2011 Global Snowman Card Exchange

I am very excited to share information with you on our newest project.  All five rotations of students are going to work together to participate in a global card exchange between 59 classes from across the United States and Canada.   Over 750 classrooms have registered and been organized in groups of 30 for this project.  This collaboration was organized by a teacher in California named Jennifer Wagner.  She has successfully encouraged teachers since 1999 to use online projects in their Pre K-6 classrooms.  This is the first time I have participated in one of her projects and I am very excited about having an opportunity to connect our students to others from across our country and around the world.  

Through this real world platform, we will be working on our research, problems solving, writing and technology skills.  We are responsible for making one, snowman themed, card for each of the fifty-eight other classrooms.  Below is a Google Map I made in Batch Geo to show the locations of all of our partners.

View 2011 Global Snowman Holiday Card Exchange in a full screen map

Our 2nd grade SAGE students are learning to use a traditional USA and World Atlas and coordinates on a grid this week so the skills tied nicely to this new adventure.  We will be working with Google Maps and Google Earth to learn more about the locations of each school. 

Both K/1st and 2nd grade SAGE students will be introduced to using a Thesaurus in the next week or so.  We will use the synonyms we find to help us write winter swirl poems  for the cards.  The cards we create must be mailed by December 9th.  Once we receive all of the cards from the other schools, we will be graphing some of the information we learn about the other students, schools and locations.  I am hoping we can Skype with one or two of our partners so the students have a chance to connect face-to-face.  We will have to see!