Storytelling with Toonastic 3D

There are a few apps that I absolutely love using with students. One of them is Toontastic 3D, a storytelling app that lets students animate and narrate their stories.  I wrote about it several years ago and included some graphic organizers and other resources I created then. Back then the app was super awesome. After Google purchased it, the app has only improved! It now supports scrolling backgrounds and 3D characters and settings.

The app works best on a touch device such as an iPad or Android tablet, but there is also a version available in the Google Play store that runs on select Chromebooks. I'm not sure how well the touch interface translated to a web-based version, but I've got students testing it out.

I recently used Toontastic 3D with 3-5 grade students in a weekly explorations class. After exploring the app and creating a very simple (beginning, middle, end) story, students used this template to develop a story following the 5 part story arc used by Toontastic. Students then spent several sessions narrating their stories and bringing their characters to life. Below are a few of the original stories students created.

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Click the playlist icon (3 lines) to see more videos in this playlist

What went well

• highly engaging - Students were very excited to use the app. They stayed on task and focused on telling their stories. Students that finished the required story early were eager to move on and create more stories.
• ease of use - The first session we met I demoed the app, showing how to add a setting, characters, and record my voice. That was all I needed to do. Students dived right in and were able to show me a few tricks, like adding their own face to a character (that became a huge hit).
• sharing - Students were motivated by their desire to share their story. When I first introduced the app I let them create a simple BME story and then played it to the class via AirServer on my laptop.
• creativity - This is the reason I love apps like this. Its very open-ended, allowing the students to be creative. As you can see from the stories above, the stories varied widely.

What I want to fix

• story development - The problem with engaging apps like Toontastic 3D is that students want to jump right in to the creation part without developing the story first. Usually they end up with a lot of sound effects and fights, but little story. This was a short 6 week course, meeting only once a week for 50 minutes. I tried having the students complete their stories at home so they would have more time in class to record, but they tended to forget their script and had to start over. If this were done in a regular classroom setting where I could stay on top of them, I'm sure the quality of the stories would go way up. 
• best on a touch screen - Because of the way to manipulate the characters on the screen, this app is best used on a touch screen device like an iPad. Unfortunately at my school we are 1:1 with Chromebooks, so I had to scramble to get enough iPads for everyone. There is a version that can run on Chromebooks, but I could already see that the screen was smaller. I'm not sure how the well it will work for moving the characters.
• voice volume - When it comes to recording their voice some students become very shy and talk softly. Plus there were a lot of us in the room so it was easy to pick up each other's voices. The best way to record your voice is with a headset, but I didn't have enough for everyone. You can tell the quality of the sound between those that used it and those that didn't.

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Summer EdTech Challenge #12: Student show offs

Welcome to the Summer EdTech Challenge! Summertime is a wonderful time to be a teacher! It's the perfect time to recharge your batteries, catch up on trends in education, read for pleasure, and learn new things. How about taking the opportunity to learn new tech skills or try out new tools and strategies?

Each Monday this summer I'll post a simple tech challenge, something you can do between dips in the pool and binge watching your favorite TV show. These challenges are practical, easy to implement ideas to help you develop your tech skills and start next year off on the right technology foot!

I am a firm believer in giving students choices when it comes to presenting what they know. For many years it seemed that teachers had students create PowerPoints as a way of sharing information. But there are so many options available today that provide a much better experience in creating and presenting. Many of these tools are free, work cross platform, and sync across websites and mobile devices.

I've blogged about many tools and have many favorites. Some tools are linear in nature, just like PowerPoint, while others allow the user to choose the order they consume the information. When we provide students with a variety of tools, they can pick the tool they like best for the task at hand. Some might prefer the visuals of Haiku Deck, while others want to make a quick video in PowToon or iMovie.

The table below provide links to my 9 favorite apps for student presentations. Some links will take you to my reviews, where available. The review may be just for the iPad app, but most also have a website that can be used on desktops, laptops, and Chromebooks. Other links will take you to other websites with more information. This list is by no means definitive - I'm still learning about great tools myself! You may want to check out Student Presentations: Moving Beyond PowerPoint for some other ideas and resources.

