Part 2: The Journey, The Adventure
It’s time for pictures! We met so many great people along the way, and made some good friends too.
It was an amazing experience to see how teachers and administrators from smaller schools reacted towards QuickSchools.com. They saw a great fit for their schools and most of them signed up on the spot.
Our 2 month conference trip in pictures:
Here’s Carmen Diaz signing up for a QuickSchools account.
Our friends from Mansion Day School having a go on the touchscreen display.
Mark McClelland of Lima Christian School, he signed up on the spot!
Pastor Scott, from FLCS, blown away by our new look and feel 
Sister Asma from Hamza Academy.
Amazed and convinced, she decided to signup on the spot.
Sue from McGuffie Foundation School giving it a go.
3 minutes later… Sue’s inviting her teachers to try QuickSchools too 
I think the pictures say enough. This conference run proved to us that there are many schools out there that are constantly looking for a solution that fits what they need. And when they meet us, they like what they see.
Going forward from the conferences, the holiday season is upon us, so the QuickSchools team is going to focus on all the great feedback we received during this term and put together some colorful New Year’s presents for you. 
Happy holidaying folks!
Science Fair Project Ideas for Elementary Students
I remember going to the school science fair as a child and looking at the erupting volcano in awe. It was indeed fun to execute a few of my own experiments at the science fairs in school.
Come to think of it, science experiments can be quite fun & educational for children in elementary school mainly because they provide an element of surprise and a sense of achievement after having conducted one successfully.
Some QuickSchoolers took 30 minutes off today to run some internet searches on popular projects for science fairs. Here’s a few cool experiments that we will soon be trying out ourselves:
1. How much energy is stored in a peanut?
This experiment uses a (fire) lit peanut to heat up 1/2 a cup of water. Students can then approximate how much chemical energy was stored in the peanut.
http://www.energyquest.ca.gov/projects/peanut.html
This experiment will require adult supervision as needles & fire is involved.
2. Making a model arm
We use it every day and probably do not even think about how it works. The human arm is a complex structure made up of bones, joints, ligaments, and muscles. But how does it all work? What makes us pick up that cup of coffee or throw that football to an exact area fifty yards away? This project will go deep into the human arm and how it works.
http://www.scienceproject.com/projects/intro/primary/PX003.asp
3. Sundial
From sunrise to sunset, shadows of buildings, trees and other objects move slowly, but continuously. In the northern hemisphere, shadows cast west in the morning, north at noon time and east in the late afternoon. Knowing the direction of shadows is very helpful for telling the time and the directions. To tell the time using the shadows we use sundials or sun clocks. Sundials have been used for centuries to tell the time.
http://www.scienceproject.com/projects/intro/primary/PX008.asp
4. The good old erupting volcano
For those who still want to try out this experiment, knock yourself out!
http://www.essortment.com/hobbies/scienceprojects_szkl.htm
Have fun teaching! =]
Part 1: The Journey, The Adventure
How time flies when you’re having a good time!
We started our journey a mere month ago. Ready with our roll bags in hand, backpacks, laptops and not to forget, some chocolate bars, we headed off to our first out of 8 exciting conferences.
Marking our first pit stop in North Carolina, we made our way up and down the country and made our final conference stop in Florida – and that’s only half the story.
FCIS Convention
This will be our 8th and final stop.
Its been great!
We’ll be sharing with you more on our adventure through our next posts.
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FCIS Convention (Florida Council of Independent Schools)
“Value Added : Why Our Schools are Special”
Date : November 19 – 20, 2009
Location : Omni Resort at ChampionsGate, Orlando, FLorida
Come visit our booth to sign up for your FREE IRIS account, FREE 30 day trial for all other plans, or simply drop by and say HI!
See you guys there!
We’re now at the CAIRS ’09 Conference
25th Annual Conference for Administrators of the Independent & Religious Schools
Organized by NYS Coalition of Independent & Religious Schools
The CAIRS 09 conference will bring together over 400 independent & religious school administrators from across New York State in an atmosphere of learning, collegiality and friendship.
Dates – Nov 16th and 17th 2009
Location
The Marriot
Wolf Road
Albany, New York
Website link - http://www.nyscirs.org/Conference.html
Detailed program information is available on this PDF doc:
http://www.nyscirs.org/2009%20NPS%20Program.pdf
Ideas for teaching geography to elementary school students
A geography teacher’s task isn’t an easy one as it requires piquing the classroom’s interest in countries and cultures that they cannot see or touch. At the same time, it’s also very rewarding as once you’ve managed to spark interest in your student’s minds, it could very well last a long time.
To help you make your classes interesting, we decided to look around for activities that you and your classroom could join. Hope you enjoy trying them out.
1. Firstly, join Geography Awareness Week happening from Nov 15th -21st ’09 http://mywonderfulworld.org/gaw.html. This event aims to explore the world through mapping.
