Showing posts with label reading. Show all posts
Showing posts with label reading. Show all posts

Friday, 3 June 2016

Kahoot and Science (Geography)

Hello teachers!  I'll show you an idea of how to use Kahoot program, a free software game-based learning platform designed to create questions and interact with them in the classroom through different devices. When a session is created, Kahoot gives us a password, and by that password all of us can enter in the same session and compete and learn from each other at a time. In this case we will use Kahoot to study the political map of Europe.



Target audience

The activity created is thought to be developed with third key stage (5th - 6th grade).

Aims:

- To revise the unit we have been learning about the last sessions, the political map of Europe.
- To create a game in groups and play with their peers in class





Competences:

-          Management of information and digital:  the students use the computer or other devices.

-          Knowledge and interaction with the world:  is a Geography class, specifically we are working the political map of Europe.

-          Interpersonal:  In groups, they have to cooperate and respect the opinion of others


Classroom Management

Having worked the political map of Europe in previous sessions, all students will be disposed in groups of 3-5 students with a device per group that they will use to create the activity. They will have 20 minutes to think about the 5 questions that will make to the other groups. The teacher will go group by group observing that the questions are well made and are not very difficult. When all groups have all ready to ask the questions, each group will make to the other groups five questions and go counting the points. At the end of class the group that has most point wins.

Material: One device per group


Assessment

The teacher will take into account the process of creation of the game by the groups, not only the final result of the competition. The teacher also will observe if all the members of the group participate actively in their groups during the creation of the game, if they create the questions in English correctly, if they need much help or not and if they treated properly the computer or the device.

Bloom’s Revised Taxonomy

This activity is mainly a HOT in the Bloom’s Taxonomy because the students have to identify which contents they can use to make the questions in order to create the questions.  Finally, when we have created the game, they use LOTS because they remember what they learned on the previous sessions.

Four English skills

The creation of this game involves mainly reading and writing. In order to create the game all of them they have to read the unit about the political map of Europe and write on the device the questions correctly in order to make the questions.  Although we could also use the speaking and listening if we added a variant that students have also read aloud to his peers the question.


Advantages and disadvantages

Advantages: it’s a very motivating game for the students.  Easy to use and very intuitive. We don’t need to create an account, simply with a PIN we can play. They learn playing.  


Disadvantages: if the internet connection doesn’t work we cannot play. Sometimes they get focused on the competition and forget the real aim of the game.  Another problem may be the lack of participation of some students in their respective groups. 

Saturday, 28 May 2016

Pacman: classic but catchy game!

Hi! We are Amaranta and Marta and in this post we'll share with you one game that we have created in the last session of ICT: Pacman! This game is well known but in this version it becomes also a quiz. In this case, the questions are about JOBS! Will you be able to guess the answer? How much score will you get? Watch out because little ghosts are following you. Before presenting our activity, here it is a Google Drive presentation about the game and things that you should take into account when introducing games in class.

Target audience: 4th grade
Placement in curriculum: English + ICT
School course: Second semester
Bloom’s Digital Taxonomy: This activity offers an opportunity to enhance both lower- and higher-order thinking skills.

Lower order thinking skills.
  • Level I-II: Remembering and identifying: This activity provides an opportunity to review the vocabulary and definitions related to jobs.
Higher order thinking skills.
  • Level VI: Creating (create new products). The activity gives the students the opportunity to add some definitions of jobs.

Aims:
  • To be able to use Pacman.
  • To be able to identify jobs by their definitions.
  • To be able to add questions about jobs by defining them.

Competences involved:
  • Linguistic and audio-visual.
  • Information handling and digital competence.
  • Autonomy, initiative and decision taking.
  • Knowledge and interaction with the world.

Grouping: This activity will be carried out individually or in pairs (let them choose).

Procedure of the activity:


1) Let students decide if they want to play individually or in pairs.
2) Send them the link to play. Explain them that they will play Pacman but only if they guess the correct answer! In addition, that they cannot play during a long time unless they answer a specific amount of questions in a row.
3) They will also have to write their names to appear on the leaderscore.
4) Finally, students will have to create three questions about by defining them, following the example.



Materials required: Computer.

Class management
  • The teacher will walk around the classroom, checking that students are doing the task proposed and observing their needs in order to help them whenever it is necessary.
  • We believe that it is important for the teacher to have used the app before and have tried to create a game to foresee the problems that can arise.


Added value through ICT

  • Visual support, engaging tool.
  • It involves a challenge (reviewing definition, construct questions,…).
  • This game is ideal for reviewing content and assessing children in a more motivational way.
  • Develop digital competence.