Linear
Haiku Deck	Google Slides	Prezi
Visual
ThingLink	Spark Page	Smore
Video
Spark Video	iMovie	PowToon

Your EdTech Challenge this week is to pick a presentation app, learn about it, and pick one of your learning activities where students will use that app. You are not limited to these 9 apps - let me know if you find another great one! Don't forget to come back to this post and let me know what app you picked and how your students will use it.

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My technology integration goals for a new school year

This school year I will be transitioning into a 4th grade classroom after about 15 years as a digital coach. Prior to my work as a digital coach I taught 4th grade for eight years. Over the course of my travels from school to school as a digital coach, I've met a lot of awesome teachers doing a lot of awesome things with their students. I've worked with many of them and explored many digital tools. Now I'm ready for my own classroom!

I'll be team teaching with a reading coach who will focus on ELA. I will teach math, science, and social studies for the other half of the day. Naturally I've done a lot of reflecting this summer on what I want to do with my students. I've thought long and hard about how I envision using technology as a tools to help my students. I've come up with this list that I don't feel I can compromise on. None of these digital tools or opportunities was available when I was in the classroom before, so I look forward to seeing what my students and I can accomplish with them.

Mystery Skype - I'm so excited to have my own class this year where I can do as many Mystery Skypes as I want! My goal is to Skype with all 50 states.

Global Learning - I've signed up to participate in Adventure16 and I want to investigate projects at Digital Explorer to find something for my students to participate in. I realize our social studies focus in 4th grade is Nevada, but I strongly feel that students should become global citizens as well. My goal is to find a global project we can team up with someone to work on and then find something local as well.

Interactive Notebooks - I'll be using Interactive Math Notebooks, but I want to explore adding a digital component with the goal of being a full digital interactive notebook next school year. Ideas I have are to use augmented reality with the printed version (links to demonstration videos, digital manipulatives and tools, etc) and explore something like Google Slides for full on digital notebooks next year.

iPad tools - I know I'll have at least 7-8 iPads in my room, but I hope to have a complete cart. Regardless, a few apps I want to have students use are Book Creator to create math books either as a digital portfolio or skill/unit based evidence of their learning. Explain Everything would be the perfect companion app for this project.

GAFE - students have full access to Google Apps for Education, so we'll be taking full advantage of those tools, including Google Classroom.

Blogging - I'm a strong believer in blogging so my students will definitely be using blogging as a way to reflect on their learning. I'll continue this blog with a focus on digital tools I discover and how we are using them in our class. Our class website will also have a blog as the home page to keep parents informed of our work.

Remind - speaking of keeping parents informed, I also plan on using Remind on a regular basis. I was on the parent end of it this summer with a non-school related event my kids were involved in and I absolutely loved it!

Websites - there are several websites that will be woven into our class work: XtraMath for math fact mastery, explore typing.com to increase keyboarding skills, GoNoodle for those important brain breaks, and EdPuzzle to hold them accountable for videos we see.

Plickers - our school has CPS Responders but I don't really like them. I'm going to use Plickers instead, which I think will give me a lot more flexibility and power with my formative assessments.

Presentation tools - I am big on teaching students proper presentation skills and giving them a variety of tools to demonstrate their learning. I also can't stand PowerPoints, so instead we'll learn how to use powerful tools like ThingLink, Haiku Deck, and Adobe Spark.

Video making - I will have a green screen station set up in the corner for students to create videos to demonstrate knowledge and learning. I'll have Do Ink's Greenscreen to integrate with the other video and picture apps.

Augmented Reality - I mentioned using AR with interactive notebooks, but I really want to explore using AR in a variety of other scenarios as well. I'll need to explore a few apps and see real case uses in the classroom.

Whew! Now that I look back at that list I see a lot of fun this year! I don't think I've bitten off too much, because a lot of this will integrate well with our curriculum. I always love to see real use examples from other classrooms. Please share your ideas and tech integration goals with me in the comments below!

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Cool and useful website: PlayPosit

More and more teachers using video in their classroom for good reason. Videos are engaging, are visual, and can really help to explain concepts or illustrate a point. Flipped classrooms are becoming more and more popular and generally utilize videos to teach concepts prior to students coming to class. The problem most teachers find with videos is holding the students accountable for what they see.

