Lisa and I continue with our series of apps which can be used across the curriculum and through the grade levels. This week we focus on the following surprisingly educational apps: Visual Poet, TypeDrawing for Free, For All Seasons, Sketchbook Express, Bloom!, Create-O-Mat, Fotolr Photo Studio HD, Painting with Time, Painting with Time: Climate Change, Mad Lips, Political Time Machine, and VidRhythm.
In our district, math teachers take the first 10 minutes each day to do a “5 Day Problem Solving”. Classes get a problem that is challenging, like an Exemplars. On the first day the class discusses the word problem as though it were a piece of literature. They talk about the author’s purpose, the characters, vocabulary, etc. They also look at the numbers and math in the problem. On day 2 they discuss strategies and make a list of all the strategies they might use to solve the problem. On the 3rd day they actually solve the problem. Day 4 is reserved for communicating their ideas and sharing their solutions. On the last day they get a mirror problem to solve on their own.
The students in Ms. Ellis’ class were working on one such 5 Day Problem Solving. They used ScreenChomp to show what they had discussed to that point. Unfortunately, I pressed a button and it was lost So I quickly recreated their work so as not to take more class time away from them. Take a look at my recreation and let your imagination fly as to what YOU could do with this amazing app (FREE APP with no log in required!).
Bertha Galan at ISA loves to try new things and let her students have fun while they learn Spanish. She teaches 4 classes of Spanish 2 Pre AP, 1 class of Spanish 4 Pre AP, and 1 Class of AP language.
Bertha and I planned a different iPad lessons for each level of her classes.
The Spanish 2 Pre AP class had just finished their unit on vocabulary having to do with clothing, shopping and events. They then were asked to write a script and create a Puppet Pals video using their vocabulary. Bertha had a rubric and directions for the students ready.
Take a look at one of the awesome examples from this class:
When Spanish 2 and 4 students finished with their Puppet Pals video, they used TypeDrawing to practice their upcoming vocabulary and phrasology. Students decided to draw what they wanted, it may not have anything to do with the vocabulary itself, they just had fun drawing pictures with their vocabulary. There were some amazing products.
The Spanish AP students were asked to create a Videolicious product. After the students had gone on a field trip around our city, they were to discuss the influence of the Hispanic Culture in San Antonio. Bertha, of course provided them with a rubric and directions as well.
I have been having fun with the 3rd graders in Ms. Chanler’s class. I walked in one day and they were studying the differences between Biography and Autobiographies. They were making Venn Diagrams. LOOK!!! We took a screenshot of a VennDiagram from Holt Interactive Graphic Organizers and brought it into iCard Sort. The students took turns typing in aspects of each to complete their Venn Diagram. I love iCard Sort for so many reasons and one of them is the way it looks when you email it. Take a look at this screen shot of how it looks when it is emailed. Also take a look at the final Venn Diagram these amazing 3rd graders created.
This week Lisa and I delve into eBook creators and album makers. These apps are great for EVERY subject area. We feature nine FREE apps: Story Spine, Story Kit, PictureBook, iPen Free, Demibooks Composer, Clibe, Albums FX Lite, Album App, and ScrapPad.
Currently in 5th grade the students are studying about data collection and graphing. They seem to have a hard time remembering what all the new vocabulary means. After doing this quick vocabulary apptivity with Type Drawing on the iPad I bet they have an easier time remembering and applying the terms.
I can think of so many other ways to use this app. I love it: fun and easy to use, and so educational!
Lisa and I offered 2 sessions in the iPlayground at TCEA this year. The iPlayground was a lot of fun.
In one of our sessions, iPrep 4 Kindergarten, we went rapid-fire through a list of mostly free apps that can be used with young learners to prepare them and reinforce the skills that are needed for kindergarten. It was a lot of fun! Below you will find links to our radio show where we have featured many of the apps (on the list they are underlined) and to our Hot Apps 4 HOTS book in iTunes. Lisa also did a couple of blogs on our iPlaygound sessions as well.
Our other session was Surprisingly Educational Apps. We feature most of the apps we highlighted in the session on our radio show. Take a listen to learn about those great resources.
The entire school flipped! The principal, Greg Green, decided that for their community and school, this would be the best way to go. Chris says that not everyone was convinced at first. Students and teachers alike were timid and insecure, it was uncomfortable to be sure.
Let me back up.
