TodaysMeet Meets the Socratic Seminar - Microblogging in a Digital Classroom

Today’s Meet Meets the Socratic Seminar - Microblogging in a Digital Classroom

Written with Marissa Grodnick, NJH ELA Teacher - @marissagrod

I saw THE COOLEST thing last week. Coolest. Some teachers decided to take an in-class discussion (Socratic Seminar) and integrate the iPad, transforming the learning for their students. It was the best of all possible worlds, fusing some "yes" answers to Alan November's 6 Questions and the CLR strategies that we've been working to develop.

Above: An image from Alison Rubbelke's ELA7 class

BACKGROUND

"ELA 7 loves Socratic Seminars (student-run discussion analyzing high-level questions using proof from concepts and ideas learned in class) as summative assessments because they are student-centered, student-led, CLRT and graded on the spot--easy for teachers.  However, with a class of 25+, not everyone gets a chance to say what they want.  After doing a little digging, Alison Rubbelke and I discovered TodaysMeet as a possible new twist to our seminars.  

We revamped the Socratic Seminar into a fishbowl-style discussion with an inner circle orally discussing questions and an outer circle (backchannel) using TodaysMeet to comment on and discuss the inner circle's conversation.  

Above: An image from Marissa's "1st block ELA room" in TodaysMeet.

LESSON PLAN

The day before:

Kids were given a Socratic Seminar prep sheet with guiding questions.  They had to come up with ideas and support them with quotes and examples from the texts we've read.  

Kids also did an exit card stating inner or outer preference for group set up

Create two even groups.

Login to TodaysMeet and create rooms for each block.  

Each room gets it's own url for kids to simply click and join. Make rooms open for as long as you want (I did one week so I could grade later and have inner circle kids read outer circle as part of reflection piece)

Above: Students were asked to provide evidence to support their opinions.

Day of:

Set up room with inner and outer circle.

Outer kids join TodaysMeet room--I just linked rooms to my moodle agenda--make sure they use real names.  Start conversation with asking one question, and let kids do the rest.

During & Grading:

I used a black spreadsheet to grade while listening.  I also glanced at TodaysMeet and added some helpful prompts or comments to keep them on track.  I let the discussion go for about 30 minutes.

Homework:

Reflection.  Inner circle was asked to go and read outer circle comments as part of reflection.  Outer circle was asked to summarize and add some things they wish had been said or discussed."

Above: Another image from the backchannel discussion in TodaysMeet.  It helps for the teacher to check in and write prompts to encourage students to dig deeper.

TodaysMeet was super easy for kids to use and easy to set up.  It took less than 10 minutes of setup and kids were in immediately.  No login, no account, etc.  It also acts like twitter in that it is character limited--which makes kids concentrate on quality not quantity.  

Here’s the blog Learn it in 5’s quick how-to tutorial (a great site that allows you to either watch a short tutorial or read some quick info to help you get started including a brief synopsis, benefits, & drawbacks to the app).

Talkboard: Create. Together.

Have you heard of Talkboard yet? From what I have seen, I’m really excited about what’s possible!

Here’s how the company describes their app:

Talkboard: Ideas without boundaries

Talkboard is a collaborative whiteboarding app for iPad that lets you sketch out ideas and work on them with others.

Talkboard is a live, collaborative whiteboard that students can use on their iPad. They don’t even need to be in the same classroom, they can be on different wi-fi networks and still be able to work together.  The app even allows participants to chat live which could make any work done outside of class easier. The final product can be exported as a PDF or as an image. Bonus: the app links to their Google Apps account so if you're in a GAFE school they don't have another login/password combo to remember.

My colleague & I spent some time working with it, and I created some ‘how to’ Skitch pics to introduce you to the app.  I also tried it in class, having my students collaborate in lab groups, using the app to write their procedure out together.  (The purpose of the lab activity was to practice writing a clear, concise procedure.)  It worked well!  The drawback was that there are a lot of colors and pen choices to choose from so some students had trouble focussing on writing their directions & instead wanted to draw. I anticipated this possibility because it’s a risk that comes with trying something new in class; like me, some of them needed time to play around with the app before getting serious.  

