Mendy Gannon's Page

Thanks, mendy. Will check them out.

Hey There!

Actually the menus that I always used for :work as you go" in order to create a cummulative project was either the list or the game show menu. The game show gives you even more control since you can choose the topics you want to put across the top. The lists you can actually seperate as well. My samples don't have the seperation, but they can, you just add a column on the left with topic areas. I always used the game show when there was more variation in the topics. Otherwise if it was one main topics, I used the list menu and if we weren't ready for a certain for product, I would say they could think about it but I wouldn't explain it until we got to that point. The 2-5-8 only really allows for 2 end products - the game show and list will allow you to adjust points and therefore factor in more products for your work as you go idea.

As for other menu types - there just isn't a lot out there on the net. Nunley has her version of tiered menus, where each grade level (A,B.C) is defined by activities. The issue my students always had was is that it is more rather than different. There is also a "menu" menu which has different food choices - i.e. appretizer, entree, side dishes and desserts. You need an entree, and one side dish then you can choose either an appetizer or a dessert. I will be using some of those in my early elementary books since they are easy for the young ones to understand. There are some other others for the young students but not as appropriate for older students.

Hope that helps!

L.

So happy to hear that the menu books are helpful for y'all. Let me know if you have any questions or issues as you use the menus!

Mendy - Jamie Porter at BES passed on the book Differentiating Instruction with Menus. I purchased the science version (she had the social studies one) and I love it and am going to attempt it with my next unit. I bought it on Amazon for approximately $20. It is by Laurie E. Westphal.

Hi Mendy. I was wondering if you have students or educator contacts who would be interested in participating in a nationwide SAT Vocab Video Contest @ MIT university. You can view contest details at BrainyFlix.com Please let me know. Thanks!

Awesome site (Mr. Cooley's) thanks for passing it on. You might show it to Grace too. It could be used to do a flow chart about photosynthesis or how a generator works. I added it to my teacher resource page on my website.

Hi Mendy,

With your interest in Education Technology integration, I recommend you take a look at Wiziq's virtual classroom and authorstream's power point presentation platform. Both are web based platforms, have a bunch of features and free basic service.

I started a classroom blog this year www.mrsheatonsclass1.blogspot.com. I am starting to video tape the kids presenting instruction and lessons (tomorrow they are being tapped demonstrating the "new" ways to multiply which I plan to upload to teachertube). We are trying out google docs also tomorrow and the kids are going to be working on an animal project with voice over on Powerpoint the next few weeks (the are very excited about that...fourth graders ROCK...or at least the ones I have :)

I signed up to do an elementary notebooking share fair thing at USCB January 24. That is a test run. I would love to present at SC2 next year. Notebooking is much more difficult at the elementary level (and without you "training" all the kids who come to me...I can't I thank you enough!). I gave them an assignment today that was 100% independant using the text and they did a good job (first time where they just had the instructions to go off of...a couple of kids tried to scam the system but I caught them...they aren't that too together in the elementary school!).