Tag: Google

Google Earth is our Paper – Part 3: Consolidate and Empower

Google Earth, Laptops, Literacy, MappingPublished onUpdated on6 Comments on Google Earth is our Paper – Part 3: Consolidate and Empower
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Photo by debaird
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In our writing sessions today I took both classes, all 60 Year 5 children, over two sessions and we continued and completed our work begun yesterday. The children were completing the task of adding 6 audio recordings to the correct placemarks in Google Earth, please see Part 2 for details of the process.

This post is concerned with some issues that have arisen from working with Google Earth and some classroom strategies I have found effective during my work with the application.

 

Consolidate

There is no better way for children to be successful then to have time to complete their tasks – today was a chance for them to consolidate the process they had begun yesterday and to once more practice embedding code in the Google Earth placemarks. All too often we want to rush the children onto the next great thing, it was useful today to take a breather and just ensure we had done a good job of the audio we worked on for our escape story.

Although a powerful and popular application, Google Earth is not used daily and so some children struggled to find their way around the different task panes and views. Having more time allowed them to become more confident. 

As both classes were running into difficulties about what they could or could not see. Often they would think that all of their work had gone, or it has just disappeared – when in fact the placemark had just been unchecked in the Places window. Today I consolidated their basic understanding of the task windows and how to switch between them. I demonstrated the different possible views you could have within the Places window – and pre-empted some of the possible problems based on situations that may or may not have already arisen. 

An issue that is well worth knowing about prior to working in Google Earth on a class laptop set is that of multiple content. For our escape story we have 7 placemarks and a path that loads up and is visible – when another child begins their own work another set of the placemarks is loaded up. Today some laptops had 3 sets visible. Children were saying they could not right click any of the placemarks but they had not realised (as the placemarks are identical) that there were multiple placemarks on top of each other. Again I reinforced checking only those placemarks which you need to be visible in the Places pane.

Empower

One of the disadvantages of working in Google Earth is that it is intended to work on a local level – as in the placemarks and items saved in My Places remain on that machine. This causes every laptop to have a different looking Google Earth Places pane, which naturally leads to some confusion. It is worth spending some time keeping on top of what files should and should not be there. My children would be using different laptops everyday and it is unfeasible to try and work with the same one everyday which would have been a time sapper of an organisational problem. Saving work is a little tricky due to the nested nature of the placemarks and content, however this is what we had to do.

I gave myself a good slice of time at the end of each session over the last few days to walkthrough the saving process with both classes.

  1. Any opened work from a network drive will begin life in the Temporary Places folder.
  2. Find the main folder for your work, all of your placemarks should be below it in a list. Select it.
  3. Right click this main folder to bring up the sub-menu.
  4. Click “Save to My Places”.
  5. The folder moves up and out of Temporary Places.
  6. Find the main folder for your work again. Select it.
  7. Right click this main folder to bring up the sub-menu.
  8. Click “Save as…” or “Save place as…”
  9. Navigate to your network folder.
  10. Name the file appropriately so you know what it is.
  11. Save.
  12. If saving over the top of previous work allow it to replace the older file.

We wouldn’t have been as successful if it wasn’t for about 6-8 children in each class who became the experts. These children had completed the tasks set them and had a very good understanding for what we had done. They knew their way around Google Earth. I would encourage you to seek these children out and empower them to support their peers.
The class experts for the saving routine above, were simply those who had been successful – I just called upon them to go and support someone else doing it. They were willing and supportive with their peers and guided them rather than taking over an important difference which I am always pointing out. This supportive ethos has always been with us as we help the children to understand how to problem solve with their class laptop resource. We try to encourage them to ask two other class member to help before talking to an adult.

Quick round-up
  • The slightly tricky nature of local content in Google Earth and saving work can cause younger children to get a bit disorientated.
  • Take plenty of time with younger students to demo and walkthrough the save process to a network folder.
  • With panes and folders open or closed the views can be very different on different machines so it is worth having confident children to help support their peers and to try and pre-empt some issues.
  • As everyone in this set of activities is altering the same placemarks, multiple copies can arise and can confuse. Ensure the children only have one set of placemarks checked.
  • Take time to consolidate Google Earth skills and confidence – use outside of the writing time and just allow them to explore. Reinforce the basic layout and structures.
  • Encourage a general sense of independence in problem solving – ask 2 friends for help before an adult. Do not underestimate the impact low level informal peer support can have on a technology rich lesson or environment.
  • Empower those confident students to actively support their peers, call them experts and make them feel special.

