classroom tech | Steps in Teaching and Learning

FaceTime in the classroom

November 19, 2011 in learning, Resources in the classroom, tools

Imagine the scene – a group of students in your class are researching a problem that they have devised and to help them with their learning, you have on your iPhone a group of contacts they could call using FaceTime. Face to face learning with experts in their field, with their peers in another class someplace else in the world, with another educator that could enlighten them further. It is the one app on my iPhone that I do not utilise as much as I could and this idea, using Facetime for collaborative learning, is one which I want to explore over the next few months. My aim is to collect together a group of educators, experts in various subject areas, that would not only be interested in this but mainly participate in FaceTime conversations with students.

If you are interested please get in contact with me through Twitter or using my email k…@g…l.com or complete the form below.

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Tags: activities, Apple, apps, classroom tech, creativity, discussion, facetime, ideas, inspiration, learning, resource, teaching, technology, tools
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BYOD – It makes a lot of common sense

October 30, 2011 in Resources in the classroom, tools

Bring Your Own Device

Imagine a classroom with a wide array of laptops, mobile devices and handheld games consoles all at the fingertips of the learners to use during class time. What would be your immediate reaction to this scene? Honestly?

There has been quite a bit of discussion about this very idea among not just educators but those in industry too and there are those who champion it and those that vehemently oppose it. Yet the concept of ‘Bring Your Own Device’ (BYOD) really isn’t all that new. For as long as there have been tools that could be used in the classroom for learning, learners have attempted to bring their own similar and at times comparatively better tools with them only to see them at first being confiscated, then banned, then allowed with parental consent and finally accepted as the norm. From pens to rulers, pencil cases to calculators schools have taken objection to students bringing their own tools into classrooms usually due to poorly conceived arguments – who will be responsible? (the students will if the school has parents sign a letter of responsibility) some children have, some don’t? (look at ways to provide those that don’t, think can not can’t) theft? (that will always happen, look at ways to safeguard against it). With time and commonsense schools have ‘relented’ allowing learners to bring their own tools into classroom but now learners are faced with a new, more technologically advanced challenge. At home many of them use laptops, netbooks and netbooks for their learning. These devices, in many circumstances, are more up to date and more powerful than the clunky, slow, under performing devices in their schools yet when the learners are at school the same devices are left at home. Schools cannot update their ever ageing equipment as fast as they would like due to cost and rapidly disappearing budgets yet they could have the potential of accessing more advanced tools if they would see some common sense and the vision to make it happen.

What do you think? Do you consider BYOD a way forward for schools?

Tags: classroom tech, inspiration, resource, technology
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Deadly 60 in the classroom

September 10, 2011 in learning, lesson ideas, thoughts

It’s a known fact that the BBC produces some of the best television in the world and the Deadly 60 series is no exception. What makes this series different is that its target audience is children. And it’s given me a great idea for the classroom.

Deadly 60 is a wildlife show whose presenter, Steve Backshall, tracks down the world’s 60 deadliest animals. His ‘Deadly 60′ lists include top ten fastest, top ten toxic, top ten lethal weapons, six top tens that go on to make the Deadly 60. The show is a stunning example of how to take an already favourite learning topic of children and turn it into something awesome, something that gets everyone talking. It’s a simple idea and one that is being used in the classroom today; we have all asked children for top ten lists of some description. But why stop there? Why not try to involve the whole school, schools further afield, schools all over the world?

Are you talking about creating some sort of huge top ten collection site?
That’s one of my ideas. Creating a ‘Classroom 60′ site where children from schools anywhere in the world can visit and vote on top ten lists created by other children and teachers. Lists can be created in the classroom and uploaded to the site where others can vote for their favourites. Does a site like this already exist? I think it could be incredibly powerful and it would involve children of any age being able to participate.

Why not use social media?
Well, many schools, like my own, have no access to social media tools due to strict web filtering measures but a website ‘should’ be a lot easier to get through filters and be accessible by many.

What else could a teacher do with this?
Well, creating lists is always going to be a classroom favourite but it could be extended, developed, pulled apart further so that it becomes much more than just a simple list. Here are a few ideas.

Create a short film of your top ten list
Upload presentation slides of your top ten onto Animoto, and let it create a short animated film for you
Design posters using online tools such as Glogster Edu (free for 50 students)
Create an online presentation using Google Docs and share with the rest of the world
Build a wiki of your own classroom 60′s so that you can include rich media with your lists

What about copyright of images, isn’t that going to be a problem?
It’s the perfect opportunity to teach your class about copyright and the use of images found online. Use image search set up to search only for images labelled for reuse. You can also use Flickr Creative Commons, Creative Commons Search and MorgueFile for starters. It’s also a great opportunity for your class to be creative with their lists so that they can take their own photos which bypasses copyrighted images completed.

Sounds like a great idea, I think I might try it out.
If you do give this a go then I’d be grateful to hear how it went and what type of lists your class created. If you are on Twitter then use #classroom60 to let me and others know. As for the Classroom 60 website, I’ll need a bit of time to create that

Tags: activities, animoto, classroom, classroom tech, creativity, discussion, ideas, inspiration, learning, presentation, resource, teaching, web 2.0
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Google Gadgets. Are they suitable for classroom use?

September 4, 2011 in Resources in the classroom

Google Gadgets are embeddable dynamic objects created by Google users for inclusion in Google Sites. But the content of many of these gadgets can only be described as totally unsuitable for classroom use and as an administrator of a Google Domain I definitely would not want these gadgets made available to my users. Google Apps for Education provides a difficult workaround that involves mastering some code but luckily enough there is another way to manage gadgets on your domain – the Domain Gadget Directory Manager (DGDM).

The DGDM is a gadget that can be embedded into a site on your school domain and which the administrator can use to control which gadgets users on the domain should have access to. These gadgets are included on a whitelist for all users. You can also blacklist gadgets if required. Once added you can relax in the knowledge that users will not have access to any unsuitable gadgets when they create their own Google sites.

I created gadgets4school to explain how to add the DGDM gadget to your own Google site and as a resource for gadgets that I include in my own Google Domain.