2015 - Going like Wildfire!

April 23, 2015
  Here it is almost to the end of the school year and I realized that I have not updated this blog in some time!  I can honestly say that I love my position with the district.  Since the last entry back in 2014, I have moved from the STEM dept to the Innovative Learning and Arts Dept - still with the District, but working with 5th grade teachers and their classes in the 1:1 laptop program.  We are into robots beg time now.  Our Robot Rodeo with Bennett Elementary and Pompano Beach High School will be taking place in May, on the 18th in the morning at PBHS gym. We will have over 100 students showcasing their coding and programming skills.  Should be lots of fun!

 

These are Darkside Ollie.  We were able to get grants through Donor's Choose and Broward Education Foundation to purchase a class set of Ollies and Spheros.  Will post more photos of the Rodeo after it happens!

2014 - Happy New Year!

Here's to the new Year - and in a few weeks, it will be the Year of the Horse.  2014 is also the start of a new chapter in my career as I join the STEM and Instructional Resources Dept. for the Broward County School District.  In my position as a Staff Developer, I hope to be working with middle and high school teachers in bringing more hands-on science inquiry into their classrooms.  I am looking forward to this new leaf in my life album!

On a semi-sad note, the art glass class that I have taught for 18.5 years came to an end with the 2013 end of the year.  However, I am ever hopeful that I can find another teacher interested in continuing this course or find a community outlet so that I can continue to teach science of art glass!

I have to learn about a number of new technologies and Twitter is one of them.  This blog has been attached to my Twitter account:  @drcrody.  While I started the blog as a way to showcase student work in the art glass class, additionally, it became a way to share science and STEM info with the conference attendees from my presentations.  Now, I hope to showcase teachers and their STEM projects so I may be updating the blog more often.  We shall see.

2013-2014 New School year projects!

We are working on mosaic mirrors!  These are just a few of the beautiful artwork samples students are creating using a combination of science (glass composition, elements, and scientific processes), math measurements, chemistry (glue and grout chemical processes), and art (creating and drawing the designs and cutting the wood in WoodShop class).  Students are selling their artwork to earn money for a fieldtrip to Art Glass Connection, Davie, Fl.  Last year, Ms. JoAnna Vitale, owner and glass artist extraordinaire, taught the class how to make resin jewelry.  This year, we would like to purchase glass supplies to make our own resin jewelry in class.  We will be posting additional photos of the finished mirror projects.  We will take orders for custom designs by email to carody@gmail.com.

In addition, we rec'd a grant to create wind chimes from recycled wine bottles.  The wind chimes will be sliced and "tuned" so that each produces a musical note scale.  This grant, from Broward Education Foundation, allowed us to purchase a wet saw that will help us with the slices of bottles.  We hope to be making these before the holidays as they will make awesome gifts!

This year, I have 4 returning artists and 4 new students so the mix of experience is nice to see.  Each student finds his or her own niche with glass.  A few like the precise details of stained glass and most are comfortable with the less restrictive mosaic artwork.  In our future lessons, we will learn how to heat and bend the glass in a kiln and how to use resin to create jewelry.  Stayed tuned for our updates.

BEF Impact Expo Feb 2, 2013 - 2 new items

This past weekend, Broward Education Foundation sponsored a series of teacher training sessions - all based on Common Core and Marzano strategies.  I was able to present "iPadded my Project" for the second year and co-presented "Padded Frogs" with Ms. Adams.  One of the cool apps I demo'd was NearPod.  This is an app that allows a presentation to be shared from the teacher's iPad to student mobile devices.  The teacher can build in polls, tests, and interactive drawing slides.  When students or participants complete those slides, the results are sent to the teacher/presenter presentation and reports can be pulled that show the results or drawings!  It is an awesome app that allows students to become part of the presentation.  The app creators are based locally in Hallandale Beach, Fl.  This app has a free version for both teacher and student and you can upgrade to get some of the cool features for a modest monthly fee.  I am trying to write more grants to get more tablets into the classroom so that I can use NearPod regularly.

At the Expo, NSU hosted us and I was able to use their Apple TV network.  I was able to wander around the whole auditorium-style classroom using my iPad for the presentation and not having to worry about a 6" dongle!  I loved the freedom.  So now -  I need to find out more about this tool and what it takes to bring it to our school.

Robotic Hands - Science research

This is the newest research project we are working on - robotic hands.  We received a grant from the Broward Education Foundation, Teacher Adapter Grant, for the hand kits.
http://yaegerco.com/index_files/Page575.htm  This is a link to their page.  The kits take students through the research and design methods needed to create a robotic hand.  Students learn how to use basic tools, troubleshoot problems, take a design idea and manufacture the end product, make it look human or presentable, and use it to perform some basic tasks.  While we are in the earliest sections, already we have students engaged in the critical thinking process and learning as they put their skills to use to bring their product to market.  We will end with some video commercials and marketing products but the students most want to compete in the Olympic-style events to see if their version of the hand will win.  Will post finished hands after Winter Break.

Bears!

We have finished the bears!  Many thanks to Melissa and the International Bear Trust and the University of Colorado for this awesome curriculum.  We did only a few of the lessons in the pilot but plan to revisit the Bear Book in the future to continue to learn about bears.  We found out that what we thought we knew turned out to be very little!  During the course of the lessons, each student adopted his or her own bear and created these wonderful stepping stones.  One we let go to a garden home before we got the finished picture!  During the pilot, we used the iPads and lots of apps to learn more.  Google Earth and the SmartBoard were wonderful ways to locate populations of our own Florida Black Bears.  However, both proved invaluable in learning about other countries.  In trying to capture the spirit of each bear, the students realized that flat glass was not going to do justice to the eyes of each bear.  We create each eye out of 3 layers of glass, placed the pairs of glass eyes into a kiln, and fused the eyes to create realistic eyes of each bear.  The results are  stepping stone replicas that almost seem alive!  This was a terrific way for students to use their research skills and their creativity to learn about bears worldwide.

UV Chameleon Podcast

This is a podcast of the UV Chameleon bead grant we got through Donor's Choose!  A HUGE Thank you goes out to Loews Miami Beach Hotel for funding us 100%.  We had enough beads to have most of the students in the elementary and middle school classrooms each make their own chameleon.  A few high school students got into the project and you will find chameleons on just about all of the students and adults!  The experiments were a success, too.  Lots of adults found out that their fancy sunglasses did NOT protect their eyes from harmful UV rays.  The middle school science classes realized that many sunscreens do not live up to their claims of protection.  We also tested prescription pill bottles for humans and pets to see if their coloring protected the medicines inside.  They do!  Students were sent home to test out window tinting in their homes and cars.  We have found lots of ways to incorporate science experiments in our everyday lives with the little UV chameleon.  The pony beads were obtained from Carolina Biological Supplies or from Steve Spangler's website.  The rest of the items were from Walmart and the local Pearl's art store.