Since we are just getting used to using the tablets in class, I thought I would start with some easy-to-use, fun programs while we worked out the bugs of using tablets in class. Two of my favorite apps I have used before in Australia are Kahoot and Socrative. Both are available for almost any platform you might be using, or the kids might have. In Australia we had laptops, so using tablets is a new experience for me with these apps. Both are games that allow you to get some good formative feedback from the students. Socrative also does lots of other things, but I have started with the space race game and so will compare it with Kahoot.
Both apps allow you to download a spreadsheet with all the data after the game. You can see how every student did on each question and how the class did on each question. This provides some very useful formative feedback that can be used to direct your future teaching. One limitation they both have for maths, is they have limited ability to write maths the way you are used to. Many symbols are not available and some things like fractions (have to write like 2/3) will not look like the students are used to seeing in their books and worksheets. There is a workaround, and that is both apps allow you to upload a picture for each question. You can write your question and answers in a different program, powerpoint works well, and save it as a picture. It also works if you want to have diagrams, shapes or graphs as part of the question or answers. This takes more time to set up and is not always easy to see when playing the game, especially in Kahoot. The kids, I teach all ages up to A level, (age 18) love to play both games. The overall favourite is Kahoot so I will start with Kahoot!
Pros: Fast paced and after each question the students get to see the point standing and where they stand. This feeds their competitive spirit and they get very excited with every move up or down the the leader board. After each question the whole class gets to see how many students answered each choice. This is fantastic for the teacher as you can see how many got the question correct and how many selected each wrong choice. The question and answers are also displayed so you can immediately discuss each wrong selection and review any misunderstandings students may have based on their incorrect choice.I have never seen an activity where all the students are so excited and committed to answering questions, no matter the topic.
Cons: Students do not get the question or answers on their device. The question and answer choices are only displayed on the projected image at the front of the class. Each device only has four colours with a shape that matches up with the answers on the projected image at the front. This means it can be hard for students in the back to clearly see the question or answer choices. For each question you choose the time allowed to answer. The max time you can set is 2 minutes so it won't work for questions that the students might need more time to work out.
Socrative:
Pros: Each student will see the question and answer choices on their individual device. This means it is easier for all students to see the question and works better for questions that have diagrams, shapes or graphs. You do not set a time for each question so the students can spend as much time as needed on each question and they work through the questions at their own pace. A set of rockets is displayed on the board and as each team answers questions their rocket moves across the screen. You can either let the students select teams or have the app randomly assign students to teams. You decide how many teams you want to have.
Cons: You don't get the immediate feedback that you get with Kahoot. It is not until you look at the spreadsheet with the results once the game is finished, that you can see which questions or topics the students misunderstood. Depending how many are on each team and how well they do on the questions, their rocket may reach the finish before they have answered all the questions. This means they tend to lose the impetus of the competition as I tell them they still need to finish answering all the questions.
Summary: The kids enjoy playing both games but enjoy and get more excited by Kahoot. I think they are complementary apps as I have discussed since in maths there are certain topics that would work better with Socrative Space Race. Trying to read graphs or angles in shapes would work better if the students could see the picture in front of them. Longer problem solving questions would work better as the students could have more time to work through the problems in the Space Race also. It is a real pleasure to see the students standing, thinking, debating, and calculating furiously to solve each question in the Kahoots. The shouts of joy as they are one of the few to get a hard one correct and move up the leader board, or the groans as they mess up and slide down the standings means they are never satisfied with one Kahoot and always want to play "one more!"
Wednesday 28 January 2015
Thursday 22 January 2015
It has been a while since I started this blog and much has changed. I am now back in Muscat at the British School Muscat teaching maths and one year 8 history class. After being used to my older students having laptops in Brisbane, when I started back at the British School I went through withdrawal. You really get used to the students having technology in the classroom.
Being a small school in the middle east makes it hard to get the same level of tech support. A few good chats with the IT department and we came up with a plan. The local hyper-market had a Eid sale back in October so several teachers got out their credit cards and went down and we managed to get a set of 24 Samsung Galaxy Tab 4's which were reimbursed through petty cash. This would allow me to have a classroom set to so every student in my classes could have a tablet to use. (My largest class is year 7 top set with 24 students.) Then ICT had to load up the apps I was planning on using. To start I had them put on the apps for Kahoot, Socrative, Infuse, Desmos and Exit Ticket.