Enter in PlayPosit. PlayPosit (formerly known as EduCanon) is an online learning environment where teachers create interactive videos with embedded questions and comments. These interactive videos are referred to as "bulbs". When you grab a video from a source such as YouTube, you can stop the video at any point and insert a question. When students watch the video and get to that point, they must answer the question before they can continue on. The correct answers are graded and the teacher can view the data to determine who watched the video and how well the understood the questions - holding the students accountable for the video viewing.

PlayPosit is free with a few limitations. The premium version lets teachers choose more question types, download worksheets of the questions in the bulb, and advanced cropping. I don't believe that these limitations inhibit the power of the site, though.

To get started go to https://www.playposit.com/join and sign up with a new account or use your Google login, which also gives you Google Classroom integration.

Tap the Design tab and enter the video URL or search through videos for the topic you want. There are also many educational YouTube channels that you can browse through to find the perfect video. You can preview any video or click Use to select it. You can also see other pre-made bulbs for this video.

Click Crop Video and you can drag from the beginning or end to select only a clip.

Play the video and position the cursor where you want to insert a question. Click Add Question and select a question type. The only question types available with the free version are Multiple choice, Free response, and Reflective Pause. Fill in the questions and possible answers. There are basic text formatting tools as well as the ability to upload images and record audio in both the question and answers. Unfortunately it appears that you can only insert one question at any given point.

Before you can assign bulbs to your students you need to create classes and enroll students. Students will create their own PlayPosit account and then join your class using the class code. If you use Google Classroom you can import your classes and rosters. Go back to your Dash and click on Fill Out Profile. Scroll to Google Classroom Sync and click the icon. A screen will appear where you can select which class (or multiple classes) you want to import. Scroll to the bottom and click Save Google Class Room. After refreshing the screen you'll see your students listed.

Click on the Bulbs tab to see all the bulbs you have created. Click Assign on the bulb you want to use and Assign next to the class. Pick a due date for the assignment.

Students can view the videos on the website or through the free iPad app. The app is only for students to view the videos. Teachers cannot use the app to create the bulbs.

After students have completed the bulbs, click the Monitor tab, select the class, and then the assignment to see data for the assignment.

PlayPosit has some great features and is super easy to set up and use. It's comparable to other interactive video platforms such as EdPuzzle. I would love to hear your thoughts and ideas of how you can use a platform like PlayPosit. Let me know in the comments below.

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Awesome iPad App: Touchcast Studio

Using video in the classroom helps those visual learners master content and keeps them engaged. Unfortunately video tends to be a passive activity where students simply sit and watch. No more! Now with TouchCast teachers (and students) can make interactive videos where students can tap the screen to interact with the video, take a poll, view a website within the video, scroll through a document, and more. Think of it as ThingLink for videos.

TouchCast is a free iPad app that teachers and students and students in most grade levels can use. Here is a TouchCast made by Lindsay Baker (@linzbaker), an educator from California. In this video she models many of the interactive video features available. 

If the interactive part doesn't work, try viewing the video from the TouchCast website at https://www.touchcast.com/baker1123/heres_how_to_use_a_touchcast_in_your_classroom

TouchCast produces a channel called EduCasts that features the best educational TouchCasts being made. These videos will give you ideas of how other teachers and classrooms are using TouchCast. You can view them at http://www.touchcast.com/educasts/ along with lesson plans at http://www.touchcast.com/lessonPlan/

Getting started with TouchCast is easy. Sign up is free for both teachers and students, but does require an email address. Creating a touchcast is done in 5 steps:

1. Scripting and planning

Have students write out a script, planning what they want to say and allowing time (pauses) in the script for vApps to appear on screen and stay there for a few seconds.

2. Filming

Launch TouchCast, make sure you are on the Cast Side, and tap the Start from Scratch theme.

The Effects tab at the bottom of the screen lets you add filters, add guides to help line things up, and add Green Screen.

You can also add Whiteboards where you can annotate on the screen.

3. Editing video clips

All of the clips from filming are in the Projects tab. You can re-order the clips, trim them down, duplicate and add transitions. Put all the clips together in the order you want them to appear in the video. Once individual clips are merged into one large video, import the video back into TouchCast using the Start from Scratch theme again.

4. Preparing interactive content

To add interactive content (vApps), tap the vApps button. Tap any of the apps to customize it and then tap Use. All selected vApps will appear in the vApp tray at the bottom of the screen, ready to use during the touchcast simply by tapping it. They can be positioned anywhere on the screen by dragging it, resized, and changing the options by tapping the gear icon. When everything is done be sure to save the project.

