Animation Creation Helps Students Review Abstract Concepts in Science

Genetics is a unit of biology with many levels.  

There is the exploration of our traits when students compare some simple dominant and recessive traits and consider which genes they received from parents and ancestors. This leads to the logical problem solving of Punnet Squares.  

There is the history and biochemistry of DNA and all the new applications of technology, from DNA fingerprinting, cloning, and the creation of Genetically modified organisms. 

Ethical questions also arise from this new knowledge and ability. 

During this unit students do everything from lab work to debating the issues. When it is time to review for the unit test I find the biggest challenge for students is being able to explain what is happening during the biochemical processes that we cannot see with our eyes.

To address this limitation I incorporate an animation assignment into the review process.

Here is an overview of the assignment:

Students work in table groups already. For this assignment each table group is given a different topic: Protein synthesis, DNA structure and replication, creation of Recombinant DNA, or DNA fingerprinting. 

Students must have a clear understanding of their topic in order to plan, script and create their movie.

Students use dry erase boards, Bendaroos, clay, beads, and colored paper as props for a movie created in one 85 minute class period.

Using an animation App such as iMotion HD (Free) or iStopMotion ($9.99) each table had a stand to hold the iPad in place while they worked. Each group completed their animation shots and selected an appropriate play speed then saved the movie to their camera roll.  

Most groups made their entire animation in one series. Some realized they could build from a series of animations and even action shots that they would splice together later.  

From here the students could further edit their animation in iMovie, add subtitles, and include a voice over.  

The assignment is rushed but the point of the lesson was to review concepts and not create the "best animation." I could give more instruction in the App and time to storyboard if I was looking for a more polished finished product. I believe the film making process lead to the review of the material they needed.

My students easily figured out the apps and helped each other between groups if one person had more knowledge. As a teacher I am able to circulate and answer questions -- more about the biology than the technology. At the end of class, I show the short clips to the whole class and share all the movies with the Biology classes on our Moodle page for them to use for Review.

Below is an example of student created work for this assignment.

Hilary Staples
High School Science Chair
San Domenico School

iTeach, Therefore I Am

Several years ago I attended the California Association of Independent Schools (CAIS) Northern California Regional meeting. I attended a session on teaching animation in primary and middle schools with Barbara Cohen who, at the time, was Director of Technology with the Marin Country Day School.

Barbara Cohen

Barbara began her workshop with introductions and went out of her way to explain to all the other people in the room that she'd known me for a very long time. She added that I had taught her everything she knew about teaching video production with students.

I was a bit embarrassed about this introduction to the group. After all, the work I did with Barbara was at least 10 or 12 years earlier. We worked together on a project I created that taught students video production with VHS camcorders and linear video editing equipment. That process became obsolete long ago.

It occurs to me now that Barbara was really saying I had taught her an important lesson about the power of teaching with multimedia in the classroom. More specifically, I had taught her the value of engaging students in media production in the classroom.

Student video producers circa 1994

Classroom media production projects create an environment that promotes a deepening of student understanding of the content in their classes. Student media projects are also an integral part of student assessment in the modern classroom -- especially in 1:1 schools.

However, today students make their own videos on tablets and cell phones, and publish it for the world to see -- without the help (or even the request) of their teachers!

Which brings me to iTeach 2014.

At San Domenico School technology is a vital tool in the entire educational process. Teachers use it for their own personal productivity and for managing their educational resources and student grades and information. More importantly, because we are a 1:1 iPad school, we are engaing our students with technology every day. Having a powerful research and communication device stuffed in your backpack provides amazing access to information. These devices also include a variety of tools we now call Apps. Students use them to collect, analyze, and produce their own projects based on their research.

This is all fine, as long as everyone knows how to use these tools.

In a recent survey of San Domenico teachers, 82% said they publish course materials online using a variety of "cloud" resources including Moodle, Blogs, Google Sites and Drive, Box, Turnitin, and our Library web page. 93% of our teachers say they engage their students with digital tools in their curriculum 25% of the time or more in class. Almost 40% of our students are required to complete some sort of digital portfolio as part of our curriculum.

