I am currently working with a group of eight teachers to work through a teacher inquiry process where they identify a curriculum need for their students and then match this to an ICT tool that can help them address this need.  Teachers have been sharing the curriculum focus with me over the last week and I have been helping them to identify possible ways of working with ICT that they will implement in Term Three. I deliberately set out to work with teachers who might be a little lacking in confidence and I am finding it interesting to see what they are deciding to focus on.

One teacher wants to concentrate on improving the students’ general knowledge. I found this to be a little challenging to my own beliefs about teaching and learning in a digital age. Should we still be trying to build up ‘general knowledge’ at a time when students can find out almost any fact they want by doing a Google search? How could I approach this subject in order to make the teacher feel her ideas were valued while still keeping the focus on effective pedagogy? Was I right to think that general knowledge was now not as important? Do my own feelings partly stem from the fact I can never remember names, dates or locations so I am truly terrible in a quiz night team?

So I did what I normally do – I started to search around the net using Google. In this way, I stumbled across an article titled ‘Is Google killing general knowledge’ I enjoyed the article and thought that it did a pretty good job arguing the point that we do still need to have a basic level of knowledge to be effective learners. Here is a quote from that article:

This is just a quick late night post to share a video about how to sign up on Skype as an educator in order to find other educators to collaborate with. Very cool! I am going to turn over a new blogging leaf after my long period of silence

How to create a profile and find a teacher from Skype in the classroom on Vimeo.

OK – so I haven’t been very prolific recently on this blog but with my son Toby due in a week’s time and my 14 month old daughter Zoe to keep me busy as well, I guess some of my online life has taken a back seat

Still, here is an article I wrote recently for a magazine that looks at two different tools for creating live collections of websites. They are both good tools for different reasons though I probably lean more to Live Bookmarks.

Organising the web

In education, there are many times you need to organise content from the internet. You might be creating a bank of websites for the students to access around a topic (or be asking them to do this), categorising useful teacher websites to be able to easily find them again, sharing great websites with other educators, or creating activities for students to complete as they move through different websites. Bookmarking sites on your own computer may help you to find them again but it doesn’t allow for many of the other functions.

There are online tools that allow you or your students to build up link resource banks that can be shared easily. Many people know about tools such as Delicious or Diigo for online bookmarking . However, there are now new tools that give you live versions of each bookmarked site rather than just a static link in a list. This article is going to focus on two such tools; LiveBinders and Jog the Web. Both are excellent options and have slightly different focuses.

LiveBinders

http://livebinders.com

The name of this tool pretty much sums up the way this tool works. You can set up an online ‘binder’ around a topic of your choice. Within each binder, you can have tabs containing live versions of websites. You can also create subtabs within each tab so you can break a tab topic down into subtopics. Below is an example of a LiveBinder I have set up to share Web 2.0 tools. You can visit this LiveBinder at this address: http://livebinders.com/play/play_or_edit?id=26329

The live versions of the sites that load within the tabs or subtabs can be navigated through without leaving the Live Binder environment or you can click on the hyperlink at the top of the window to visit the site directly.

Clicking on ‘Edit Menu’ while working within Live Binders gives you a number of extra options. You can upload a file into a tab or subtab, change the position of a tab or subtab, insert media from sites such as Flickr, YouTube or Delicious links, change the layout of a tab or subtab so that you can include your own text or content, and change the properties of the binder including the title, description and colour scheme.

A LiveBinder can also be added to while surfing the net by adding their bookmarklet to the toolbar of your browser. Simply click on the bookmarklet (called LiveBinder It ) and you will be asked to select one of your binders to add the site to or be given the option to add it to a new binder that you can create on the fly.

Finally, sharing a LiveBinder is very straightforward. You can send people an email with the link to a specific binder or embed a visual link to the LiveBinder within a blog or wiki page.

Jog the Web

http://jogtheweb.com

Jog the Web has less customisation than LiveBinders but what it does, it does very well making this another useful tool.

