ICT in my Classroom

As part of the new Primary Literacy Framework, we are covering narrative over the next four weeks and I must say it has been much clearer what we are doing in literacy due to the changes. I find them most welcome, gone are the days of chopping and changing all term.

Anyway one of the 12 strands is to “Engage with and respond to text.” Well today we used Diigo in a fantastic way that got the children doing exactly that!

Unfortunately I cannot link to the work we did as it had photos of the children and some text from published texts. So you get your visualisation juices going…bear with me…

Imagine a web page, I used a published Google Doc, with a table at the top of the page with the children’s photos and names in. Under the table is an opening to a story by a significant author and suitably chosen for the ability of the children in the group. Tomorrow a different group are doing this activity so a different story. As we are only looking at the opening hooks it is just a few paragraphs worth. Above the table of children’s names are some simple instructions such as:

Take your time to read the opening to the story below. Your job is to respond in two ways.
1 - Add a sticky note, using the Diigo toolbar, under your picture or name and  explain how you feel about this opening.
2 - Highlight some text and comment on part of the opening you enjoyed or want to talk about. Add you initials to your comments.

In my planning I had put down to work with this group as they completed the activity on individual laptops at their desks and it was a real success. The children clicked on Sticky Note in the Diigo toolbar and added a typed comment, they then went a step further and (after clicking refresh in IE to see their friends comments - a good tip!) added further comments to their friends Diigo stickies. They rolled over the sticky bubble icon and then rolled over the Actions menu at the top right. Then it is just a case of going to “Add Comment” and the children are engaging with not only the text but each others’ responses.

The other Year 5 class completed the same activity after playtime. Whereas the group in my class began with a webpage with no comments on, the other class were able to view (and comment on) ours and get started quite quickly. The children were, as before, motivated and really engaged with the task. Diigo as a tool is becoming very, very useful!

Here are some of the children comments on the text we looked at today using Diigo.

“Its a sad story when the girl and hugo dies at the end.(and i think that hugo should die because he didn’t let the girl have freedom so he disereves it.”

“on the part were hugo found out that the young girl escaped your body goes really cold for second with fear that something terrible is going to happen”

“It is a sad story because some body dies and the girl trys to get her freedom.”

Any guesses what the story is?

On Reflection 

• This activity was easy to set up - it is basically a page of text, the key thing is to have the Diigo toolbar (and class account) ready to roll.
• It can be done with a whole class using a computer suite for a literacy lesson, different children looking at different texts.
• The texts could also be in the public domain and they do not need to be narrative even. If you are looking at persuasive text why not look at the Alton Towers site and get the children to add Sticky Notes with their comments about how persuasive the site is.
• It could also be extended beyond popular fiction to include peer reviewing of children’s work they have published. (Lots to explore here I think)
• We worked between classes separated by a corridor but there is no reason why schools from anywhere could collaborate in response to a story or text.
• Given the right preparation and equipment I think this is a most manageable activity within a literacy independent session.
• My children had looked at Sticky Notes before but never added them independently - they catch on very fast and coped without any problems.
• Diigo with its “Highlight and Comment” tool can easily become a very useful online text annotation / response tool and I think I will keep using it.

I am pleased to welcome Diigo into my toolkit on a permanent contract all these ideas have been simmering for a while now and it is excellent to have the opportunity to see the children engaging and responding to text in this unique way.

Times tables are such an important tool in maths for primary aged children to master and there has never been a better time for online resources. Here are my top 5 recommendations that tick all the boxes. I would be looking for resources that are engaging, have a depth of maths involved, flexibility so it can be used in different ways, perhaps an assessment breakdown at the end and give quality feedback. All of these have been added to our school’s del.icio.us links and the children in Year 5 access them both at home and when they are using the laptops during morning activity time in class.

Multiflyer - A wonderful resource that can be used throughout a child’s practise of times tables. Engaging and very well presented by a digital designer Dan Perkins. I have been using this for a long time and still think it is one of the top resources around. It is free to play, and there is a version you can pay for with some little extras. There are lots of options to look at specific tables so you can focus the children’s efforts on their weaknesses and a printable results sheet that we will be using this term - all good for work life balance eh?! Well worth a look.