92% of our teachers say their comfort level with using technology in their classroom is 5 or higher on a scale of 1-10. 68% said they were a 7 or higher. On the same scale, 77% of our teachers answered 7 or higher when asked how important it is to continue to expand the way they integrate technology in their curriculum.

When teachers were asked to name the most important areas for us to focus when thinking about ways to improve technology integration in our curriculum they answered:

   "More professional development"
   "Technology specific curriculum development"
   "Time to collaborate with my colleagues"

Whether it be regular faculty meetings, one of our school level technology committees, outside conferences and workshops, or the creation and delivery of  iTeach 2014, our teachers want to learn from and teach their colleagues what they know about teaching with technology.

Sharing what you know, and being willing to learn from others is certainly a hallmark of teaching and the teacher very often becomes the student when it comes to technology. Now, with  iTeach 2014, San Domenico teachers and other leading technology using educators come together to teach and to learn about using technology to enhance student learning.

Thank you Barbara for reminding me that engaging students with technology on a regular basis is a powerful way to deepen their learning. I look forward to learning with you at iTeach 2014 this summer.

Brad Lakritz
Director of Technology

New apps and new opportunities

One of the great advantages of utilizing the iPad as a digital tool to enhance student learning is that the iPad is an incredibly flexible tool for both teaching and learning.  Teachers can prescribe specific apps and steps to support the design of a lesson.  At the same time, students are empowered to use apps that help them organize their own learning and extend that learning beyond the initial learning situation.

What are the apps that help students organize their work?  When we launched the one-to-one program at the beginning of the 2011-12 year, we found answers that worked for us at that particular moment in time.  Almost a year later, we have learned about new tools and have new insights into how our students use the iPad.  While it is still early in the school year, here are some of the tools that our students are using this Fall:

7th Graders in Annemarie Wheaton's Life Science course
use iPads.. with lots of other tools and media!

Notability - At this time last year, we rolled out Noterize (now rebranded and upgraded as Paperport Notes) to support annotating documents, completing handouts, organizing PDFs at other documents, and -- for some students -- taking handwritten or typed notes.  This tool was particularly used by high school students for most note-taking and by middle school students working with PDFs.  Noteshelf was an app used by middle school students for taking handwritten notes.  Throughout the school year, we kept hearing from friends at other schools about the merits of a $0.49 ($0.99/individually) app called Notability.  Notability integrates handwriting, PDF annotation, typing, recording, and organizing in one app.  It works with Box which is extremely helpful in our environment (though Notability's connection to Box is not as perfect as it could be yet).  Notability is now the app our high school, middle school, and primary school teachers show students first.

Socrative - Last year we used an app called eClicker for student response on iPads.  Student response apps allow you to take the "pulse" of a class's learning quickly and in a way that empowers less confident students to tell you whether they've learned something without embarrassment.  Such apps can also be used for quick quizzes.  eClicker worked but was limited to timed questions and was a little pricey for school-wide use.  Now the original eClicker is no longer available (more information on the new version of eClicker is documented here) but we have had success using a newer entry to this field, Socrative.  Socrative is a little more complicated but has additional features for running "quizzes" and instant response for quick student feedback.  I particularly like how it does not require student and faculty iPads to be on the same network and how quiz-takers can access quizzes through the web on any device.

Clibe - Clibe is allowing our high school students to create beautiful (really -- they are stunning!) journals in science classes and in other subjects.  Notebooks are instantly shared with the teacher without hassle so that the teacher is able to review the progress of student work effortlessly and with no printing of paper.  We have had some challenges getting this sync process to work perfectly in every case and are trying to contact support with little success, but hopefully those challenges will be ironed out soon.  We do not use this app with younger students because there is no way to shut off the impressive -- but "open" -- Clibe library of notebooks others in the world have shared.

