Evaluate – Page 6 – iLearn Technology

The Future We Will Create: all the in-between important stuff

March 20, 2013Kelly Tenkely2 Comments21223 views

A few years ago I watched the documentary TED: The Future We Will Create. Being a fan of TED talks, I was curious to learn more about the behind the scenes of TED talks and how the conference came to be. I had heard snippets here and there that the TED conference was like a boys club…you had to have money and “be” somebody to get into a live event. The documentary pulled back the curtain a little on the intentionality of the way that TED conferences are set up. They are intentionally packed with entrepreneurs and successful people from various walks of life to bring together change makers. The actual speakers may not be well known (at least not prior to the talk), they have a limited time to speak, and they share an inspirational message. But TED isn’t really about the talks, TED is really about the talks that happen in between the talks. It is about those serendipitous moments that happen when people are exposed to a shared inspiration and then have opportunity to dream about it together. The magic is in those moments when people with different perspectives come together and share their thinking from that unique vantage point. It is really about the in between moments, that seemingly empty and unimportant time. TED does something else that I wasn’t aware of, they offer one TED speaker a “prize”. Only the prize isn’t really a prize (not in the way we typically think about prizes), instead it is that this person gets to make a wish. They get to cast a vision and a “what-if.” They get to challenge the audience to solve a problem that matters to them. Then comes the incredible part- these people actually use their unique gifts and talents and perspective to help make it so. World changing. A future that we create. Together.

As I was pulling together resources for our current inquiry block about “sharing the planet,” I came across several fantastic TED talks that could act like a catalyst for deeper thinking and additional curiosity. As I watched each video, I kept thinking about the behind the scenes, the in-between talks that aren’t documented. The change happening as a result.

Then it hit me, we could do this at Anastasis. We could watch these talks together, and then allow for the in-between talks. We could be intentional and let our students engage in the discussion, the serendipitous moments of one thing leading to another, and another. We could give our students time to just talk and wonder and discover together. We could narrow it down to 3 or 4 TED talks and provide our students with serendipitous in-between. We could open up the opportunity for our students to come up with the “wish” or challenge that the others would work to make happen. We could empower our students to go through this same process and then watch them use their unique perspective, gifts and talents to find solutions and dream up new possibilities.

I’m excited to try this. I believe that we are in the midst of genius every day at Anastasis. These kids are really incredible. I want to see what unfolds when we offer just a little inspiration related to our inquiry and then give them some space to just explore and talk. I want them to see that when hunches collide, BIG world changing ideas happen. I want them to understand that they are world changers.

Has anyone else done this with students?

I think that this will be a starting point. For now we will watch talks. Next year, I would love to have our students plan their own talks. I want to invite the best-and-brightest from around the world to come listen to our talks. I want to provide the in-between moments where change is enacted.

Stay tuned…

An inquiry into sharing the planet: embodied energy awesomeness

March 18, 2013Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment2875 views

You may think that when I’m not posting here regularly, it is because I’ve run out of cool new technology to share…or maybe I’m just being lazy…or tired of blogging. While I’ve had moments of the latter two, it really boils down to the 24 hours I have in a day. Sometimes I choose sleep!

This week, I’ve been pulling together our last inquiry block of the year at Anastasis. I can’t believe that we are down to counting weeks before we say goodbye for the summer.

Our last inquiry block is an inquiry into sharing the planet. For our 6th through 8th graders the focus is: “People can choose to take specific actions to help conserve Earth’s resources.” Each time I put together an inquiry guide for teachers, I am sure to offer plenty of more detailed questions that they can use to help guide the inquiry. Below are some of the questions I included.

What can people do to help conserve Earth’s resources?
What are other countries doing to help/hurt conservation?
How does United States demand impact Earth’s resources?
What country has the most impact on Earth’s resources/the least? Why do you think this is?
Is conservation a political issue?
What is ecological overshoot?
What is embodied energy?

I love helping teachers craft the opportunities for students to be curious, to dig into learning. During this planning, I found the following resources that are too good not to share!

What it is: Embodied Energy free ebook download. Created by a design firm, this ebook does a nice job explaining embodied energy.

