Thursday, April 30, 2009

The Power of the Network





A couple of weeks ago, I saw tweet on Twitter by isenbergs asking if anyone was willing to catch an egg. Intrigued, I DM'd her and we started networking . Basically, my students needed to "catch an egg" sent by a group of third graders from Saltsburg, PA live on Skype.
It was a cross country egg toss and the objective was:
"To design and construct a protective structure within a cardboard box that will prevent damage to an egg or eggs which will be mailed to another classroom. An egg without any visible cracks or damage is scored as a success."
Click here for the rules.
Each group had to construct a case for an egg and mail it. Then my students had to open the package, LIVE on Skype. The other teacher, Ms. Jake, recorded the grand opening. We received the package at 1:19pm today and Skyped at 2 pm. The box was very carefully wrapped with warnings on it such as "FRAGILE" and "OPEN WITH CARE." The 3rd graders stuffed the box with broken popsicle sticks, cut up straws, and twine. They also created a paper box inside, placed it in a ziploc bag, and secured it with rubber bands. We couldn't wait to open it! It was so great the they actually got to watch my students open the box live on Skype.
Sadly, the egg was cracked, but it was a good try Saltsburg Elementary!
We blame it on the postman! Better luck next time. I was surprised at how empathetic my students were and they were all genuinely upset! Some wanted to beg the cafeteria manager for a hard boiled egg to hold up to the camera.
Anway, the moral of the story is now we have even more CONNECTIONS. My students are starting to write children's e-books on themes we have been studying throughout the year and now we found a class to send them to for review. It's all about CONNECTIONS.

1 comment:

paul martin said...

next time try a chocolate egg and experiment with writing made from icing - in my experiment ....