5. Recording the touchcast.

Press the red Record button and start recording, adding the vApps as you go. Tap the Done button when you are finished and you can preview the touchcast. You can always go back and edit the video or the vApps.

6. Exporting

When everything is like you want, tap Export TouchCast, name the touchcast and press Save. When you are signed in to your account it will save to your TouchCast channel as well as giving you the option to save to the Camera Roll.

There is a lot of power in this little app that allows you and your students to create some high quality videos. It seems to have a little learning curve and certainly requires some pre-planning (scripting), but I think students will enjoy working with it.

In my classroom this year, I plan on having a mini video studio set up in one corner of the room with green screen capabilities. Students will be able to use the iPads to create reports, screencasts, and other projects. I think TouchCast will be a great addition to this area.

Have you used TouchCast with your students? Let me know in the comments what you have done with it.

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Awesome iPad App: Videoliscious

Videoliscious is a simple video creation app for iPads. The app is free, but has a 60 second limit. It's simple to use, has a clean interface, and is great for creating short videos on the go.

There are only 3 steps needed to create the videos. The app makes it super easy for students by walking them through each step.

Step 1

Select videos and photos you want to use. These can be from the Photos app or take live video with the camera. It includes a tool to let you trim your video so you can include just the right shot.

Step 2

Add narration to the video. After choosing microphone only, students record their voice as they narrate over videos and photos. The videos and photos chosen in Step 1 appear in the bottom right corner. As the student talks, they tap on each video or picture. These are all combined to make the full video.

Step 3

Add background music from the Videoliscious library. The free version is severely limited in the number of options, but the chosen music is ducked under the narration from Step 2.

Finished videos can only be saved to Facebook, Twitter, YouTube or emailed to the teacher. They are not saved to the camera roll.

This app is straight forward and easy to use. Students can easily master it in a matter of seconds. It's great for short (60 second) projects.  One limitation is where the video is saved. Since it's not saved to the camera roll, the only viable option is to email it to the teacher.

Check out these two blogs for some ideas of how this app could be used in the classroom.

Oral Presentations
Vocabulary

Although the 60 second time limit and inability to save to the camera roll are limitations, I think I will include this app in my video toolbox on our class iPads. I'm excited to share it with my students to see what they come up with. Let me know in the comments how you are using this app with your students!

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Awesome iPad App: Spark Page

Adobe recently recently rebranded several of their apps and now collectively calls them Adobe Spark. With Adobe Spark students can communicate ideas and learning with stunning visuals and multimedia, each focusing on a different presentation format (video, social media, and web page). I believe all three apps should be a part of everyone's presentation toolbox. All three Spark apps make it easy to create professional looking presentations that include stunning images, videos, and text.

I previously wrote about Adobe Voice (now rebranded as Spark Video), which is used to create amazing student narrated videos. Today I played with Spark Page and found a new favorite presentation app. Students can add pictures, videos, and text to create polished web stories with magazine-style themes. It’s so simple and easy to use that students in most grade levels and across all subject areas can use it.

It is available as a free app for mobile devices and also has a web page. Students can log in with an email address or their GAFE accounts. Projects are synced across all devices.

I embedded a short presentation I created while practicing with Spark Page. It was super easy and looks great!

Once students are logged in, either by creating free account or signing in with their GAFE credentials, they create their first project by tapping the + button at the bottom of the screen. From this main screen students can also view sample projects from the gallery and have quick access to their saved pages.

Students are then prompted to add a title and a cover picture.

 
When selecting images for any part of the project, students can choose from a variety of sources, such as the camera, Photos app, and even search high quality, creative commons photos.

Students can then start adding a variety of elements to their Spark Page, including images, text, links, and videos. One of my favorites is glideshow, where students add several images and they slowly transition as the user scrolls or swipes up the web page.

Adding links creates a button, that when tapped, take the user to other websites for additional information. Students just need to add the text for the button and the URL for the website.

When the project is done, students tap the share icon and choose their settings. Projects can be public or private. They must select a category and can add their information as the author of the post.

Projects can be shared by copying the link to the clipboard and sending to the teacher or embedding it on a website, like I did above.