Pages - QuickOffice Pro HD was our word processor of choice last year.  Our students and teachers are turning more often to Apple's Pages app for word processing.  We will have more discussion of paper-writing in a future blog post.

In the coming weeks, this blog will narrate how these apps have been used in particular classroom experiences.  We will also highlight emerging trends and new uses for iPads in the curriculum.  For example, we are observing how software that had been flash-based on the web for younger grades is -- in some cases -- being supplanted by engaging iPad apps.  How is this changing how we learn and teach?  We will also discuss other challenges and successes as we work with these digital tools in Kindergarten through twelfth grade.

Thanks for being part of our integrated technology experience,

Christopher K. Sokolov
Director of Technology

iPads empower anytime anywhere learning

High School art teacher Logan Wood describes the ease with which iPads work as a digital tool to support learning "anytime and anywhere":

Recently the Freshman class took a field trip to San Francisco. They visited the Coit Tower to view the murals and proceeded to the DeYoung Museum to check out the contemporary art collection. Students brought along their iPads to complete a writing assignment for both their English and Art classes. The portability of the iPad made it made it much easier for the students to get the writing done on the spot. Once we were back on campus the students only needed to email their teachers their assignments.

Show me the Nervous System!

High School biology teacher Hilary Staples uses ShowMe (@showmeapp) to transform students into teachers:

In order to review what they learned during their unit on the Nervous system students needed to be able to explain various concepts such as the anatomy of the brain, how we hear, see, smell and taste, and neurons. In addition they needed to understand the more complicated physiology of how neurons communicate, create electrical signals and transfer information chemically across the synapse. As they say, "If you can teach it, then you know it." That is why students were put into pairs or threes and given a topic in which to make a ShowMe. Then the links to the ShowMe presentations were added to their review sheets in the class Box (@BoxHQ) folder for everyone to be able to watch as much as they want while they are reviewing for the unit test.

Some examples:

http://www.showme.com/sh/?h=9scfPqi

http://www.showme.com/sh/?h=lulrNCq

iParents in the Classroom event

Our Head of School, Dr. David Behrs, highlights our "iParents in the Classroom" event which was held this week on our campus.  Dr. Behrs was pivotal in unifying the leadership of our School in all three divisions around the promise of integrated technology in the curriculum utilizing the iPad as our digital tool of choice:

Dr. Behrs welcoming families

We just concluded our "iParents in the Classroom" night. I am so proud of our students, faculty, and staff for developing and executing this informative program for parents. When we began integrating technology further into our classroom this year with our 1-to-1 student iPad program, we knew it would transform teaching and learning by building on the strong student-centered learning we foster at San Domenico. I don't think we fully appreciated the impact or how well the iPads would work in our classrooms. Every day I walk around this campus and see exciting projects and teaching occurring with lots of social group work that is so engaging.

This coming year we are going to continue to grow our integrated technology program in age appropriate ways. In addition to iPads in grades 6-12, we will have a 1-to-1 program in grades 4 & 5, an iPad cart in 3rd grade, and expanded iPad stations in K, 1, and 2.  Our "iTeach 2012" event in June (www.sandomenico.org/iteach2012) will bring educators from around the country to our campus to benefit from our leadership and experience from this pivotal year.

It's difficult to express the energy of this great evening.  Much like a traditional science fair, tables around the room featured students who demonstrated all kinds of apps and how they're used in (and out!) of the classroom.  A video montage from the evening gives a taste of the students' enthusiasm and engagement.


I want to give special thanks to all the students who showcased their amazing work; their families for supporting their participation; the all-school technology committee who coordinated everyone's amazing efforts, and and all our faculty & staff. What a wonderful community we have here at San Domenico!

