LRSD Spotlight

Debra Sloan, EAST facilitator at Forest Heights Middle School, recently was interviewed by eSchoolNews.com in its June 2010 issue concerning the use of Augmented Reality in the classroom. eSchool News is a national educational technology magazine.

Augmented Reality comes from virtual reality developer Scott Jochim and Digital Tech Frontier and is a technology that overlays digital information on top of real-world surroundings as viewed through a smart phone or other handheld, GPS-enabled device.

Augmented Reality is the next step in allowing technology to be interactive within all classrooms. Developing lesson modules that many different courses can utilize is very exciting as students not only can learn using the modules, but they also have the opportunity to create them!

"[Augmented Reality] is such a nice direction to go...in incorporating technology in the classroom, because it makes learning more interactive,” Sloan said in the article. “The kids love it because they are active...they love [participation] more than just sitting and watching things happen."

Virtual Reality projects such as the Clinton Library virtual tour and the current virtual tour of St. Vincent Infirmary have catapulted Forest Heights Middle School EAST into a positive, productive program where students are eager to participate.

Pictured above: Forest Heights EAST Lab students attending the national 2010 EAST Conference, where the group received its first-ever perfect score and the "Talk-A-Holics" award for spreading the word about their projects. Also pictured is EAST founder Tim Stephenson.

Robin Kratzke, a teacher at Dunbar Magnet Middle School and a Pathwise mentor, recently was named LRSD Mentor of the Year 2010 by the Arkansas Department of Education. 

Pathwise is a state-sponsored program for mentoring new teachers. Each novice teacher receives a mentor for one or two years, depending upon the type of license that teacher has been issued. The mentor works closely with the novice teacher on a variety of activities that support the four domains of the Pathwise framework. The mentor also provides face-to-face interaction with the novice teacher.

Mrs. Kratzke teaches Spanish at Dunbar. She receives $500 and a certificate commemorating this honor.

Teachers at Carver Magnet Elementary have been busy applying for -- and receiving -- grant money for math and science projects for their students! These enterprising teachers have received $40,000 worth of 3M Ingenuity Grants that help teachers make math and science come to life in their classrooms.

Twenty-one states participated in the Ingenuity Grant program, and of the 226 applications received, 185 were selected. Carver received $40,000 worth of grants in the following areas: We Do Robotics, $3,499; Space Station Experiments, 3rd grade, $3,360; Differentiation of Math, $3,248; Mastery in Measurement, $3,456; Marilyn Burns Math, $3,500; Space Station Science, 4th grade, $3,360; Space Station Science, 5th Grade, $3,360; Solar System and Moon, $2,875; Fun with Math, $2,949; Differentiation of Math, 4th Grade, $3,248; Differentiation of Math, 5th Grade, $3,248; Magnetic Attraction, $1,221; Amazing Air, or the Lack of it Anyway, $2,076.

Amanda Burwell from 3M recently visited Carver to present the grant checks that will help these teachers purchase materials for the hands-on activities that will allow their students to apply new concepts to learn by doing.

Pictured above are some of the teachers who received 3M Ingenuity Grants: (front row) Gene Williams, Lauren Hickmon, Amanda Burwell (3M) and Jason Crader; (back row) Suellen DiMassimo, Karen Banks and Mary Acott.

Kay Jones and Charlotte Cook of Carver Magnet Elementary recently received a $2,000 grant from the Wal-Mart Foundation for a Litter-Free Zone at their school. Carver is the first school in the LRSD to become involved in this grant program. It is a student-centered program where students learn to be "litter scene investigators." The students begin their investigation by flagging trash around the building. Their investigation includes such methods as measuring how much trash was found per square foot, understanding perimeter and other forms of measurement and utilizing creative problem solving and scientific inquiry to figure out how to best solve the problem. Thanks to this grant Carver will not only become a cleaner place for students to learn, but it also will produce better problem solvers!

Mrs. Kathryn Thomas’ 1st grade class at Meadowcliff Elementary just celebrated a spectacular reading achievement: the class has read 3,247 books! At the beginning of the school year, Mrs. Thomas promised the students a pizza party when, as a class, they had read 1,000 books.  This was measured by students successfully completing the Accelerated Reading test for each book. The class reached their goal of 1,000 books around the end of February. At that time, Mrs. Thomas noticed that several students had almost reached 100 books, so she decided to start the “100 Book Club.” When students read 100 books, they were able to sign the “100 Book Club” poster, receive a balloon and a book for achieving this goal. As more students achieved this goal, Mrs. Thomas found that students needed to see their progress toward the 100 books and made 50-book and 75-book posters. Students who signed these posters knew they were getting closer to 100! Even after reaching 100 books, students continued to read. Several students reached 200 books and celebrated with a lunch “out”--an off-campus lunch to the restaurant of their choice.

While this initiative has had a definite effect on student achievement (the average oral reading fluency for Mrs. Thomas’ class is 54 words per minute), the effect on student confidence and motivation to learn is phenomenal. Conversations that once were “he took my pencil” or “do we have to?” turned to “do you have another book I can read?” and “may I have that book when you have finished reading it?”. Students began to come to school early so they could read in Mrs. Thomas’ class. Most of the classroom conversation was centered around books, the characters, the illustrations, the problems and the new concepts learned from the stories. The class celebrated their 3,247 book accomplishment with Happy Meals!

The class is no longer taking Accelerated Reading tests and counting the number of books read, but as photos were being taken for this story, they were all reading! The love of reading Mrs. Thomas teacher has instilled in her students cannot be measured!