A Digital Way of Doing Safety!

Mr.  Blevins' classes decided to tackle lab safety this year by writing up words and phrases and holding them while he video taped the kids using flipcams.  Mr. Blevins imported all of the videos into animoto, and animoto added borders, music and transitions automatically.  He added a couple of text slides, and his videos were done!  

Here's an example of one of the videos!

Repeating Yourself? Use Voki Instead!

Mr. Dempsey, 6th grade teacher has been using Voki's, online avatars in his classroom to introduce topics to his World Culture classes.  He says, "it's a great way to say the things I would normally have to say over and over again for every class, and the kids love it."  When I walked into his room today, he had one of Borat up on his computer.  

Voki is a great way to communicate with students because it allows the presenter to become a character.  In order to use Voki, you can type in text and your Voki will have an automated tone to it, you can call in, use a microphone to record what you want your Voki to say, or you can upload a prerecorded file. 

World Cultures Pops with Great Ideas!

Mrs. Pazos' World Cultures Classes, recently diverted from making a flip book to creating graphic organizers using Popplet.  Popplet is an online Web 2.0 tool that allows students to create a graphic organizer not only using words, but also using videos, images, and Google Maps.  Students remain engaged while organizing their content.  Students and teachers can also collaborate on a Popplet by inviting other Popplet users to work on their project.  

Students had to explore Citizenship, Government, and Economy. They had to define, explain the rights and duties of citizens, give information on the three branches of government, and show how Market Economy, Traditional Economy, and Command Economy are different. Students were allowed to use images found from online by using the "free to use or share" setting in Google Images Advanced Search settings, and appropriate YouTube videos to complete their assignment.  Here is an example of work that one of Ms. Pazos' students created using Popplet.

Checking for Understanding with Today's Meet

Mrs. Pazos' World Cultures Classes recently used Today's Meet, a free back channel website, to demonstrate understanding of longitude and latitude.  Mrs. Pazos would give the students latitude and longitude coordinates and the students would have to look on their map and put what continent was located on those coordinates.  Mrs. Pazos said, "I like that I can see if a student is getting the answer wrong and then I can check in with him/her.  Polleverywhere does not show a name.  They feel like they are getting to do something super fun on the computer...but really they are learning latitude and longitude!"  What a great way to quickly check for understanding.  

Socrative and Mobile Devices

Ms. Cameron's 6th Grade ELA classes recently read Iqbal by Francesco D'Adamo, and she wanted to provide an interactive review for students before she gave her test on the book.  Ms. Cameron set up a series of multiple choice and short answer quizzes in a free Web 2.0 tool called Socrative.  Students can either enter her classroom by downloading the free app on their hand held device or by using a laptop.  During the first part of class, while students were learning how to work with the program, students had to join the class and were asked a series of questions.  A graph shows up with the responses that the students are giving in real time.  Ms. Cameron then discussed each question with the class and the students talked about why the correct answer was the best choice.  After the students were familiar with the program, she started  a "space race" to challenge them further.  The users were automatically assigned a team color and had to answer questions correctly as fast as they could.  The more correct answers their team members made, the faster their rocket ship moved across the screen.  Students were so excited about the immediate feedback that some students were begging to use the program on a daily basis.  Ms. Cameron commented the next day that her students performed exceptionally better on the Iqbal test than other tests she had given this semester.  

Instant feedback for students

Space race game.

  Socrative from the Teacher
Side Using a Mobile Device

Socrative from the Student perspective
using a mobile device

QR Code Review

Ms. Pazos, World Cultures teacher, has always made her reviews optional.  Students who did the review would always get a 100 for completing the assignment.  Before her most recent test, she decided to put the review up in the form of a QR code.  QR codes were placed throughout the hallways and students could scan the code with their phones.  Students who didn't have phones, worked with other students who did.  When just doing a regular review, Ms. Pazos said that about 20% of students complete the assignment before a test, having the review placed on a QR code, Ms. Pazos increased her participation in completing the review to 80%.  When I asked Ms. Pazos if she thought her students did better on the test because of the QR code review, this was her response, "I have only had 1 class test today but their test scores were higher than usual. I asked a few kids why they think they did better on the test than they usually do and they both said it was because they did the review. I believe that they did the review because they were interested in it with the QR Codes."
What an amazing testament to how technology can improve the learning environment!

QR Codes invade World Cultures

Ms. Pazos recently created a review using QR codes, and her students were so excited and engaged, that she adapted their next poster project to allow the students to create their own QR codes.  The original project had students take a place in the world and write two facts about various topics on their world map location.  Ms. Pazos' students had to write the facts, but also create a QR code with even more information about their location.  Students were very excited to learn how to create these codes that they have been seeing around the school!