Then we had to work out the logistics for the classroom. We needed somewhere secure to store the tablets and some way to charge them. I ended up with a cabinet built by the carpenter which was attached to the back wall. The first version didn't have any room for the power boards. That got sorted and there are 4 six outlet power boards in the tablet cabinet.
We have started small in class and I am only focusing on my year 7,8 and 10 classes as I have these classes the most, six 65 minutes lessons a fortnight. The first lesson learned was getting the devices connected to the Wifi. One of the issues we identified at the start was whether the wifi would hold up with 24 tablets at the same time. It seems the only way to get connected to wifi is to open the browser and the apps for each program won't work unless you have already connected to wifi. This slows things down a bit when we get started. The school wifi login does not always come up the first time you open a web page. This means it can take a few minutes to get all the students logged in and into the program. Many of the students are not used to Android so they are learning their way around the device.
All the students have been very excited to use the tablets in class and rush in each lesson to get started. On those days I have not planned on using them they are very sad! The key is to turn this enthusiasm for using tech into maths and learning enthusiasm. These first 3 weeks I have been just using Socrative space race and Kahoot. I have been keeping the games to 10-15 question games that I have made myself. While you can use other games already on the sites I find I get exactly what I need for each day's game if I write my own. One of the best resources I have found to get multiple choice questions is Diagnostic Questions. There is a wide variety of very well designed questions designed to diagnose student misunderstandings.
While the students enjoyed Socrative's space race, they all love Kahoot! They all get into every question and cheer every change in the leader board and moan if they get a question wrong, or even worse, get booted out of the game when the wifi cuts out. (Fortunately this does not happen too much) No matter the topic, I have never seen such enthusiasm. The first question in the door is "Are we doing Kahoot today?" Just the other day we were doing multiplying and dividing decimals as the topic and the enthusiasm and learning going on was beyond what I have ever seen in a classroom. The kids don't want to stop.
I will finish up for now and talk more about lessons learned and how I am using the apps next time.
Being a small school in the middle east makes it hard to get the same level of tech support. A few good chats with the IT department and we came up with a plan. The local hyper-market had a Eid sale back in October so several teachers got out their credit cards and went down and we managed to get a set of 24 Samsung Galaxy Tab 4's which were reimbursed through petty cash. This would allow me to have a classroom set to so every student in my classes could have a tablet to use. (My largest class is year 7 top set with 24 students.) Then ICT had to load up the apps I was planning on using. To start I had them put on the apps for Kahoot, Socrative, Infuse, Desmos and Exit Ticket.
Then we had to work out the logistics for the classroom. We needed somewhere secure to store the tablets and some way to charge them. I ended up with a cabinet built by the carpenter which was attached to the back wall. The first version didn't have any room for the power boards. That got sorted and there are 4 six outlet power boards in the tablet cabinet.
We have started small in class and I am only focusing on my year 7,8 and 10 classes as I have these classes the most, six 65 minutes lessons a fortnight. The first lesson learned was getting the devices connected to the Wifi. One of the issues we identified at the start was whether the wifi would hold up with 24 tablets at the same time. It seems the only way to get connected to wifi is to open the browser and the apps for each program won't work unless you have already connected to wifi. This slows things down a bit when we get started. The school wifi login does not always come up the first time you open a web page. This means it can take a few minutes to get all the students logged in and into the program. Many of the students are not used to Android so they are learning their way around the device.
All the students have been very excited to use the tablets in class and rush in each lesson to get started. On those days I have not planned on using them they are very sad! The key is to turn this enthusiasm for using tech into maths and learning enthusiasm. These first 3 weeks I have been just using Socrative space race and Kahoot. I have been keeping the games to 10-15 question games that I have made myself. While you can use other games already on the sites I find I get exactly what I need for each day's game if I write my own. One of the best resources I have found to get multiple choice questions is Diagnostic Questions. There is a wide variety of very well designed questions designed to diagnose student misunderstandings.
While the students enjoyed Socrative's space race, they all love Kahoot! They all get into every question and cheer every change in the leader board and moan if they get a question wrong, or even worse, get booted out of the game when the wifi cuts out. (Fortunately this does not happen too much) No matter the topic, I have never seen such enthusiasm. The first question in the door is "Are we doing Kahoot today?" Just the other day we were doing multiplying and dividing decimals as the topic and the enthusiasm and learning going on was beyond what I have ever seen in a classroom. The kids don't want to stop.
I will finish up for now and talk more about lessons learned and how I am using the apps next time.
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