You can create ‘steps’ within a ‘Jog’ which are basically live versions of the sites listed in a sequential order down the left side of the Jog. You can either use the arrows to move through the sites in order or click on each site listed on the left.

You can add text to the top of the live website so that you can give information and instructions related to the site. I do think that the interface on Jog the Web does this function a little better than LiveBinders which is why it lends itself particularly well to building web challenges or guided tours of sites.

You can also choose to add your own content pages as a step within a jog. You have different layout options for these pages and the page editor gives you lots of customisation options within the page. You can even edit the html so I was able to embed content such as Slideshare presentations.

If you are using Firefox, you can install an extension that allows you to add to a Jog while browsing the net. As yet, there is no support for other browsers.

Finally, you can share your Jog easily by giving people the URL to visit the Jog. The embed option creates a ready made hyperlink but does not give you a visual object to embed on your wiki or blog. You can access the URL from the final page called the ‘End Page’.

There are a couple of downsides in that there is quite a bit of advertising on the Comment and End pages which are added to every Jog created in a free account. You can also not control the comments that are added to a Jog, which can become an issue if people leave inappropriate comments. Overall though, I think this would be a handy tool to use in the classroom.

What is Wall Wisher?

Wall Wisher is an online Web 2.0 application that allows someone that has signed up for an account (free) to create a digital wall.  Once given the URL of the wall, a number of users can simultaneously post virtual sticky notes to the wall making it a great tool for gathering contributions during a brainstorming session. A big advantage is that the users do not need to have accounts themselves to post a sticky note so it is quick and easy to use in a group situation. Sticky notes can contain up to 160 characters and can include hyperlinks to other sites. Multimedia that is hosted online on other sites, such as images, videos and sound files, can also be added to a sticky note by using the URL. Once a wall has been created, you can also embed the wall in other online spaces such as wiki pages or blog posts.

How can you use Wall Wisher in your classroom?

This simple yet effective tool has a number of classroom applications. Here is a list of some ideas to get you started.

Use Wall Wisher to:

• brainstorm knowledge about a topic before beginning a study
• brainstorm key questions to investigate during a study
• summarise key learning points about a topic after a study
• collect student feedback on a lesson
• have students collect feedback from their peers on the work they have completed
• create ‘to do lists’
• link to online resources for a given topic
• link to work that students have completed that is available online
• create a multimedia space for a topic where students can view videos and images or listen to sound files as well as add their own
• brainstorm ideas on how to deal with issues that have arisen in the classroom
• have students document how they are demonstrating the key competencies

To see Wall Wisher in action and add your own ideas to the ones above, visit the wall set up at this address: http://www.wallwisher.com/wall/interface

How does Wall Wisher work?

Visit http://wallwisher.com and sign up for a free account. Click on ‘Build a wall’ at the top right of the screen. You will then be given a number of options for your wall.

You need to add a title, subtitle and image for your wall.  You also need to choose the end of the URL for the wall and decide who will be able to leave sticky notes on the wall. Once you have completed all of those steps, click on ‘Done’ in the bottom right of the screen. The wall will be created and you will be sent an email containing the URL of the wall to give out to other people.

To add a sticky note, users need to double click anywhere on the wall.  You can type up to 140 characters into a sticky note. You can also add an image, audio track or video link by pasting in the URL of where these are hosted online.When you have finished adding your content to the sticky note,  need to click on ‘OK’ on the bottom right corner of the sticky note to ensure the note is visible to others and remains on the wall.

