iPads – Sharing our work

Part of our ICT Vision Statement reads

We will promote ICT as an essential tool for inquiry, communication, collaboration, content creation and learning.  ICT capabilities will be incorporated through the whole school curriculum.

Underlying all of this is the technical requirement to be able to copy work quickly and easily to and from our students’ iPads.  Resources such as photos, images, videos and links to educational websites need to be shared from teacher to students and vice versa.  Students need to share completed work in the form of documents, presentations, videos, collages, music and all sorts of creative content.

This is a little more challenging on an iPad than on a PC or tablet device.  Content cannot be easily viewed via a file system, but rather is stored inside the various apps.  For example, word processing documents are stored within the Pages app, presentations within the Keynote app and iBooks within the Book Creator app.  However, once a process is established, content sharing is easy.

Apple TV

The most immediate way of sharing content in the classroom is by using Apple TV.  Apple TV is a small device which is connected to a data projector and it allows the teacher or any student to wirelessly connect to it and share their iPad’s screen with the whole class.  This is a fantastic way of sharing work in progress and completed documents, presentations, videos and so on.  The student can receive immediate feedback from their teacher and the rest of the class.

IMG_2160 (1024x768) IMG_2166 (1024x768)

eMail

eMail is a quick and easy way to share small documents and most apps have a ‘send by email’ option.  Our year 4 students all have their own school email account and have been educated in email etiquette and cyber safety.  Teachers can easily send information and documents to all students at once using eMail.  At the start of the year it was the primary way of sharing content, whereas now other methods are also used.

WebDAV

WebDAV is a protocol for sharing files over the internet or over a local network such as our school network.  Earlier this year, a WebDAV server was set up on our school server and this enables us to quickly and easily copy documents of all sizes to/from the server to/from our student and teacher iPads.  A special drive (Q:) has been set up on the server and students can save their work directly to an appropriate folder.  WebDAV is built into some apps, such as Pages and Keynote, but it is also accessible via the File Explorer app which all teachers and students have installed.

DropBox

Before WebDAV was set up, we used DropBox for sharing large files. DropBox is similar in nature to WebDAV, but files must be uploaded to and downloaded from the internet.  This makes the copying of large files slower the WebDAV method.  There are also storage space limitations in DropBox unless a monthly subscription is paid for.

Print

Of course, some work is ideally shared by printing it.  Our year 4 classrooms have a wireless B&W printer that can be printed to directly from most apps.  If colour printing is required, the students save their work to the WebDAV drive, from where it can then be printed to any of our school network printers.

 Online Sites

Students and teachers can share their work with a global audience by using online media sharing sites such as Edublogs, Edmodo and SchoolTube.  In the traditional classroom, the only audience of student work is the teacher, classmates and sometimes parents and visitors. Online sites, such as our class blogs, provide a much larger audience for sharing student work as well as news and photos of classroom activities. 

More Information

More detailed technical information about these methods of file sharing is available in this documentiPad File Sharing

 

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Beyond the classroom walls

Modern technology offers so many great ways for our students to communicate outside of the classroom and participate in a global community.  In recent years our students have used Skype to participate in a video conference with people in Fiji, Cambodia, USA and Australia to assist with their Units of Inquiry.  (See previous posts Using Skype in the classroom, Year 6/7 Skypers, Year 7 Skypers)

Mr Pfieffer’s Year 2 class recently used the Facetime iPad app to catch up with one of the students who is touring around Australia.  From the back seat of her car, the student was able to speak to the class about her trip and the places she had visited so far.  From the classroom, the students enthusiastically asked questions, shared news and sang “Happy Birthday”.  It was such as great learning and sharing experience.

IMG_2285

IMG_2284

 

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

ICT and the Year 7 PYP Exhibition

The central idea behind this year’s PYP Exhibition was

There are major events in history which have impacted on the world and its people.

Our year 7 students researched, prepared and showcased their learning about a significant historical event.  ICT played a large part in all of these stages and along with traditional display materials such as books, posters, artifacts and models, digital technology was used extensively during the exhibition performance and showcase.  Here are just some of the ways in which ICT was used during the Exhibition process.

Printing information and photos for displays

Nicholas displays photos and information about the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki

Creating an Exhibition Newspaper

A 4 page exhibition newspaper was created in Microsoft Publisher and printed on beige A3 paper to give the old looking effect.

Chloe made a crossword for the back page of the newspaper using a crossword making website.

Visitors enjoyed reading the newspaper which contained an article about each of the historical events that were presented at the Exhibition.

