ICT in my Classroom

I took these pictures in 5 minutes around my classroom during an afternoon of work last week. It was great to see so many different things going on in our learning environment. There are some great examples of artwork done by the class as well as a wonderful display created by our brilliant teaching assistant on James and Giant Peach.

Make sure you get a look at the laptop screens to see what the children are up to, what can you spot?

These are some of the ideas I have been brewing over during my half term break from school. Today I managed to have a great few hours and got 3 solid looking weeks of planning done which incorporate all of these concepts. As the next few weeks pass I will reflect on their effectiveness in the classroom with our classes.

Photostory

Not a particularly new idea as this is a firm favourite for digital storytelling. I have always spoken highly of this simple application from Microsoft because it has such a clearly set out structure to follow. It is particularly beneficial for young children as there is noa chance they will get lost in an open application searching for features or trying to remember how to do things. Photostory is linear in structure and so each step has to be passed by to finish.

We have had success in the past with Photostory so it is familiar territory for the staff in Year 5 but our classes have yet to look at it with us. They had some brief experience with their classes last year but not on the scale we want to use it.

The children will be generating illustrations, clay models, images and paintings to help tell the story of James and the Giant Peach for the first few days. We are not taking on the whole story though, as the children have already written a letter explaining about his early predicament to an imaginary character. We are going to use Photostory to bring that letter to life and make it multi modal in nature. The prior writing will be a good source of support and the children will add audio and narration of their correspondence in this new digital way.

Comiqs

I first came across Comiqs from Steve Kirkpatrick’s excellent blog. There are growing numbers of online comic and cartoon sites but the feature that makes this so useful in the classroom is its simplicity. I am looking forward to mashing up their writing into this different digital form following our Photostory work. The children will have to reappraise their writing and look at the direct speech of characters in more detail due to the comic book genre.

I have contacted Michael at Comiqs regarding multiple logins and just asking advice in general about using it with a class of 30 or even 60 children in total. It is clear that a class sign in system, like Voicethread, is not yet in place so I wanted his opinion – single login for the class or multiple logins. He replied:

Currently, it might be best to use a single login and password for the site. However, managing the photos, etc, would be a bit of an issue. However, we might look into implementing a paid service with better much login and classroom support.

If this is the case it should be interesting looking out for this in the future. I am excited about letting the children loose on Comiqs and know they will enjoy using it for their digital narrative, nonetheless it remains to be seen how well it copes with large amounts of media in a single account, accessed by many children.

Google Earth

During a seminar at the Scottish Learning Festival Ewan McIntosh explained about using Google Earth for narrative in Penguin’s 21 Steps examples from Charles Cumming. The idea struck me that beginning with a journey would be a great way to tell a story and combined with the children’s general confidence around Google Earth it should be a great medium for narrative.

The idea for our own work is using James and the Giant Peach as our launch pad, but taking it in a different direction. I thought today that the class could write his escape from the clutches of his Aunt and to write the ongoing story using placemarks in Google Earth.

I spent some time hunting around for a place in England somewhere that matched the location of the house from the Dahl story. I found somewhere in Dorset I think, on a hill with a thin sliver of sea visible in the distance.

I will show the children how to create a path using Google Earth and talk through James’ possible escape. We will use the real features of the land to help inform the narrative. I will ask the children to write 6-10 parts of the escape story from James’ point of view. Each placemark could form a paragraph and must refer to the real environment around it.

I love the idea of a visual pathway beginning the story rather than traditional plans or notes. I think the children will respond well to this digital form of stroytelling and perhaps we can make it an option in the future for writing narrative. The possibilities are huge for the scope of this work and combined with other information and creative media within Google Earth layers it could really support children’s storytelling. This is the one I am most looking forward to exploring.

Woices

To support the location driven narrative of Google Earth and to provide the children with the opportunity to talk through their writing ideas prior to using GE, I have decided to plan in a few sessions using Woices. This is a geotagging audio site and is meant to be used for recording audio references “echoes” about places in the world, they then can be combined together to form a “walk” of “echoes” with something in common.

An echo is an audio record that is attached to a physical real-world location or object. Echoes are words, left by one person at some precise place, that can be listened to by anyone, as if their author was still there. Echoes can speak about any topic and respond to any user’s purpose. They can speak about local history, art, curiosities, personal memories, and so on. Just something you think its worth to leave that may make the world a more interesting place.