How to use the Embodied Energy ebook in the classroom: This ebook is a well designed book that will introduce students to the energy that we don’t see in the objects around us. This pdf can be projected for a whole class, downloaded on individual student devices or, if you must, printed out. Use this ebook along with the Sustainability by Design TED talk playlist to spark student interest into embodied energy and how it can impact the decisions we make every day.

These introductory activities led me to the Energy Trumps project. This is a design project by the Agency of Design that looked at using design to help people better understand, and take-in-to-account, the way that we build, design and consume. I absolutely love the idea of students working together as a class to study a variety of materials. Each student could create one (or several) of their own embodied energy trading cards to help others understand the environmental impacts of materials. Students can research key environmental properties of materials including embodied energy, embodied carbon, embodied water, recycled content, extraction intensity and years of reserves. These can be used to compare materials at a glance. (If you purchase the cards created by Agency of Design, you get the added bonus of an augmented reality feature that brings the material properties to life to explore in 3D. Students can test out the different amounts of material they can get for one megajoule of energy.)

Take this a step further and ask students how they can use that information to help design a more sustainable future. How can they hack every day objects? How can they change the way that society builds, consumes, etc.?

How can the idea of embodied energy be communicated to a larger audience so that more of the picture is taken into account by the average consumer?

Any time I create a new inquiry block, I work to remember that we are in the business of apprenticing change makers. These students matter and WILL change the world. I love reminding students that age does not have to act as a restriction for world change.

Felix Finkbeiner is a student in Germany (similar in age to these Anastasis students) who is changing the world in HUGE ways. Felix’s Plant for the Planet initiative has started a movement of planting trees…millions of them! Read the an article about Felix here.

Felix has also addressed the United Nations with a speech to open the International Year of Forests which can be viewed here.

Students can use this embodied energy calculator to explore their own curiosities.

The Happy Planet Index is a fantastic way to discover the extent to which 151 countries across the globe live happy and sustainable lives based on their efficiency, how many long and happy lives each produces per unit of environmental input. Data can be viewed in map or table format.

I love the potential that a new inquiry block holds. We offer guidance and some starting places to spark interest, but where students find passion is always exciting to watch unfold. We truly are in the midst of genius in our students!

The other reason to love inquiry? The brilliant way that it allows room for transdisciplinary exploration, and touches each level of Bloom’s Taxonomy. I mean really, how can you beat learning that looks like life?

Digital Life: Video Killed the Radio Star

March 1, 2013Kelly Tenkely4 Comments3086 views

What it is: Being a child of this decade, I am LOVING @amyburvall‘s newest video to the tune of “Video Killed the Radio Star.” Brilliant. If you don’t know @amyburvall, you should. She is amazing and makes learning history so very enjoyable. The newest music video is all about Digital Life. A great one to kick off discussions with your class about digital life and clue them into what MTV used to be about in the pre “16 and Pregnant” days. How I long for those days to be back (at least as far as programming is concerned).

How to integrate Digital Life into the classroom: The Digital Life video is a fun way to start a discussion or inquiry into digital life. I don’t know about you, but the digital is becoming SO common that it tends to blend right into the background and we take it for granted. This is an important discussion with students because most of them have never known a life without idevices and smartphones that instantly connect them to the world. This “invisible” tech can be problematic. Kids can take it so for granted that they don’t see the separation between their digital life and their real life. Not everything needs to live online forever (how many duck faced pictures can a person have?). That break-up that happened in 8th grade is probably not the footprint kids want to leave for future employers.

When we talk with students about digital life at Anastasis, we make sure to highlight the following: EVERYONE has access to things posted online- even when you think it is private; deleted from Facebook or Instagram doesn’t always equate to being gone-it can always be resurrected (screenshots are killers); disrespecting others online is bullying-period; there is no sarcasm font- choose your words carefully; emoticons can’t capture every emotion-sometimes conversations are best had f2f (that’s face to face); words can be damaging and lasting-don’t be a bully; cherish your relationships off-line-take time to be away from the connected world.

Tips: If you haven’t seen @amyburvall history videos, go now. You can thank me later. 🙂

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using Digital Life in your classroom.

