February 2009


Last year as a second grader, my buddy Charlie created a very informative VoiceThread project on Bats. This year he is back with another project on The Wright Brothers.

As I have mentioned before, one of the reasons I love working with these students is because they bring such joy and excitement to their projects. And the one thing I notice time after time, and with every production, is that students become their own critical self-assessors when it is time to record their voice and evaluate their performance.

The last piece of creating a VoiceThread is recording the audio and it is here where they establish these high standards for themselves. Yes, they comb through lots of images to find the ones that are just right, and the editing process of their script often goes through many revisions, but it all leads up to the recording of their script.

I really am proud of them because it is more often the case where the students say, “Can I do it again? I think I can do it better.” Very rarely do I need to encourage them to give it another try because they might have stumbled a little bit. Students love this process and want to do their best because they understand that they have potentially a huge audience.

Be sure to go to the 3rd Grade page and enjoy Charlie’s presentation on The Wright Brothers.

This VoiceThread project on Dolphins, was a labor of love by Grace and Kendall. And I think it shows in their presentation.

This is really a wonderful project and I continue to be amazed at the quality of work being produced by these young students. They always bring such passion and excitement to these “side trips” and it is a real joy to work with them.

We shared Grace and Kendall’s VoiceThread project during our last Sheridan School Sharing Day assembly which has motivated more and more students to research and develop their ideas for their own VoiceThread project.

Stop by the 3rd Grade page to enjoy this marvelous project!