As soon as I saw this tool i thought digital storytelling on a map! And that is how I am planning on using it, the children will take their journey from Google Earth (see above) and record audio of James’ escape story. The children have to navigate on a world map to the location of the first piece of audio, so giving them a real location to search will be important, and then they record part of the narrative. Whereas Google Earth placemarks are the written version, Woices is the spoken version.

This is still very much an unknown service and I am unsure how it will cope with the media we will throw at it in a very short time. I will be getting in touch with the folk at Woices to forewarn them and to get some advice about usage. Once again their is an issue around many users on one single login and with lots of media being generated.

I am planning that the children will work in pairs to create their Woices audio on the map – once the “echoes” have been created they then can choose a bunch of them to create a “walk” and this will tie in together theor work creating a seamless narrative.

Of course now thinking about it the pooled audio provides for an interesting option of generating a whole variety of “walks” by combining different children’s ideas. I also had the thought that the Google Earth journey type narrative could lead from one path to another. The starting point for one child’s story could be the end of another, the whole class has the same theme and you begin with a shared/modelled piece of work and then the children take different parts of the journey. Combining to form a whole class digital journey narrative.

There are many unanswered elements here and a completely new application to explore in the classroom, but there is also the reliability of Photostory and the exciting prospect of geo-narrative in Google Earth. I am looking forward to what the children make of it all and broadening their horizons to the nature of storytelling and narrative.

Last week as I was helping a child in my class with some data entry using the excellent Create-a-Graph, I watched as a child sitting next to them learned something new. I was simply using the TAB keyboard short-cut to move between fields when adding some data. I could see that the boy next to me had looked up from the work on his own laptop. I continued supporting this child and I again noticed their neighbour peering around my arm trying to spot which key I was using to move between fields. He then looked back at his own keyboard and found the TAB key, he navigated to his own data on his own graph and began trying his newly found keyboard short-cut. 

As I finished up with the child I was originally helping and moved away, I could not help but notice a big grin had spread across the boy’s face as he put into action what he just discovered for himself. I have to say it also made me smile. It is pretty amazing witnessing someone discover something for themselves and benefit from using it.

Last week I was pleased to have another opportunity to teach a lesson that we did for the first time last year. In this blog post I explain about how the literacy lesson worked out this time around, as I don’t think I wrote about it back in 2007. The lesson formed part of unit of work exploring instructional writing that is part of the new Primary Framework.

The second set of instructions were much easier to follow and the children began remarking on the formatting that was facilitating the process. Yet still a lack of images in the instructions still caused confusion. Most of the children were not reading the first instruction carefully enough and due to a lack of visual clarification started with the t-shirt in the wrong position. Most children made good attempts but none managed to get the knack of the fold without those visual clues. We rated the instructions as being much better in terms of layout but still lacking the clarity we needed.

There are so many online resources available nowadays to support literacy and spelling, but which are the true gems in the bunch. Which do we use in the classroom? Which are favourites with my class? Which have the flexibility, depth and longevity to make it into my Top 5 Spelling resources?

1) Spelling City

This has proven to be a highly valuable resource. You are able to save spelling lists for the children to access beyond school. It comes into it’s own as each list is used in a variety of different games to help the children learn them. Each word that you add to the list is automagically linked to a snippet of audio pronouncing the word and there is even audio of the word used in a sentence.

Lists can be downloaded, printed and there is even a handwriting sheet that you can print off for your spelling list. There has been a big take up by KS2 teachers in my school and Spelling City is a firm favourite of my class. My only grumble is that some words are difficult to understand in the audio as the pronounciation is American.

2) TutPup

No problem in TutPup with the English pronunciation of the words as the lady who has done the audio, I am told, did the announcements for the London Underground system! TutPup provides a social competitive edge to the children’s practice which they really enjoy.

The main bulk of games are maths based but the audio quiz for spelling is excellent too. The children listen to a word and type in the spelling, they are of course paired with another user from somewhere in the world giving it that competitive fun. Why not finish your session with a look at Google Earth and map where the competitors were from.

I am pleased to note that since I began using TutPup last year they have added a link to the word lists used for the different levels so you can point the kids at the right one.

3) Look Say Cover Write Check

There are a whole bunch of these resources but the best in my opinion is the Crickweb version.

