Day 151 - Sharing the Learning: Leveraging Digital

This afternoon, we were lucky enough to participate in a sharing session of teachers from the West. They came together to reflect on their inquiry that revolved around using the iPads for taking learning deeper.

Here are just some of the examples that were shared.  Daryl Pike's Grade 8 students at Birchview Dunes explored the impact of humans on the earth. Students did research and storyboarding in their Geography class and then did the video production with Daryl (their Media teacher).  The project evolved to include a focus on digital citizenship.

Rebecca Barr's grade 5 & 6 class at Admiral did a unit on fractured fairy tales.  The challenge was to modify or combine fairly tales and then share them in a digital format with their reading buddies. Students wrote a plan with paper and pencil, a draft in a Google Docs on the Chromebooks, then they used the Book Creator app (combined with Chatterpix and iMovie).

Laura Kennedy and Jody Bumstead shared some work that their students did in the Learning Centre. They were doing procedural writing so they created their work in the Book Creator app.  Students used speech to text and text to speech features in the iPad to support them with the writing process.

Margaret Johnson from Nottawa talked about how she is supporting her students to be more independent and self-assess their writing.  She has them use the accessibility features built into the iPad so they can correct spelling and punctuation, and use Voice Typing in Google Docs.  The change in routines has resulted in improved writing.

The common outcome for all of the students, as observed by the teachers involved, was greater engagement in the learning.  Everyone agreed that the quality of work was enhanced due to the combination of the technology and  the fact that the work was shared with an authentic audience.

Deb Shackell & Marie Swift