Digital Review of a Math CBA

Students and teachers both feel the pressures of Curriculum Based Assessments or better known as CBA's. It is a time where students show what they have learned over a longer period of time. Fifth graders at Sendera Ranch Elementary were challenged by their math teachers, Mrs.Courtney Baker and Mrs Tracie Gomez, to display, explain, and justify mathematical ideas and arguments using precise mathematical language in written or oral communications that would help students to review and study for the next CBA in a new way.

First, the teacher deconstructed the review questions into three modules and assigned them to groups of students. Each group received five review problems that represented each module. Students downloaded the questions from Google Classroom to their Google Drive and imported them into the interactive whiteboard application called Educreations. In Educreations students created HOW TO videos using the annotation tools and voice recording features. Using this web based digital tool made it easy for students to demonstrate to their teacher they could solve the problem and show their work digitally. Below are pictures of Kristopher and Maverick as they are recording their Educreations videos.

 

Once the student was done with their video, the next tool used on the Chromebook was Screencastify. Screencastify was used to capture the tutorial video with easy integration into Google Drive as it saved the video for future use. Google Drive allowed the students the ability to set the shareable settings to allow others to view the videos. Click the image below to view Jack’s tutorial video showing the problem solving process for problem #12.

Jack stated, “This was an awesome way for me to send work to my teacher. It made learning math FUN!”

Mrs. Baker and Mrs. Gomez wanted to have something published that could be sent home to parents to provide help to their student before the CBA. Teachers also know the importance for students to provide peer feedback with written communication and doing this digitally enhanced the learning. Students created a Google Document where they embedded their Screencastify video and shared the doc with their group where students added detailed peer feedback. Students not only saw their peers comments, but they could go back and make any corrections needed based on feedback for the final production that would be published. Below is a copy of Kayden's Google Doc with peer feedback. Kaden states, “I like to read the feedback so I can make changes. Also, look at the time the comments were made, some of them were after school.” Mrs. Baker and Mrs. Gomez were so impressed with the students focus and dedication to the project. With the help of the Google Tools, this project extended to well past the school day and students were able to log into their Google Account from home and continue to learn.

 

The final published product is a compilation of student tutorial videos. A Google Slideshow was created and teachers gave all the students in class editing rights. Each student had their own slide where they embedded their video and a link to their video. Once the Slideshow was complete, the teachers published and emailed it out for reviewing outside the classroom walls. Click the image below to access the final product that was sent home this past Friday.

 

 

When I asked Kaden what he liked about this type of project he stated, “Normally I do not like computers, but the Chromebook makes things easy to organize, record, and do many things at one time.” Kayden added, “after reading through my peer feedback I knew I should have made the denominators equal.”

Maverick stated, “I know I am going to do well on this CBA.”

The amazing part of this project is just how fast the students have adjusted to the 1:1 environment. All of these skills were accomplished within ten days of the Chromebooks becoming deployed on this campus. ISTE (International Society for Technology in Education) emphasizes skills and qualities we want for students, enabling them to engage and thrive in a connected, digital world. This project met the ISTE Standard of Knowledge Constructor in which students critically curated a variety of resources using digital tools to construct knowledge, produced creative artifacts and made meaningful learning experiences for themselves and others.

When PBL meets App Smashing Field Day Fun

When the second grade at Hatfield Elementary was asked by their PE teacher to plan and design a new field day game that incorporates force, motion and/or balance, students jumped at the chance to create a great solution to this Problem Based Learning (PBL) challenge. 

To build schema students worked in groups with hands-on activities to learn about balance, rolling, spinning, and sliding. They researched various field day games using books and iPads (internet).

After students had collected enough information and understood with mastery the concepts of force, motion and balanced, they worked together to design a new game using what they learned.

Throughout the project, to cement their learning and connect ideas, students used iPads to collect observations via several apps including the camera and other platforms. Once the teams completed their research, they used Educreations to draw out a blue print of their activity. Then they worked as a team to build a model using various materials in the classroom and donated by families. In order to collect all of the information and the process, students created a PicCollage of their learning activities. They also created a Tellagami to explain how their game would be played. 

Once all of the pieces were finished, the teams created a video using Videolicious, inserting all of their previous files and recording their voices to explain the project in order to present their ideas to the PE teacher and to the rest of the school. 

The final presentation not only showcased the solution students came to for the initial problem, but captured the learning and integration that happened throughout the entire learning event.

Here is one example of the many projects completed by Hatfield Elementary's second grade led by Nicole Wallis:

Click here to see the full video presentation.

Stepping Up to Educreations

The first graders at Peterson Elementary were preparing for their math SBBBs. I talked with Mrs. Sanders and discussed apps that would work well for students to represent their work. After discussing pros and cons of several we determined that Edu-creations would be the best fit.

We presented the following math problem to out first graders:

There is a staircase that goes up three steps. How many blocks are needed for the first step? How many blocks are needed for the second step? How many blocks are needed for the third step? How many blocks in all are needed to make this staircase of three steps?  Explain how you know.

The problem involved a growing stair case.  First we let the students practice with their manipulatives and paper products to organize their thinking. Then we brought in all the ipads, gave the students a brief tutorial on the Educreations app and let them do their  ‘thing’. The children were engaged in their learning and talking with each other as they worked on the problems.  After discussing with students their experience of using the program, some of their comments were:

• Adria said, “I used the typing, it was easier than writing with my finger.”
• Haven said, “I liked it better, if you messed up you could just erase and not get another papers. It doesn’t waste paper.”
• Greyson said, “I didn’t get to do that one (Educreations) before. I liked it more than paper and pencil because you had so many choices to do that were fun.
• Armand said, “I had colors to use.”

 

The students are already asking when can we do it again.

By: Debbie Kahler, 1st grade teacher, Peterson Elementary

A Shape Is Not A Shape Unless You Add An iPad….

During Kindergarten Math workshop students listened to the story The Shape of Things, by Dayle Ann Dodds and Julie Lacome (Illustrator).

The class created a shape poster by looking around the room and finding objects that look like their shapes they chose.  Students then incorporated the iPads by taking pictures of their shape and thought about what they could add to it to make it into a digital design.  After they completed their designs, students wrote a sentence describing their picture.  Adding the finishing touches students recorded themselves talking about their shape picture using the sentence:

“A ____ is just a ____ until you add _____, then it is a ____. “

Creating the project, sharing with others, and the conversations about the learning helped to solidify student learning and build a strong conceptual base for their understanding of two dimensional shapes.  Additionally, because students saved their video in Educreations to be shared online, student projects could be re-visited time and time again to help refresh and review their knowledge of shapes.

When Mrs. Laura Janese and Mrs. Julie Peters set out to transform student learning through technology even they were amazed by the end result of 2 students in particular: Ally Peng and Kasey Dwyer.  This product not only was a classroom experience that changed student learning it became an exemplar that became a showcase product at and at TechnoExpo 2014