You can add your own 10 words, practice using the look, say, cover, write and check method and there is even facility to print paper based resource cards and review and assess progress. Simple and very effective.

4) Spin and Spell

A lovely interactive site for the simple practice of common key words. Children can choose from a range of different word topics such as “In and around the home” and “Animal Kingdom”. The children then are presented with a big wheel in the centre of the screen with all of the letters on it. They choose a little image from the many that populate the rest of the screen and they hear audio of that word and then have to spell it using the dial.

You can select to have the words chosen randomly and they can reveal and hear the word again as they are working. Again the American pronunciation can cause some confusion but otherwise it is worthy of a spot in my top 5 spelling resources.

5) GeoGreeting

A bit of fun for number five – this resource will help children to see their spellings in a different way. 

GeoGreeting finds satellite images of buildings and other objects from around the world that resemble the letters in your words. Great to get the kids using them to see the words in an alternative visual way.

These are my top 5, but I know that there are a huge variety of online games and interactive resources that can be used. What do you think of my list? What would make it into your top 5 online spelling resources? I hope you have found something useful here to use with your class.

Over the last few weeks we have been working with the poem The Highwayman by Alfred Noyes. We have been discussing and exploring it through lots of talk and drama. On Monday we talked as a class about the drama technique of hot-seating, I asked the children to work with a partner to prepare some questions they might ask the Highwayman if they had the chance. As they were working I wandered out of the class and immediately returned into the room, but this time I tiptoed in and asked one of the children, in a whispery voice, whether it was safe or not. They looked bemused and I crept through the rest of the class shiftily looking from side to side. I had become the Highwayman. 

I have always enjoyed drama as a way into text and the children love it when their teacher goes out on a limb a little and pretends. I told the children that I didn’t have much time and that I had gotten their message about meeting them here. We had a series of questions about the plot, the character’s feelings about Bess and what it was like to be a criminal. All the time I was checking through the blinds and looking suspiciously at the kids. When my time was up I acted as if the paranoia had got to me and I accused the children of setting me up – that it was a trap and I with one more furtive glance I dashed off out the door again. When I returned we were all smiling. (The children went on to do hot-seating in smaller groups.)

In the following lesson we used a Voicethread to further explore the characters in the poem. (Each child had their own laptop in this session.) I asked the children to add voice and text (I always give them the choice) comments on the various character images I had uploaded. I prompted them to make these kinds of comments:

• Questions that they might like to ask the characters. Consolidating the previous drama work.
• Answer a question that they see from someone else. Take on the character’s role and answer a question posed by other people in the class.
• General reactions and thoughts on the different characters in the poem.

Last year it was in the Summer term that I finally got my act together and began using more cloud based computing and relying less and less on my memory stick. This year has started with barely a shred of paper in sight and I actually do not know where my memory stick is. I have been pleased to see that Google Docs is beginning to deal with imported Word files containing tables much better and so in this post I share a couple that I use.

The links I have provided to the docs should give you access to your own copy – what you see will be yours and not a shared or published version. If you have problems with the link I have added another link where the document is currently published online.

Those of you in the English primary schools will appreciate the fact that we have new literacy and numeracy frameworks to work with and this is an example of a weekly literacy planning document that you could use.

You will of course have to remove the information that doesn’t apply and it is currently filled with a few days of planning from last week just to illustrate how it is used- this is the general style of planning we do for a week.

I like the fact that a digital document that remains as such can take advatage of the links that you can add. Once it is printed those links are dead.

Get your copy – Weekly literacy plan. If you have trouble with link you can view the document here.

Our timetable changes every week, as well as we accomodate different things going on in school we deal with staff absence, courses etc.  Rather than use an online calendar we use a simple weekly timetable that outlines what we are doing – this year we have also added links from the subjects to their respective planning documents too.

Get your copy – Weekly timetable. If you have trouble with link you can view the document here.

Rick my teaching colleague and I are using Google Docs to organise, author and share our planning for this year and it is already proving useful as we make changes during the week to planning. But the person you share it with will of course always have access to the most recent copy.I look forward to the further development of the template resource currently in it’s infancy within Google Docs so that I can make a template from my Docs home screen and generate further copies from that.

I hope you may find some of the Docs useful – let me know if they are and if you have any of your own to share.

