I poked around some online examples and tutorials. This snail was super cute and ended up being my inspiration! Can't get any cuter. And then this was a nice and straight-forward tutorial for making the spiral shell, which I stuck on top of the snail. He's a little lop-sided and one-eyed, and after all, that… Continue reading Making a snail in Blender
Tag: science outreach
Quiet pause in the class
After some rough days, I just had one of the best lessons I conducted today at Wolf Meadow. This was with a group of kids whose lesson last week was a complete wash, mostly due to some miscalculations on my and my partner teacher's part. Well, we tried again this week, and it went so… Continue reading Quiet pause in the class
What the kids call me
I used to always just have all the kids call me 'Mejs', when I visit schools for 'Animations with Kids'. But then, the teacher I first worked with in the fall insisted on the kids calling me 'Dr. Hasan', plus she would always introduce me to the kids, or refer to me, as "my doctor… Continue reading What the kids call me
Animations with kids – my little readers
I have to take aside every student, one by one, and record with them. They read out-loud their little slip of paper on which is printed the words for their page of our animated story while I record (I just use the 'Voice' program that came installed on my laptop, is that lame? But it… Continue reading Animations with kids – my little readers
Is Mary Poppins anti-science?
I guess a lady who floats down from the sky on an umbrella would, on first glance and by a lazy observer, have to be classified as anti-science. I guess?! I saw the movie this weekend, and I loved it. But some comments made me pause, just for a bit. There was a repetition by… Continue reading Is Mary Poppins anti-science?
First viewing party – Butterfly story
It was really nice! The kids in the two classrooms said their movie was 'amazing', 'awesome', 'terrific', etc, etc. This was all in front of their parents. I was really happy with the number of parents who showed. In one of the classrooms, there were like 10! I got surveys from each and every one.… Continue reading First viewing party – Butterfly story
How to gently give kids feedback
Over at McAllister, we have already made the drawings for their animation project. That means we have about 45 illustrations floating around, from 3 second grade classes. We're doing the preliminaries before winter break, and then we'll do the animating afterwards.They're going to make two different stories in between them. On the first day of… Continue reading How to gently give kids feedback
Animations with kids – pond algae
Animations with kids is going really well! The "Butterfly Story" is on hold for the moment, because due to scheduling, I've over at McAllister Elementary for the time being. But the last time I was with the butterfly kids, in a new classroom, we at least came up with the title for that story. It's… Continue reading Animations with kids – pond algae
Student evaluations
Someone told me that I should do evaluations of these projects, to gauge the effect of the kids' attitudes on science and computers. So this is what I came up with: Nice and straight-forward for my itty-bitty second-graders. I actually forgot to do this with my first class at Irvin Elementary. But then, after we… Continue reading Student evaluations
Animations with kids
Yesterday and today, I visited a classroom at a local school. It was really great. We haven't started animating yet or anything, or even illustrating. But we read our story (about butterflies) and talked about life cycles. One kid got carried away and after we talked about caterpillars morphing into butterflies, said something like, "and… Continue reading Animations with kids
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