Section 5 (Ch. 20-23)
1. Jonas and the elder have a plan that is “… barely possible. If it failed, he would very likely be killed.” Comment on Jonas’s motivation for even attempting his plan.
2. Do you think the story has a happy ending or a sad ending? Explain your feelings.
Section 4 (Ch. 16-19)
Please respond to any of the questions in 1 paragraph. Make sure you include some details from the story to support your answer. You may include your thoughts and feelings, or compare an experience you have had to what Jonas is going through in this section. MAKE A CONNECTION BETWEEN YOU & JONAS.
1. Discuss Jonas’s reaction to the experience of love (pages 125-126) AND WHAT HAPPENED WHEN HE ASKED HIS PARENTS ABOUT LOVE.
2. What impact is baby Gabriel having on Jonas? How is Jonas affecting Gabriel?
3. Jonas has a strange reaction to his friends in Ch 17. How does he feel and what decision does he “know with certainty” afterwards?
Section 3 (Ch 11-15)
Choose only one
1. Write your reaction to the difference between “honor” and “power” in the community as given by the Giver. (Page 84)
2. The life of the Receiver is very lonely. Why does the commuity need a Receiver? How would you feel if you were chosen to be the receiver?
3. Chapter 15 is the shortest chapter in the book but may be the most powerful experience for both Jonas and you, the reader. Comment on what happens in this chapter and your reaction to it.
Section 2 (Ch. 6-10)
Choose one only.
1.The chief elder describes the life of children to age Twelve on pages 51,52, & 54. Compare how the life and experiences of young children in the community are different from the experiences you have had.
2. Each dwelling in the commuity had only three reference books. (page 74) Jonas “..had never known that other books existed.” Can you imagine a world without books? Which books would you miss the most? List your three favorite books & explain why you would miss them the most.
Section 1 (Ch. 1-5)
Choose one of the three writing prompts below.
1. If I lived in a controlled community like Jonas, I would…
2. Compare the way the Old are treated in the community with the way older people are regarded in our society.
3. My ideas of a perfect commuity are…
Yesterday I was so inspired to create an ebook for my 8th grade class that I stayed until almost 7:00 p.m. I found a Chammorro legend; a sequel to “The Legend of Two Lover’s Point” called “The Secret of Two Lovers’ Cave” from www.ns.gov.gu. Because we are currently reading the play Romeo & Juliet, I thought it will be nice to also extend the lesson with a taste of our local legends. The story is about what happened to the two lovers’ bodies after they jumped off the cliff. Creating my ebook using the ebook studio program was easy. First you find a story you like or create your own and copy and paste it on to the page in ebook studio. Next, edit, and make all necessary corrections and formatting before you apply page break. I found 2 pictures of Urunao and the statues inside the cave from the same website. I had to resize these pictures to fit into the palm format. I went to resize2mail.com to resize the pictures making sure that if the image was in landscape, I put in size 148, and the other which was a portrait was 158. Doing this is as easy as 1-2-3. The only problem I had was that one of the pictures I used was too big, that I had to keep resizing it until it was just right. The next step after resizing was to go to www.iaza.com to convert your resized picture in .jpg to .png format. Doing this was also easy. Once the image is converted into the correct format, you can drag the image to where you want it to show in your ebook. When everything is done, all you need to do is click on “make book” (still in the ebook studio), and your saved file will convert from .pml to .pdb format. From here, you can use Bluetooth to transfer your ebook to your Handheld.
I was thankful I came to Tuesday’s class or else I would have missed the opportunity. When I came back to my class the following week, I gave the Vocabulary 19 & 20 test to my 6th grade class using the Quizzler. Of course, it was my first time to use it with the students so I came across a minor problem. It was just when students beamed their scores to me, my unit didn’t accept or even recognize it. I found out later that I have to register the Gradebook program first in order for the students grades to be compiled. It was exciting to see the students’ enthusiasm to use the handhelds. I paired up students who were already familiar with the handhelds since 5th grade with new students. They were helping their new classmates learn how to operate and trouble shoot their unit.
Another program I have tried using is Smartlist To go. With this program I have created a database for my personal books, and books only for Book Club. I’m planning to create one for the Board of Review, but I still have to work on it. The more I use my handheld, the more I find it useful & easy.
Though our meeting last Tuesday was a bit lonely(missed some people), it was a night worth attending. I was running late for class that I almost decided not to attend thinking I would miss the beginning of the lesson. I was glad I came because when I got there only Mr. Babia & Rolly were in attendance, and I didn’t miss anything.