I have written about Multiflyer before as it qualifies as one of my top 5 Times Tables resources. We begin the year with a test of the children’s multiplication knowledge to ascertain their strengths and where they need to focus their practice, we also like to be able to see how quick they are. Using Multiflyer we can do this all and have it marked within 15 minutes.

Previously we used to give the children a paper test of 100 multiplication facts, but timing did not come into it. Although it did when we had to manually check 3000 answers from the whole class! Using Multiflyer addresses the work life balance we all battle with.

Here is how we do it.

1. Access the site and choose Practice from the options. 
2. Select what you want to test the children on – we choose 1-10 from both sides.
3. Ensure that the children choose to have the Table OFF otherwise they will be able to find the answers using a multiplication grid.
4. Clicking START will display a practice question – ensure the children know what they need to do.



5. Remind them that they do not need to move the mouse and that the quickest method is to enter the answers and press enter on the keyboard.
6. We give the children 15 minutes to answer as many questions as they can. We find that this gives us a really deep picture of their times tables ability.
7. You might like to ask them to turn their volume down before they begin as the sound effects can be off putting for children trying to concentrate.
8. When the children have had 15 minutes, or however long you have given them, ask them to click on End MISSION. 
9. This will display a chart displaying how they got on. We ask them to choose PRINTABLE CHART from the top.



10. They enter their names and the date of the test and print if needed – this could be filed in their folders or with their other maths work.

Tomorrow sees us begin our Autumn term here in Nottinghamshire, England – most of the English primary schools will be back by next week at least. I just wanted to explain the road ahead for me in terms of the ways I will be using technology in the classroom this year, my classroom cornerstones. These tools/ideas will be sticking around for the course of the year, either because they have become part of the fabric of how we support learning in the case of the first two, or they are areas I want to explore the potential in more depth, the latter two.

Group media collaboration tool: Voicethread - this has become such a great tool to use in supporting children with speaking and listening. Beyond the basic group collaboration, last year I saw children grow in confidence due to the protracted use of refined talk and voice recording in Voicethread. Children who would usually not utter a thing when in a whole class situation were more willing to contribute and speak in front of the class. There is a lot going on when a child decides to record a comment in a Voicethread, most importantly for me is the fact that they willingly and independently vet and refine what they say. We will be looking to consolidate the use of Voicethread in the classroom this year, especially in the use of peer feedback in the writing process.

Office 2.0: Google Apps/Docs – I carefully documented the steps we took last term to use Docs in the classroom and I have even had the opportunity to contribute to the Official Google Docs blog in a post about introducing online collaboration. We will continue to use Docs as a cornerstone technology in our classrooms this coming year. The classes we were with last year have moved onto Year 6 and I look forward to seeing their work with the tool continue and the teachers alongside them develop their knowledge and understanding of the technology. Last year we did not have the opportunity in the Autumn and Spring term to use Docs so we will have a whole bunch of new opportunities to utilise the tool to support learning in the best way. I am looking to use Google Forms more and to reach beyond the school in bigger international collaborative projects – please let me know if you have a similar age class using Docs.

Timeline tool: Mnemograph - Last year I stumbled upon this great timeline tool just as we were finishing our Ancient Egyptian unit. We will repeat this unit, beginning before Christmas and I am pleased to be working with Will and Michael from Mnemograph in some development of new features which will perhaps make it easier for a whole class to work with the tool. If you have not had an opportunity to see it in action I would strongly suggest you take a look – it is very useful for Ancient history as it is one of the few online timeline tools that allows you to go back that far. I am looking forward to unleashing my class on Mnemograph and putting it through it’s paces this year.

Class blog: ???? - I have yet to decide about the tool that we will use this year for our class blog. I know that it doesn’t matter a great deal and it is more about the content. 2 years ago we ran a class blog for the Year 6 class I was with and found we had problems remembering usernames and passwords and the whole process took too long. I have been exploring the use of Posterous - a blogging tool that just needs an email sending to a simple address and that is it. It deals really well with all of the media a classroom could possibly throw at it. Of course a Blogger account has a similar email address to send updates too – still undecided about the best way to go yet.

I think there is enough there to keep me out of trouble for the year to come (there is of course about 10 other things I didn’t mention) – what are you focusing on this year in your classroom? What will be new for you? What are you going to consolidate and explore in greater depth?