The Cabeza Chronicles

Accepting the Invitation to Innovate Play

The Discovery of Innovating Play

Jessica LaBar-Twomey is a Kindergarten teacher who has made it her mission to prioritize play for play for children around the world by promoting #InnovatingPlay. The idea of combining play with technology for early elementary students is a concept first grade teacher, Sarah McCown, at Clara Love Elementary was willing to pursue for the math unit on 2D shapes. Jessica LaBar-Twomey’s blog post “I play with Design and Creation: #InnovatingPlay Through Math” was the perfect experience to support Mrs. McCown’s learning goals for her students.

Mrs. McCown’s first graders were working on their 2D shape unit in math and one of the skills is to join shapes together to make a new shape. First graders love to build and create with any manipulatives you give them. Mrs. McCown wanted to give them the opportunity to "play" and be creative, while still working with shapes. She asked her students to create an object (or scene) by joining pattern blocks. She gave them a bag of pattern blocks and allowed them to create anything they wanted on their desk. Once they were finished she took pictures of what they created, while they explained their work.

Students in Mrs. McCown’s class then turned their creations into a stop-motion video using the Stop Motion app. Mrs. McCown scheduled time with the campus instructional technologist to work with the kids one-on-one to create a stop-motion video. The students loved turning their shape creation into a stop-motion video. Mrs. McCown felt like the technology enhanced the learning experience for her kids because they were able to take something they created in class and put it into a video for all to enjoy. The app allowed others to see step-by-step how the students created their scene out of pattern blocks.

When Mrs. McCown reflected on the experience with her kids she shared, “All of my students enjoyed the time they were given to "play" and create using pattern blocks. When you allow kids the opportunity to create anything they desire, you give them the chance to work on their level to make something meaningful to them. All of my students were proud of their work and were excited to explain what they made to each other. They marveled at each other's work. It was a great learning experience for all!”

Stop, Drop, & Animate

If you’ve ever seen an episode of The Magic School Bus, then you have a pretty good idea of what it’s like to be a student in Mrs.Suarez’s 5th grade science class at JCT Elementary. Mrs. Suarez has a knack for engaging students through unique learning opportunities. She reels them in and then once they’re hooked, students tackle rigorous and relevant learning activities.

JCT Elementary prides itself on accepting challenges and maintaining a no matter what attitude. Students and teachers work hard to embrace the motto, never give up! Sometimes this attitude requires flexibility and creative thinking. In an effort to best meet the individual needs of all students, the 5th grade team at JCT recently decided to review their grade level data and arrange students in flexible groups; allowing the ELA and math teachers time to pull small groups. Mrs. Suarez is responsible for providing extension activities for students who have already mastered the concepts being covered during small group instruction. One day a week, this time is devoted to students extending current concepts through new technology platforms.

Mrs.Suarez’ can-do attitude and confidence to experiment with new tools, led her to Stop Motion animation using Google Slides. The idea originated from one of her favorite tech blogs, “Ditch That Textbook” by Matt Miller. Mrs. Suarez had student view the beginning of the “how to” video found on the blog. She then challenged her students to create their first project. Mrs, Suarez says, “Kids are true digital natives. I knew just enough to get them started. Students have amazed me with their creativity and the stories they can tell!” While students were exploring the tool, they were given the option to create a quick story or comic.

One student, Lucas, who become particularly fond of this activity shares, “I liked having some freedom with what I chose to make. But it was challenging to decide exactly what to put next. Then, my friend and I decided to share our stop motion animations with each other and combine our projects!”

The beauty of this activity is revealed during the next unit of study, when students will apply this technology skill into the curriculum with life cycles. Students will use Google Slides to create a stop motion animation that follows an insect through complete metamorphosis (egg, larva, pupa, adult) and incomplete metamorphosis (egg, nymph, adult). Mrs. Suarez believes Stop Motion will deepen students’ understanding of this somewhat challenging concept. Suarez states, “Metamorphosis involves change over time. The Google Slides Stop Motion animations allows students to create this change in small increments, while continuously being aware of the previous and next steps. Students can tell a story through pictures in their slideshow. Allowing students to create this change in the insects from egg to adult will help solidify their understanding of the difference between the nymph and larva stages, allowing them to more easily identify complete versus incomplete metamorphosis!” Students are already enjoying the ability to create their own animations. Grayson shares, “I think it is cool and interesting to make something that is animated that is not just a drawing. It’s digital so you can make it move so easy.”

After the students create their animations, they will use Screencastify to record themselves narrating the presentation slide by slide. Mrs. Suarez is excited to add this aspect because, “it saves the project directly into the student’s Google Drive and they can upload it directly to their ePortfolios! It is pretty seamless integration of so many different technology components!” Taking this lesson one step further, students will share their completed Slides with younger grades as visuals for metamorphosis.

In conclusion, with a little freedom to explore and time to create, students mastered a new tool that will provide them with an easier way to comprehend difficult processes. Extending beyond the walls of the classroom, some students are even motivated to continue their work at home. Fia explains, “It was so awesome! I thought stop motion would have to be done with something super fancy. I was surprised it was so easy. Now, I make them all the time!”