If It Were My Home: Compare Countries Visually

February 11, 2013Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment2687 views

What it is: We are just heading into a new inquiry block at Anastasis Academy. The kids are exploring world communities and our interdependence on each other. If it Were My Home is a fascinating website that asks students to consider what their life would be like if they were born in a different country. Would they be the same person? If it Were My Home is a country comparison tool where students can compare living conditions in their own country to those of another. When students select a country, there is a visual overlay comparison of maps. Students can easily visualize relative size of another country based on their own state or country. Students will also see a break down of death rates, HIV/AIDS, birth rate, electricity availability, oil consumption, economic comparison, health care, and class divide. Students have the ability to compare the country they selected with another country of interest. Students can learn additional information about the country and vote to show if they would rather live in the chosen country. Additionally, most countries offer a recommended reading list with books about the selected country. When students click on the mini-facts, they get a full description of the fact along with the original source. SO stinking cool!

How to integrate If it Were My Home into the classroom: If it Were My Home is an outstanding way for students to visualize and compare other countries to their own. I love that this site helps students with geography, but also reveals that there is a real world community that is interdependent and diverse. This site helps students recognize the unique place they are in the world and how it relates to other countries. I love the added awareness of human rights and social justice issues that this site encourages. In our inquiry unit, we are looking at what the facts listed on the site mean about the government, belief systems, human rights, equality, social justice and landscape of the countries they represent.

This is a site that can be used to help students ask bigger questions. To see a fact about another country, and ask what bigger problems might be revealed, what we can learn from other countries, and break down some stereotypes that students may have about other countries.

Ask each student to choose a country to compare to their country of origin. Have students pair up with a partner and compare their chosen countries to the country of origin.

Choose “Disasters” from the menu at the top of the screen to view some natural and man-made disasters that affected the lives of millions of people. Students can view the scope of the disaster in relation to where they live, helping them to better visualize the impact that man-made and natural disasters can have on a population.

Tie in a creative writing project and have students imagine that they are moving from their country of origin to their chosen country. Students can use the information and comparison as inspiration for their fictional story about what life would be like in their new home. Students could also write a short autobiographical story about growing up in their country of origin, followed by a short “autobiographical” type story about their life growing up in a different country.

Use the statistical data in If it Were My Home for some real world mathematical comparison between countries. If Rwanda has a 10.7 times higher chance of dying in infancy, how many infant deaths does it expect on average per year? If Rwandans make 98.06% less than Americans, what would you expect an average salary to be?

I used Rwanda as my example because Rwanda is where we started our first Anastasis sister school. Our 2nd-3rd grade class has been absolutely fascinated with Rwanda and poured over this site to learn more. 🙂

Tips: Encourage your students to read one of the recommended books about the country they chose. This will help them understand more about the country they chose, and give the people in that country voice beyond the facts listed.

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using If it Were My Home in your classroom.

Inklewriter: interactive story designer

February 5, 2013Kelly Tenkely2 Comments12614 views

What it is: Inklewriter is a great digital tool that lets students (and teachers if you are so inclined) write and publish interactive stories. Inklewriter lets students create choose-your-own-adventure type stories, story lines can come with choices and then be linked back together. Inklewriter makes this process easier by keeping track of which story paths have been finished and which still need work. There is no set-up required, no programming language to learn and no diagrams. Inklewriter is free to use and easy to share with the world when it is published. When a story is finished, it can even be converted to Kindle format!

I found the Inklewriter format to be pretty intuitive and easy to use. I think intermediate elementary and older will have no trouble using this tool for creative and informative writing.

How to integrate Inklewriter into the classroom: Inklewriter is a great digital tool for creative writing. Students can explore multiple plot lines and what-if scenarios in their fictional writing. I also like the idea of using Inklewriter to ask kids to explore the “what-ifs” in history. What if we lost/won this war/battle? What if the other guy (or girl) had been elected president? What if the Berlin wall hadn’t come down? These types of stories are fantastic opportunities for students to explore their curiosities and, in the process, learn more about the event they are exploring. After all, you have to know something about how an event actually went in order to write alternate endings.