Anyone that has been to workshops I run on Web 2.0 tools knows that I am a HUGE fan of Voicethread. To my mind, the three big online tools are blogs, wikis and Voicethread. Other tools that I speak about are great but they are not as central to me as these three (though Google Docs would come close!) I am always impressed at the ways Voicethread continues to innovate (and they’ve just given the site a makeover too!). Here are a couple of features of Voicethread that I think are really valuable. They might have been around since last year but I’ve just tripped over them. I read about them within the Voicethread blog https://voicethread.com/blog/#20090911

Searching within Voicethread for Creative Commons images in Flickr

This is a new development for adding images to Voicethread straight from Flickr that have a Creative Commons license. You do have to have a Flickr account to link to your Voicethread account for you to be able to make access this feature. Here are the steps involved.

Step one

Click on ‘Create’ to make a new Voicethread and then click on ‘Upload’ and select the option’Media Sources’ and then choose the ‘Flickr’ option.

Step Two

Click on the link to import Flickr images from your Flickr account into your Voicethread. If you have not done this before, you will be prompted to link your Flickr account with your Voicethread account.  Once you have done this, the option to search Flickr for Creative Commons licensed images is at the top of the screen.

Step Three

You can click on the ‘i’ next to the title of an image in the search results to see more details such as the specific Creative Commons license.  Click on each image you want to add to your Voicethread and then select ‘Import’.

The brilliant thing about this option is that Voicethread automatically adds a link back to the image on Flickr on the Voicethread slide so there is no need to worry about attribution.

Changing the order of comments on a Voicethread

I have wanted to do this before but didn’t realise I could.  This is a direct quote from the blog:

If you are the creator or editor of a VoiceThread you can now reorder the comments by moving your mouse over any comment segment on the timeline beneath the VoiceThread.  Just hold down the shift key while over the timeline and then click-drag to move a comment segment to another position.  This will allow you much greater control over the quality of your conversations.

So basically, I continue to be impressed at Voicethread and look forward to ongoing future improvements.

I’ve just found out about a handy Twitter tool that helps to ‘mine’ information from your Twitter contacts. One of the best things about Twitter is that you can access a huge number of interesting links that people Tweet about. However, if you are not watching Twitter 24/7 then you are going to miss a lot of that Twitter goodness. The Twitter Times goes through all your contacts and puts together a top list of links ordered by the number of people in your network that have tweeted about it. As most of the people in my Twitter network are educators, this list of links becomes very interesting from an educational perspective. Try making a list of links from your own Twitter followers.

http://twittertim.es/

You  can also see my own Twitter Times page to check out the links there:

http://173.13.167.171/suzievesper

I have recently presented to a conference of teachers in Palmerston North looking at the connected world we are a part of, considerations for when starting to work online in school contexts, and great examples of kids being connected through technology. You can view this below:

I have recently presented to a conference of teachers in Palmerston North looking at the connected world we are a part of, considerations for when starting to work online in school contexts, and great examples of kids being connected through technology. You can view this below:

I’ve just responded to a question about the value of using Comic Life on student outcomes to the ICT English mailing list and I thought I’d put my thoughts here too so that others can join the discussion in this blog.

Karen Mulhuish asked the question:
Why use Comic Life over pen and pencil? What kinds of learning (or ‘affordances’) does it offer students?
For example, does it help students understand sequencing because of the ease with which you can manipulate images? I guess what I’m driving at is, how do we know that, by choosing Comic Life (or any software, for that matter) we will add value to the learning experience?

This was my response.

For me, presenting information through a tool like Comic Life comes down to what the value is of comics and graphic novels within education. There are a number of sites that believe that information presented graphically helps to motivate students but there are plenty more advantages than just motivation. Personally, I think one of the biggest advantages is that students have to reprocess information in order to change it from a text platform to a visual platform. This removes the ‘cut and paste’ option for presenting work and requires higher order thinking to be able to represent something graphically with minimal text while representing the key information. Obviously, for visual learners, graphical representation of the work may be more effective for learning and retention than straight text.

In terms of why a software application is better than comics with pen and paper, for me the benefit is that it takes away some of the time required to manipulate the images and information so students can focus instead on the learning behind the task.