Integration Ideas

This is the perfect app for students to use when presenting any type of information or report. Some examples could be:

• Create an All About Me story
• Summarize a chapter
• Recount a story
• Share a biography
• Create a how-to video
• Present a position on a topic
• Cultural explanations
• Journal of field trip
• Book trailer
• Descriptive language practice
• Create a dictionary

Download the Tech Integration Challenge for Spark Page and see if you are up to the challenge!

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Summer EdTech Challenge #4: iPad apps

Welcome to the Summer EdTech Challenge! Summertime is a wonderful time to be a teacher! It's the perfect time to recharge your batteries, catch up on trends in education, read for pleasure, and learn new things. How about taking the opportunity to learn new tech skills or try out new tools and strategies?

Each Monday this summer I'll post a simple tech challenge, something you can do between dips in the pool and binge watching your favorite TV show. These challenges are practical, easy to implement ideas to help you develop your tech skills and start next year off on the right technology foot!

iPads are a popular technology device in most schools.  They are highly versatile, mobile, and engaging. Students can literally take them anywhere that learning is happening. The touch interface makes them ideal for learners of all ages.

Unfortunately they are not always used to their fullest potential. Often I see students consuming information by watching videos or using content delivery apps. I believe the true power of iPads comes out when students are allowed to create content. This gives them opportunities to show what they know in a medium they are comfortable with.

Here are a few apps to try out. These are my favorite apps for student presentation and creation. They can be used with pretty much any subject and grade level. The only limitation with these apps is your students' imagination!

Don't have iPads at your school? Many of these apps are also available for Android devices as well as having web versions.

Presentation Apps

Toontastic/Puppet Pals - these two apps are great story telling apps using puppets. I prefer Toontastic because it has more backgrounds and puppets. It also walks students through a story arc to help them develop their story. Both are great ways for students to publish their original stories.

Book Creator - this is an awesome app for publishing ebooks. Students can write their stories and add images, videos, audio, and a few animated widgets. Books can then be published as ebooks and read on any platform. Books in any subject can be written.

Haiku Deck - this is one of my all time favorite apps for student presentations. Its simple and visual. Students can't get caught up in all the dancing letters, animations, and bullet points that make up so many PowerPoint presentations.

ThingLink - this one is another of my all time favorite apps for student presentations. With ThingLink students select a "base image" and create hot spots on it that can display text, images, and videos. Its great for presentations that are non-linear in nature.

Spark Video/Spark Page -Adobe recently rebranded a few apps and brought them under one umbrella called Adobe Spark. Spark Video creates quick, high quality animated videos and Spark Page creates magazine-style web stories.

Canva - I was introduced to Canva at recent iPad conference I attended. This is a great graphic design app that I really want to explore more.

Educreations/Explain Everything -these are screencasting apps teachers and students can use to create videos teaching concepts or showing learning. Both have their pros and cons, so you'll have to decide which features are more important to you.

Pic Collage - this is a great little app for creating photo collages and adding text and stickers. Its great for vocabulary building.

ChatterPix -this is a fun little app where students can make any object talk. Imagine a rock with a mouth discussing all of its characteristics!

Video Apps

Students love creating videos. With iPads today it is extremely easy to create high quality videos with lots of special effects. Videos are great for demonstrating concepts in any subject. Here are a few of my favorite video making apps.

iMovie - Apple brought movie making ability to the masses with iMovie. This app is very powerful and extremely easy to use. Its free for any iPad purchase after September 2013.

TouchCast - I saw a demo on this app last year and have been dying to get to know it more. It has many powerful capabilities including a teleprompter, annotate any video, and embed images, documents, websites right in your videos.

Videolicious - another powerful, yet easy-to-use video editing app. I've heard alot about it in classrooms, but I haven't yet had the opportunity to play aorund with it.

Green Screen by Doink - at the last tech conference I attended I finally had the chance for some hands-on action with this easy to use app. With any green screen set up in your classroom you can use this app to transport students to any location either with images or videos. Final projects can then be imported into other apps for further editing and publishing.

Miscellaneous Apps

Popplet/Ideament/Mindomo - all classrooms have brainstorming and mind mapping going on at some point. These apps bring those activities into the digital age. Students can insert drawings and photos as part of the exercise.