My Proposal to use Google Docs for Online Reporting to Parents

Google DocsPublished on34 Comments on My Proposal to use Google Docs for Online Reporting to Parents

What follows is a proposal I submitted to my headteacher regarding a trial of the use of Google Docs (as part of the Education Apps) to deliver online reporting to the parents in my class. I have spent considerable time working with Google Docs both on a personal level, organising planning files and within the classroom as a tool to support learning. The ease with which you can share a document is central to the idea that I could share a collaborative report throughout the whole year – updated at times when units of work are completed or at opportune moments of review.

My headteacher gave me his consent for me to explore the idea and I suggested to him posting the original proposal for reaction from a wider audience, he was also keen for this to happen – as this post and hopefully your reactions will help us develop and refine the whole concept.

What is the proposal?

I am proposing to use Google Docs as a platform to trial the delivery of online reporting to the parents and children in my class for this academic year 2008/2009.

What is the National Picture?

It is clear that the government is positioning itself to deliver real-time online reporting by the target year of 2010 for secondary schools and 2012 for all primary. According to Schools Minister Jim Knight:

“Real time reporting will deepen the school-parent relations and is not a substitute for regular personal contact with teachers. Effective technology systems can actually significantly cut the staff workloads – but it has to be to be manageable for individual schools and meaningful for parents.” Jan 2008

The aim is to develop a real-time reporting system that means parents will be able to access frequently updated information on children’s achievement, progress, attendance, behaviour and special needs wherever, whenever they want.

According to this announcement from the DCSF Primary schools must meet the basic requirement to provide information to parents covering achievement, progress, attendance, behaviour and special needs, on a timely and frequent basis – this should be at least once per term by September 2010 and the real time requirement by 2012.

According to Tanya Byron:

“Schools already using online reporting methods have noted that teachers spend less time in total producing three reports each year online than they did when producing just one by hand. The anytime, anywhere aspect of online reporting allows teachers to have greater control and flexibility of the use of their time. And, importantly, online reporting allows teachers to see the ‘bigger picture’ for each student because they are able to view grades and progress in other subjects.”

Why Google Docs?

This tool presently has three main advantages:

  1. It is already in place to be used within school, therefore no new software or programme has to be installed or found.
  2. It is free – we will not need to buy into any contracts or purchase new software.
  3. It delivers the real-time aspect of the online reporting requirement. This is because parents and children will have complete access throughout the year to the document. It is always on.

What will be the differences with the current end of year system?

We will have to unlearn some things. The sense of a formalised report at one time of the year will no longer exist. In this proposed system the parents (and children) will have continued and timely access to a single document that is the child’s report. That document will be periodically updated by the teachers as various units of work are completed and key assessments are finished throughout the year – not just at the end of the year. There will be key contributions from the children as they also comment on the work they have done and explore their own targets for improvement. Parents will have room to make comments based upon the contributions from teachers and children.

Will it increase the workload for a teacher?

For many their first reactions will be that it will, as you are in effect reporting throughout the whole academic year. However in my opinion the timely nature of reporting extends to the teachers too. I believe I will be able to better report to parents if I have the opportunity to just write comments about, for example, a history unit completed at Christmas time. As opposed to doing it 2 terms later alongside all of the other subjects. I believe I will find it easier to write subject comments if it is all fresh in my mind, consequently this will increase the quality of reporting to parents.

When would the report be updated?

I would expect that comments are updated when major units of work are completed in Design and Technology or History for example. Specific times throughout the school year must be negotiated for adding comments about Literacy and Numeracy and some of the other subjects.

What about parents who do not have access at home?

Although more and more families in the community have access to the internet, due to lowering costs, not all of the children in my class (2008/09) have access at home. For the 2 or 3 families that do not have access I will operate an open door policy in terms of the access to the report document at school. The parents will be welcome to come into the classroom immediately after school and access the document.

What is the teacher’s role?

As the year progresses I will schedule times that I will add comments about particular subjects – at the end of units of work, after major pieces of work in the unit are completed. I will also plan time for children to add their comments about the work that has been completed and support them in adding examples of what they have done. I will also collect evidence that is suitable for the online form of the report. I will notify the parents when these updates have been completed or if there is something that needs their attention.

What is the parents’ role?

