Art & Technology

At times, I will get teachers who teach a performance class tell me that they can not figure out how technology could be used effectively for their area. So when I see a use of technology that goes above and beyond and is REALLY COOL, then I just have to share it.

Britney Ray, our JH Art Teacher, completed a project with her classes recently. The kids created a stop-motion style collaborative video while using their drawing skills. Each student had 5 scenes to draw. Their scenes had to connect in with the scenes of the person to their right. So they had to figure out how the two could connect in a sequence. They put everyone's scenes together in iMovie to create the finished product. When I watch their movie, I just can't help but smile. So, I hope you enjoy it. And to Mrs. Ray, bravo!

Subject Matter Experts

Our students have a good many technological tools: iPod Touch or iPhone and Macbook in class every day. They have a reliable network and online tools like Studywiz. The tools are great but what we do with the tools is more important.

This past Friday, we had a special visitor on our campus. Ed Leonard, Chief Technology Officer at Dreamworks, visited and spoke to our Senior High kids. I was fortunate to hear him speak to two groups: the entire SH student body at chapel and the kids in the video broadcasting class. I'm not sure what I expected but as a person who works on billion dollar projects I felt like he should be somewhat "unusual" or at least out of the ordinary. What struck me was that he came across as a real person who might be considered ordinary in many ways that has done extraordinary things with his life. Many of the things he mentioned to the kids - how important a script is to a feature length film, for example - sounds like something I've said to my students many times. The difference is that the kids will remember what he says much more than what I say. He is the subject matter expert out there doing extraordinary things in the field.

This just confirmed for me what I've known for some time. We need to really work and leverage the technology we have to provide more opportunities for our kids to be in contact with Subject Matter Experts. The walls of the classroom can no longer be used as an excuse to not bring the "real world" into contact with our students in meaningful ways.

So . . . I'm looking for subject matter experts to connect with my students: authors, editors, playwrights, etc. Any ideas for me???

iPad - Initial Thinking

So you'd have to have your head in the ground to not realize that the world is a-buzz over Apple's new iPad. When I see new tools like this come out, I usually wait a bit to let some others test out the possibilities for the tool. After all, real life is happening now and it is difficult as a teacher to have time to test out things when you have today to worry about. However, this tool is different. I've actually had my hands on an iPad for less than 48 hours and I already see the possibilities for students.









I find this video telling of the intuitive nature of the iPad.

I like the intuitive design of the iPad. This is much like the iPod Touch, only bigger. For me, a middle-aged digital immigrant, the bigger interface is a plus. I also see that bigger interface being a plus for younger students. Will Richardson has made available an interview that he did with a well-known evaluator of digital tools for young kids. I thought the interview gave some good insight into the potential the tool has for kids, young and old.



Part of the apps now available for the iPad include some of the iWork suite: Pages, Numbers and Keynote. Even though the apps are not full versions of the software, a person can put together a presentation in Keynote and present it all from the iPad. The VGA adapter for a projector will make it so that keynote presentations, photo slideshows, and videos can be seen on the projector. However, the adapter does not show the iPad environment. Why is that so hard for Apple to manage? When will Apple come up with a way for the iPad (as well as iPod Touch) environment to be projected?

Even though the iPad definitely has potential for K-12 education, I don't see the iPad as being able to replace a MacBook. The iPad is still limited in what can be created using that tool. It is, however, a very good "consumption" and "connection" tool.

I am curious as to what other educators think about the potential for the iPad in education. I enjoyed watching this video from wilsontech1, The School Tech Show.

Let's Get Disruptive

My husband likes to read a lot. He brought me an article from one of his Forbes magazines entitled “How to Change the Way Kids Learn.” The fact that he thought of me when he read that title is flattering, in my opinion, so I delved into it.

Computers have failed to improve education. That’s because no one’s gotten disruptive with technology.

This intrigued me further. Getting disruptive with technology? I’m not sure what that means but it sounds cool! I read on.