Times Attack - this is one of those amazing finds from the site multiplication.com when I was getting into Multiflyer. A standalone game that you can download that is nothing like you have seen before. A first person game that allows the player to control a character through a series of levels that test their times tables. I cannot do it credit in this description, you need to see this one! The demo is free and just allows you to play, quite adequately, on a single level. We might consider the full version if the demo is received well in school. Don’t worry the children will take to the controls far better than you! They enjoy the unique way it is presented and hardly realise they are working on their tables.

BBC Skillswise Times Tables - a classic in my mind - I discovered the great resources available over on the Skillswise part of the BBC site back in my first year of teaching. This is a clear, bright and engaging resource that is ideal for the IWB. In our school you can often hear it being played on first thing in the morning as the children are coming in. In fact I have used it during my register time, I say good morning, they come and answer a question on the IWB. Again you can be specific about what you practice so it is suitable for all ages and for individual use too. Lots of fun.

Maths Trainer - I have only recently come across the last two resources in this list, some new entries into the Top 5! This is part of a series of excellent resources from the Maths is Fun website. This works best when an individual is working on it, as it reacts to their weaknesses and can be carefully tuned to their individual needs. It is always the aim to not only be accurate but also to be rapid in your recall of the times tables, so the timing element is most welcome. In this resource you can work on different chunks of the times tables at a time, lots of flexibility which I really like and quality support too. You will also notice that there are options for the other operations, well worth exploring. Whilst you are there I would recommend looking at Speed Maths and Reaction Maths.

Multiplication Puzzle - Much like Maths Trainer this resource is flexible enough to allow you to tailor it to individual needs and offers valuable practice. It works on a missing number type puzzle within a number grid. The numbers to multiply can also be missing along the sides, so children are encouraged to use the inverse operation to check these. One of the best features which makes it stand above the rest is the way you can alter how much time the children have to work. You can change the length of time for the whole activity or based on how many questions they need to answer. This offers an excellent way to encourage those who can recall their tables accurately but need to speed up. A simple but highly effective resource that offers real depth and flexibility. In addition it has one of the best “Well Done” sound effects I have ever come across, but you will have to find that out for yourself!

I hope that you find my Top 5 Times Tables resources useful and you have fun using them in your own classroom setting. There are many, many resources for maths but there are much fewer that have the depth and flexibility that is required to be used effectively in our classrooms.

Let me know what you make of them and what successes you have, or even if you think that you have a resource I have missed that qualifies to be in my Top 5!

Videojug and the pursuit for folding glory!

Who is doing instructional writing? We have been covering this text type for a few weeks now and two weeks ago we used this site as part of reading and evaluating instructional text. I decided I wanted the children to compare 3 sets of instructions for the same thing and to rate the instructions I chose to look at a renowned video titled “How to fold a T-Shirt in 2 Seconds”. However I did not reveal the video until the class had tried to follow two different text instructions (no pictures). And yes I did take in a load of T-Shirts for the kids to use! Don’t worry by the end of the lesson you will have all of the neatly folded!

The two sets of written instructions were taken from the Videojug site - a written set accompanies most videos. The first set the kids used was one edited down to one paragraph, no numbers or bullets. They struggled, but the point is they are meant to. (T-shirts become messy at this point) Suddenly the children are talking about how difficult it is and saying that this feature or that feature is missing.

We then looked at the second set of instructions which are just the exact written set from the Videojug site - as you see it online. The children still struggled, even though there are far more reader friendly features. There was some mild folding success, but not much. We discussed as a class why this was and rated the instructions as before.

I then told the children to open the laptops they had on their tables and look at the video. I showed it on the SMARTBoard too. I suggested to pause the video as it played so the children could keep up. It’s good as it has a “You will need” section and clear numbered steps on the video. I would recommend getting the site preloaded if you are getting lots of machines to access it - also if you are working on a wireless network.

There were lots of serendipitous moments and suddenly children were expertly folding the T-Shirts as if they had been working in a clothing boutique for the past 10 years! We then had a Fold Off, children folding as fast and accurately as they could. I even challenged the other year 5 teacher, Rick to a contest. Entering his class with his kids backing him, I struggled and lost my 2nd pinch as he made a beautiful fold to the rapture of his children’s voices, I skulked off and called for the return tie!