In the document there will be room for the parents to add comments and feedback about the examples of work and subject comments about their child.

What is the children’s role?

The children will take an active role in updating the document with examples of their work and comments about their learning. At the end of units of work a structured class activity will see them remark upon what they have learned from a subject unit and the highlights from it.

What is the headteacher’s role?

The fourth collaborator on the report document will be the headteacher who will act as overseer on the process throughout the year. A final end of year comment will still be present but the document will be open to any comments from the headteacher throughout the year.

What might the report look like?

The report will be similar to the existing paper version with areas for subject comments. Room must be made for comments from all of the different stakeholders. Photos of the children working will be able to be included as well as examples of work. Links to other online documents and work examples will be used.

What needs to be in place if we were to begin?

  • Parents consent.
  • Email addresses need to be collected from the parents.
  • Schedule of commenting mapped to curriculum.
  • Information letter to parents.
  • An agreed report layout in Google Docs – what would we want to include in the report?
  • What will happen to effort and achievement grades?
  • What do we need to unlearn about the current reporting system.
I have much to iron out but would really appreciate your take on the idea, pitfalls that you might see and your general commentary on the proposal. Your comments will help us to develop the proposed system.

Unobtrusive Collaboration in Google Docs

Google DocsPublished onUpdated on7 Comments on Unobtrusive Collaboration in Google Docs

We have been using Google Docs with our students for over a year now and I have spent some time writing about our experiences so far. One of the key questions that I have been exploring for a while now is “How do you mark and manage student work in Google Docs?” but this simple question is applicable to most other online office tools. In this post I explore a facet of this type of assessment that I would call “unobtrusive collaboration”.

1326786748 84b469d0f4 mOn a number of occasions in the last year I have taken the opportunity to conduct a “live marking” session with the children in my class. They are working on a piece of work that is shared with me – I open it at the same time and add comments and marking to the piece of work. I would often also back these comments up by talking to the children involved, going over to them to reinforce what I had commented on – actively engaging them in the collaboration.

In some of these instances I would just nip into the doc and take a quick look around to check the progress, leave a comment if appropriate and leave them to it. I think this is an interesting type of quiet monitoring as the children are working. In the online document I can mark, highlight and leave comments without intruding on the flow of work that is taking place.

With paper based tasks or work that does not allow synchronous editing I would have to interrupt what the children are working on to inspect their work more closely. I might have to ask them to scroll to different sections or simply to move their writing hand so I can see what they have done over their shoulder!

Of course we must always find time to talk to our children face to face about the progress of their work, and I am not disputing the value of this, but often it does intrude on the flow of work. This sense of passive collaboration offers us the opportunity to access all of the children’s work very quickly and to quietly monitor progress and to add our comments.

I think that this sort of unobtrusive marking or monitoring is especially useful when my children are working in a small group or a pair. They are often busy talking about what they are doing or about to move onto and I do not want to stop that communication, or break their train of thought. Last Wednesday I quietly added comments and thoughts to my class as they were busy working in pairs on an activity in Religious Education. They picked up on those comments, adjusted their work, responded if they needed to, but it essentially did not halt the immediate process – it was a tacit collaboration.

What experiences have you had of marking and managing the ongoing assessment of work in Google Docs or other online office tools with your students?

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Image: ‘a perfect circle‘

Fruity Forms

Google DocsPublished on5 Comments on Fruity Forms

This week we used Google Forms to collect and share preference data about fruit. We spent Wednesday afternoon’s design and technology session learning about different fruit as a precursor to creating a healthy fruit smoothie.

The children had the opportunity to taste about 15 different types of fruit and record their thoughts and preferences. I used a Google Form to collect this data into a spreadsheet so that the children could use this information to help inform them of their peers’ preferences. That is why this was so useful, the form acted as a simple data entry point to contribute to a wider pool of data. This larger set provides the children an insight into the a wider range of preferences which we will use to help plan the ingredients for their smoothies.

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We are working in Google Apps for Education and there are a number of ways to share both the form and the spreadsheet, in the screenshots below I explain some of them because there are a few different options.

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I used this feature when I shared the fruit form with my class. They accessed it from their email and the form was included in the message. However be aware that when the children completed the form and clicked submit from the email message ironically the Google toolbar blocked the pop-up that opens as conformation. The form data is not submitted.

In order to sidestep this quickly during the lesson without having to ask the children to edit pop-up settings I asked them to access the form via the link that is included in the email. In the future I will just send the link to the kids and get them to access it outside of their email. 