Inklewriter would be a fun way for students to come up with alternate endings to a novel they are reading. Our students wrote a variety of endings for The Giver. Each student wrote a different ending that picked up from the last chapter of the book. Inklewriter would have been a great tool to use for all of these endings to be available in one place. Students could copy/paste the last paragraph of the actual book and then offer their alternative endings as options.

In science, students could use Inklewriter as a tool to record their hypothesis. Students can write out the objective and steps in their experiment and make a new “alternate ending” for their various hypothesis.

In math, students could create story problems where they lead others down the path to discover the correct answer.

Tips: These interactive stories are MADE for your tablet devices…if you have some in your classroom, take advantage of them!

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using Inklewriter in your classroom.

Numberphile: a series of numberly videos

January 28, 2013February 1, 2013Kelly Tenkely2 Comments3882 views

What it is: Numberphile is a series of “numberly” videos by Brady Haran. This is the same guy behind some other great projects including periodicvideos and sixtysymbols. These videos reveal some of the mystery behind numbers and math in fun, short snippets! I could give a long, drawn out explanation about the site…but really, you should go have a look and play a few videos. Or, try out the video below:

How to integrate Numberphile into the classroom: Numberphile can make a math geek out of anyone, myself included! I don’t tend to geek out very much about numbers or math, but show me pattern and reveal some of the mystery that numbers hold and I am in. This is what Numberphile does beautifully! Numberphile would make a fantastic opening for math class. Start each math class with these short videos to get your brain’s math muscles working. I’ve watched 3 videos in a row and I am seriously geeking.

Ask students to each choose a different video to watch. Students can learn a new math “trick” or pattern in math to teach their classmates. The goal: creatively teach the concept! They could create their own video, stop motion animation, infographic, story, illustration, etc. Hold a math day (3/14 would be fun…pi day) where students get to spend the day teaching one another.

You may assume that these videos are best for older students, not so! At Anastasis, our 2nd and 3rd graders had a ball learning about Fibonacci and will happily explain it to any who enter their classroom. Find an area of interest and share the passion!

Tips: All of the videos on Numberphile are YouTube videos. If you don’t have access to YouTube in your building, try one of these methods for accessing the videos:

YouTube for Schools- This is a YouTube that has been created just for schools. Network administrators must be involved so that they can add this option for YouTube into your filtering system. This is a completely customizable option that lets teachers and administrators add videos to a playlist that you have predetermined you want students to watch. Teachers can find videos by Common Core Standard, subject or grade. Students can watch videos that teachers and administrators have approved or any YouTube Edu video (think Kahn Academy, PBS, TED, Stanford, etc.).
SafeShare TV- This site lets students watch YouTube videos without ads, links, comments and related videos. You also have the option to crop videos and share videos with a unique URL.
YouTubeXL- This is a service that YouTube provides that lets you watch videos on large screens without the ads and comments. Neat tip: if you time “quiet” before the YouTube url, it takes you to a safe page where you can watch a YouTube video. WAY cool and easy to do on the fly!
Clean VideoSearch- This site lets students search through YouTube videos without the comments, ads and busy sidebar. It has additional features like the ability to choose how many videos you want to see on each page in your search.
Clea.nr– This service (a browser plugin) deletes all of the obnoxious extras that hang around videos (ads, comments, related videos). You can also search YouTube without all of the extras showing up.
ViewPure– This site cleans out all the clutter and gives you just a video. Bonus: There is a quick button that you can add to your browser so that you can go to a video, click on “Pure” in your bookmark bar and instantly have a clean video.
Dragontape– This service lets you drag videos into a timeline and share them easily with students. This is great for mashing up several videos, or cropping multiple videos into one.
Movavi– This is a video conversion service. Wonderful for teachers who can’t or don’t want to access a video directly from YouTube. Copy/paste the url you want to convert, choose a file type, done!
Zamzar– This is another great video conversion service. Works quickly and easily!
SaveYouTube- This site used to be called KickYouTube. Here you can enter the url and download it to your computer to play offline.

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using Numberphile in your classroom.

Popcorn Maker: Mashup video with images, articles, text, maps, etc.