2. Get your classroom to join programs like ePals - http://www.epals.com/ This site connects classrooms from across the world and helps to connect the students in those classrooms to provide an exchange of cultures. Your class can even join ongoing projects on topics that range from climate to global warming to people and culture. Read more at this link: http://www.epals.com/projects/info.aspx?DivID=index
3. PBS.org has a wealth of knowledge to offer your students. Based on a tv series called AFRICA, the website helps teachers come up with lesson plans as well as provides good content for discussion with elementary students http://www.pbs.org/wnet/africa/about/index.html. There’s even a site that kids themselves can log on to, to watch videos taken from various parts of Africa on this page: http://pbskids.org/africa/
4. National Geographic too tries to get educators and classrooms more involved by providing action plans to teachers on their Geography Action! section http://www.nationalgeographic.com/geography-action/
5. On a lighter note, National Geographic also site where elementary students would enjoy playing interactive games http://games.nationalgeographic.com/
6. The site MyWonderfulWorld.com offers great lesson plans that makes teaching geography fun http://mywonderfulworld.org/toolsforadventure/educators/index.html
Do leave comments if you have more ideas to make geography a fun subject to learn about.
Visit us at the ACTS Educators Conference
ACTS National Educators Conference
Organized by the Florida League of Christian Schools
FLOCS marks its 25th year of services to schools this year and it’s organizing this year’s conference which will host over 100 workshops within three professional tracks.
Dates – Nov 12th and 13th 2009
Location
Renaissance Resort at SeaWorld
6677 Sea Harbor Drive
Orlando, Florida 32821
Website link - http://www.flocs.org/pages.asp?pageid=83723
This year’s conference features the following speakers:
Dr. Don D. Petry – Executive Director and founder of the National Council for Private School Accreditation (NCPSA).
Dr. Bryan Smith – Bible Integration Coordinator at BJU Press.
Michael Burroughs – Executive Director of the Florida League of Christian Schools.
Books for young children
It’s that time of year again when the summer starts cooling into mellow autumn, with leaves turning brown and the cool breeze blowing as you walk to school.
November is here!
Here are some great books that you can read to your kids as they gather around fire place!
Corn Is Maize by Aliki (Illustrator)
What’s so great about corn?
Popcorn, corn on the cob, cornbread, tacos, tamales, and tortillas. All of these and many other good things come from one amazing plant. Aliki tells the story of corn: How Native American farmers thousands of years ago found and nourished a wild grass plant and made it an important part of their lives. They learned the best ways to grow and store and use its fat yellow kernels. And then they shared this knowledge with the new settlers of America.
Johnny Appleseed by Reeve Lindbergh, Kathy Jakobsen Hallquist (Illustrator)
Lindbergh’s poem tells the story of John Chapman’s crusade to spread apple seeds from Massachusetts to the Midwest. This poetic narrative is by a woman to her grandchildren. It tells the story of John Chapman’s life and travels. Details of his kindness and piety, his nonviolence and bravery, and his respect for all living things are shared through the text.
The Autumn Equinox by Ellen Jackson
The book provides a definition of the autumn equinox and shares historical perspectives as well as current celebrations from around the globe. The book includes crafts, recipes, and games for the season. Ellis’s folk-art illustrations portrays different cultures and how they share similarities of their observances.
http://www.apples4theteacher.com/holidays/fall/kids-books/
Happy reading!
Found a Teacher Through Twitter: Conducted a User Test
Project Teacher Twitter Test
This is a program where we pick 3 of our followers on Twitter to help test a new feature on the QuickSchools service. This is brand new, a trial run, and we’ve successfully conducted the first user test with Jason Schmidt (twitter name jasonschmidt123) from Gethsemane Lutheran School to research on the effectiveness of our Gradebook feature.
Jason if you’re reading this let me say ” Thank you, we really appreciate it!”.
The format of the test is being refined, but basically testers will be asked to login to a pre-prepared school account and asked to carry out a few tasks.
To help us evaluate the results, we’ll ask you to use Screentoaster.com to record your screen and voice while you are carrying out the test. This helps the QuickSchools team understand the complexities that a new user faces when using the school management system to do basic tasks. The results are quite valuable as the findings help us understand how a minor tweak to the UI could make a huge difference to the ease of use.
Would you like to be involved with our user test too? Register here today!
Results of the program will be out in less than 2 weeks.
AIMS Fall Conference 2009
Come visit us at the Association of Independent Maryland Schools Annual Fall Conference!
Date : November 9, 2009
Time : 8:00 a.m. to 3:30 p.m.
Venue : The Baltimore Convention Center
Theme : Expanding Horizons
The Conference Planning Committee has assembled an impressive list of speakers and topics. This year’s keynote speaker will be David Oliver Relin, co-author of Three Cups of Tea.
To find out more about the conference click here
Visit us at booth #121
Looking forward to see you!