Our engineering teacher is probably the most excited to use this app.  He has been looking for a program that would allow students to collaborate virtually on the engineering design process [ask→ imagine→ plan→ create→ improve] but needed more than what Google Docs can currently offer.

So what do you think?  Is there a better collaborative app that allows students to work together at the same time?  Have you looked at BaiBoard?  I wonder if it’s similar?  I’ll check it out.

Get Kahoot!

• What if you could check for understanding as a way to guide your instruction?  

• What if we could get a snapshot of where our students are at so that we could re-teach or review material that the students didn't get?

• What if there was an activity that did these things AND your students were begging you use it in class?

My answer is to Get. Kahoot. Now.

If you’re unfamiliar with it you soon will be.  (It spread like wildfire through our district over the last two months.)  Kahoot is a formative assessment activity that students play like a fun trivia game, using their mobile devices. 

It's not just something you make for them; increase their critical thinking & ask your students to create a Kahoot for an upcoming test.  If they sign into GetKahoot.com on their iPad, through the Safari app, they can create their own.

If you’d like to see the game I created when I introduced it to staff, and use it for your own PD, you can search the “Public” Kahoots for some of the title: “Team Meeting Practice Quiz 2014”.  Then “Duplicate” it and edit it how you’d like.

Here’s your first tip - there are two different sites to know:  

• Use GetKahoot.com to create and show the quiz
• Log into Kahoot.it to play

Scroll through the presentation to see the benefits & get some helpful hints for creating your first Kahoot.

Create-your-own 4 Pics 1 Word (Voacb Review) Game with Pic Collage

...This activity is just a clever ruse to learn new vocabulary words.  

This year we’ve got the iPads on lock down aka they’re hooked to The Configurator aka WE choose the apps--so we’ve put on a limited number of educational games for the students to play. Whenever a kid gets downtime I see them playing the game ‘4 Pics 1 Word’.  They love it!  I’d go as far as saying that, for our students, playing ‘4 Pics 1 Word’ borders on obsession.

Imagine my excitement when one of our math teachers told us about an activity that she had created - 4 Pics 1 Word Vocab Review Game.  Brilliant!  She showed me the examples that she had created (see below) and her kids loved reviewing their vocabulary this way.  They worked collaboratively, as a class, to guess the words that went with the pictures that she projected on the whiteboard.

I thought about taking this game and turning it into a creation activity for students.  Having students find their own pics, to describe the new words that they’ve learned, increases the critical thinking that they’re doing about them.  This is going to help them increase their understanding of, and remember their meanings, better.  I knew this activity would fit well with Pic Collage, which is a fabulous app that our students love using in class.   I asked a few of our iPad Geniuses if they were interested in creating some of these Pic Collage-s, to review some of the vocabulary that they had recently learned in class, and they were psyched to do it! (See their examples below.)

If you’d like to increase the critical thinking even more, have students explain why they chose the pictures that they did. For example, for the Life Science vocab word ‘Nucleus’ below, “The nucleus is the boss of the cell so I chose a picture of Michael Scott, the boss on ‘The Office’” and “The nucleus is the control center and so I chose a picture of the control center in iOS7.”  Or, have students explain why they guessed the answers that they did.  Have them explain what they think the pictures are representing.  

(Balance)

(Slope)

(Y-intercept)

(Collaborate)

(Nucleus)

Time Saving iPad Tip From the Genius Team! Make Logging Into Google Apps Easier!

Here is a tip from one of our student Genius Team members -- so simple it's brilliant.

Make your apps email address a shortcut.

Logging into apps associated with Google Drive is time consuming on the iPad this year, isn't it?  Our teachers and students are always having to re-enter everything, including our long apps email address, plus finding the underscore can be cumbersome. Make your apps address, important logins, and your passwords a shortcut and you'll get in so much quicker.

Some of you only needed to hear the words "iPad shortcut" and you've got it.  Some of you will need the skitched graphic that's below, and some of you can check out this presentation, that the student made(!),  for more info.