Trouble-shooting


  • Limit the time that they can play to Pacman in order to focus their attention in the content.


Assessment:

The teacher will assess if the aims of the activity are fulfilled taking into account the following assessment criteria:
  • Is he/she able to identify jobs by their definitions?
  • Is he/she able to create three questions of jobs?

Do you want more games?: Visit ESL GAMES + and enjoy with your students


Thursday, 26 May 2016

Show Me, this is what you are looking for!

Hi everybody!


I’m Marta. In this post I would like to share with you a useful educational tool, called ShowMe, that allow users to record their voice as well as write text, draw or add some pictures or videos in order to explain some content. This app is available in Ipad and can be used by anybody who want to, no matter the age. ShowMe Interactive Whiteboard is an easy and effective tool for step-by-step audiovisual presenting and sharing. The visual/auditory combination of a ShowMe is engaging to watch as well as create. This app is also useful to help children organize the information in a sensible order as well as develop good presentation skills in a collaborative context. In addition, children can share their projects with the educational community and take advantage of other user’s explanations.

How to use ShowMe? Here you have a presentation that explains it in detail.


What is ShowMe? from ShowMe App


Features (taken from the Apple website)


  • Voice-record
  • Multiple brush colors
  • Enter text
  • Pause and erase
  • Import pictures from your photo library, built-in camera, or web image search
  • Import documents as pictures from dropbox, or google drive
  • Create video from any document
  • Unlimited lesson length
  • Free to upload and share your recordings with friends
  • Easy embedding for sharing anywhere
  • Manage students with groups


ACTIVITY

Target audience: 5th grade

Placement in curriculum: Science (CLIL)

School course: Second semester
Bloom’s Digital Taxonomy: This activity offers an opportunity to enhance both lower- and higher-order thinking skills.
Lower order thinking skills.
  • Level III: Applying (using the knowledge in a variety of ways): This activity provides an opportunity to apply, use and practice the content vocabulary in meaningful context:  a short speech (presentation)
Higher order thinking skills.
  • Level VI: Creating (create new products or points of view). The activity gives the students the opportunity to create a piece of oral presentation about how the respiratory system works.
Aims:
  • To be able to use ShowMe app.
  • To be able to identify and summarize the main contents related to the respiratory system.
  • To be able to work in cooperative groups.

Competences involved:

  • Linguistic and audio-visual: because pupils have to create a presentation while drawing and explaining different concepts. In this case, drawings are useful to improve the comprehension.
  • Information handling and digital competence: in order to do the task, they have to interact and know the app to use it.
  • Autonomy, initiative and decision taking: because they are creating a tool that enables their classmates to watch a video-presentation done by themselves. If they are able to do it properly, it means children have understood the concept and are able to explain something in their own words.
  • Social and civic: because children have to work in pairs and listen to their partner’s suggestion. This is not about one child doing everything but it involves reaching an agreement about what they want to show.
  • Knowledge and interaction with the world: this activity will be about the respiratory system and how it works so the majority of the concepts go around scientific


Grouping: This activity will be carried out in pairs (explained in the procedure).

Procedure of the activity:

First of all, I will explain to students how ShowMe app works and the elements they can find in the toolbar.  

In pairs, students will summarize and present, by using ShowMe, the main contents related to the respiratory system through a recording of about one minute. Each pair will be in charge of a different topic (parts of the circulatory system, how it works, common diseases, healthy habits to take care of it, curiosities, etc.).
First, both students of the pair will identify and write in a draft the information that they want to share through the presentation. When they finish, the teacher will check their rough draft and will give them a feedback (weaknesses and improvements).
Then, they will record the presentation, including the advices from the teacher. Each member of the pair will be responsible for recording one part of the presentation.
Finally, each pair will present their presentation to their other groups of the class, so they will review the circulatory system contents.

An example of recording could be the following:


Materials required

  • Ipads (one per pair).
  • Paper and pen if they want to do a draft before recording the presentation.


Class management

Following the tips that I have learnt in the ICT lessons, I would ask students to set Ipad aside when they didn’t need them to avoid classroom management problems. When I am giving them the instructions of the activity, I would say “Ipads facing at me”, so I could make sure that they pay attention to what I am saying and don’t get distracted. Moreover, I would assign some students to be Experts TIC, responsibles for giving support to me or to their classmates if in case we need some help.
When they are doing the recording in pairs, the teacher will walk around the classroom, checking that students are doing the task proposed and observing their needs in order to help them whenever it is necessary. We believe that it is always important for the teacher to have used the app before and have tried to create a game to foresee the problems that can arise.
In case that students would need a quiet atmosphere to record their presentation, they will have the opportunity to go to another classroom just to record it and then come back to the main classroom.