January 23, 2013Kelly Tenkely2 Comments5603 views

What it is: Popcorn Maker is a super cool site that I learned about from Michael Zimmer’s blog, The Pursuit of Technology Integration Happiness. Popcorn Maker is an online video mashup tool that makes it easy to integrate several different forms of online media into a video. A clip from YouTube can be enhanced with article clips, images, text, audio, maps, other live feeds and social media content. Add some “bling” to any video clip…interactive is better! Videos can be mashed without logging in. Creating a user profile let’s you save and share the finished project.

How to integrate Popcorn Maker into the classroom: Popcorn Maker is a great way to enhance videos. Teachers can use Popcorn Maker to mashup media for students to engage with. This could be adding a map to an historical video so that students can better visualize where an event is taking place, adding a wikipedia article to expand on an idea that a video touches on, adding a live social media feed with student comments as a “backchannel” video, etc. This type of use is great for expanding on Kahn academy type instructional videos (which can be a bit boring/dry), educational videos, etc. Wouldn’t it be great to have a real-life example pop up during a Kahn academy instructional video? Students can connect number sense and computation. (What a novel concept!) For young students, create a video with embedded directions (audio or text) and next steps for learning. This would make for a great learning center for completing a science experiment, multi-step directions, or next steps of learning.

Students can use Popcorn Maker to enhance videos that they have created, to further expand on an idea, to help explain a researched topic to the rest of the class, or to share reflections on a video with others. Because students can add text, it is easy for them to add their “blogged” reflections directly in a video to be shared with others. So often our students start their research with a video search. Ask them to create a mashup of all of their research using Popcorn Maker. This will help them to dig beyond the video for other relevant content that adds to their understanding.

In the “flipped” classroom, Popcorn Maker takes the videos to the next level. Popcorn Maker could be a great way to help apprentice students in the art of learning. Students can see the way that connections are made among different media types and are led through how to think and expand on an interesting topic. After students have viewed a few mashups, ask them to create their own. This could be really helpful in discovering misunderstandings in learning, gaps in the way research is being completed, or difficulties in making connections.

Tips: The tutorial on the first page is really useful. I recommend it before beginning a project!

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using Popcorn Maker in your classroom.

Physics Central: Nikola Tesla and the Electric Fair

January 9, 2013Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment2864 views

What it is: Physics Central is a fantastic website full of…you guessed it, physics! There are fantastic sections for students to explore science, activity books, experiments and activities. Students can learn more about physics in action (physics as found in the world around us), meet physicists, and learn about physics research. Physics Central will ignite a students curiosity in: sound, electricity and magnetism, force and motion, light and optics, material science, quantum mechanics, space and the universe, and thermodynamics and heat. My favorite find on Physics Central so far (I’m sure there will be many more favorites the longer I explore) is the Nikola Tesla and the Electric Fair section. Here, students will find a downloadable kit that includes a manual, comic book, and four related activities.

How to integrate Physics Central into the classroom: Physics has always been among my favorite sciences. There is something about it that is fascinating to me. Physics Central is packed full of great resources to enrich your classroom. The comics are a fun way to learn about famous scientists, inventors and events in science history. The complementing activities bring the comics to life and invite students along on the journey of discovery.

Work with your students on a “PhysicsQuest” like Nikola Tesla and the Electric Fair and see what they come up with. Compare their results with the actual solutions (posted on the site). Join the current PhysicsQuest with your students to help students recognize the fun and relevance of science. You can register now for the Spectra: Turbulent Times quest.

Tips: Start a PhysicsQuest with your students, as an after school club, or as a home extension investigation.

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using Physics Central in your classroom.

Playfic: create, play and remix text-based games

January 8, 2013Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment8006 views

What it is: Playfic is a site that let’s users create, play and remix online text-based games. I may have lost some of you already…but don’t leave yet! A text-based game is a genre of game that uses no graphics or sound, but instead, uses text to tell a story in an interactive world. Think of a choose your own adventure tech-style. Students can create a story that others can interact with by directing the story using words and phrases. As an example, the story might be about a forest, describing what you can see East, West, North and South. The player would type in a direction “East”, hit the return key, and the story progresses. You can try out a sample text-based game here.

