Kindergarten students used Comic Life on the iPad to create a comic about the qualities of a good person.
Steps taken in this lesson:
Nalisha Narsai, our 1st grade teacher, decided to have students become zookeepers of specific animals. The students were required to become “experts” through research on the Kid’s National Geographic website.
A reporter interviewed her zookeepers about their animal.
To capture the interviews, she had students video record using the iPads.
Ms. Narsai used iMovie on the iPad to create her Zookeeper movie. If you plan to create a movie as well, make sure to record video AND photos.
Here are some resources to help you create your own movies on the iPad.
“MindUP™ is a family of social, emotional, and attentional self-regulatory strategies and skills developed for cultivating well-being and emotional balance.” -The Hawn Foundation website
Provide Teachers Immediate Feedback for Informal Teacher Observations
Erin Zaich’s conference session, “Learn to Create Dynamic Audio/Visual Feedback on Essays, has inspired my principal, Danielle Rich, to provide her teachers with immediate feedback/comments during her informal teacher observations.
I suggested that she use Skitch, an Evernote app, that allows you to annotate images with text, shapes, and sketches.
Here are the steps an administrator would take in using Skitch for iPad to provide feedback:
Here are her first couple Skitch messages:
Dr. Jenny Lane discussed how #mobilelearning brings the world into the #classroom, takes the classroom into the world, and takes the #teacher into the home. She also mentioned TPACK Model (technological pedagogical content knowledge) that connects and uses the three types of knowledge together to create effective & engaging tech integrated instruction.
Images are from Ms. Mines’s drama lessons.
Eric Schmidt and his daughter Sophie took a tip to North Korea to promote the use of the Internet in the country. Sophie created a Google Site called It Might Not Get Weirder Than This to showcase what she learned from her extraordinary and controversial visit to the country.
Sophie’s website could be an example of a summative assessment product. She used her site to demonstrate and present the knowledge she gained from her experience in North Korea. Likewise, students in the classroom can demonstrate the knowledge they acquired from a unit through the creation of a Google Site. Teachers can also have students work in groups and use Google Site as a wiki tool. This option involves student collaboration, active student learning, and student progress-monitoring.
Teachers can use this authentic assessment to identify strengths and weaknesses in their knowledge of the content.
If your team is going to a conference, convention, or trade show, it can be quite difficult to find your colleagues in the mass chaos. Google Latitude could be the solution to this problem. Google Latitude allows you to locate your colleague and get directions to her/him.
Here are the steps you will need to take to set up the tool for your iOS device (iPad or iPhone):
Now you can tap on a friend and get directions to her/her.
My team will be going to the 21st Century Learning Hong Kong conference this Thursday to Saturday (Jan 24th-26th), so we will test out this app, and see how well it locates us and provides directions to our colleagues’ location.
Turning off the app will not stop Google from tracking you. You will need to follow these simple steps:
iOS
Android
In the Edutopia blog post, “The Pros and Cons of Computer Labs”, Mary Beth Hertz discussed the strengths and weaknesses of her computer lab. Here is the table that she created:
I believe my school, Korea International School, has created a computer lab that resolves these cons. These resolutions have only been possible due to the large budget the school has reserved for educational technologies. Here is what my school has done:
All the computers in the lab are against the walls. This allows me to monitor every computers’ screen to make sure students are on task. Additionally, my younger students don’t need to look over their monitors to listen to my instruction. If I need to get my students’ attention, I call out “Monitors off!” This requires my students to immediately turn off their monitors, turn around in their seats, and look at me for my instruction.
With the introduction of collaborative online office suite applications (like Google Docs or Sky Drive), students don’t need to have books, paper, and pencils on their desktop to complete projects. Students utilize digital graphic organizers, resources, and tools to create digital products. This gives students an uncluttered workspace to complete lessons and projects.
PBS NewsHour offers a great lesson plan about the Presidential Inauguration. Here are the objectives of the lesson:
Learn about the Constitutional provisions for the Presidential Inauguration.
Learn the history of the Presidential Inauguration, including changes to the procedure and notable speeches.
Work in small groups to analyze President Obama’s first inaugural address and to compare his ideas with the actions of his first term.
- Have an opportunity to predict the content of President Obama’s second inaugural address on January 21, 2013.
There is also a PBS NewsHour supplement article that will inform students on the President’s Oath of Office, the Inaugural Address, and additional fun facts.
According to Comic Life, there are numerous student benefits for creating comics in your classroom.
I have incorporated comic creators into my Cyber Safety unit. My students created comics about cyberbullying, online safety, and forms of media. I used the Professor Garfield Cyberbullying apps (includes comics and interactive questions) to supplement my lessons.
Your students can watch the video versions of the cyber-safety comics on the Infinite Learning Lab.
RULES TO LIVE BY FOR YOU CLASSROOM WEBSITE IN 2013
Google Cultural Institute is a website designed to inform visitors about historical cultural stories through video, photographs, manuscripts, and exhibits. This website could be an essential research resource to any social studies unit or history course. You can find world changing events by time or topic. Each search will also provide you with related topics. Since this is a Google website, you can share your interesting findings through Google+!
The Next Web’s article, 29 new inspiring responsive designs on the web, showcases numerous website examples that offer an excellent optimal viewing experience (e.g. easy reading and navigation). I think teachers and students should focus on effective web design techniques for their classroom website, ePortfolio, or class wiki to give them a smart, elegant, and aesthetically-pleasing look.
Here are some of the examples that can inspire your classroom website:
1. Starbucks
2. Spigot Design
3. Microsoft
Here is my own classroom website that could provide you some design inspiration. I use Wix, a web-based platform that allows you to create stunning websites.
STAR TREK HOLODECK CLASSROOM IN OUR FUTURE?
Stevie Bathiche, the Director of Research in Microsoft’s Applied Sciences Group, showed the Verge the projects they are working on to hopefully one day develop a holodeck (simulated reality facility).
Why would this be considered EdTech? Well, it seems that a holodeck classroom could be in our future (probably in the far future). A holodeck classroom full of students can interact with their simulated surroundings and teacher. Theoretically, students would be able to experience any type learning activity through this simulation.
Holodeck from a episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation
Flat Stereoscopic 3D Display that is steerable (As your head pivots or zooms in and out, the 3D image appropriately alters to make it seem like you are in the room.)
The Lake Elsinore district in California has implemented a program called the Virtual Learning Center. This online program allows struggling students to retake classes that they failed in their traditional setting classrooms. The program allows students to take charge their learning, and learn at their own pace. Here are some of the specifics of the program:
Visiting the Lake Elsinore VLC website, I found that they use Plato Learning Environment.
According to Michael Griffie, blended learning requires the human element of teaching and modeling positive behavior for it to succeed in an urban setting.
His school uses the Positive Behavior Interventions and Support (PBIS) system to encourage students to be respectful, responsible and safe.
Blended learning is an approach that combines computer activities and direct instruction together. This can be done through classroom rotations or a flex model (online activities that deliver most of the curricula). This gives time for teachers to target smaller groups who need help.
Here’s an example of how a blended learning environment looks like from New Classrooms:
Tagxedo let’s you create word clouds out of your URL, Twitter ID, Del.icio.us account, news, search or RSS. Here is an example of a word cloud I created of my edtech blog:
As you can see in the second image, you can customize the font, theme, color, orientation, and shape of your word cloud. Share your creation via Facebook and Twitter.
Check out this video by eduTecher. It explains how to use Tagxedo very thoroughly.