Here is the page of Comic Life in Education examples I’ve put together:
http://educationalsoftware.wikispaces.com/Comic+Life

Check out some of these other links.
Read, Write, Think – has a number of comic based activities and has an article discussing the benefits of the comic form (if you haven’t explored Read Write Think yet this is an amazing resource)
Eek! Comics in the Classroom! – an article from Education World
Comics in the classroom: 100 Tips, Tools and Resources for Teachers – a very useful blog post
Cartoons and Comic Life- a blog post containing video interviews with teachers about how they are using comics effectively (and Comic Life) at secondary level.

So how would you answer the question Karen posed?

I spent another busy day going around classrooms at Ngaio on the 11th of March.

I started off working with a Yr 5/6 class who had already created scripts about the key competencies and now wanted to transfer them into a podcast using Garageband. I walked them through how to use the Garageband tools with the data projector and then the kids got to it. One skill that proved to be useful for the students was to be able to cut a track (command T) in order to remove a section that they wanted to improve rather than just deleting the entire track as many of them did initially. They were also adding some music and so needed to learn how to layer tracks along the timeline. I encouraged them to think about the mood of the music they selected and to make sure they adjusted the audio where necessary so it didn’t drown out their spoken recordings. This took pretty much the entire session! The idea is that from there they will drop the podcast track into the audio soundtrack of a Keynote presentation with a series of slides containing images representing the competencies timed to the length of the podcast.

If you want more detail on how to do this, let me know in the comments and I’ll create an instructional handout for it.

In the middle block, I worked with a group of Yr 3/4 children to create informational mindmaps about guinea pigs (they have a pet guinea pig in their classroom).  We looked at the ready made templates in Kidspiration and they began to transfer the information they had gathered into a mindmap. We looked at skills such as how to drag a square around parts of the mindmap in order to select all the items within the square. This makes it easy to move whole sections of the map rather than each bubble individually. Below is an example of one of the completed mindmaps.

Finally, in the afternoon I worked with a Yr 2/3/4 class on how to graphically present their ideas around key competencies using Comic Life. I walked them through a few tips and tricks on how to use the software and then they added the photos they had taken earlier to their Comic Life pages. Below is an example of what they came up with (with the faces blurred to protect the privacy of the students).

From here, they plan to drop these ComicLife images into Keynote slides and then drop videos of the students talking about the key competencies into the corner of the slides. To help the teachers understand the power of ComicLife, I put together a page showing different examples of how to use the software along with links to tutorials online. You can access these on my Educational Software wiki by clicking the image below.


Well that’s it for another week. One more week of the term to go.

I spent another busy day going around classrooms at Ngaio on the 11th of March.

I started off working with a Yr 5/6 class who had already created scripts about the key competencies and now wanted to transfer them into a podcast using Garageband. I walked them through how to use the Garageband tools with the data projector and then the kids got to it. One skill that proved to be useful for the students was to be able to cut a track (command T) in order to remove a section that they wanted to improve rather than just deleting the entire track as many of them did initially. They were also adding some music and so needed to learn how to layer tracks along the timeline. I encouraged them to think about the mood of the music they selected and to make sure they adjusted the audio where necessary so it didn’t drown out their spoken recordings. This took pretty much the entire session! The idea is that from there they will drop the podcast track into the audio soundtrack of a Keynote presentation with a series of slides containing images representing the competencies timed to the length of the podcast.

If you want more detail on how to do this, let me know in the comments and I’ll create an instructional handout for it.

In the middle block, I worked with a group of Yr 3/4 children to create informational mindmaps about guinea pigs (they have a pet guinea pig in their classroom).  We looked at the ready made templates in Kidspiration and they began to transfer the information they had gathered into a mindmap. We looked at skills such as how to drag a square around parts of the mindmap in order to select all the items within the square. This makes it easy to move whole sections of the map rather than each bubble individually. Below is an example of one of the completed mindmaps.