Workflow: Cornell Notes Template (or any PDF) into Notability & then into Evernote

As part of our commitment to making our students college ready, our school is implementing the use of Cornell Notes in all of our classes.  There are plenty of Cornell Notes templates to choose from, and many teachers have chosen to link these templates to their websites, the question becomes how do you move that template into the Notability App (which is AMAZING and allows you to write/type/draw/etc on the document) and then into the Evernote App (equally AMAZING & allows you to store their document in a folder)?  BTW--the Evernote folder can be shared with the teacher so that teachers can see their students' notes at anytime, anywhere there's WiFi. (Also, do you think I’m correct in capitalizing Cornell Notes?  It’s a proper noun, no?  My Google search turns up mixed opinions in answer to this question. But back to the more important point of this post...)

Here are some tutorials, created by our Genius Team*, to help staff & students better understand this process.  

They are broken into two short tutorials to represent the two easy steps to move a PDF that's linked to your website

...into Notability (to write on it) and then

...into Evernote (to store it).

Without further ado, here are the tutorials:

How to put a document into Notability

How to move a document from Notability to an Evernote folder (version 1)

*Why Evernote is the greatest, why I love Notability, and why you too need to get your own Genius Team TBPS (#tobepostedsoon)

Nearpod Nearperfect? Some Tips & Tricks...

aaaaaaand I’m back.  Long time no write.  It’s been a hectic Spring and even though my colleagues & I have found some great tech tips (!) I haven’t gotten my butt in gear to be reflecting & sharing these & I apologize. But I’ve been keeping notes.  Hopefully it will be a blog-filled summer.  What prompted this quick interruption to an otherwise quiet blog is my recent experience with Nearpod.  I think you’ll love it.  I really do!


In a nutshell: 
Nearpod allows you to lock your audience into a presentation on their iOs devices.  You control the movement of the slides.  Nearpod also gives your audience an interactive experience; you can add quizzes, links to the web, movie clips, poll the audience, you can even insert opportunities for students to draw something.  It’s a super cool way to present.


Here are my tips for when you use it:
1.  It’s quirky and, for me, not intuitive at first--but that’s why I am writing this for you!  Keep reading...

2.  Practice is better when you practice with the paid version.  It’s expensive though--$100, I believe.  You’ll need the paid version to create a real presentation that includes all of the bells & whistles in your presentation - like quizzes & movies.  Find someone who has purchased it and borrow their account to give it a real test drive before you jump in.

3.  You can’t make slides in the application- you make the slides in another application (google presentation, ppt, ActivInspire, really anything that you can convert to PDF) and import them.  It’s easy to move slides around, delete slides, and add slides.  Think of it as a plus - you don’t remake all of your presentations; you can import all of your old stuff.

4.  The videos are not simply links to YouTube videos - you have to download mp4s from YouTube & then upload it to the presentation.  This can feel like “one more step” - I get it.  But once you have a system it gets easier.  I used the Xilisoft app (thanks, Bert!).

5. Don’t give the “room number” for your presentation until you are ready to begin.  I practiced and practiced the night before, I thought that I had the pin ready to go.  The only problem was, the pin that I gave the class directed them to the old presentation from the night before.  So even though you have one saved presentation in your library it will always have a different launch pin, make sense?  This resulted in some confusion because when I logged in as a teacher and launched the presentation the next morning, it was given a new pin (which I didn’t know this at the time).  Thus I was in a different presentation than my students.  Learn from my mistake!  I didn’t realize that the pin changes each time you launch the presentation from the beginning.

6. Watch the free presentation (tutorial) that they provide - it’s great.  It’s simple and explains what the program is about. Great tips & tricks!  For this reason I included no screenshots with directions.

7. You don’t need two iOS devices to practice (...like I originally thought. For a long time I practiced by being the teacher on my iPad and the student on my iPhone.  Like I said before, it’s not super intuitive to use at first. I had to figure this piece out.)  Then you can log in as a teacher on your iPad and you can “be the student” on your PC or Mac.  Go to www.nearpod.com/web and enter the pin number when prompted.

