
Our class of thinkers are the leaders of the leaders.
They are burdened not only by being the model learners for their younger brothers, sisters, cousins, and friends who look up to them, but they also are on the verge of one of the biggest transitions of their lives as they prepare to enter the middle school with their six hundred new classmates.
My Project
The future has arrived. Today's students and teachers need technology in the classroom to fully realize their learning potential. Students are able to accomplish so much more in much less time when computers are readily available. The pen is mighty, but the Chromebook is mightier. And thanks to Google, it is more affordable than ever.
The opportunities that students have with Chromebooks are nearly limitless.
The artfully inclined students have access to applications such as Pixlr to help them learn the basics of graphic design and express their thinking. The future engineers can work on and tinker with their robotic creations. The journalists of tomorrow have publishing tools and the Google Suite to share their expertise. The next Spielberg can put together a blockbuster with programs like WeVideo.
Just as important, students and teachers are being required to do more and more every year, but they aren't being provided the necessary tools to help them be successful.
Every Spring, Michigan fifth-graders are expected to take the weeks-long M-STEP exam. This time of year, after the long and cold months of winter, is stressful on everyone. Teachers worry (and students are astutely aware of that) about preparation, resources, and time. A Chromebook for a kid would do much to alleviate that pressure and make for a noticeably more productive learning environment.
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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 Mr. Phillips and reviewed by the DonorsChoose team.
