Mrs. Jones Teaches

Image Source: Wikimedia Commons In reading back through my blog posts over the semester, it struck me that my evolution through the semester went from creating technology projects that are teacher-directed, to finally handing the baton to students with a project that gives students the agency to create using technology. Students creating hits the highest level of Bloom’s Taxonomy. But it’s good that my work was an evolution, because we don’t always want to go straight to the highest level of Bloom’s … we want to hit different spots on the taxonomy. Image Source: Fractus Learning Some examples of teacher-directed activities I created at the beginning of the semester are the Interactive Documents I created here as a HyperDoc and here using Google Slides , this Prezi , and this EdPuzzle . I am proud of all of these projects, and I think they provide a variety of interesting ways to lead students to information. These activities ask questions of students to assess lea

This week I am going to talk about app smashing, and share with you part 2 of my project that I blogged about last week . App Smashing App smashing is simply using two or more apps to create content. It's that simple, and you have probably done this before. To find some great examples of app smashing, simply search the hashtag #appsmash on Twitter and you will see tweets of how students are using this in the classroom.  You can also check out this  padlet  with examples. Last week, I used the Do Ink green screen app to make videos about igneous, metamorphic and sedimentary rock (as an example of a project I would have students do). This week, I am going to use the HP Reveal (formerly named Aurasma) app to play the videos. HP Reveal HP Reveal is an augmented reality application. Augmented reality means enhancing the physical environment with digital content. It superimposes digital content over something you are viewing in the real world.  Pokémon Go is an example of th

This week I had plans to do an app smash (when you use two different apps together for one project) for my tech project. However, I had problems with one of the apps, so today I am just going to share one. Hopefully I can share the other app next week as part 2.  I wanted to do a geology activity that joins real artifacts to help build students' schema, nonfiction books to help them investigate the artifacts, and technology. This is a set of three different types of rocks I have: sedimentary, igneous, and metamorphic. I also have these wonderful books. The Street Beneath My Feet  by Charlotte Guillain and Yuval Zommer folds out and shows a cross-section of the earth and what is found beneath our feet. Rocks; Hard, Soft, Smooth and Rough  by Natalie M. Rosinsky and Matthew John helps students identify some rocks by their characteristics.  I made three videos to explain each of the three different types of rocks. The students can then scan an image or a QR code t

Nearpod is a tool for teachers to create presentations that can be shared with students in live class mode, or at student self-pace. I thought the learning curve on this was very easy, and I created a presentation pretty quickly. Nearpod Silver edition is free, and Nearpod Gold costs $12 per month. Among other differences, with Silver you can have a class of up to 30 and cannot do student self-paced mode. I created a presentation about perimeter and area of squares and rectangles. Here it is: To start a presentation, just click on Create your own lesson: Next, choose from Add Content, Add Web Content or Add Activity. There are many different options for content and activities to add. I started by adding a video. You simply insert the share address of the youtube video under Add Web Content. Next, I added an interactive simulation from content. It is an area builder game. This slide is a collaborate slide. In live mode, the students' answers are posted

This week I chose to learn more about Edpuzzle. I chose it because teachers use video so much these days, and I like the idea of being able to add to videos in case the video I want to use doesn't have all the information I need. Edpuzzle is a service that allows teachers to edit videos to use in the class. You can crop the video, add voice over (this removes the audio track for the entire video and replaces it with your audio), add audio note (the video stops and plays a recorded message from the teacher), or add a quiz. There are three options for a quiz: open-ended questions, multiple-choice questions and comments). In any of the questions, you can add an image or a web link. Students can also use Edpuzzle. There is an option for a teacher to create a project and assign it to students. Then the students can make a video to share their learning, and it would be great to use with project-based learning. This is the video I made: This week I also decided to do a screencast

Videos in the Classroom Videos have so many amazing applications in the classroom. And it's so easy to create one that even I can do it. As for students, I suspect that many kids will say  more about a subject than they would be willing to write  about it. Who among us hasn't had writer's block from looking at a piece of paper? There are also a lot of kids who hate the physical act of writing with a pencil, and taking that away chore frees them to share their thoughts. Of course they need to practice writing, but it's ok to separate writing from sharing thoughts once in a while. Teachers can use videos to share student work with the class as a group. And yes, you can still put student work on the wall when it is a video by using a QR code (I have just recently discovered QR codes, and I love them!) Videos are useful for students who are shy or selectively mute, because it removes a lot of the pressure of performing in front of a group. They can practice and re-rec