Photomath - this is a great app for secondary math teachers. It reads and solves mathematical problems by using the cell phone or iPad camera. Not only does it show students the answer, but it shows students the steps necessary to solve the problem.

The Challenge

The EdTech challenge for this week is to explore an iPad app that you are not familiar with. It doesn't have to be from this list. Find one that you are interested in that meets your subject and/or grade level needs. Explore the app, press the buttons, learn everything you can about it. Figure out how you would use it in your classroom next year. In the comments, tell me about the app, what you thought about it, and how you will use it.

I'll probably check out Spark Page, TouchCast, and Videolicious. These are all apps I've wanted to learn a little more about and this challenge gives me the perfect excuse! I'll create a blog post on each one and publish them this week. Stay tuned for my answers to this challenge!

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Cool and useful website: EDPuzzle

I've been working with a few high school science teachers that use video in their classroom to help students understand some complex science topics. Video is a great way to do this - after all we live in a video generation. YouTube reports 300 hours of new video are uploaded every minute. Leveraging video lets you bring in multimedia and simulations to your lessons as well as take your students to places they may never get to otherwise.

While working with these teachers we explored one of my new favorite tools: EDpuzzle. EDpuzzle is a really cool tool that lets you take existing video and embed your own voice, comments, and even quizzes. Plus it's entirely FREE! Here's a one minute overview.

Creating an account is super simple. Click on the Teacher button and login with your existing Google or Edmodo account or create an EDpuzzle account from scratch. Using your Google or Edmodo account gives you the advantage of being able to access class rosters and other resources directly from those accounts.

My Classes

Your first task after signing in is to create your classes. If you signed in using Google or Edmodo you can import your existing classes. Otherwise click the Add Class button and follow the prompts.

Find Videos

The next step is to find the video you want to use. Click the Search tab and choose your favorite source for videos. You can also use the Upload button to upload your own video or video you've downloaded from another source.

After you find a video, hover over the thumbnail and either click Use it to start adding your content, or click Copy to add it to your My Content tab and edit it later.

Create your video-lesson

Once you are in your video its super easy to create your lesson. Once you are in edit mode you'll see four buttons across the top of the window.

Crop - lets you use only a section of you need. No need to force your students to sit through an entire 15 minute clip, just crop to the relevant section. To crop, just drag to start and end points.
Audio Track - is used if you want to use your own voice on the video instead of the embedded audio. If you use this option you have to record audio for the entire video clip. Click the microphone button and the video plays at the same time you are speaking.
Audio Notes - lets you record your own commentary at a certain point of the video. Drag the playhead to the point in the video and click the microphone button. You can have multiple audio notes throughout your video.
Quizzes - this is probably the best feature of EDpuzzle. Click on the point in the video where you want to embed a quiz and click the question mark. You can add an open-ended or multiple choice question, or embed your own written comment. The question editing box gives you basic formatting tools as well as the ability to embed links and images into the questions. When students are watching the video, it automatically stops at the quiz and students are forced to answer it before continuing on.

Assign

Click the Finish button in the upper right-hand corner. You'll be prompted to select a class to assign the video to as well as a few other awesome features: You can disable skipping so that students can't skip important content. You can also assign due dates to videos.

When you click the Send button it assigns the video to your EDpuzzle class. If you linked your Google Classroom or Edmodo accounts, you need to take the additional step of clicking the Post button and it will appear in the class stream.

EDpuzzle is a must-have tool for any teacher that uses video in their classroom. I love the ability to embed quizzes to hold students accountable for the video content, as well as the ability to disable skipping.

What are some ways you can think of to use video in your classroom? Let me know in the comments below.

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Show what you know: iPad apps for expression

I love giving students the opportunity to share what they know. I believe that students have something to say and share. When given the opportunity to share their knowledge, they will do so and can be very creative. Too many times teachers restrict them with certain requirements for the presentation. I believe that this limits the students too much.

Earlier this month Rebeca Lundberg, a fellow DLC, and myself were asked to present at a district librarians' conference. The librarians began their sessions learning about WISE Inguiry Learning. Our session focused on the Express part of the process, focusing on iPad apps that can be used by students to show what they know.