My very best,

Dave Behrs

Using FaceTime to create a virtual classroom

High School math teacher Tammy Swanson explains how having iPads available in the classroom empowered her to help a student in a special situation:

"I have a student in my IM 3 Honors class who, due to a chronic health condition, must miss class frequently. At the beginning of class, this student 'calls' me on FaceTime, just as her peers are walking into my classroom. I set up a stool in the front row, prop up my iPad, and see her there in front of me! Along with her classmates, she checks her homework and has the opportunity to ask me questions. The other day, she participated in an investigation with a group of students in my classroom: I put my iPad on a desk, and she was able to participate as if she were right there.

Without this technology, my student would have to learn on her own and arrange times to meet with me outside of school so that she could try to catch up. With our iPad program, she is able to see and hear my lectures, participate in class discussions and group work, and get her questions answered in real time. This technology keeps her illness from slowing her education: she is on track with her peers and doing well in the course!"

Apple shakes things up.. again!

Apple made a series of exciting announcements today related to education that are worth serious reflection in the coming days. When we committed to integrating technology in the curriculum with a 1-to-1 student iPad program, our teachers and leadership saw a natural connection with San Domenico's integrated sustainability curriculum. Handouts and assignments can be "passed out" to students and "returned" to teachers digitally without being printed.

Further, traditional textbooks -- with their weight, cost, and limitations -- seem ripe for iPad replacement. We have been successfully using HMH Fuse Algebra 1 in Algebra classes but few similar products have existed. Our faculty have experimented with moving "beyond" the textbook with course web pages or collections of material hosted in our cloud.

Apple, today, announced a series of new products that continue to push the iPads effectiveness as a textbook replacement. iBooks Textbooks promises to give us easier access to traditional textbook content on the iPad with a compelling interface. iBooks Author looks like it will give our own faculty the opportunity to take their own work and make it available on our students' iPads with a real Multi-Touch interface.

We don't yet understand all the implications of these announcements yet. I was excited that the infrastructure of the Volume Purchase Program does work with textbooks but I'm not certain how to deploy books to hundreds of iPads quite yet. One thing seems clear to me: the new offerings look strong and will do what Apple often does best: shake things up.

I welcome your comments and thoughts on today's news!

Christopher K. Sokolov

Student Centered Learning with iPads in Global Studies

Dr. Justin Suran, high school teacher and technology facilitator, shared this classroom unit with us:

At the end of October, the students in my ninth-grade Global Studies class chose research topics from a list of possible topics on ancient India (e.g., “Aryan gods and goddesses” or “Chandragupta Maurya”) and ancient China (e.g., “bronze casting” or “Legalism”).  In a series of assignments, each student formulated a research question, found and took notes on several online sources, and wrote a works cited entry for each source.

I published each student’s research question on our Global Studies website, along with a one-paragraph synopsis of each report:

https://sites.google.com/a/sandomenico.org/globalstudies/resources/unit-two/ancient-india

https://sites.google.com/a/sandomenico.org/globalstudies/resources/unit-two/ancient-china

These student-authored synopses became a kind of “textbook” for our unit on India and China.  Each student also presented her findings in an in-class report.  Students created PowerPoint presentations using the Quickoffice app and projected their slides directly from their iPads. Ultimately, I used information from the in-class presentations and written synopses to write a series of multiple-choice questions for our summative assessments.

While some students may have benefited from a more structured, teacher-centered approach, most students rose to the challenge and learned a lot from the assignment.  They framed interesting and meaningful research questions, found reliable sources, and taught the rest of us what they had learned. In the process of writing their presentations and learning from one another, they learned to see themselves as co-creators of historically significant (and test-worthy!) knowledge.

10 Minutes with iPads in the Library

As the learning hub of the school, the library serves hundreds of students daily as they read, research, word-process, email, copy and print. With the adoption of our 1-to-1 iPad program this year we wanted to assess how students use this new educational tool during a recent study hall for the middle school and 'free' period for the high school. From the following "snapshots", all taken within 10 minutes of each other on Thursday, Nov. 10th, it is apparent that the iPad is a valuable (and enjoyable) option for student learning.