Displaying Prezis on the Student’s Tablets

(see previous post Presenting Prezi)

Alicia and Isabel presented their Prezis using a data projector

Macca created a Prezi about Hiroshima and Nagasaki

Campbell created a Prezi about Charles Kingsford Smith

 Playing Video and Audio Recordings

Younger students watched videos relating to the exhibits

Olivia displayed information and played an audio recording of Kevin Rudd’s Sorry Day Speech

Kane narrated the events of the Cuban Missile Crisis with images in the background

Sam used his iPod to play an audio recording about World War II

 Background Music and Video for the Exhibition Performance

Campbell created an amazing video clip to accompany the entire exhibition performance. It contained backing music, video clips, images, sound effects and strategically placed silences.

 

 

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Voice and Sound Recording

Recently, I talked to the year 7 class about the many uses for recording their own voice, music or other sounds on their tablet, computer or other recording device.

  • To create narrations for presentations
  • To create soundtracks for video clips or animations
  • To practice reading and to listen to themselves reading
  • To tell a story
  • To create podcasts
  • To create read along books for younger students
  • To record themselves singing

We then had a look at two methods of creating a sound recording here at school.

Windows Sound Recorder

Sound Recorder is a Microsoft Windows accessory that records sound through an internal or external microphone and saves it as a Windows Media Audio (wma) file.

 

 

Easi-Speak Microphones.

These portable microphones record sound directly into the microphone’s memory. The recordings (mp3 or wav files) can then be downloaded to a computer by plugging the microphone into a USB port.

(See my previous post on Easi-Speak Microphones for more details)

 

We then had a look at the 3 different types of sound files that are produced by these methods (wma, mp3 and wav), how to convert files from one type to another and briefly mentioned how sound files can be edited.  For more details about all of these things, please click here.

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Collaborative Websites

Collaborative software and websites help people to work together, sometimes over geographic distances, by providing tools that aid communication, collaboration and the process of problem solving.­­

During this term, the year 7 class have had a look at few collaborative websites, including Wallwisher, Dabbleboard and Edmodo.  The first two sites offer simple ‘walls’ or ‘whiteboards’ for sharing ideas, pictures, videos and documents, whereas Edmodo offers a more sophisticated resource sharing and communication platform (see former post on Edmodo).

Collaborative websites like Wallwisher and Linoit are fun and simple collaborative websites that are great for many primary school year levels.  In their simplest form they don’t require each student to have an account and they have a nice graphical interface in the form of a pin-up board with sticky/pinned notes.  These sites lend themselves nicely to sharing brief snippets of information, ideas, viewpoints, pictures and so on.

Wallwisher
(click to enlarge)

Linoit
(click to enlarge)

St Michael’s staff have also had a look at Wikispaces and Google Docs as sophisticated ways of collaborating to share knowledge and to edit documents simultaneously with another user.

Wikispaces
(click to enlarge)

Google Docs
(click to enlarge)

Click here to view a more detailed document that was prepared for the students and staff about Collaboration and Collaborative Tools.

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Edmodo – Turning a Classroom into a Community

To quote from the document The role of ICT in the PYP, written by the International Baccalaureate Organisation (2011). .

ICT provides opportunities for the transformation of teaching and learning and enables students to investigate, create, communicate, collaborate, organize and be responsible for their own learning and actions.  ICT allows students to make connections and reach a deeper understanding of its relevance and applicability to their everyday lives.

At St Michael’s, the year 7 class has been using the Web2.0 tool Edmodo to practice the 21st century skills mentioned above, especially communication, collaboration and connections

To quote from the Edmodo website

Edmodo provides teachers and students a secure place to connect and collaborate, share content and educational applications, and access homework, grades, class discussions and notifications. Our goal is to help educators harness the power of social media to customize the classroom for each and every learner.

Edmodo has the look and feel of a social networking website and as such, is an excellent safe tool for engaging students and teaching them about Cybersafety and ethical/legal issues surrounding the access and use of information technologies. 

Edmodo is used effectively in the year 7 classroom to

  • Discuss hot topics, enabling students to practice persuasive writing in a post/reply style format and also to apply ethical principles of etiquette and respect.
  • Submit journal entries and assignments for teacher comment or marking.  Students upload Microsoft Word documents, the teacher adds comments and then the student accesses or downloads the marked document.
  • Communicate events via a calendar.
  • Collaborate by uploading documents and website links to a shared library.  This is an excellent way to group resources for a particular Unit of Inquiry, ICT skills session or other research activity.
  • Communicate homework requirements.
  • Communicate with students who went on the recent exchange trip to our sister school in Fiji.
  • Do all of the above activities from outside of the school, from any computer with internet access.

