A few years ago I had a chance to try out Podbean for podcasting our elementary school news. Using my iPad, I’d record students and staff using the Twisted Wave audio editor app. I’d then edit recorded interviews for clarity, adding sound effects purchased from Soundsnap. Using Podbean’s free account, I could share and embed podcasts, like the one shown below.
#Twisted_Wave #Podbean #podcasting #Soundsnap
Check out my first tutorial using Camtasia software to record step-by-step instructions for creating a wheel using Tinkercad. This wheel requires 5 parts: a thin torus, a half sphere, and 3 cylinders. The final cylinder is used as a box tool to cut a hole through the small blue cylinder, the larger pink cylinder, and partially through the yellow half sphere. The hole allows the wheel to adhere to an axle and is part of a larger project focused on building a miniature scooter.
#TinkerCad #3D #SheTinkersIn3D #Camtasia #SheTinkersIn3D
Sketches of Ishvir Dancing.
I made this animation of a student when he was in kindergarten. I took a brief video of him dancing and then made a simple drawing of him every 10 frames using thin paper to copy his outline. I completed a total of 60 drawings for this short animation. The student has now graduated to the 7th grade. Upon his graduation, I bequeathed the original 60 drawings to him.
#Animation
Kids often place a high value on images over text. In fact, kids will start searching Goggle images for pictures to add to their essays when no visual content is required. ;-( When images are requested, students frequently distort them, either horizontally or vertically. Well, here’s a simple project that takes advantage of that skill. The results can be stunning and Padlet.com is a great way to organize and display completed student projects onto a collaborative canvas.
#Google_Drawings #distorted_art #Padlet
This is the spring 2017 newsletter for Tri County Wildlife Care. This organization has visited the CRES campus with their wildlife ambassadors. The newsletter was created in Publisher and then uploaded to Flipsnack to create a virtual flipping newsletter.
Tri County Wildlife Care is currently running a GoFundMe campaign to help feed their animals in care. Five dollars buys 5 mice!
#TCWC #Tri_County_Wildlife_Care #SavingWildlifeSavesUs
Analytics can be called data mining. In the field of education, it can be referred to as Learning Analytics. This is the process of collecting data from student responses to curriculum content. This data can be used to inform instructional practices, allowing a teacher to tailor her instruction to student need, alerting her to early intervention. One such resource for this data collection is Classroom Salon. The CRES computer lab is currently using this resource with 4th, 5th and 6th graders. This resource is similar in design to that developed by the Smarter Balanced Assessments Consortium to assess reading skills. CRES students will be using online assessments as publishers move away from pencil and paper exams to those that can be delivered digitally.
Through Classroom Salon, an instructor can upload videos and documents she wishes to use as teaching resources. She can use markup analytics (tagging) to better gauge the effectiveness of her teaching and the ability of her students to understand concepts. As students read a document or watch a video, they can pause at any spot along the way, tagging and composing responses. Tags that might be appropriate for college students could include Clarify, Discuss in Class, Important Point. Tags that might be more appropriate for younger students could include I have a question, Can You Explain, Agree/Disagree, I feel…. Collecting these types of responses can help the teacher efficiently identify areas of strength and weakness. The teacher can also quickly respond to students, correcting misunderstandings that could become permanent or difficult to correct. It’s also a great way to engage students because they’re interacting with their course materials. As pointed out in the article mentioned below: “Unlike a classroom setting, every student in a course using learning analytics answers every question, ensuring they interact with all course material.” So, there’s an accountability factor! I rather like this. I recall a student who didn’t do well on her reading exams. Her mother feared she had a learning disability. She actually suffered from “I did not read the text.”
Behavioral analytics provide insight into a student’s desire or ability to reply to other classmates or to post comments. Frequency of replying and commenting can also be captured. This kind of data collection helps the teacher learn more about her students’ areas of interest/motivation.
Social analytics refers to the level of interaction the students have with each other. Bloom’s Taxonomy places creativity and, in some models, collaboration at the top of the pyramid; collaboration is also one of the important skills students are expected to develop according to the International Society for Technology in Education. These analytics help the teacher identify who are the leaders, followers, and helpers in the course.