Our main focus was on iMovie and Keynote and at the end we threw in some demos of other apps that are our favorites for student presentations.

iMovie - Apple's consumer grade video editing app is very powerful, yet super easy to use. Even younger students are able to put together simple videos. Just look at the explosion of YouTube videos  to see how powerful video can be. iMovie makes it easy to capture and edit video, edit audio, and add titles and transitions. Checkout our video tutorial and print tutorial.

Keynote - This is Apple's version of PowerPoint. I think it's much nicer and easier to use than PowerPoint. Adding images, videos, and text are easy to do and you're not distracted by all the extra dancing letters and ridiculous animations that make PowerPoints such a chore to watch. Checkout our video tutorial and print tutorial.

ThingLink - This is one of my favorite apps for students to use to share their knowledge. A lot of times information isn't linear. With ThingLink you start with a "base image" and add "hot spots". Hot spots are place you can touch or click to display additional information in the form of text, images, video, or audio. Because of it's non-linear format, it's easy to explore a given topic and absorb the information in your own way. While there is a web version, I did a write up on the iPad app that you can read here.

Haiku Deck - Haiku Deck is perhaps one of my all time favorite presentation apps. I love it because it is very visually oriented. Each slide has to have a picture and the amount of text allowed on each slide is limited. This forces students to really know their material since they can't use the text on the screen as a crutch. Not only that, but the image library is very high quality, making any presentation enjoyable to watch and listen to. You can read my review of Haiku Deck here.

Adobe Voice - I only recently got in to Adobe Voice, but have come to enjoy it as well. I now recommend it to all schools that are looking for quality iPad apps. Adobe Voice lets you quickly throw together simple videos using icons and your own voice. The app then adds transitions and music to seamlessly make a quality presentation. You can read my simple tutorial here.

Google Slides -  Google Slides is another PowerPoint alternative. The advantage it has over PowerPoint or Keynote is the collaboration, which is true for any Google product. This app is perfect for small group presentations. Check out this tutorial for beginners.

What apps do you like to have students use to show what they know?

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Google Workflow on the iPad

image courtesy of Flickr

At the Google Mini-Conference on Saturday, video production teacher Shira Park and I presented on Google Workflow for the iPad. With our district jumping on the GAFE bandwagon, many teachers are now knee deep in using Google apps with their students. There are many ways of handling the workflow of passing out assignments and collecting work from the students. We presented a few options that might make this process easier. Teachers can pick what works best in their unique situation.

Our inspiration came from a great post by Catlin Tucker from 2014 called Which Workflow Works for You? I love her ideas. They are straightforward ways for students to share Google documents with the teacher. They help with the organizational setup that can also be used while students are working on iPads. Just a note that gClassFolders that she mentions is no longer supported by the developer.

She mentions using Google Forms and an add on called Doctopus that are not available for iPads. So the initial teacher work would have to be done on a computer, but the students can still utilize those strategies on the iPads. Here is a tutorial I developed for Doctopus.

Since Shira and I were focusing mostly on the workflow on iPads, I'd like to add a few more ideas.

Edmodo and Google Classroom

These are both digital platforms that help with the distribution and collection of student work. Teacher can assign work to students, distributing templates or documents if they want, and students can turn them back in with the click of a button.  They are great methods for gathering the assignments in one location. Teachers can us a built in gradebook to quickly go through the assignments from one screen.

• Edmodo tutorial - a series of posts on this blog
• Google Classroom tutorial - a presentation by Kelly Fitzgerald

Set a Passcode

In most classrooms iPads are shared between students. Once a student is logged in to their account in Drive, Docs, Sheets, or Slides other students can access their docs. Students can log out when they are done, but that becomes a hassle every time they come to class.

An easier way is to have them log in to the app and then set a passcode. When they do that in one app it applies to all the other apps where they've logged in. Then when the student quits the app and opens it the next time, they have to enter their passcode. Passcodes are easier to remember and enter than an entire username/password. If another student is currently logged in, the student can switch to their own account and enter the passcode. Directions for setting the passcode can be found in Google's Help files.

AirDrop

All of the solutions so far have been specifically for sharing of Google docs. But a lot of the work students do on iPads might be within other apps, such as iMovie, Pic Collage, or other creative apps. These apps save or export files that can be sent directly to the teacher's iPad or Mac using AirDrop. AirDrop is a feature that lets you send files wirelessly to another device.