The authors state that U.S. public schools struggle to improve because they aren’t motivating the children. Ok, I see children in my classroom everyday that force me to inevitably come back to one question: why aren’t they motivated? Just today I had a student tell me in not so many words that he wanted to do the minimum, just what he can get by with. Do educators condition students in a way that encourages this notion of “just getting by?” Where did the natural curiosity and thirst for learning go? Didn’t they have it when they were 2 or 3 or 4?

If the goal is to educate all students so they have an all-American shot at realizing their dreams, we must find a way to disrupt the monolithic classroom and move toward a student-centric model.

I will admit that I proceeded to look up monolithic to make sure I understood the message. Monolithic means cut out of one stone, characterized by total uniformity and rigidity. This is a business magazine with an article that indicates the typical American classroom is monolithic, rigid and totally standardized. As an educator, I took that to heart. For all of the information on differentiation, learning styles, brain-based strategies, etc., the business world still sees our classrooms as inflexible and ineffective.

The way to implement an innovation so it will transform an organization is to implement it disruptively.

One of my goals this year is to revise the curriculum for 6th grade Language Arts so that a student-centered approach emanates from the curriculum map and other files that communicate standards. That means getting disruptive with some of the curriculum pieces. That means moving further toward an open-content type curriculum as opposed to a text-driven curriculum. Blogs, wikis, skype, wiziQ, moodle, etc., all have the potential of transformation if we get "disruptive" with them. My students will be putting together curriculum resources through our class wiki. I want the students to create resources for curriculum. How will students develop creativity without being given opportunities to create?

For now, I am still pondering, "What does 'getting disruptive' really look like?"

Using Voicethread with Students

VoiceThread is a web 2.0 tool that I heard about this summer but recently became reacquainted with due to a collaborative project that Lisa Parisi is organizing. (See my post on Collaborative Project in the Making.) The VoiceThread site offers this description: A VoiceThread is an online media album that can hold essentially any type of media (images, documents and videos) and allows people to make comments in 5 different ways - using voice (with a microphone or telephone), text, audio file, or video (with a webcam) - and share them with anyone they wish. A VoiceThread allows group conversations to be collected and shared in one place, from anywhere in the world. The Tablet PC Education blog highlights one 6th grade teacher who is using this tool with his class.

In preparation for the Collaborative Book Talk Project that my class will participate in, I posted a VoiceThread on my class blog and worked with students to respond via voice recording. I registered a VoiceThread account for all of the students to use. The students use my email address and a generic class password to access the VoiceThread account. They create their own identity within the account. I instructed the students to either use their initials for their identity name or a pseudonym. We had some troubles with avatars and learned that VoiceThread requires .jpg images as opposed to .gif or .png. We use the Portrait Illustration Maker site to create the students’ avatars. The students thoroughly enjoyed the process of making their own avatar and not only uploaded them to VoiceThread but also uploaded them to their blog pages.

Once the avatars were uploaded and the identities were made, then we moved onto recording the audio comments. We used small button computer microphones much like you can find at any discount department store for around seven dollars. We had some issues with our new Vista computers and getting the microphones to be recognized. Once that was fixed, the recording went well. One student tried to stop recording in the middle and start it again. However, VoiceThread makes different comments each time you start and stop. I had to emphasize to the students to say everything they wanted to say before stopping the recording. It was funny to see how the students became somewhat nervous and intimidated by speaking into that little microphone. Even though they could easily delete the recording and start over, they were apprehensive. I think it will take doing this a few more times before they will become comfortable with it.

The topic of the VoiceThread and their comments is on setting goals. Feel free to leave a comment yourself on the VoiceThread. The kids would love to know that someone is listening to them. You have to have your own VoiceThread account to leave a comment but registration on the site is free. By the way, as an educator you can have an enhanced VoiceThread account free by contacting VoiceThread. Once registered, just click on “Go Pro” and then click on K12 educators click here.