Spreadsheets in the Classroom

I was very impressed with what spreadsheets could do! I had never used a spreadsheet before my assignment and loved the ease with which I could calculate data. While using Microsoft Excel it was very obvious that spreadsheets would be used to calculate grades in the classroom. Another way to use them would be to keep ongoing attendance records. Lates and absences could be calculated at the end of each term to add to the report cards and children with perfect attendance and/or no lates could be rewarded for their efforts.

I thought that introducing spreadsheets into a grade two classroom would be a challenge, but looking back at the language arts lesson that my TA taught this past Thursday, I was inspired! She was teaching the class about nouns, verbs, and adjectives. She had created columns on the board, with the noun, verb, and adjective headings and the class brainstormed many Halloween-related words to fill the columns. If the technology was available, then this lesson could be transfered to a spreadsheet...whether it be through a smart board in the classroom, individual computer time or a projector connected to the classroom computer. It's a simple concept for a spreadsheet, but it could be made into a chart to see what the class liked the most as noun, verb and adjective and those words could be used in a Halloween poem.