In preparation for having my students use Socrative to make 4th grade math review questions, I made a decimal review quiz. I used the Teacher paced mode, and we went through the questions one at a time which worked fine, but took a while. I did want to review the information and by seeing how the students did on each question as we went, I was able to immediately review missed questions and discuss misconceptions.
One issue with Socrative was with short answer questions. The computer was a bit picky as to what it would count correct (as you might imagine). I didn't have a big problem with this as I could easily read their answers and let them know if they were right, but the students didn't like it if the computer counted their answer wrong. Another issue was that when you are in Teacher paced mode, it tells you
when all students have answered, but it didn't always seem accurate.
After playing once in Teacher paced mode, we played again where it was student paced, and I had the questions go in random order. They really liked this mode (self-paced).
I like all the options that Socrative offers. I think the more I "play" with this site, the more I will figure out other great ways to use it when I have computers up and running with kiddos.
Sunday, March 29, 2015
Thinking Skills and Creativity, ISTE Standards
The article on Thinking Skills and Creativity emphasizes the importance of collaboration and the power of improvisation. It says that schools need to educate students for creativity. Schools need to provide students with "opportunities to engage in collaborative knowledge building activities through disciplined improvisations." Students will need to be taught how to "engage in effective collaborative discussion." A sentence at the end of the article especially concerned me. It says "In many large U.S. urban school districts, schools have taken an opposite tack - toward scripted curricula that are teacher-proofed, removing all possibility for improvisational action." That seems to be the direction we are going.
When evaluation the ISTE Standards, ISTE defines creativity as constructing knowledge and developing innovative products and processes using technology. It includes applying existing knowledge to generate new ideas, products, and processes as well as creating original works, using models and simulations to explore complex systems and issues and identifying trends and forecast possibilities. We can certainly facilitate and inspire student learning and creativity by teaching them a variety of technology tools, apps, and websites. We can then provide them with opportunities to choose and use the tools that they have learned to create a project related to their curriculum (math, reading, writing, social studies, science, etc.). The biggest factors that would help facilitate this learning would be having more time to do these projects as well as the technological devices available for students (we are headed in this direction!)
One project that we had our students complete last quarter was related to writing and persuasive essays. The students used Kidspiration to create a graphic organizer which would summarize their persuasive essay and also would be used when giving their persuasive presentation. They also typed their final copy of the persuasive essay on Google docs and added relevant images. I'll look at this project and relate it to the 6 standards.
1. Creativity and Innovation- they created an original work, but it followed a model. A new product wasn't created nor were trends identified.
2. Communication and Collaboration - this project was certainly used to communicate, but each student created their own, so it wasn't necessarily collaborative. It was one form of media and only engaged with their classmates.
3. Research and information fluency - Through the persuasive essay, they did do some research to find facts and statistics to support their reasons.
4. Critical thinking, problem solving, and decision making - The students did some critical thinking when choosing their persuasive essay topic where they identified an authentic problem. They did collect and analyze some data when looking for facts and examples to support their reasons.
5. Digital Citizenship - Students did need to demonstrate digital citizenship when researching their topic and using technology to create their organizer as well as when typing their final copy. They added used the web to add images to their final copy.
6. Technology operations and Concepts - Students needed to use Google docs to type their persuasive essay using the research function to find images (came back to this on multiple occasions). They also used Kidspiration (Mac computers in library) to create their graphic organizer. There is always much troubleshooting when using both the Dell computers in our cart and the Macs in the media center. Printing is different on each device.
When evaluation the ISTE Standards, ISTE defines creativity as constructing knowledge and developing innovative products and processes using technology. It includes applying existing knowledge to generate new ideas, products, and processes as well as creating original works, using models and simulations to explore complex systems and issues and identifying trends and forecast possibilities. We can certainly facilitate and inspire student learning and creativity by teaching them a variety of technology tools, apps, and websites. We can then provide them with opportunities to choose and use the tools that they have learned to create a project related to their curriculum (math, reading, writing, social studies, science, etc.). The biggest factors that would help facilitate this learning would be having more time to do these projects as well as the technological devices available for students (we are headed in this direction!)
One project that we had our students complete last quarter was related to writing and persuasive essays. The students used Kidspiration to create a graphic organizer which would summarize their persuasive essay and also would be used when giving their persuasive presentation. They also typed their final copy of the persuasive essay on Google docs and added relevant images. I'll look at this project and relate it to the 6 standards.