Finally, document analytics, help the teacher learn about the ability of her resources to develop student understanding. Many teachers have had the experience of giving an exam with the best of expectations only to find to the contrary, that 75% of the class scored poorly. Document analytics helps the teacher see areas of weakness in her existing curriculum: red hotspots tell the teacher some of her content may need better explanation/support.
The future of analytics:
A recent article titled Will Analytics Transform Education (http://www.learningfrontiers.eu/?q=story/will-analytics-transform-education) brought up a few interesting questions worth discussion: 1) will data mining attempt to replace the teacher 2) could this data collection distinguish student guessing from knowing multiple-choice answers 3) what happens to this collected data (privacy concerns) 4) is this an example of running education like a business.
I think learning analytics/data mining is here to stay. It has the potential to improve teaching practices and student outcomes.
This report was prepared for Flipping Your Class: An Analytics-Based Approach. This course is offered through HP Catalyst Academy. This document is available for response at this link: http://classroomsalon.com/annotations/Individual.aspx?document=17997
Thanks to a grant for $2500, our school was able to purchase some LittleBits Premium and Synth kits. Some students worked with the Premium Kit, familiarizing themselves with the different components, making the Hypnotizing Wheel and Auto Greeter. The other group used the Synth Kit to create their own music. All students culminated their activities by partnering up to build the Bubble Flute, which used 3 components (power, sound trigger, fan) from the Premium Kit.
#LittleBits #circuits #synth kit
Some of my grades are using EverFi’s free online curriculum to develop their digital literacy skills. Students must pass 7 modules, which takes 4-5 hours to complete. Modules include the following: Choosing a Computer; Wireless Communications; The Viral World; Internet Resources and Credibility; Creating Multimedia Products; Digital Relationships and Respect; The Future of Technology. Extra resources accompany the program and include discussion questions and a vocabulary bank.
Ignition – Digital Literacy & Responsibility from EverFi on Vimeo.
#everfi #digitalcitizenship
Math Facts Pro Sign-on Screen
If you’re looking for a convenient and affordable way to build and track your students’ computation skills, try Math Facts Pro. Students sign in with their teacher’s name, then type in their name and password. The teacher can select the number of problems for quizzes (Math Facts Pro recommends 50). Students enter their answers by clicking the online number pad. Class reports can be printed in under a minute. Here’s an example of the progress made by one of our 2nd grade classes during one academic year:
CRES has had Math Facts Pro for 2 years. For at least 3 years prior, we used a much more expensive, software-based program. Internet access for the program was cost prohibitive. Math Facts Pro runs $1/student.
Students make progress when the program is used 4-5 times a week. Students solve more computation problems accurately on Math Facts Pro than they do on worksheets because the program grades them immediately. It is this timely feedback that holds students accountable and prevents them from leaving the classroom with misconceptions that may not be corrected until the student returns to class the next day. Students completing worksheets often wait days to see their test results.
#computation skills #edtech
Students build a giant Squishy Battery.
In a this after school class, students used their basic electrical concepts to build a Squishy Circuit. This particular circuit required students to build small cubes of conductive dough, bridging them between insulating layers of dough. As the circuit grew, so did voltage. Students bridged each cube of conductive dough with a galvanized nail and copper wire, jumping over the non-conductive slices. A meter was used to measure the slowly increasing voltage.
You can learn more about Squishy Circuits by viewing the video below.
#SquishyCircuits #ElectricalProjects
Closeup view of my crawlerbot Inchworm.
Mention the word “bot” and you’ll get a large crowd of kids gathering around you. This was the case in my elementary school computer lab. The kids were so interested in robots, they practically beat down the door with requests for after school classes focused on building robots. They’d stop me in the hallway to ask if I had sign-up flyers ready to hand out. Luckily, my school site tech kept me supplied with outdated technology from our surrounding schools. So, I had a large supply of DVD drives waiting for transformation. I searched YouTube and came across this fabulous project from #GrandadIsAnOldMan.
