Info Bootcamp 2011 -- YEAR FOUR of molding FIFTH GRADE MINDS!

Every year I get the ability to spend the entire day with one 5th grade class.  The teacher doesn't set a goal... it's all up to me what I want to teach them.  Since I know that this is the last time that any librarian is going to get this amount of access to their minds, I feel a great responsibility to really make a lasting impact.

Here's a collection of three lessons that I've been working on for this year's fifth graders.   It is available as SmartBoard slides for sale for $5.00 on Teachers Pay Teachers.   I'm including two lessons that I taught last year, information privacy and the World Wide Web and I'm adding a new one called "The Wikipedia Game."

I really like "The Wikipedia Game."  It is my attempt to show kids the element of chance in how credible a Wikipedia article is.  For each roll of the dice, there is a different outcome to the article, including a "hacker" adding a one-word tribute to themselves.  I already played it with two of my ten fifth grades and I think that it was a highlight of the day.  Here's a screen shot of the actual game.

Wikipedia GAME screenshot

Of course since I had to come up with something that most fifth graders felt very confident about and was still very fun, I chose SpongeBob SquarePants.  This was a MUCH better choice than Parkour or Justin Bieber, I'll tell you.

Part two of INFO BOOTCAMP features my favorite fake Web sites including my beloved Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus, which I am so sad to say will not be showing up in my backyard tree at any point in the near future.  If you don't know about this sad creature that is not yet on the endangered species list but SHOULD, please check out his advocacy page here: http://zapatopi.net/treeoctopus/

I do recognize that I am a very lucky librarian in that I even get to run bootcamp every year.