Here is an example of a class discussion about war.

 

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Year 6/7 Skypers

Today, Mrs Geering’s year 6/7 class got a surprise when Mr Tim was beamed into the classroom via Skype.  Although Mr Tim usually lives in Fiji, he is visiting our school this week, so he was only as far away as the school library !!  However, it was still very exciting for the students to see Skype in action in the classroom.

Later in the day I visited the classroom and showed the students the following videos.

  1. Skype Explained Visually
  2. Skyping Etiquette for the Classroom

The second video clip outlined some important techniques to keep in mind when using Skype.

  1. Look into the camera when you are speaking.
  2. Introduce yourself before you talk.
  3. Speak loudly, clearly and slowly.
  4. Be polite and have good manners.
  5. Don’t talk when someone else is speaking.
  6. If you don’t understand what the other person is saying, don’t be afraid to ask them to repeat it.

Mr Tim then came to my office and we made a Skype call to the classroom.  A few of the students put their skype etiquette skills to practice and spoke with Mr Tim.  He asked them each a few questions about their interests and their goals for the school year.

We hope to communicate using Skype with Mrs Geering when she is in Fiji and with Mr Tim on his return to Fiji in a few weeks time.

For more information about Skype, see my previous post titled Using Skype in the Classroom.

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Year 7 Skypers

Today, Mr McNicol’s year 7 class conducted their class meeting via the Skype on-line video conferencing application.  Although several students were familiar with Skype or used it at home, we started the session by showing them the following videos.

  1. Skype Explained Visually
  2. Skyping Etiquette for the Classroom

The second video clip outlined some important techniques to keep in mind when using Skype.

  1. Look into the camera when you are speaking.
  2. Introduce yourself before you talk.
  3. Speak loudly, clearly and slowly.
  4. Be polite and have good manners.
  5. Don’t talk when someone else is speaking.
  6. If you don’t understand what the other person is saying, don’t be afraid to ask them to repeat it.

Two of the student leaders, Darcy and Alisha, then came to my office and made a Skype call to the classroom.  Darcy started the conference by reading a few pages of his book to the class.  Alisha then asked the class to go to their table groups and discuss options for their fitness program.  Back in the classroom, Emmie asked a student from each table to sit in the chair in front of the webcam and report on the options discussed at their table.  Each student demonstrated the Skype etiquette they had learned by introducing themselves, looking into the camera and speaking clearly and slowly.

After the Skype session was completed, the class had another short Skype conference with Mr Dow, who was in his office.  Six of the students took it in turns to sit in the seat near the webcam and tell Mr Dow one of the six techniques for good Skype etiquette that they had learned.

The quality of the video and audio was very impressive.  Nearly every sound in the classroom could be heard and every movement detected, even from the back of the room.  This means that it is very important for Skype participants to be quiet and still when they are not talking.

The students were actively involved in this exercise and are already thinking of other ways to use Skype in the classroom.  Mr McNicol and I also discussed the use of mobile phones and other portable devices, such as wireless laptops, to make video conferencing possible from more locations around the school.

For more information about Skype, see my previous post titled Using Skype in the Classroom.

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

New webcams

logitech-hd-webcam-c510

Our school has recently purchased three Logitech C510 HD Webcams.  Click here for technical details about these units.

These webcams easily clip onto a computer monitor and can be tilted and rotated as required.  They can also be laid flat on a table or clipped to other objects within cable reach of the computer.  Possible uses for these cameras within the school include

  1. Video conferencing with Skype
  2. Taking pictures with the Logitech Webcam Software
  3. Recording video with the Logitech Webcam Software

Using a webcam is a great way to make clay animation or other stop motion animation videos because the webcam can be carefully positioned on a table top and controlled from the computer, making it easier for children to operate it without moving the camera.

They could also be very useful for teachers to instruct or talk to their students by making video clips while sitting comfortably at their computer.

If anyone would like to start using these webcams, especially for video-conferencing, please let me know as I am keen to start using these valuable devices.

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Using Skype in the classroom

SkypeLogo

It was an exciting day when Mrs Hall sat in her classroom and held a video conference with Mrs Whittaker, who was sitting comfortably in her office.  They were using the application Skype which is a widely used video conferencing tool that enables participants in different locations to make voice and/or video calls over the internet or to type instant messages to each other.

Mrs Hall is organising a video conference between her class and an advertising executive in the USA, as part of their unit of enquiry on advertising.  Other possibilities for using Skype include linking up buddy classes or classes from other schools.

For some other people’s experiences with using Skype in the classroom, check out these links :

Print Friendly, PDF & Email