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Remember that the form and the spreadsheet can be shared separately – once we have collated all of the data we need, I will be sharing the children into the document so they can access the results. I displayed the spreadsheet data on the IWB so the children could see what was happening I highlighted the live update of the data as forms were submitted.

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This final option to share the form will allow children access to it from their documents home screen. We had great fun sharing the fruit preferences we had by using Google Forms and we will soon be all set to average out the data to help with our smoothie recipes. 

With a week passing since we began using our docs accounts the kids have experienced the use of sharing and working on documents, forms and spreadsheets – on Friday the children worked in pairs on a piece of work in RE, shared with each other as the pair were co-owners and then handed into me by sharing too. I showed the children how I star the documents that I need to mark and how to filter their docs home view in different ways. It is still enjoyable to see children sharing Google Docs to hand work in, it is just so simple and effective.

Important to note the pop-up problem if you share the form embedded in an email – next time I will probably use option 3 rather than email.

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Finding their Voice

Google, Literacy, My class, VoicethreadPublished onUpdated on8 Comments on Finding their Voice

Over the last few weeks we have been working with the poem The Highwayman by Alfred Noyes. We have been discussing and exploring it through lots of talk and drama. On Monday we talked as a class about the drama technique of hot-seating, I asked the children to work with a partner to prepare some questions they might ask the Highwayman if they had the chance. As they were working I wandered out of the class and immediately returned into the room, but this time I tiptoed in and asked one of the children, in a whispery voice, whether it was safe or not. They looked bemused and I crept through the rest of the class shiftily looking from side to side. I had become the Highwayman. 

I have always enjoyed drama as a way into text and the children love it when their teacher goes out on a limb a little and pretends. I told the children that I didn’t have much time and that I had gotten their message about meeting them here. We had a series of questions about the plot, the character’s feelings about Bess and what it was like to be a criminal. All the time I was checking through the blinds and looking suspiciously at the kids. When my time was up I acted as if the paranoia had got to me and I accused the children of setting me up – that it was a trap and I with one more furtive glance I dashed off out the door again. When I returned we were all smiling. (The children went on to do hot-seating in smaller groups.)

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In the following lesson we used a Voicethread to further explore the characters in the poem. (Each child had their own laptop in this session.) I asked the children to add voice and text (I always give them the choice) comments on the various character images I had uploaded. I prompted them to make these kinds of comments:

  • Questions that they might like to ask the characters. Consolidating the previous drama work.
  • Answer a question that they see from someone else. Take on the character’s role and answer a question posed by other people in the class.
  • General reactions and thoughts on the different characters in the poem.
I have enjoyed using Voicethread in the classroom for a long time now and have always considered it to be a great tool to encourage quality speaking and listening. This was only the second session using the tool and I once again witnessed children recording, listening back and improving what they had done. The open and transparent nature of sharing their work seems to sharpen their attention to detail especially in voice recordings. I sat with a few boys who need considerable support with their literacy and they were just having a great time, big grins, listening and enjoying the comments from others in the class and recording their own. Finding their voice. When you work like this as a class there is a tangible sense of a community of use.
 
We were coming to the end of the session and with 10 minutes to go I wanted to review the lesson with the children but I decided to change the plan a little and explore a new method to do this. I asked them to log into their newly created Google Mail accounts and send me a short message explaining what they thought of that lesson. With my inbox displayed on the SMARTBoard the reviews of the lesson rolled in. Although the comments were simple in nature it proved a point, it tested the process more than anything. These 9 year olds were independently able to switch applications, sign into their accounts, think about their learning and respond by composing and sending an email in under 10 minutes and for some much less than that. The children each had an opportunity to express their feelings about the lesson, to add their voice to the lesson review. If I had just asked them as a whole class then I would have only been able to garner a handful of comments. Would these comments have been from the same groups of children? Probably – so the use email in this instance helped everyone to express their own indiviual remarks.
 
I am not sure that email is the ideal tool to respond with lesson comments, although replying to an email that you have sent to the children with key questions about the lesson would be more appropriate I think. Using Google Chat is another tool that would allow for instant messaging in review of a lesson, or I could have added a final image on the Voicethread for the children to add lesson review comments. (Another alternative is to take advantage of a Google Form for lesson review)
 
Whichever way you approach it I think that it gives every child the opportunity to make their voice heard.