Finally, in the afternoon I worked with a Yr 2/3/4 class on how to graphically present their ideas around key competencies using Comic Life. I walked them through a few tips and tricks on how to use the software and then they added the photos they had taken earlier to their Comic Life pages. Below is an example of what they came up with (with the faces blurred to protect the privacy of the students).

From here, they plan to drop these ComicLife images into Keynote slides and then drop videos of the students talking about the key competencies into the corner of the slides. To help the teachers understand the power of ComicLife, I put together a page showing different examples of how to use the software along with links to tutorials online. You can access these on my Educational Software wiki by clicking the image below.


Well that’s it for another week. One more week of the term to go.

Thanks again to Karen Schweitzer being a guest author for this blog. She has put together another  useful and informative post on collaboration tools.

10 Collaboration Tools for Students and Teachers

Collaborating online is a good way for students and teachers to communicate and engage each other in classroom projects. There are many different fee-based tools that can help with this, but there also a number of free tools that work just as well. The following ten collaboration tools are free and well-suited to an education environment.

HotChalk – HotChalk is a free learning management system that makes teacher/student collaboration a breeze. Teachers can manage classes, assign work, receive homework from students, communicate with students and parents, and streamline the teaching process.

Wikidot – More than 2,000 education wikis have been created with this wiki-maker which allows easy collaboration, private sites, and unlimited pages and revisions. Wikidot is free unless you would like to remove the ads from the wikis, in which case, you will need to pay $5 per month.

NoteMesh – NoteMesh was made for college students but can be accessed and easily used by students in any grade. This free note collaboration system works like a wiki and allows students and teachers to create a unified collection of notes for any class.

Wridea – This free application offers a set of tools that allows multiple people to brainstorm together online. Users can set up an unlimited number of idea pages and then categorize them, share them, revise them, and comment on them.

Thinkature – Thinkature offers real-time collaboration for the web. It includes a voice chat and a workspace where people can share documents, images, ideas, outlines, diagrams, and more.

Stixy – Created specifically for people who want to collaborate online, Stixy works like a web-based whiteboard. Users can paste photos, notes, to-do lists, documents, and other items onto a board and share them with other people.

SimplyBox – The American Association of School Librarians recently named SimplyBox one of the best websites for teaching and learning. The SimplyBox tool allows students and teachers to clip and share portions of the web in a safe, controlled environment.

Diigo – This unique research tool can bookmark sites, permanently archive web pages, and highlight and annotate portions of the web. Anything that has been marked with the tool can be stored in a personal learning network or shared with a private group.

Yugma – Yugma is a free web conferencing and desktop sharing tool that works well for students, teachers, and parents who want to collaborate online. Up to 20 attendees can be present on a Yugma conference at one time.

Zimbra – Zimbra is a web collaboration and productivity suite. The free version of Zimbra includes email, file sharing, an interactive calendar, search features, and much more.

Guest post from education writer Karen Schweitzer. Karen is the About.com Guide to Business School. She also writes about online degrees for OnlineDegreePrograms.org.

Thanks again to Karen Schweitzer being a guest author for this blog. She has put together another  useful and informative post on collaboration tools.

10 Collaboration Tools for Students and Teachers

Collaborating online is a good way for students and teachers to communicate and engage each other in classroom projects. There are many different fee-based tools that can help with this, but there also a number of free tools that work just as well. The following ten collaboration tools are free and well-suited to an education environment.

HotChalk – HotChalk is a free learning management system that makes teacher/student collaboration a breeze. Teachers can manage classes, assign work, receive homework from students, communicate with students and parents, and streamline the teaching process.

Wikidot – More than 2,000 education wikis have been created with this wiki-maker which allows easy collaboration, private sites, and unlimited pages and revisions. Wikidot is free unless you would like to remove the ads from the wikis, in which case, you will need to pay $5 per month.

NoteMesh – NoteMesh was made for college students but can be accessed and easily used by students in any grade. This free note collaboration system works like a wiki and allows students and teachers to create a unified collection of notes for any class.

