An Aussie Emu

Photo by Mr. Michael Macnamara Enfield, South Australia


Our Circle Song friend from South Australia sent us a big picture of an emu that he took when he and his family were visiting the Parra Wirra Recreation Park near Adelaide, South Australia.

My first graders talked about emus, watched a video below:

Then we created our own emu in Kid Pix and I put the images into a slideshow to share.

Click on the link below to watch the Emu Slideshow by first grade artists.

emu slideshow
The music for the slideshow is ‘Silly Fun’ is from the Incompetech web site.
http://incompetech.com/

For further information about emus, begin here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emu

Spaghetti and Meatballs–Kid Pix Style

I met the kindergarten students for the first time today. Some of them had never sat at a desktop but they had used ipads and iphones before. It’s a whole new generation! I still use the desktop computers in the computer lab with the students. There are some interesting programs that they can explore and have fun with while learning some of the terms such as file, save, delete, and open.

Today I showed the kindergarten students Kid Pix. I have used the program for more than 20 years. Kid Pix is a writing and drawing program that can be used by the youngest students as well as adults. I use the Mackiev edition of Kid Pix that is available through Mackiev on their web site. I think that it is also available at the Apple Store.

I showed the students how to use the paint tool to create ‘spaghetti’ in many colors. Then I showed them how to use the paint bucket tool to fill in the spaces in the spaghetti to create a design. In the photo above the child made spaghetti, sauce and meatballs.

After they completed their ‘job’ the students were free to explore within the application. Expressive language is developed as they share their discoveries with their peers. Excitement is contagious and students are delighted to uncover the many ‘tricks’ that this application has to offer.

They will continue to work with Kid Pix in their classroom this week.