Triple Threat… Culture, Creativity, and Technology

When you think of a traditional art class in elementary, what comes to mind? Pencil, paper, paint, pottery and maybe a few other ways to create. At Peterson Elementary, Mrs. Mock and Mrs. Ericsson’s 5th grade art classes are taking it up a notch. They are incorporating 21st Century Skills and school culture into Fine Arts Education.  

Making of the movie...ACTION!

After viewing a variety of stop motion animation videos, a technique that makes inanimate objects appear to be moving, the students were given the task to create their own. They were given the prompt “How We Do Things at Peterson” and were able interpret that idea however they saw fit, giving students ownership and choice. Once they were in their groups, students assigned roles and split up tasks.  Being able to develop, implement and communicate new ideas to others effectively is an important skill to learn at this age. Everyone had different ideas on what they thought the video should be about. Presley pointed out, “We had to work together to come up with a plan. We knew we wanted to make sure that we represented what we do here at Peterson, so something that is really big here is our assemblies.”

Once the plan was in place, the groups created comic strips of the story they wanted to tell in the stop motion video. Mrs. Mock and Mrs. Ericsson gave them all different types of materials to to choose from for the creation of the background scene and characters.

Now it was time for the making of the movie! Students took images of their characters, moved the objects frame by frame, and created an illusion of movement in the iMotion app on the iPad. For many of the students, it was their first trying stop motion animation, and they were surprised how easy it was to create. Some groups wanted to take their movie up a level and add sound. They decided to smash the app Shadow Puppet Edu to voice over their video. Sydney commented, “Adding the second app was fun, it made our video more exciting and we were able to tell our story better.”

Mrs. Mock and Mrs. Ericsson found a way for 21st Century Learners to explore creativity, find the value of the importance of school culture, and actively use technology in the Fine Arts classroom.

Claymation Creations

From creating their own set, modeling their characters, and writing their scripts, 5th grade students at Cox Elementary got to experience what it is like to create a claymation short film.  Using the Stop Motion app, students were able to capture picture by picture each action in their story.  

Mallory, Kaylea, and Paige's group truly enjoyed this project.  "We started with the idea of creating our set in space," mentioned Mallory.  "This was a crazy idea, but Mrs. Ascher helped direct us to some tools that we had in the art room that could help. Paige added, "We learned  how to make a background that looked realistic.  We used shiny stars and made a planet out of a 

plastic ball and pipe cleaners.  We used glitter, so with the black light, everything appeared to be glowing in space." The team agreed that planning an entire story requires organization, time, and attention to detail. They team had 304 pictures to put into their film. 

Kaylea points out, "The most challenging part of this project was moving the pictures just the right amount so that that movie was smooth and not choppy."  The group agreed that planning the script and assigning roles was important to getting things done on time.  "We helped each other think of new ideas to add on to our story.  Two people worked on the background, while the other worked on props and organizing the pictures," stated Mallory. This project required much communication and collaboration.

In art, these students were introduced to several famous paintings. They decided to include The Mona Lisa, Starry Night, and Dancing Lady in their film. "These are paintings in our classroom and we’ve talked about them as a class," said Paige. "This is why we decide to have our characters talk about each of these in space. We wanted to do space to be different and think outside the box." Overall, these students and the entire class learned not only about story creation, but organization, communication, and how to publish entertaining work for a target audience. In fact, it's not just the students at Cox Elementary that felt this project had impact. The University of Southern California featured this project in the Toolkit for Digitally-Literate Teachers.

Tearing Down Walls for a Community Classroom….

What do you get when you open the wall between two ELA classrooms?  Well...50+ students in one 7th grade classroom taught by Mrs. Heather Bjornberg and Mrs. Andrea Driver at Truett Wilson Middle School which equals LOTS of choice and digital creativity!!  

The lesson challenged students to analyze the relationship between theme and choice using the structure of Mythology.  Of course the teachers - YES TEACHERS - offered digital choice to their students by allowing them to choose any web-based program or app to showcase their knowledge.  Two student projects really stood out amongst the others: Jamie and Ashley. Jamie created a digital myth that explains the relationship between Demeter and Chartus that cautions readers to heed warning signs.  Ashley created a digital myth that showcases the conflict between Zeus and Gaea.

The creativity began flowing when both students used their devices: ipad, netbook, and smartphone, along with applications such as stop motion technology,  and multimedia presentations to animate their stories.  

Both Mrs. Bjornberg and Mrs. Driver knew they were not experts with the tools, but they encouraged their students to explore and become their OWN experts!  The teachers invited the campus I.T. Coach to help with planning and preparation before the execution.   I asked both students “What is your favorite part to having so many students and two teachers in your class?” Without hesitation Ashley said, “I always can have different perspectives about what we talk about in class.”  Jamie replied, “more collaboration and students to interact with on projects.”  

This is the first year that Mrs. Bjornberg and Mrs. Driver have been co-faciltators of a 7th grade ELA class and they are excited to continue this type of teaching for future years to come.