Nearpod

Whilst doing some research to support the iPad trial today I came across Nearpod - a way of creating and sharing interactive presentations (which you can create yourself). Nearpod enables the synchronised use of iPads, iPhones, ipod touches etc.. within the classroom; students ‘join’ the presentation on their individual device and the teacher can control the pace of the activity as they work through the presentation. You can include interactive content such as polls and quizzes and multimedia content such as videos and slideshows can be included as well as searching online content within the presentation itself. Student responses to polls and quizzes etc.. are all shown on the teachers iPad to assess student knowledge and understanding throughout the activity. Nearpod is a free download which in itself has a great deal of functionality, however this needs to be upgraded to a paid version for some features such as adding slideshows and browsing the web within the presentation. The free version also limits the number of presentations you can have in your library and the size whilst the paid for versions remove this restriction. Nevertheless the free version enables you to produce some great presentations with interactivity for use in the classroom.

The video below gives a brief overview of how it works and more information can be found on the Nearpod website.

I am not in a position to try this with a class as we are not a 1:1 iPad school and we are only in the midst of a small scale iPad trial with a small group of staff to look at the potential; however, I can already envisage how this could be put to use if students had access to devices which could link to the presentation and I look forward to trying this out further and keeping an eye on how it develops. I am intending to try it out with a small group of staff at our next iPad trial meeting. One of the pitfalls is that all students have to work through the presentation at the same pace as the teacher controls the change of slides / activity so it doesn’t enable personalised learning for students who prefer working at different pace or want to return to content for consolidation. Nevertheless this certainly has potential for use with certain groups of students.

iPad Trial 2 – Starting to Evaluate

It might seem like a bit of a leap from my first post of introducing the trial to the second one being starting to evaluate, but it has been a hectic few months with so many things going on. I will still break down and share findings in future posts such as useful apps etc. but in the meantime we are meeting as a group this week and on the agenda is the initial stage of evaluation.

To try and draw together thoughts and ideas there are a number of questions we are going to discuss as a group and as we continue with the trial we need to think about potential next steps and how we could move things forward.

The questions we are going to be considering are:

EVALUATING THE iPAD TRIAL – The story so far….
(a) Teaching using the iPad

1. How has the iPad helped fulfil general admin tasks as a teacher, has it made everyday life easier?
2. How have iPads enhanced the learning experience of your students? Have they? Could they?
3. Is there anything that has held you back in getting the most out of using the iPad as a Teaching and Learning tool?
4. Is there anything that you can do with the iPad that is not possible or is more difficult to achieve without it?

(b) Potential for student use?
5. What further potential does the iPad have for transforming learning opportunities for students in the way we teach?
6. Do you feel students could make good use of iPads in your subject area? If so in what kinds of ways?
7. In what ways does the iPad have potential to support students? SEN? Gifted and Talented? A’level students etc..?

MOVING FORWARD
8. What technical issues / problems have arisen when using the iPad which need addressing?
9. Are there any particular concerns over e-safety and use of the iPads by students that need to be considered?
10. What would be the main goals of any future iPad implementation? Engagement, access to digital textbooks, access to digital environments, watching videos / listening to audio; media production (editing of photos / video), or a mixture?
11. What do would be the main challenges in increasing use of iPads / implementing use with students?
12. Will iPad use always require forward planning? Or have you found tools which you would be able to naturally integrate into lessons when needed (adding to the teachers everyday toolkit)?

… and so the next stage in the trial commences!

Embedding a Voki avatar in SMART notebook (Notebook 11)

Having tried the widget for embedding YouTube clips I have been investigating a few more of the widgets available on SMART Exchange. It is a few years since I have used Voki – but it has potential for use in the classroom. Here is a great little widget for embedding any Voki avatar you produce directly into SMART notebook so that they can be used as an integral part of a lesson resource. It is very simple to use.

Simply download the widget here. Go to the Gallery in SMART notebook and click on the arrow next to My Content. Select add new content and browse to where you have downloaded the widget. This should then add it to your Gallery ready to use. Then simply create your Voki and grab the embed code.