Wridea – This free application offers a set of tools that allows multiple people to brainstorm together online. Users can set up an unlimited number of idea pages and then categorize them, share them, revise them, and comment on them.

Thinkature – Thinkature offers real-time collaboration for the web. It includes a voice chat and a workspace where people can share documents, images, ideas, outlines, diagrams, and more.

Stixy – Created specifically for people who want to collaborate online, Stixy works like a web-based whiteboard. Users can paste photos, notes, to-do lists, documents, and other items onto a board and share them with other people.

SimplyBox – The American Association of School Librarians recently named SimplyBox one of the best websites for teaching and learning. The SimplyBox tool allows students and teachers to clip and share portions of the web in a safe, controlled environment.

Diigo – This unique research tool can bookmark sites, permanently archive web pages, and highlight and annotate portions of the web. Anything that has been marked with the tool can be stored in a personal learning network or shared with a private group.

Yugma – Yugma is a free web conferencing and desktop sharing tool that works well for students, teachers, and parents who want to collaborate online. Up to 20 attendees can be present on a Yugma conference at one time.

Zimbra – Zimbra is a web collaboration and productivity suite. The free version of Zimbra includes email, file sharing, an interactive calendar, search features, and much more.

Guest post from education writer Karen Schweitzer. Karen is the About.com Guide to Business School. She also writes about online degrees for OnlineDegreePrograms.org.

I am continuing with my day a week working around Ngaio School. Before I went to the school I spent more time working on the wiki I’m using to support the staff. I used Wix to create navigation pages for the site. This gave me a chance to see how Wix has developed since I last used it and to make the wiki a little more attractive and inviting. Click on the image of the wiki below to go and check it out.

I worked with three classes again. In the morning, I worked with place value activities but with a different Year 5/6 class than the week before. I mostly recycled some of the place value games and activities from last week so won’t spend to much detail on that here. However, I had a problem with the internet connection so ended up playing some ‘low tech’ games too such as the one where you toss some dice and the students have to try and make the highest number they can by entering the number of each dice throw into one place value column of a six of seven digit number. I found a website with a ‘virtual’ dice toss so that I could have this up on the data projector for all to see but wasn’t too happy with the way it worked. I have since found some other sites that I think could be better such as this Virtual Dice site where you can select how many sides your dice has. I’ve also since found a lesson plan with downloadable ‘Place Value Houses’ that would be a useful resource to have used to help students say the large numbers correctly.

After morning tea, I headed off to do a play podcasting session with four Yr 3/4 children. I have put the process I went through on the wiki but will replicate it here as well:

The play we used to create the podcast is called ‘Your Time is Up’.  School Journal, Part 3, Number 1, 2005.

There is a lesson plan for this play available for download. Below is the process we went through to create the podcast:

• Parts were assigned and students read the play through silently.
• Themes and new vocabulary discussed (ideas for themes can be found on the link below).
• The students read through a section of the play once as a group and strategies for presenting a play successfully were discussed ie being aware of cues.
• I showed the students how to record and playback audio into a podcast in Garageband
• Students went and practiced reading their one line of their part into Garageband and then listened back to hear how they sounded. I roved discussing possible improvements with individual children who then rerecorded.
• I showed students how to split audio files and how to change the volume of clips. Students took earlier recordings and experimented with reordering parts of their lines using the split function and changing the volume of split clips.
• The students then met back again around a single laptop and recorded the chosen section of the play.
• I showed the students how to access the built-in sound effects in Garageband. The group discussed which could be used for this play and phone sounds were added.
• The finished play section was exported out as an MP3 and uploaded directly to this wiki. When MP3’s are uploaded to a Wikispace wiki and then added to a page, they are automatically shown within a player. Listen to the play podcast below!