Clintondale is a High School in Clinton Township, Michigan. According to Chris, they are not Title 1, but they have a very high at-risk population, most qualifying for free and reduced lunch. They have school of choice and have many students who travel very far on the bus to and from school daily. Many students are care-takers for their younger siblings in the evenings and may have children of their own to care for. Many have after school jobs that keep them up late at night. They had high failure rates, low test scores, and too many discipline referrals. Something had to change. The principal made the decision to flip the school.
The result is a school that has decreased their discipine referrals by 66%. Test scores went up in all subject areas, “We have reduced the failure rate by 33% in English Language Arts, 31% in Mathematics, 22% in Science and 19% in Social Studies in just one semester.”
According to Chris however, the most rewarding aspect is that he now has a one to one positive academic relationship with EACH ONE of his students. Chris speaks to each one of his students and interacts with them in their learning. He says he used to be the “Sage on the stage” but now likes to see himself more as the “Guide on the side”.
Chris explained what his take on what a flipped classroom is. He describes a “traditional classroom” as about 80% teacher talking and 20% students interacting and talking. This is simply flipped or reversed so that there is 20% teacher and 80% students talking and interacting. Chris says that before the flipping he used his 1 hour of class time ineffectively: the students were going home to complete an assignment without the presence of an expert. He states that he had felt OK in the past about his 5-8 students per class (about 40 students total) that did not pass.
His typical class time now looks like this:
When the students walk in they have a little warm up that they do, something simple. This is done while the kids are walking into class and for the first few moments of class. It is a little review of some kind that reinforces what they had done the day before. Then Chris shows the videos he makes (though he is a proponent that they do not need to be his videos, maybe he shows videos from another class or another school’s flipped classroom that he has found online. Or perhaps he has found a video from YouTube or other source that fits the bill for that day.) The videos are short, maybe 10 minutes at the most. He has the students complete a cloze activity or some other type of simple activity to drive home the key points whilst they watch the videos. All of these video activities are kept by the students in a binder which is essentially their text book. Sometimes the activity is graded, other times he just looks to see if it is being completed, but all the while he is up walking around and interacting with the students.
After the videos, the remaining time is used for questions, activities, simulations, examples or whatever will help his students really understand the concepts. He says that the facts not really what is important. That part is what the videos are all about and the activity that is completed during the presentation or video part. The real meat of the class is in this active/interactive time spent collaborating or creating understanding. If the students do not finish, this can be taken home for homework, but most of the work is completed in class. I did not sense from Chris that there is a lot that is expected of the students outside of the classroom, though they do have some requirements.
The videos are available at home via QR code and URL for students if they wish to watch them prior to class or as a review of materials or if they were absent. The school day is further extended through Twitter, blogs, and other online collaboration groups. The teachers are expected to post on Google Groups at least once per week to which the students are required to email and post. The students do have access to computers before and after school in the library if they do not have Smart phones or other access. The students are also asked to self-assess on the day’s activities.
So this year those 40+ students that used to slip by Chris and fail is currently down to 6 and his goal is to have it be at 0 by the end of the year. I think he can do it, so can YOU. Flip your classroom!
Chris and his colleauges use Camtasia Relay and all of their videos are online, free for you to use with your own classroom. Check out the CNN video of Green being interviewed about his experiences.
The whole reason Lisa and I even started writing the book in the first place was because we had a workshop we wanted to offer at TCEA.
Bloom’s Taxonomy was the basis for the class. We wanted to have teachers think about how they could purposefully use the iPad to deepen instruction vs using the iPad as a consumption device or as a reward tool. Each level of Bloom’s is important and has a valuable place in learning. We really wanted to drive the point home that even though you are at the lower levels of Bloom’s does not mean that you cannot use the device or have your students be creating and producing, using the iPad as a production device. So we created the apptivities to go with each level of Bloom’s.
It was also very important to us to highlight free apps. We know that the VPP process can be difficult for some districts and money is an issue in this economic climate. Additionally, the apps we chose are excellent and for the price, they can’t be beat.
During the class, participants are walked through Understanding A apptivity as a whole group. In small groups, participants found their own way through Creating A. With a partner or individually, participants then worked through a level of their choice. Participants shared their creations during the course. Throughout the course time was given for participants to synthesize information and to think about how some apps though shown in one level of Bloom’s also cold be repurposed with a different apptivity to fit into a variety of other Bloom’s levels. It was a blast! Everyone learned a lot!
So I quickly recreated their work so as not to take more class time away from them. Take a look at my recreation and let your imagination fly as to what YOU could do with this amazing app (FREE APP with no log in required!).