Create a Graph

A classic maths tool, Create a Graph is saved by about 850 other people on del.icio.us and is a wonderfully useful tool for your data handling work. It can of course be used as an excellent way to demonstrate the creation of graphs with a whole class but This week we used it as part of an independent activity in a maths lesson. The children had pulse rate monitors fitted and a laptop to access the site. They needed to record their pulse after 2 mins of resting and then again after 2 minutes of walking around the room. This was repeated for 10 minutes - we tried to predict the shape of the line graph and the children managed very well with the tool. An important aspect of the tool is the ability to add a minimum and maximum value to the graph, so that you can create a more balanced graph with greater detail. We also discussed why 0-30 would not be useful on a pulse rate axis!

Once the line graphs were created we exported them as PDF files and talked about them in the plenary of the session using the SMARTBoard. You also have the option to export/download the graph in other formats: SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) PNG (Portable Network Graphics) JPG (JPEG, Joint Photographic Experts Group) EMF (Enhanced Metafile Format) Can be imported into programs such as MS Word or MS PowerPoint, EPS (Encapsulated Postscript) Can be opened with graphics programs such as Adobe Illustrator or QuarkXPress. A good range of options to keep everyone happy!

I like the way that you can continually preview the graph as you enter data which allowed the children to spot errors as they built the graph. All in all a good apple!

Good Ol’ MS Word 

Now even though I have dabbled in blogs, wikis and online documents I still think there is great value in just some basic word processing skills. We are using the new MS Word on the class laptops and we have charged the children to write a set of instructions, a help document for the excellent Sploder game creator site. It has been great seeing the children bring to their work basic skills they have learned along the way and to develop some new ones. It has also brought us excellent opportunities to recap saving routines and simple image manipulation.

I know, and have experienced, the value of working on writing with other collaborators, with other children, other schools using new age writing tools. But in this instance I wanted to write without publishing along the way, I wanted the children to hone and master a single piece of work for a chosen audience without the outside world looking in. That’s not so bad is it? We have had some fantastic results, which you will no doubt see glimpses of here soon, and the children have been extremely motivated by the whole writing task.

Unfortunately it has been a while since I have been fit to write as I have been off of work, away from school with a nasty bout of tonsilitis. On a course of penicillin tablets for it now which tastes completely rancid by the way! I am feeling back to my normal self at the moment and have had a full week in school which has been busy as ever.

Throughout this week in our Year 5 classes I have planned to utilise our class Diigo account for some simple comprehension work on instructions. Diigo is a tool that allows you to add annotations and sticky notes to any web page - making the most text heavy site partly interactive. As the children roll over these highlights or sticky notes they can read the pop-up message or comment. I have used it to pose some questions about an instructional text on making a healthy smoothie. The text itself is on the excellent WikiHow website and is in fact a piece of shared writing I completed last year with my year 6 class when we did instructional text too.

The children have been working on laptops during the group time in our literacy lessons at this task. The activity has rotated throughout the week so all the children can experience it. Once the children have read a question they can view the text immediately in front of them and they have no need to navigate away to a different window etc. In an ideal world I would have liked the children to answer using something like Google Notebook which is still very much my intention. But I thought that I needed to take things slowly and explore the use of Diigo first. So the children answered the questions in their jotters - a more nostalgic notebook shall we say!

They have enjoyed the task this week and have been engaged and motivated - the problems seem to be the tendency to move the sticky notes around the screen, so the order has been a bit lost. One or two notes have also mysteriously disappeared. I have been signing into the Diigo account so we can see our private annotations, but I suppose that if the notes were public and we didn’t sign in then no alterations could be made. They could be viewed but would be protected. Mmm I will test this out.

del.icio.us has proven to be an invaluable tool with so much constant access to technology with our laptops in lessons. Our Year 6 teachers are getting stuck in too, so our school’s weblink resource will no doubt begin to grow and grow. A great tool for any school that I cannot recommend highly enough!