Rolly started demonstrating how to use the Quizzler by going through the steps of making the quiz from the memo first. Then he beamed his sample quiz on “Elements” to us and we played (notice I didn’t use “took the test”) for a little while. Seeing my score, it is needless to say that Chemistry is not my cup of tea. We beamed our score to Rolly, when we finished playing (testing) so it will be kept in the Gradebook. Gradebook is another program that works together with Quizzler. Then Professor Rolly wanted to see if we can create a simple test at that point. He had prepared a How to Create a Quiz handout to guide us in creating our own quiz, but forgot to bring it. Thanks to modern technology, we were still able to see the handout using Rolly’s laptop projected on the screen. Norman and I followed the procedure. I created a 12 true or false quiz for Romeo & Juliet. After we finished creating the quiz, we exited memo, and tapped on to quizzler. We were to import the quiz from the memo into the quizzler program. Once you do this, your quiz will show up from the memo, so you must tap the name of the quiz you made, and then tap “convert”. I was excited to try it out but something went wrong with my quiz. Some of the questions didn’t show up on the screen except the choices of answers. How weird was that! Rolly tried to figure out the problem but it would take more time so we decided to work on it together during our prep time. Based on my unfortunate experience, my advice to my colleagues: 1. Before giving the test to your students, make sure that you have tried it out first to check for errors and unforseen problems. 2. Double check the first choice answer for capitalization or else kids will have an idea. 3. To decapitalize, use shift on the keyboard before typing the first answer.
For our break Rolly let us play a game called SameGame in our handhelds. It was a nice stress reliever. I scored the lowest with 350, however I was determined to raise that scored. I played the game at home until my score went up to 1000’s.
Another game he shared was the idea of using Tick-Tac-Toe as a way for students to take turns in answering questions for a review or practice. I think it is great because when a student do not have the correct answer to the question, then he or she will lose a turn in Tic-Tac-Toe. This game just adds some excitement to having students work together in pairs when reviewing.
The last thing we covered in class was how to use Smartlist. This is a database program that allows you to design your own database of information. Rolly assisted us in designing a database for student descipline. My plan is to create a database for non-AR books, and another for the Board of Review.
Before going home Rolly showed us the most important websites that will be very useful in creating our ebooks. These are resize ??? (sorry, forgot the name) and Iaza. This will convert your picture in .jpeg format to .png so it can be seen in the handheld.
The new things I learned on Tuesday was really worth the extra time I spent in school. Yes by 7:15 pm I was very tired and hungry, but my mind was full of ideas as I was driving home.
Last Saturday was a fun class. I learned not only how to download ebooks, but also creating one. First Rolly told us to check out globalclassroom.org, where he showed our class some examples of ebooks made by intermediate to middle school aged students. Rolly guided us step by step on how to make ebooks using the ebook Studio software. We visited StrohHouse website to get the text file and we also included some images into our creation. You can get your pictures from google images. I learned that the images we put into our ebooks must be in .png format or else it will not work. One helpful tip I learned through the experience is that before I could apply the page break, all necessary corrections, formatting, and inserting images in the approriate locations must be completed or else some pages or screen will look incomplete. Some screens may only have a few lines of texts instead of showing a full page.
After we saved our ebook we were able to use the bluetooth to transfer it to the handheld. Cecille was able to assist me on this. The process went too fast for me. It was a lot easier and faster than hotsyncking. My only problem with this is my inability to remember the process after a while, so I may need to ask Cecille or any of my classmates to remind me.
The last lesson was on “Documents to go”. This lesson is just like having microsoft word only in the handheld version. Here we were able to save our documents and printed it as soon as we finished. I don’t know why, but I felt quiet like a kid, so excited to see my doccument after I beamed from the handheld to the printer, and it came out looking as if it was done in the desktop computer. The infra-red adaptor plugged to the printer was like a magical toy. The program PrintBoy is an amazing tool for allowing the handheld to (wirelessly) connect to any printer. We lined up, beamed the handheld to the infra-red adaptor called “Infraready” and the printer printed my document. Having these tools makes life a little easier.
Last week I learned how to use different programs such as MegaClock (Alarm, Stop watch, etc.), Yesterday, Lesson Plans (an excellent program for teachers), Students (to keep essential information about students & parents, student’s class schedule, and emergency info.) and about ebooks. It was an amazing experience. We visited manybooks.net where you can find many titles that you can download to your Handheld. I was able to get a copy of Romeo & Juliet that day. When I came back to school the following week; as soon as my 8th graders came in the classroom, I took out my handheld instead of my bulky Teacher’s Edition of the Literature book, opened the ereader, and chose the title Romeo and Juliet. My kids were amazed that I was able to read the same story they were reading from their textbook. An advantage I see with ebooks is that I can read and reread the story where ever I go without the hassle of bringing my heavy TE. I hope that more young adult selections will be avaible in the future.