Algebra Word Problems                         High School Research Project                   Reading E-Books

Mapping                                                        Typing a Paper                                              Science Notes

Creating a Photo Collage                          Creating a Quiz                                           Watching a Movie

All the students photographed were working or reading independently on projects of their choosing. As can be seen by the wide variety of uses, the 1-to-1 program has been integrated fully with the Middle School and High School curriculum.

—Scott Fletcher, Library Director

Paperport Notes (née Noterize) enables core student tasks

Students in our 1-to-1 iPad program use Paperport Notes
to take notes, annotate documents, record audio

The iPad impacts learning and studying in many ways that are transformative. New uses are energizing and exciting. Yet it is also good for us to review past choices with our 1-to-1 student iPad program and our app choices. There are some basic tasks for students where tablet computing excels:

• Organizing PDF and other documents: handouts, articles, assignments;
• Critical reading and annotating: making notes in the text and margin while reading, creating an active relationship with the text;
• Taking notes by either typing or handwriting with a stylus or finger.

One app that we have had as part of our core "toolbox" for our students is Noterize. We made Noterize available to our students because it combined the functions listed above in one, easy-to-use app. Further, it functions well with Box, the cloud file storage system we use. Better yet, it became free in the summer of 2011. While it has not been a perfect tool for our students -- some students experienced the app crashing with loss of homework -- for many, it has been effective.

Noterize disappeared from the App Store a few weeks ago and has reappeared with a new company and a new name: Paperport Notes. There are a few new interesting note-sharing features that are not directly relevant to our student community this year but are worth investigating. We're also hoping that some bug fixes made it into this revision. We're hopeful this is a first step towards a larger update. But don't get me wrong: Paperport Notes, especially at it's free cost, is definitely worth investigating!

Do you use or like Paperport Notes? Or have an alternative app that you love? Please comment below!

ShowMe.. Ancient Civilizations in Global Studies

High School teacher Justin Suran, who also facilitates the high school faculty's work workgroup in integrated technology, recently had his students in the 9th grade use the app "ShowMe" on their iPads.  He reports:

App: ShowMe

http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/showme-interactive-whiteboard/id445066279?mt=8

San Domenico freshmen created presentations about ancient Mesopotamia on topics ranging from sailboats and the invention of the wheel to astronomy and architecture.  Students recorded their presentations using an app that allows them to record their voices, import images, and write with a finger or stylus on a digital whiteboard.  Students demonstrated, for example, how ancient irrigation worked and how cuneiform evolved from basic pictures to a sophisticated writing system.  

The following are some examples of the whiteboard presentations created by my 9th grade Global Studies students using the ShowMe app.  Students created these two-minute videos on different aspects of ancient Mesopotamian civilization:

Architecture

Sasha Nakae

http://www.showme.com/sh/?i=40034

Cuneiform Writing

Erin Wiens St. John

http://www.showme.com/sh/?i=38914

Irrigation Systems

Bailey Ferguson

http://www.showme.com/sh/?i=40857

Babylonian Astronomy

Coco Jiang

http://www.showme.com/sh/?i=40575

The Wheel

Annabelle Kronik

http://www.showme.com/sh/?i=41834

Learning psychology with iPads

As part of our 1-to-1 iPad program, our high school students are learning with new "apps" as they and teachers explore new opportunities. High School Science Department Chair Hilary Staples gave us this update on learning psychology with iPads:

"After units on learning, memory and cognition, the AP Psychology class is now exploring neuroscience and all aspects of the brain and nervous system. In order to understand and engage with the concepts students have completed a diversity of assignments; from analyzing 'how many parts of your brain it takes to ride a bike to Redhill', to acting out the neurotransmitter exchanges in the synapse and how drugs interfere, and even eating celebratory brain (shaped) jello. As we work on reviewing this material the students have really enjoyed using the 3D Brain App on their iPads which allows them to rotate the model of the brain in multiple directions. Areas can be selected and information about each location is highlighted."