Create a Graph

My students have started a science project several weeks in advance of reading The Science Fair, the story in Lesson 12 of our Journeys reading series. We have been graphing in math, so I thought it would be the perfect opportunity to teach them how to use Create a Graph! That way they will be all set in making a graph when they do their projects. I'm going to post a little picture tutorial here for them and for you! (Trust me, it's easy once you model it and kids get the hang of it. I've even pre-filled parts of the data, e-mailed it to myself, and opened it on several computers so that my K and 1 students could use it last year!)

First a disclaimer: due to the fact that this is a free website instead of software, the only way to save something is to go to the Print/Save tab. It saves to your computer, not the website. Therefore, you can only open it if you emailed it to yourself or if you use the same computer. You can edit it later ONLY if you e-mail it or save it with the link! Also, hitting the backspace button can cause you to lose all of your work! Hopefully if this happens (and I hope it doesn't!), you should have a written copy and / or you can autofill the blanks by typing the first letter / number or two.

So here we go, your opening screen. Choose a graph type by clicking on its button. If you aren't sure what type of graph to create, read this.

For our purposes, most students will use a bar graph or a line graph. A couple might choose a pie chart. I'm going to do this with a bar graph, since the process is pretty much the same for all 3 types and most kids recognize them and know their purpose. 

Once I've clicked on Bar, notice the tabs that appeared on the right. This is the design tab. I really don't like the kids to change the grid color or appearance because it takes up so much ink and makes it harder to read. I do allow them to choose shape and direction for their graph (and since I'm such a visual person, I'd choose horizontal for things like rolling or moving and vertical for things like jumping or rising).

 

Now on to the Data tab. We type in a title and label our x-axis (horizontal) and y-axis (vertical). I always have the students write their name in the Source box because they are collecting the data. Then I typed in the item label (what you're graphing), group label (what the bar means) and value (how much).

If you ever want to take a quick peek at what your graph looks like so you know it's correct, click the Preview tab.

My students have to collect data with three trials, so I changed the number of groups to 3. I also selected different bar colors using the drop down menu arrow. Since I used this birthday chart as a model instead of a science experiment, I am going to show you how it would look if I created 6 separate bars (It won't let me do 12 because 6 is the limit).

Notice the difference in the data table and the preview from the other way we did it.

Here's the same data using a pie chart.

As we talked about in class, you should choose the type of graph that best shows your data visually. As you can see, the range of numbers is close and we have so much data, so the pie chart doesn't make it as very quick and easy to see which month had the most birthdays compared to the bar graph.

I hope you found this useful! I will post again in January about easy ways to use create a graph with math, science, and spelling!

For my students, this should help you create your own.

 You will see your colored lines when you add data to the chart.

Don't forget to e-mail me and / or yourself a copy and print it for your project!

Gingerbread Glyph Bulletin Board

We needed to have a little fun on Friday afternoon, so this was our Five Minute Fun activity! (And as we all know, things that normally take 5 minutes take a lot longer when holidays are near!) My students loved the scarecrows they made and wrote about in the fall, so I found a blank gingerbread person from Kidzone and used a glyph direction sheet from Teacher's Mailbox (but you can use this one.) We didn't have the time to cut and glue construction paper, buttons, or yarn, but they still loved it anyway!

Here's a blank gingerbread person:

Click to download.

 There are tons of other glyphs at Mathwire.com (awesome site, if you haven't already checked it out!) 

Concrete Poems

As part of our story Max's Words in our Journeys reading series, we had to create concrete poems, or poems that are written in the shape of their topic. They're perfect for any writer because they don't have to have any rhyme or rhythm and they can be any length! Here are some examples I used to show the kids.

Since we were very busy that week, we didn't create them until last week. I asked the children to pick a winter theme so we could use them for our winter bulletin boards. Here they are!

My favorite way of creating concrete poems is to use Tagzedo. Check out this penguin from the gallery!

Need more structure? Try your own woodland themed concrete poems here.

For more Max's Words activities, click here.

For more Journeys posts, click here.

Christmas Must-Haves / Must-Dos

Check out the Portable North Pole...Santa sent me a video with my name in it to show to my class! He even knew how old I was, where I lived, and what I wanted for Christmas!!! I posted some pictures here because they wanted to show their parents.

Watch the Video!

Santa said my name...and spelled it correctly! He said I was on the nice list!

He knew I asked for books for Christmas!

(I should have asked him for a house...but come on, it is New Jersey - even Santa can't afford a house here!)

He knew I had a new niece this year!

He knew I had a fabulous new class!

We saw the file he kept on me

and the machine that told him I was on the nice list!

We have been tracking Santa using the NORAD Santa Tracker. You have to wait until Christmas Eve to track him this year using Google Earth, but here's the video from last year!

Click on the Countdown to Track Santa picture to go there!

and you can play games while you wait for Christmas Eve!

Kids can also leave Santa a free Google voicemail by calling the number 1-855-34-SANTA (1-855-347-2682)!

or use Send a Call (this one's for adults only)

We are waiting for Santa to send us our Elf on a Shelf. We're hoping it won't take long...and maybe me switching schools caused a delay! We can't wait to find out if it's a boy or girl and see the DVD that it comes with!

Check out what some of the other Elves on Shelves have been up to!

Check out more Christmas / Winter ideas on Pinterest.

Test Prep Materials

I have finally come across some great NJ ASK test prep materials thanks to the before/after school tutoring program here at our school! There are still 5 months until the test, but you can never start preparing too early! I don't spend time cramming near the end, nor do I make testing a focus. I do, however, want my students to use test taking strategies throughout the year and to feel comfortable when they take the ASK the first time. I'm sure I'll be posting about this again as the test gets sooner, but for now here are some materials you may want to consider purchasing. (Keep in mind that I posted the NJ materials, and most of them also come aligned with other states' standardized tests too!)

Right now, we are using the following products by Triumph Learning:

New Jersey ASK Coach (Language Arts Literacy and Math Level C) for direct instruction

Ladders to Success Level C for math, reading, and language arts skills acquisition

ASK 3 Workout for Math and Reading review and extra practice

In the past, I have used Qworkbooks Explore series for language arts literacy and math.

Measuring Up to the NJCCCS

Just a disclaimer: we have now moved to common core standards, so there may be some changes coming to the NJ ASK...but since we did not receive Race to the Top funds, who knows?!

Click here to download NJ ASK released test samples!

Math

Language Arts Literacy

Do you have any materials or questions about the NJ ASK?