Added value through ICT

  • Visual support, engaging tool.
  • It involves a challenge (summarizing contents, identifying the key ideas, cooperating,…)
  • ShowMe it’s ideal for reviewing content, assessing children and make them connect all the topics learnt through the unit in a more motivational way (not only making them memorise it and write it down.)
  • Develop digital competence as well as linguistic and audiovisual.
  • The recordings can be shared with each other and they can open it in any device.
  • The recordings remain always kept and available to review, use or edit them.

Trouble-shooting

  • One possible problem could be that, perhaps, student’s speech in the video is not clear or understandable enough. For that, I will let it clear beforehand that they have to speak loud and pronunciation.
  • Another problem foreseen could be that students spend too much time recording their presentation, doing and redoing it again and again. To avoid that, I will limit the time that they can spend making the presentation (30 minutes maxim).

4 skills involved

Reading: Children will be able to read some keywords that will appear in the presentation.
Listening: Children need to listen actively the presentations made by their classmates.
Writing: Children will write and draw the main contents to support their speech.
Speaking: Children need to explain the key concepts fluently and taking into account the pronunciation.


Assessment:

The teacher will assess if the aims of the activity are fulfilled taking into account the following assessment criteria:

0) needs improvement; 1) fair; 2) good; 3) excellent

To be able to use ShowMe app

0
1
2
3
Is he/she able to record his/her voice explaining the content?




Is he/she able to draw?




Is he/she able to erase his/her drawings?




Is he/she able to change the colour of the digital pencil?




Is he /she able to paste images in the presentation?




Is he/she able to enlarge and reduce the images?




Is he/she able to delete an image?




Is he/she able to share with the rest of the class his/her ShowMe record?




Is he/she able to save his/her ShowMe record?




To be able to summarize and present the key contents of the lesson
Is he/she able to identify the keywords of his/her topic?




Is he/she able to summarize the information?




Is he/she able to summarize the contents using appropriate grammar structures?




Is he/she able to express his/her ideas in a clear way?




Is he/she able to listen actively to the other group’s presentations?




To be able to work in cooperative groups
Is he/she able to listen actively to his/her partner’s ideas?




Is he/she able to respect his/her turn to record his/her part of the presentation? (each member of the pair records on part of the presentation).




Wednesday, 25 May 2016

Kahoot!


Creation of a game with Kahoot


Name:Laura Carrillo and Elena Joaquin
Level: 3rd grade, 20 students working in pairs with tablets.
Curriculum: CLIL
Topic: Food and going to the restaurant
Skills: Reading and vocabulary
Classroom management: Two kids in charge of going around and helping the others to go into kahoot (experts).
Type of activity: Task based activity, learn by doing
Material: PDI and Ipads.


We have created a vocabulary game with kahoot. Kahoot is a useful tool to create games by yourself or as a resource to look for them. Once you create a game, kahoot provides you with a code which kids will have to introduce and they will have access to the game.



To create a game in kahoot is very easy. You need to register and you can start!


https://getkahoot.com








This is the result of our game. You can always edit things and add songs whilst playing! It is very engaging and motivating for the kids. As you can see, you can also manage the time you want the kids to answer the questions, the number of options to answer and you can display the answers while doing or editing the game:






The vocabulary presented in the game has been previously worked in class in order to do a roleplay of a restaurant at the end of the project. The game is accompanied with pictures so that it helps to identify and relate contents. It is related to a the restaurant context where kids need to decide which option is the correct one between four different ones.


According to Bloom’s taxonomy this activity requires remembering and applying so that afterwards they can produce the language in a real situation (roleplay). This activity is going from LOTS to HOTS because it is a simple game of vocabulary but it becomes more difficult because kids need to learn not only the vocabulary but also the structures that will be presented in the following session (scaffolding).



The activity will be held with tablets and it will be shown on the interactive whiteboard so that everybody can follow. The questions are going to the displayed on the PDI and the kids will mark their answer on the ipad. It will be done in pairs for the first time so that they get familiar to kahoot and next sessions we will carry out an individual assesment with a different game but the same content. 


The teacher, though, will know the results of the pairs because kahoot shows inmediately the marking so it is a quick way to assess your students in a motivating and fun way.


It is useful to have two kids helping when starting the activity. They will show the others the steps to go into kahoot, otherwise it becomes messy. Also make sure all the Ipads have battery and they work properly so that you can avoid any surprise or problem.


Hope it is useful and you can apply it in your classrooms! ;)