You Tube

If you have a child between the ages of 2 and 18, then you have a love/hate relationship with YOUTUBE.

My son started by watching a few minecraft videos a couple of years ago.  He quickly learned how to hit the subscribe, and more.  Soon he was watching more and more videos...some positive and some negative.

Now he is 10 and is obsessed with YouTube.

Add a Google Home or Alexa and YouTube becomes a frequent request.  My 2 year old and 5 year know how to walk over and say "OK GOOGLE - PLAY _________" and it works.  You can cast it to the TV, phone, etc...

(Funny side story - I was reading my post aloud to my husband to proofread it and my Google Home caught my "Okay Google" and stopped the kids movie.  It was trying to play "BLANK" like above.  OOPS!)

So what are we are watching on YouTube in our world?

My 10 year old watches a wide variety of minecraft videos, exploding items, baricade yourself in a store, and more!  He does enjoy the guided bedtime meditation type videos on a positive side.

My 8 year old girl loves Tic Tac Toy.  They review various toys and re-create real life scenarios like school with toys.

My 5 year old loves a cartoon called Animal Mechanicals.  You can watch it on YouTube and/or Netflix.  I think that our Google Home connects to our NetFlix for this request!  Technology is good kind of crazy.

 

My 2.5 year old is named Lucas so it is not surprising that he LOVES "Lucas the Spider" videos. 

As a parent, I love to watch the Holderness Family.  They make me feel normal and laugh at some of the parenting insanity!  Here is my current favorite!

As an educator, I have found a few that are great to follow! First is John Spencer.  Here is his video on libraries.

As a STEAM/STEM teacher, I use Sci Show and Sci Show Kids frequently to introduce a new topic or lesson.  The videos are less than 5 minutes long and are on a wide variety of topics!

Finally, I found Fun Science Demos for my students when we can do the actual science experiments ourselves!

WHAT ARE YOUR FAVORITE YOUTUBERS?  WHAT ARE YOUR KIDS FAVORITES?

Share them in the comments!

Engineering Design Challenge

1st and 2nd grade have been working through a hamster habitat lesson set called "Picture STEM".

I added an additional engineering design challenge to the unit.  Students were put into pairs, given a standard piece of construction paper, newspapers, masking tape, and scissors.  The students had to design something to entertain the hamster.

Students spent the first STEAM lesson trying to engineer the activities then the second class was for improving and sharing their creations.

The creativity and ideas from these students was AWESOME.  Secondly, I love watching students present to peers.  I need to do this more often.

The drawback or fix is how to store 50 - 100 newspaper creations for 1 week.  Number 1 LOTS of boxes.  Plus you need to label the boxes with the class names on them!  Plus the micro sized scraps are EVERYWHERE at the end of the day, but the smiles are worth it.

Looks for pictures soon!

Snowmen and snowballs

Rock wall and slide

Tunnel and a football training ladder

Living room design 

Students at work!

Sara Sassafras and the Tiguar

I love to meet local authors and illustrators!

Last Saturday, I got to meet both the author and illustrator of a local board book called "Sara Sassafras and the Tiguar".

The author told us about the back story and how she came up with the word "tiguar."  Then she read us the book.

The illustrator broke the drawing of a tiger down into simple shapes!

The highlight was getting a signed copy of the book and a picture with them.

Part of the proceeds goes to the Erie Zoo!

Check it out on Amazon and Google

Here is a picture of the book cover and a picture of my children with the author and illustrator!