Quizizz Last week, I created a formative assessment using Formative . The topic was plant cells for fifth grade. I made it somewhat like a Hyperdoc, by including a video for students to watch, and a link for them to go to. I then asked them to draw the cell on the whiteboard embedded in the quiz. This week, I created a new plant cell assessment using Quizizz . I wanted this assessment to be more like a quiz. After reading Elisabeth's blog post , I chose Quizizz because the interface seemed much more user-friendly and fun for students. Formative gives the students all of the questions at once, which did work well for making a Hyperdoc, but not so great for a quiz. I referred to this page for help in getting started, but it was very easy to create a new quiz. If you would like to try my quiz, go here and use the code 452006.  *Update: I thought I tested this when I did my original blog post, but Robin commented that it didn't work, and sure enough it didn't. Then be

Formative assessment is an important part of instruction. It gives the teacher data on how well the students are understanding the lesson. This data can then be used by the teacher to alter instruction, and it can be used by the student to work toward mastery. There is so much technology available to teachers to make assessment easier! I decided to give Formative a try. This is a website that can be used to create many different types of assessments, and can be used with Google Classroom  and Clever . You can choose from a library of already-made assessments, or you can create your own. When creating an assessment, you can add content like videos and images. With the premium, paid subscription there are more options. There are 17 different types of assessment you can create, including reflection, lab, pre-assessment and exit-ticket. There are 11 different types of questions that can be added into the assessment. What I Made I made two different assessments. The first was a spe

Assessment for Learning Formative assessment is assessment for learning. Assessments are used to inform both the teacher and the students. The teacher is continuously using assessment to gather data on how students are understanding instruction and at what level. The teacher then plans further instruction based on the students’ needs. This can include whole group lessons, mini-lessons for a smaller group of students, or one-on-one consultation, and should be presented in a different way than it was previously presented. In this way, it is a learning process for the teacher because he/she learns about the students and the effectiveness of instruction.  Formative assessment should also be used to help students learn about themselves. This assessment informs students about where they are at, where they want to go, and what they need to do to get there. It gives them the opportunity to reflect on their learning, understand their mistakes, and make corrections. Ideally, teachers are n

This week, in order to extend my learning on Going Beyond Presentations , I decided to do something completely different from Google Slides. Instead, I created a Prezi presentation. Apparently, Prezi has been updated and is now called Prezi Next . I have minimal experience with the classic version of Prezi, so learning the new version was basically starting over. Thankfully, Youtube is always there for me when I learn something new. I found this video to be very helpful. Incidentally, the video was from the Technology for Teachers and Students Youtube channel, which looks like it may be a good channel to subscribe to for future reference. The video pointed out that you can sign up for a free student account with Prezi that gives you more options than the regular free account does. Overall, I found creating the Prezi to be easier than in the past with the classic version. The main difficulty I had was with editing subtopics. I could never figure out how to get to the zoomed in subtop

For this week's assignment, we had to create an interactive document using Google Slides. There were so many options that I found myself getting a little overwhelmed again. Instead of creating something completely new, I decided to follow a tutorial and then use the process I learned to make my own unique document. I began to do this tutorial on Creating an Interactive Presentation but was having some problems. I noticed that an update to the video had been posted, so I tried it again. Here is the tutorial I used: 1 The second tutorial was better, but there were still a couple of things I had to figure out. When he highlighted multiple items, he did not say how to do that (because it is basic), so I had to google it. Also, he gave instructions on how to create a "back" button to get back to the start, but it didn't work. So I just tried something different and I thought it had worked. Until I embedded the presentation in this post and tested it one last ti

Hi everyone! This week our assignment was to create an interactive document that makes it fun for students to learn. My initial response was that this would be a fun and easy assignment. It was definitely fun, but the word easy  should always be a red flag. It wasn't necessarily a difficult project, but it took a lot more work than I thought it would. My main difficulty was dealing with  overwhelm . I read through all the course resources and then perused the internet for ideas. So many ideas that I lost my way a little.  At that point I took a walk and listened to the Cult of Pedagogy podcast . This was really great because the ladies from HyperDocs explained the teaching that goes with the HyperDocs. Previously, I had read a lot about how to create the documents, but this gave the pedagogy perspective and wrapped it all up. It's definitely worth a listen. The Process A problem I frequently run into is that I want to create the best work on the first try.  But t