To use AirDrop follow Apple's steps in this document. Once the files are on the teacher's device, the teacher can open them, move them, or do anything else.

Open in App

Files saved on a device can usually be opened in another app. To use this feature the iPad will need to be updated with the latest OS and that particular app will need to support it. For example, a picture in the camera roll can be saved directly to a folder in Google Drive or uploaded as an assignment in Google Classroom.

Tap the share icon (the icon that looks like a box with an arrow coming out of it). In the list of apps tap either Google Drive or Google Classroom. If you don't see them listed, swipe all the way to the right, tap More, and flip the switch for that app.

If you try to open in Google Drive it will let you navigate to the folder you want. If you try to open in Google Classroom, it will pull up a list of assignments for that user. Choose the correct assignment and it will upload that file as if the student were in Google Classroom.

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Student Presentation Apps

Today was my district's annual iDevice Mini-Conference. I always love these conferences because of all the learning and sharing. There are so many good ideas that come from them! I facilitated two sessions on student presentations. Because of the focus on iDevices, I shared several apps that I love to use for helping students share their learning.

Rather than just focus on tools, I like to discuss ways to help students be better presenters. My inspiration comes from a blog post by Lisa Nielsen called Stop Letting Good Students Do Bad Presentations.  She outlines 6 tips teachers can use to help students be better presenters. I think these tips are more important than learning the apps. It doesn't matter how well students use the app or how easy the app is, if they present their content poorly all the hard work is lost.

My beginners session focused on 3 basic apps that are simple enough for students and teachers to transition from the idea of PowerPoint to doing the same style presentations on an iPad. The session handout can be downloaded here and the presentation is below.


Student Presentation Basics - Created with Haiku Deck, presentation software that inspires

The three apps I focused on for this session are

• Keynote
• Haiku Deck
• Educreations

In the advanced session I also added information about a new presenting method I absolutely love called PechaKucha. PechaKucha 20x20 is a simple presentation format where students show 20 images, each for 20 seconds. The images advance automatically and students talk along to the images. This helps them be concise and stay on topic. It forces them to let pictures tell their story.

The session handout can be downloaded here and the presentation is embedded below.


Engaging Student Presentations - Created with Haiku Deck, presentation software that inspires

The three apps I focused on for this session were specifically chosen because they don't follow the traditional slideshow format typically used in PowerPoint.

• ThingLink
•  Sock Puppets
• Adobe Voice

These are some simply, yet powerful apps that can really help students be creative and show their learning.

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Awesome iPad App: Adobe Voice

Storytelling is a powerful way to inspire students and give them a voice. They inspire us, catch our attention, and solidify concepts in our mind. The way stories are created and shared can be just as powerful. Students don't need a tool to be so complicated that it gets in the way of the telling of the story. 

Adobe Voice is an iPad app that follows this philosophy. Check out this two minute video from Adobe Voice that shows this philosophy.

 

Voice is so easy to use that students at virtually any grade level could use it. When you launch Adobe Voice the first time, it includes an on screen tutorial to walk you through the process of creating your story. Once you know what you're doing you can skip that and go straight to the creation!

The app starts by asking you to enter a topic for your story. Swiping up from the bottom reveals suggestions for different types of stories.

Voice then offers a story structure for various kinds of stories. The structure includes a certain number of slides with suggestions for what story element to include on that slide. You can also start from scratch. Make your choice and tap Pick This One.

Choose a Layout for the slide you are on.

Choose a Theme for the entire story.

Choose Music for the entire story.

On each slide you tap the + to add an icon, photo, or text. There are thousands of iconic images to choose from.

If you select photo you can import from the camera, camera roll, or Dropbox.

Tap the microphone and record what you want to say. It's best to add only one or two sentences on a slide. Let the pictures help you tell the story.

When your whole story is done tap the Share icon and save the video to your camera roll.

Adobe Voice maintains a YouTube channel with some really good videos that offer some more advanced tips and tricks.

Integration Ideas

• Create an All About Me story
• Summarize a chapter
• Recount a story
• Share a biography
• Create a how-to video
• Present a position on a topic
• Cultural explanations
• Journal of field trip
• Book trailer
• Descriptive language practice
• Create a dictionary

Download the Tech Integration Challenge for Adobe Voice and see if you are up to the challenge!

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