Experts in the Field: Traveling to Other Countries

Students were able to choose a speaker related to their country researched in their PBL and had the opportunity to jigsaw knowledge with their group from each speaker.  It was an excellent springboard into research today!

Dr. Haynes and daughter Judah shared about their travels to Rwanda, Australia, and many other countries.

 Shawn Cooper talked with students via video conference from Malaysia.

 Becca Veazey spoke about her travels to Guatemala and tips on cultural awareness. 

 Mr. Andy Morris is a world traveler and spoke of his experiences in other countries.

Video Conference with Paralympian McClain Hermes

We had the pleasure of speaking with Paralympian McClain Hermes a few days before she was leaving for Rio to complete in the Paralympics for Team USA!  She spoke with students about being positive and working together with others as well as her passion project Shoes for the Souls; she gives thousands of shoes to Atlanta Mission (a homeless shelter) every year!  She is such an incredible inspiration for everyone!

TWIST Team PBL Launch Day!

Everyone was excited for our first project launch day as a 7th grade team!  Students learned how to write and create their own driving questions to guide their projects and collaborated with other groups to refine and improve them.  Dr. Haynes and Mr. Reilly spent the afternoon helping students shape their questions and help push the real world connections.  We have so many great ideas and we are all looking forward to seeing these projects grow!

Group Collaboration: Chalk Talk and Community Circle

This week we tried out a few different ways to share our research findings related to Middle East political and economic issues.  Yesterday we had community circle where every student had the opportunity to share out loud three times in their group.  Today we had a "chalk talk" conversation where all conversation was written and not spoken out loud.  It was very interesting to see and hear what everyone had to say this week in regards to their research.  Next week should be exciting with the topic of religions in the Middle East!

First Day Using Devices on Wi-Fi Excitement!

We all figured out how to connect to the wireless network on our own devices and also learned how to open a document in Google Classroom using Drive and DocHub to create our SW Asia map.  Students worked together to find political and physical locations using maps, atlases, and Google Maps.  

We are excited about using devices to learn in a digital classroom!

Video Conference with Cave Diver Jill Heinerth

Today we had the opportunity to speak with cave diver Jill Heinerth.  She shared how important it is to follow your passions and always question the world around you.  Here are some resources to learn more about her:

Jill Heinerth's TED Talk

Jill Heinerth's Blog

First Day of School: Collaboration Lessons with the 7th Grade TWIST Team

We spent the afternoon together with all 120 students in the Sandbox working on several collaboration lessons (home team vs. away team, how to have an effective team meaning, and using body signals in conversations).  Each homeroom class will be learning more about collaboration this week during extended homeroom!  We had a great first day!

 Mr. Green helping his homeroom class with the icebreaker game!