I teach 5th and 6th grade STEM in the lovely Pacific Northwest in a small, rural town called Chimacum. My goal is to help students discover that all learning is life-long and that 21st century tools can be used for work as well as fun.
Jun 24
As a kid I was a huge fan of science fiction. I remember going to the theater to watch Star Wars A New Hope when it first came out and at home I watched Star Trek The Original Series (TOS) and Battlestar Galactica (1978 version) and thoroughly enjoyed envisioning what the future could be. Of …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2023/06/24/using-ai-like-we-use-computers-star-trek-inspired/
Mar 26
The Northwest Council for Computer Education (NCCE) puts on the best EdTech conference in the Pacific Northwest! The amazing sessions, workshops, and speakers are as high quality as the International Society for Technology Education (ISTE)! Educators from Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana and all over come to Washington state to attend NCCE’s annual conferences. I’ve been …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2023/03/26/best-edtech-conference-in-the-pacific-northwest/
Mar 08
The amazing Cassondra Smith, EdTech Coordinator from Battle Ground Public Schools here in WA state, has a podcast for teachers who want to learn more about EdTech and integrating technology. For her most recent podcast she invited my presenting partner Tammie Schrader and me to talk about gamification and game-based learning (GBL)! Click on the …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2023/03/08/intro-to-gamification-and-game-based-learning-gbl-podcast/
Feb 19
My 5th and 6th grade STEM classes have been working on robotics using the Lego Mindstorm EV3 kits since December. Students built their first robot then took the Lego Mindstorms programming lesson tutorials before we began some activities and challenges. We still have two major challenges left in this unit before we transition to our …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2023/02/19/students-excited-by-robotics-and-ai/
Dec 29
I used Chat GPT to write a blog post so I thought I’d play around with it some more and try it out to help me lesson plan. I asked Chat GPT some questions about the unit we’re working on in my STEM classes to see what it knew. It surprised me because I didn’t …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2022/12/29/chat-gpt-for-lesson-planning/
Dec 14
My first ever blog post written with the help of an AI! I am adding my own commentary and adding to the blog post the AI wrote for me so from this point on anything you see italicized is written by me. Normal text was written by the AI! I have continued to be active …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2022/12/14/are-they-helpful-or-crutches/
Dec 04
Thursday, December 1, I had the honor of being invited to present at one of our state’s Senate Early Learning & K-12 Education Committee meetings! Thanks to my WEA workshop partner, Tammie Schrader, who introduced me to the Senate Committee chair, Senator Lisa Wellman, and recommended me to speak and share I got to speak …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2022/12/04/senate-committee-session-on-gamification/
Nov 28
Minecraft Education Edition has some amazing Hour of Code worlds that are fun to play to have students learn a little bit of coding. This year’s new addition to the collection is the Escape Estate and it looks great. But what if you want something more in-depth? If you are looking for more coding with …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2022/11/28/coding-in-minecraft/
Nov 27
Another great activity I started this year with only requires beakers, crayons, water, and salt! Spoons help, too. If you Google Floating Crayons you’ll find more ideas, resources, and even YouTube videos. For this activity, Crayola crayons are the best. I don’t normally endorse products but cheaper crayon brands float in fresh water and that …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2022/11/27/do-crayons-float/
Nov 26
In 2004 I was part of the North Cascades and Olympic Science Partnership (NCOSP). Of all the amazing activities we did in the years that I participated in NCOSP there is one activity that I am still doing with students 18 years later. The activity, also known as inference cubes, is a fantastic way to …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2022/11/26/observation-or-inference/
I'm a Curipod Ambassador! :)
I've presented at NCCE
2016, 2017, 2019, 2022,
2023 and 2024!
I presented at WSTA 2015!