Finally, I worked with a junior class in the afternoon on creating a similar Kidpix counting pictures as I did last week. However, we used a different Digistore activity to start off with as these were slightly older kids called ‘Number Trains’ the children had to put carriages of a train in the correct order with numbers up to 20 (clicking the image below will take you there). The whole class was involved this time as there were enough laptops for one between two.

I noticed that when we were using Kidpix, the students had difficultly with clicking and dragging using the laptop touch pads. We practiced together on the mat the actions of holding the button with one hand and dragging with the other. Then they went back to their laptops and we played an impromptu ‘game’ where they had to drag as many animal stickers onto their picture as they could within a time limit. The partners took turns having a go. Skill drills can still be useful and fun when a need is identified in a lesson.

So that was it for last Thursday! I’d love to see some comments that aren’t spam! I seem to be having a lot of spam comments left at the moment.

I am continuing with my day a week working around Ngaio School. Before I went to the school I spent more time working on the wiki I’m using to support the staff. I used Wix to create navigation pages for the site. This gave me a chance to see how Wix has developed since I last used it and to make the wiki a little more attractive and inviting. Click on the image of the wiki below to go and check it out.

I worked with three classes again. In the morning, I worked with place value activities but with a different Year 5/6 class than the week before. I mostly recycled some of the place value games and activities from last week so won’t spend to much detail on that here. However, I had a problem with the internet connection so ended up playing some ‘low tech’ games too such as the one where you toss some dice and the students have to try and make the highest number they can by entering the number of each dice throw into one place value column of a six of seven digit number. I found a website with a ‘virtual’ dice toss so that I could have this up on the data projector for all to see but wasn’t too happy with the way it worked. I have since found some other sites that I think could be better such as this Virtual Dice site where you can select how many sides your dice has. I’ve also since found a lesson plan with downloadable ‘Place Value Houses’ that would be a useful resource to have used to help students say the large numbers correctly.

After morning tea, I headed off to do a play podcasting session with four Yr 3/4 children. I have put the process I went through on the wiki but will replicate it here as well:

The play we used to create the podcast is called ‘Your Time is Up’.  School Journal, Part 3, Number 1, 2005.

There is a lesson plan for this play available for download. Below is the process we went through to create the podcast:

• Parts were assigned and students read the play through silently.
• Themes and new vocabulary discussed (ideas for themes can be found on the link below).
• The students read through a section of the play once as a group and strategies for presenting a play successfully were discussed ie being aware of cues.
• I showed the students how to record and playback audio into a podcast in Garageband
• Students went and practiced reading their one line of their part into Garageband and then listened back to hear how they sounded. I roved discussing possible improvements with individual children who then rerecorded.
• I showed students how to split audio files and how to change the volume of clips. Students took earlier recordings and experimented with reordering parts of their lines using the split function and changing the volume of split clips.
• The students then met back again around a single laptop and recorded the chosen section of the play.
• I showed the students how to access the built-in sound effects in Garageband. The group discussed which could be used for this play and phone sounds were added.
• The finished play section was exported out as an MP3 and uploaded directly to this wiki. When MP3’s are uploaded to a Wikispace wiki and then added to a page, they are automatically shown within a player. Listen to the play podcast below!

Finally, I worked with a junior class in the afternoon on creating a similar Kidpix counting pictures as I did last week. However, we used a different Digistore activity to start off with as these were slightly older kids called ‘Number Trains’ the children had to put carriages of a train in the correct order with numbers up to 20 (clicking the image below will take you there). The whole class was involved this time as there were enough laptops for one between two.

I noticed that when we were using Kidpix, the students had difficultly with clicking and dragging using the laptop touch pads. We practiced together on the mat the actions of holding the button with one hand and dragging with the other. Then they went back to their laptops and we played an impromptu ‘game’ where they had to drag as many animal stickers onto their picture as they could within a time limit. The partners took turns having a go. Skill drills can still be useful and fun when a need is identified in a lesson.

So that was it for last Thursday! I’d love to see some comments that aren’t spam! I seem to be having a lot of spam comments left at the moment.