Embedding YouTube Clips straight in SMART notebook

I have just been playing around with a very handy little widget for embedding YouTube clips straight into Notebook. It plays from the internet so still requires internet access but it is very handy having the video embedded straight into the page and although I have only tried a couple it seems to work very well. You can download the widget from Smart Exchange here and Danny Nicholson has given a quick and easy to follow tutorial of how to install the widget on his excellent Whiteboard Blog.

iPad Trial – 1. Aim of the project

This academic year I am co-ordinating a small scale iPad trial in school with a  group of 12 teachers looking at the potential use of iPads in the classroom. We are meeting on a regular basis to share good practise and collectively look at and evaluate the potential use of iPad’s in enhancing teaching and learning in the classroom, whilst also facilitating the general role of the teacher. I would be very interested to hear from any other teachers that have been using iPads in the classroom and what their experience has been. As part of the trial I am researching and trying to draw together links to existing research, trials  and other online documents relating to the use of iPads in the classroom.

One local school in Cambridge (The Perse School) has already rolled out a 1-1 iPad project, and examples of how the iPads are being used are summarised in the video below.

Another example where significant research has already been carried out is at Longfield Academy in Kent where the impact of iPads in the school has been measured over a couple of terms and research carried out on behalf of NAACE has been summarised as a report “The iPad – A Tool for Education”

Our trial is very small scale in comparison, with only a small number of teachers involved and only one iPad being available in the classroom, but I am looking forward to seeing how the iPads can be put to good use. We are already beginning to see benefits and I am hoping to record our ‘iPad journey’ and thoughts through fairly regular posts on here.

This useful scoop it page “How schools are using iPads in education in the UK” is a particularly interesting and uptodate set of links with regards to the use of iPads in education and one which is well worth keeping an eye on and I am also tweeting any particularly useful links I find on my @RobGeog account.

Stop Motion Animations – MonkeyJam

A colleague has asked me to help with some ideas for how to carry out stop motion animation that they wish to get their students involved in and this has made me pause to evaluate the options with regards to stop motion animation. I firstly remembered the useful video below which I blogged about back in 2010.

How to make a Stopmotion animation2

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We have used stop-motion animation in the Geography Department for a couple of years to encourage students to apply knowledge and understanding in the formation and development of coastal landforms and also in documenting the processes and features created at different plate boundaries in the study of plate tectonics. We have used plasticine for students to create and manipulate models and used flip cams to record stills which have then been stitched together in moviemaker. The results have been variable, there have been some great films produced, whilst others have been less successful. The method we have used in the past has been quite time consuming which has meant that some have been started and not finished, some have also been quite ‘stop start’ and lack the smooth look of some animations. I am therefore keen to look at how we can rationalise the process and what other software could be used. I am therefore going to have a look at MonkeyJam, a free stop-motion animation programme.

There are a number of basic tutorials available on YouTube for how to use MonkeyJam (see below) and by all accounts it seems very user friendly.

MonkeyJam seems to work well with a web cam as shown in the video, however this tutorial video from the BBC show how to use a digital camera and simply then import the images into Monkeyjam to carry out 2D animation; the beauty of the webcam however is the ability to capture straight into the Monkeyjam software.

There are some great examples of stop-motion animations on YouTube using lego figures – for example this short one on Free Running

I am looking forward to seeing what our students might be able to produce!

Google World Wonders Project – bringing the Geography and History classroom to life!

Getting back into the new term has taken some time with so much going on but I am very much looking forward to continuing to explore the world of new technologies and the ability to use them to enhance classroom practise throughout the academic year. There are various school based projects on the go (more to come) and lots of new digital resources to explore! One such resouce is the Google World Wonders project.

The Google World Wonders project is based on bringing world heritage sites of the modern and ancient world online. The project uses Google’s Street View technology, 3D modelling, photos, videos and in-depth information, to enable exploration of the world’s treasures from the classroom.

There are useful separate primary and secondary teacher guides with ideas for using the Google World Wonders project in the classroom. There are also more in-depth lesson plans which can be downloaded from the education section. These include ideas for both Geography and History lessons, for example the Jurrasic Coastline (Dorset & East Devon) and Pompeii / Herculaneum and I am looking forward to exploring these – particularly the Geography ones for potential use with my Key Stage 4 Geographers studying coasts next year.