A Skype & Padlet Full Of Advice From High Schoolers In Florida To Our 5th Graders In Iowa

A few months ago my friend Donna Gephart and I talked about ways we could connect our students. 

Donna is an author and teaches high school students in Southern Florida.  I was going to connect them with our elementary students in Iowa. 

She came up with the idea of having her students write advice for the younger friends they were going to meet at Van Meter.   This was perfect timing with the school years coming to an end and our students moving onto middle school next year, and several of hers graduating.  

Today we Skyped twice and connected our two schools.  

Donna's students took turn reading the advice they wrote and talking with the fifth graders.  

We all loved what they had to say...what amazing young people!  

Our students also shared a little advice too...even though they didn't know what advice they could give to the older students. 

As we finished with our Skype,  I created a Padlet for all of our students to share advice with one another.

I thought this would be a great digital space and a little more comfortable for all of our students to share their advice.

The question was simple......

What advice would you give other students? 

Our fifth graders used their iPads.....

and some used laptops to add to the Padlet.  I love how a lot of them also found images to share their advice.

By the end of the day, we had a wonderful spot with all kinds of advice.

We also the treat of listening to Donna read from her newest book Death By Toilet Paper due out in August 2014.  She read us part of Chapter 1 and I continued to read three more to my students.

Donna's website is another awesome place to check out!  You can learn all about the other books she has published too.

Thank you to Donna and your amazing students.  We had a great time and will enjoy reading through all of the advice we gave one another.