I studied the video and prototyped a similar version for the kids. I elected to solder the students’ wires to their switches, giving them a reliable connection. With almost 30 kids taking the class, this resulted in several long nights in the classroom–something similar to Santa’s workshop, but with one exhausted elf.
A parking lot of crawlerbots.
I used Radio Shack’s SPDT Mini Toggle Switch #275-0635. I wanted the wiring to be easy for the kids, so I decided to use 9V battery snap connectors, cutting open the vinyl cap and then cutting the positive and negative connectors apart. I also added a tiny alligator clip to help with on/off.
I jazzed up the front of the robot by applying a section of decorative duct tape to the plastic section from the soda bottle. Behind the plastic, toward the bottom, I glued a popsicle stick horizontally, thinking it would make the lower section more rigid and might help the bot move more efficiently. Here’s a video of my bot in action.
#GrandadIsAnOldMan #Crawlerbot #Robots
Students practice acceleration.
In this after school class, 12 students built race cars from cardboard, two motors, a battery pack and lots of wire. The project took place after school and was spread over 3 days and took about 5 student hours to complete. I was able to complete all of the soldering the day before students returned to practice “drag racing” their models. Motors were purchased through All Electronics, and though slightly tarnished, were a great purchased at just 50 cents/piece. And, the prepped DPDT rocker switches from All Electronics were another great purchase at just 50 cents/piece.
Gavin’s race car.
You can view a step-by-step slide show at this link. On Friday, students headed over to the cafeteria to try out their creations. All cars ran successfully. This project was inspired by A2C Arts And Crafts YouTube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DfPclWXE5ro&t=40s. This was a very popular class so three sessions were scheduled.
You can click the link shown below to view a slideshow for step-by-step directions.
#robotics #all_electronics #DPDT_switches #race_car #Makerspace
Google Forms can be a great resource for current events. When my students had free subscriptions to USA Today, I wanted to take full advantage of it by having them do more than just read the paper online. Working with 2 web pages at one time, students could bring up USA Today and their current event form, reading their article and filling out the form at the same time (no paper or pencil needed). I kept the form fairly simple to facilitate their ability to complete and submit the form successfully. Student information was collected into a spreadsheet, which I could view and print from docs.google.com. So, rather than giving all the kids a worksheet and collecting 24 papers, I could collect all student answers into a 1-2 page spreadsheet.
#Google_Docs #current_events
A display of collected media on a Padlet.
This year I began using Padlet.com. It’s a great resource for students, teachers, and parents. I simply write the access code for a particular padlet on my whiteboard, and students enter the code to gain access to the digital canvas, uploading their writing, art, slideshows or videos. I’ve also used it as a repository for digital presentations I’ve great to showcase school activities or classroom art projects. Check out my collection for 2016-17.
https://padlet.com/mtgal48/digitalpresentations
#padlet #digital_canvas
CRES students began using EduTyping Jr. Because it’s not software-based (it’s web-based) students can continue their keyboarding practice from home. Teachers can contact the company for a free 90 day trial. They’re very accommodating. The Computer Lab was able to enroll 300+ kids for 6 months for free. The program runs $8.95/student for the first year and then drops to $4.49 the second year (based on an enrollment of 200-499 kids).
During the 2012-2013 school year, CRES had a trial subscription to Keyboardingonline.
The free trial ran for 60 days. Fourth graders used it, as they had used EduTyping Jr. the previous year. KeyboardingOnline allows the teacher to blackout (there is no need to use a keyboarding cover) the portion of the screen, which would normally show the student how accurately he/she is typing. This encourages the student to look up at the screen, where the keys being used are shown. Students who pause for 2 seconds are timed out and must redo the lesson. This prevents them from hunting and pecking. KeyboardingOnline is screen-based: it installs an applet and information is sent back to the servers every 12 seconds or so. Meaning: if the Internet at your site is busy, it won’t affect your kids. The price is also less: 300 kids costs $459/year with a 2 year commitment ($1.53/student).
KeyboardingOnline outlines these important points regarding frequency and reinforcement:
