How good is animation?

Today in our ICT elective we explored how animation can be used effectively in schools. I am going to admit that I was completely oblivious to how animation works and was shocked to hear that it takes 15 clicks of a camera to produce 1 second of a movie! No wonder Wallace and Gromit took MANY years to produce...

The Digital Blue Cameras that we used only cost about £80-90 each. This is a similar price to a camera but I think the advantage of this camera is, that it is easier to use with young children.

Before we started we talked about groups. We all felt that lower primary should be given a topic to focus on which should help them to get started, whereas upper primary pupil's would thrive on the challenge of choosing their own topic. It is good for the children to learn to listen to each other's ideas and co-operate well in a group:

Co-operative learning has proven to be an enormously effective instructional method (Johnson & Johnson, 1999; Sharan, 1999; Slavin, 1994) (cited in Green, Brown & Robinson, 2008).

Mixed ability groups would work well whilst using animation as everyone can bring their talents to the group and learn from their peers.

The obvious next step for the children is to plan their animation. First of all, the group should brainstorm their ideas. My group managed this very well as we all work well in groups. WE had many ideas but chose the most popular idea.

After brainstorming, we used the storyboarding format. This breaks the animation down into the different scenes you want and helps to show how the different parts link together. I found this format helpful whilst filming as it kept us focussed on our storyline.

The children should be encouraged to take on a variety of roles in the group. This ensures that all children are using the required skills and contributing to the group.

Context for animations

I think animation could work well with many topics. It could be used with older children as an english lesson and they could add the speech in speech bubbles. Animation could build on an art lesson using clay. It could also be used to tackle relationships through looking at the body language of the characters (waving, turning away etc.)

Our animation:

We really enjoyed creating out Easter bunny, basket, eggs etc. We all made different parts of the set and whilst filming we all swapped our roles around to make it fair. Although I think children would really enjoy using animation, I can see that their are some disadvantages to it also.

Advantages:

• Enjoyable when creating their set
• using fine motor skills (using clay)
• using co-operative learning
• Relevance- children will enjoy creating their own animation as they will be keen fan's of many animation films
• High level of achievement- the children will feel proud of their finished product

and many more....

Disadvantages:

• It takes a long time to film
• children might put their hand in and have to delete a large part of their animation (talking from experience this can be rather frustating!)

Overall, I think children would LOVE using animation and I will definitely try and use this whilst teaching!

"Digital Planet"

Our ICT Elective is all about being 21st century thinkers and learning a range of ways to enhance learning in the classroom.

I listened to an episode of Digital Planet which looks at the advantages that technology can bring.

The episode really made me realise how far technology has come...Cassettes to DVDs to studying a course on the Internet. Open University allows students to complete courses online which would really benefits those people who would struggle to get to a University.

Using mobile phones:
Something which came to my attention was using mobile phones in Bangladesh to learn English. The British Government is financing the project and Shihan Zuberi said "Mobile phones are making it possible". The Bangladesh population would struggle to read the english words but they are finding that hearing the words is "making it possible". This shows how technology can break down barriers between countries. I thought that Voices of the World would also help to increase their recognition of words and knowledge of other languages.

Using Laptops:
In Brazil, 350 schools are involved in the initiative OLPC (One Laptop Per Child). At first, the laptops were estimated at costing 100$ but unfortunately they are still priced at 300$. A teacher from one of the schools trialling out the project talked about how important these laptops were in improving the education of the children and making a positive influence of their lives. The laptops include many activities and learning opportunities (games for maths and language...)

The programme says that technology can help to personalise learning through giving children more choice in what they want to use to learn. This fits perfectly with the principle "Personalisation and Choice" of Curriculum for Excellence (Lts, 2009).

The final part of the episode ponders how to ensure that teachers are prepared to use and teach technology in schools. Hopefully, this elective will help to make me prepared to use technology confidently and I am sure I will have to keep on learning as technology keeps on changing...

I will end this with a quote which I think sums up what technology should bring to schools:

Technology is a tool that is used across content areas and throughout everyone's daily lives. Technology is not something that should be considered seperate from the curriculum. Instead, our goal should be to make technology a seamless part of our teaching and instruction (Brown, Green and Robinson, 2008. p3)

GAMES-BASED LEARNING

On Monday, we explored many different games you could use in the primary classroom. This has opened my eyes to the number of games that we can incorporate into our teaching to enhance the learning in the class. Children will have experienced many of the games before and some will be experts at them. It is important to not focus on the pupils who are the best at something as our aim in Curriculum for Excellence is to produce "Confident Individuals". I think the way to tackle this is to ask the pupils to keep personal targets in their tray or on a chart on the computer, where they can see the progress they are making. Using games-based learning is extremely motivating whereas:

The kids themselves are frustated by the wide gap between their exhilarating experiences playing games and their slow-paced lessons in schools (Prensky, M. 2006. intro)

Using games is an innovative way of closing down the gap between children's experiences at school and at home. As a child, I would love to have played Guitar Hero, played with ninetendo's, played Brain Gym...

Guitar Hero:

This is contextualised learning as the guitar can be used to link many areas of the curriculum together (e.g. Music, Literacy and English, Drama) to produce an exciting project. The stimulus of using a guitar would immediately engage the children in the lesson and make it active.

In a school in Aberdeen, the children were first of all asked to create their own "Rock Star". I found it interesting to watch the videos as they talked about their writing because they were all very enthusiastic, engaged and confident in their work. The children used their imagination enormously in their work. To watch their videos click here!

Guitar Hero has unlimited learning opportunities and I think games like this are definitely following the Curriculum for Excellence's aims of producing an enriched and child-centred curriculum (Lts, 2009).

I-Phone:

There are many apps available to download from the IPhone. I found some apps that I think would work very well in the nursery such as "Wheels on the bus" etc. Brain Teaser could be used individually in primaries.

I think the I-Phone has potential but I worry that children might not work collaboratively with them. However,when groups do work effectively I think that using Iphones will be good experience and will promote pupils teamwork and technological skills.

The IPhones could be used in many curricular areas in primaries: Mathematics, Language, Drama, Social Studies...

Wii Games:

We played Wii Music and Wii Cycling. I think that some games like cycling would not work well in a class as it would only allow one person to take part at a time. However, whilst discussing this with Sharon and Jennifer, we realised that some games have the potential to involce the whole class. I thought that Just Dance could be used as a Gym lesson with the game on a screen at the front or using the projector on the wall. Only two people could use the remotes, however, the rest of the class could also dance along. This game increases fitness, co-ordination, timing, gross motor skills and is a lot of fun! What more could children want!

I will end with a quote which sums up the purpose of Games-based learning:

Video and computer games are helping- not harming our kids.
The real reason they play so much is that their games are teaching them to succeed in the Twenty-first century (Prensky, M. 2006. no page)

Using technology in the classroom!

I was looking at our ICT elective's wallwisher page and noticed that many people have been using Wordle. I was intrigued and looked at the website. I think this would be a good tool to use collaboratively in the classroom, when brainstorming thoughts and opinions. It could also be used individually after a student has wrote a piece of work. The Wordle chooses random words and I think this would sum up a piece of work nicely. Their are many uses for this and I think children would enjoy using this website. Another possible use of Wordle could be choosing random words and then swapping the wordle pieces with a peer and they can make a story from the words. Wordle could also be used for self and peer assessment as the children might enjoy writing in a brief manner rather than writing in sentences all of the time. Additionally, if the focus in a Language lesson is on a wide range of vocabularly, this tool could be used for assessment purposes.

I am due to start a placement in a pre-school shortly and have reading early years literature. I have been looking at the importance of play and this is what I made my Wordle piece based on.

Why BLOG?

There are many reasons for blogging and my peers and I are starting to understand these.

What is a Blog?
A blog is "an online journal" but they have progressed into "highly interactive forums for communication" (Brown, Green & Robinson, 2008. p16). All jobs require communication skills and these skills need to be developed in children's education. Blogging is an exciting way of children developing communication skills and many others.

What can we use blogging for?

• Keeping reflective journals
• Giving opinions on various topics
• working in groups on a task
• managing notes
• Giving children homework- Blogging can make the essential link between schools and homes. The teacher can inform the parents about what their children are going to be doing etc.
• Sharing ideas with others and gaining feedback.

Blogging can also help to make the required links between children at home and in school. If the children can use their blogs at home and show their parents this, parents will have a deeper understanding of their child's learning at home. Also, parents can give their children feedback on their blogs. Glow will also help to bring teachers and families closer together.

Their are many benefits to blogging and I have probably not done blogging justice! If you have thoughts leave me a comment please.

Personally, I am really enjoying sharing my ideas with others and hearing their views on similar topics. I like getting ideas from other people and this is all about learning from others, which I will do as a teacher. Also, I think Blogging helps you to become aware of your own thoughts and will help me to become a Reflective Practitioner.

A Frankenstory

Jennifer and I wrote a story collaboratively. I wrote the first 40 words and then sent it to Jennifer who could only see the last 10 words I had written. We both wrote two parts of the story, building on each other's last words. This was a fun and challenging activity that primary children would enjoy! Our Frankenstory worked out really well. Look at our collaborative story!

There are many advantages to working cooperatively. We know this from research by Vygostky and Piaget but we can also look at more recent theory. Cooperative learning gives:

• Positive Independence- each member of the group needs the other members and each individual has a role that contributes to the overall success of a project. Each student becomes neccessary to the success of the project.

• Face-to-face interaction- In a well-designed cooperative learning project, students will spend much of their time engaged with each other. They will NEED to communicate to complete a project.

• Individual and group accountability- When each person has a role, he or she can be held accountable for completing the assigned task.

• Interpersonal skills and group processing- Students working in collaborative teams will be practising communication skills and learning to make group decisions.

(Johnson, D & Johnson, R. 1999) (cited in Brown, Green and Robinson, 2008)

Whilst working on our Digital Movie, I feel that all members of the group worked cooperatively. We made decisions together and all know what role we had in the group.

Wallwisher

Feel free to comment on this wall...I will add more nursery apps as I find them :)

Today's input

Our lecturer introduced us to Project I can read which shows us how I-Phones can improve reading activities. The I-Phones give the children the chance to hear themselves reading and rate how well they think they read. This is encouraging the pupils to self-evaluate and works on reading and talking skills. This video shows us the benefits of using the I-Phone:

We also looked at the app Voice Band for the IPhone. This is a "revolutionary new way to make music - with your voice!" This would be an excellent collaborative activity and it would help children to improve their knowledge of instruments and their sense of rhythm.

An INSPIRATIONAL teacher!

I think this video shows that repetition, songs and actions can help to make learning motivating. This teacher knows his pupils well and he makes up a rhyme that he can use repeatedly with his class. "Work hard, get smart" is a simple but effective way of stimulating the class to try their best!

How good is the I-Pad?

The Apple launch that took place last week introduced a spectacular new device called the I-Pad.

In this video, Steve Jobs looks at how pictures can be displayed in a slide show when clicking on the country where they were taken. I travelled Europe in the summer and think it would be brilliant to be able to quickly look at a set of photos from a particular country at any time.
I think this would be an extremely motivating device used in class as it is symbolic and iconic.

I think the I-PAd could help to make the classroom more interactive. Working in groups, with the internet literally in their hands, would allow children to voice their opinions and contribute to their lessons through asking questions whilst the teacher is talking.

The I-Pad would help visual learners, auditory learners and kinesthetic learners. We know that children have different types of intelligence (Howard Gardner) and I believe that this innovative device can help all learning styles and cater for individual needs!

As Jobs said the I-pad is "so much more intimate than a laptop and so much more capable than a smart phone".