8.  There are TWO ways to login.  If you’re going to view as a student you need to enter a pin number.  If you want to present or modify a presentation you need to log in with your email & password.

I hope this helps!  Let me know if you have questions or tips for me!

Here's a sample of what my 'teacher view' was for my presentation.  

(Pink words & arrows not included!)

Alright, I said no screenshots, but this one is helpful to remember the basics.

Haiku Deck Awesomeness

Haiku Deck sent an email late last week telling me about how first, I was on the leading edge of awesome simply by using their app--thank you!--and second, that it’s possible to be thatmuchmoreawesome by utilizing their new notes feature. (Side note - if you’re NOT using Haiku Deck in your class let me put a plug in right now.  It’s a fantastic presentation app that functions like a PowerPoint on your iPad.  Right now PP or it’s more leading-edge cousin, Google Presentation, isn’t available on our devices and Haiku Deck is a great substitution.  The graphics are stunning--and plentiful--and it’s easy to share.  Students simply send me a link to their creation when they’re finished.)

Up until this point, the amount of words that you can include on each slide is limited.  This can be both positive and negative.  Similar to Twitter, limiting the characters forces the students to be concise and to the point.  Unfortunately, if you wanted further explanation about the slide they often did not have the room.  I saw an English class use Haiku Deck for a vocabulary assignment.  It was such a fabulous idea!  Students chose pictures, that to them, represented the new vocabulary word.  Think how these students would be thatmuchmoreawesome if they were allowed to explain the reasoning behind each photo and embed it into the presentation!

Utilizing the notes feature is simple.  

1.  Have the student email themselves the link to the presentation after they’ve added all of the pictures and titled the slides.

2.  Open the link, from their email, in Safari & sign in to their Haiku Deck account.





3.  Add additional notes to the slide(s).

 

Pinterest Possibilities with Vocabulary

Provide an authentic and engaging project for your students while tapping into their critical thinking skills!

By having students create their own Pinterest board (think of it as a visual bookmarking site) to show their knowledge of new vocabulary words, they employ critical thinking skills while collaborating with others.

Here's a Pinterest board that I created for an upcoming vocabulary unit in English 7.  Here’s another one I created for a Spanish I class.  I signed up for a work account using my school email.  I also used the Pinterest App on my iPad--it's seamless!* Quick disclaimer- I currently teach in a 1:1 environment with iPads so their use is incorporated into many of my lessons.

Create - After creating a board you can pin pictures directly from a Google image search or repin from Pinterest itself.  (Pinterest does not store the entire image file but it does 'pin' the URL that your picture comes from.)  

Communication - You have the ability to comment (500 characters max) on each picture so you could include an explanation for each.  Another cool thing - if you put a link in your comment section it will automatically hyperlink it when you save it.  I left one in (check the chess pieces in my Ron Weesley board- more on that board later) so that you can see what it looks like.

Collaborate - Students can repin images from other students and add them to their board; so students could work together in a group creating pictures for the whole vocab unit.  Four kids could work together, creating only 5 pins on their own, through sharing they could have a board of 20 words.  Students can also comment on one another's pins.

Critical thinking - There are a few ways that kids could use it w/ vocab:

• A picture that illustrates the vocab word

• A picture with the synonyms or antonyms listed & they have to guess the vocab word
• Pictures with English word descriptions for a particular word/phrase (ex: el vaso de jugo de naranja) - specifically for world language vocab
• Pictures that represent the word - then I explained why I chose it in the comment section
• Pictures that were antonyms to the word - I explained why I chose this picture as well

* Well...ALMOST seamless.  At this point, on an iPad, you can't create a public link (in Google Drive or in Skitch) so that your own picture (that you took with your camera) has a URL.  So I had to upload the Skitch photos from my laptop, not my iPad.  Also, on an iPad, if you want to pin an image you find in a Google search you need to go through Safari & not use the app.   Repinning pictures while in the app works great, however.  The app is really easy to use!