How to integrate Playfic into the classroom: Playfic has all kinds of good stuff for classrooms. To create a story, students must first learn a little bit of coding. Tutorials are included on the Playfic site, and are easy enough to get your students up and running in no time. There is even a link to an Inform 7 (coding language) recipe book that will have your students dreaming up new scenarios and actively researching how to make them come to life. Students can create games for each other while strengthening their writing and grammar skills. This is wonderful for fictitious writing, but could also be used for students to explore “what ifs” in history and science. Students can take a moment in time and dream up what might have been different about the world if the event hadn’t happened the way that it had. As they are researching and learning about the actual event, they will also be analyzing why the event is important and critically thinking about it’s impact on the world we live in. Similarly, students could explore a science experiment, hypothesizing what will happen and the different outcomes that might occur.

Teachers could create these choose your own adventure stories for students for new learning or review of a topic. Wouldn’t it be cool to have a story using sight word vocabulary that prompted practice with the sight words?

I know a handful of students who really struggle with writing…it is PAINFUL. These students are brilliant. They have great ideas to share. One of the students I have in mind came up to me today and said, “over break I taught myself Lua (programming language).” Students like these will be all over this type of writing. What a cool way to engage them and excite them about the writing process in a new way.

One of the things that I really like about Playfic is that it takes a lot of planning, organizing, and thought to create this type of story. For some students the planning/organizing portion of writing is a real struggle. This site would be so useful in teaching students the importance of those steps. I also love that it will have them researching and looking up solutions for how to make their ideas come to life. Just like we do every day in the “real world.”

Tips: The Inform 7 Recipe book can be found here.

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using Playfic in your classroom.

E is for Explore: discovery, science, math, art, literacy, social studies and more!

January 7, 2013Kelly Tenkely3 Comments4974 views

Happy New Year!! I have to say, I wasn’t heart broken to see 2012 go and welcome a year of new beginnings. 2012 felt…hard. And uninspired. I think that is what happens when you see a dream realized and then comes the part where you are in the middle of it, making it work and doing the HARD work. 2012 wasn’t a year I felt particularly creative. I miss that, it is part of my essence. I’ve been so incredibly busy, just working to keep everything going, that I had nothing left over. I’m hoping that 2013 is a different story. Step 1: the first post of 2013. Here is to creativity and passion!

What it is: I discovered a new blog that I am absolutely loving! It is hard to beat a place where exploration is not only welcome, but encouraged. E is for Explore is that place. Here you will find new learning activities and a fantastic collection of ideas from other sources. There is a handy-dandy index that helps you find just what you need quickly and easily. I’ve been working on collecting resources for this inquiry unit and E is for Explore has been an absolute treasure trove. Topics include discovery/exploration, science/engineering, mathematics, art, literacy, social studies and seasons/holidays.

How to integrate E is for Explore into the classroom: E is for Explore is a great tool for unit, center, and inquiry planning. I am really enjoying the huge bank of hands-on activities and projects all designed to encourage exploration in learning. The wide range of activities will keep sparking curiosity in a variety of disciplines.

As I plan out inquiry units and gather resources, I am always on the lookout for activities that will encourage students to explore and spark new curiosities. E for Explore made this process infinitely easier, bringing me an easy-to-search collection of activities, with great instructions, all in one place. Many of the activities are manageable enough for a center activity within the classroom…great for differentiation and individualization!

I shared E is for Explore with some of our students, they had a great time looking through the science experiments and learning about how to make mini robots and floam. This would be SO much better than a small tic-tac-toe board for students to choose an activity from. Students can explore the entire site and choose an exploration that is of interest to them and complete it accordingly.

Tips: My hope is that iLearn Technology does for you what E if for Explore did for me. Did you know that you can search by keyword (at the top of my website) or through a multi-category search (in the sidebar on the right)? Choose as many variables as you want and see what you can find! I categorize every post by keywords, Bloom’s Taxonomy level, Grade Level, Resource Type, and Subject Area. After 7 years of free resources, I’ve amassed quite a collection of awesome, free classroom tools. Go ahead, give it a try and see what new fun finds you come across!

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using E is for Explore in your classroom.