1. Creativity and Innovation- they created an original work, but it followed a model. A new product wasn't created nor were trends identified.
2. Communication and Collaboration - this project was certainly used to communicate, but each student created their own, so it wasn't necessarily collaborative. It was one form of media and only engaged with their classmates.
3. Research and information fluency - Through the persuasive essay, they did do some research to find facts and statistics to support their reasons.
4. Critical thinking, problem solving, and decision making - The students did some critical thinking when choosing their persuasive essay topic where they identified an authentic problem. They did collect and analyze some data when looking for facts and examples to support their reasons.
5. Digital Citizenship - Students did need to demonstrate digital citizenship when researching their topic and using technology to create their organizer as well as when typing their final copy. They added used the web to add images to their final copy.
6. Technology operations and Concepts - Students needed to use Google docs to type their persuasive essay using the research function to find images (came back to this on multiple occasions). They also used Kidspiration (Mac computers in library) to create their graphic organizer. There is always much troubleshooting when using both the Dell computers in our cart and the Macs in the media center. Printing is different on each device.
Tuesday, March 17, 2015
Screencast - Educreations
For my screencast, I used Educreations. I chose to teach the grammar skill for the week, comparing adjectives using more and most. It took me a few tries to get the recording right (there doesn't seem to be a undo or "back" button for recording), but overall, I was pleased with how it turned out. It worked well to take a screen shot of the grammar worksheet from the Wonders book to use for a few slides. I had the slides ready to go so that I could annotate them as I recorded the video. https://www.educreations.com/lesson/view/u5w4-grammar-more-or-most/30115912/?s=5hs2Qs&ref=app
I had students watch the screencast during independent work time during guided reading groups. I made a jump code (PCOV) to it as well as posting it on our 4th grade website. I had them use headphones to watch and listen. At the end, for formative assessment, I had them write a sentence that included a comparison statement. I had them turn in the sentence that was written on a notecard, and I was able to give them immediate feedback. I would definitely do something like that each time. The students seemed to enjoy watching the video, and 4 minutes was a good length of time.
All in all, it worked well! I would consider trying it again. I don't think I could assign it as homework like in the flipped classroom video because not all of my students have internet access at home, but it did work to use during independent work time. I could see using this process to teach a math lesson, especially if a skill needs to be pretaught.
I had students watch the screencast during independent work time during guided reading groups. I made a jump code (PCOV) to it as well as posting it on our 4th grade website. I had them use headphones to watch and listen. At the end, for formative assessment, I had them write a sentence that included a comparison statement. I had them turn in the sentence that was written on a notecard, and I was able to give them immediate feedback. I would definitely do something like that each time. The students seemed to enjoy watching the video, and 4 minutes was a good length of time.
All in all, it worked well! I would consider trying it again. I don't think I could assign it as homework like in the flipped classroom video because not all of my students have internet access at home, but it did work to use during independent work time. I could see using this process to teach a math lesson, especially if a skill needs to be pretaught.
Friday, March 13, 2015
Graphic Organizers
I tried Popplet Lite. I really like this app. It was very easy to use. I'm sure my 4th graders would catch on quickly. It was easy to insert photos from the camera roll of the iPad. You can also draw sketches
( mine look pretty bleak, but you get the idea).it was easy to change colors, connect boxes, etc.
I tried two different types of organizers. One would be more of a topic brainstorm. I focused on the genre of personal narratives. It would be great if students had their own personal photos to use. You could also use photos from shared classroom experiences.
The second organizer I made would be more of a story map. I arranged the boxes to show rising action, climax, etc. students could use words, sketches, or both to map out their story. I think it would work very well and would be motivating. It's easy to email as a PDF or JPEG. Popplets can also be saved to your camera roll.
I wish this app had an audio recording feature like was mentioned in the article . I like the idea of students being able to tell their stories verbally and refer back to it. We do quite a bit of story "talk", but I've never experimented with recording and saving the story. We
Since this is an app and not a website, it would work best if you had a class set of iPads. One of the other graphic organizers that I looked into was Lucidchart which is web-based. You set up an account which can be accessed from any device.
Our 4th graders just finished creating graphic organizers for their persuasive essay presentations. We used a Mac application called Kidspiration. It works great! Our media specialist helped our students work on these since we don't have a mobile Mac cart. It is not web-based, so kids do need to go back to their same computer to complete their work. The product prints very nicely and looks very professional!
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