Date: Sat, 23 Aug 1997 02:05:15 -1000
From: Patricia Weeg
To: KIDLEADER@LISTSERV.NODAK.EDU
Subject: Using KIDLINK in your classrooms/labs

KIDLEADERS,

For some of us in the Northern Hemisphere the new school year is starting. I'm very interested in seeing us share the way we organize and manage our KIDLINK activities with students.

Here are some basic ideas to start:

1. Encourage the kids to have a KIDLINK folder for their mail printouts.
2. Laurie Williams in Texas issues small "KIDLINK cards" to her students when they answer the 4 KIDLINK questions. She can tell us more about that.
3. Read Shelia Gaquin's excellent article for ways to use the RESPONSE messages that kids send from all over the world:
4. Give students maps (single sheets) of the countries where their keypals live and have them highlight the city on the sheet. Identify latitude and longitude, GMT factor.
5. Have students put flags on big wall maps of the world to locate their keypals.
6. Spend time making the students aware of the KIDLINK projects/activities that are available for them:
   1. KIDPROJ (projects)
   2. KIDFORUM (6 week topics)
   3. KIDCAFE lists (only kids meet here)
   4. KIDART (interested in art?)
   5. KIDIRC (real time chats)
7. Be sure to make your foreign language teachers aware that KIDLINK has lists in other languages as well.

How do you organize your KIDLINK activities and work them into your curriculum? We'd love to hear....

All the best,
Patti

Date: Sat, 23 Aug 1997 06:13:44 -1000
From: Laurie Williams
To: KIDLEADER@LISTSERV.NODAK.EDU
Subject: Re: Using KIDLINK in your classrooms/labs

Well, we've just started school, we started August 13th. I teach 5th grade, btw.

My kids' first homework assignment was to answer the 4 KIDLINK Response Questions. It's a great first "writing assessment": Do they answer questions in complete sentences?; Do they write simple answers, or do they elaborate?; How is their grammar, spelling, punctuation, capitalization?; Is their handwriting legible?

I check over their Responses, giving them suggestions for elaboration or correction. Then we take the Response Questions with us to the lab, and it's our first lab assignment. How are their keyboarding skills? Do they understand basic conventions of word processing?....

Next, when there is a free moment, I train one student how to answer the Response Questions on the Web (our connection is in the classroom). Each student then trains the next student. We can send in 3 or 4 during the time others are working on seatwork. I *have* sent them in myself in previous years, but I like giving the kids the opportunity to "take charge".

Once the first batch of Responses has gone in, I begin issuiing KIDLINK "business cards" to the students who have sent in their Responses. My first set to go out this year will be passed out on Monday :-) I use perforated business cards, and usually, I have them laminated so that they can hold up. There's an example of the cards I issue.

Have a great year!!
Laurie

Updated August, 1997