In a technological and ever-changing world, it is important for students to understand that we can present our information across several different mediums. Standing at the front of the room and presenting something doesn't always capture an audience's attention anymore. For this reason, it is important that we learn ways to display our information in fun and engaging ways. The culminating project in my Literacy-Infused Unit does just this.As mentioned in my Tech Integration 1 project, my unit works to incorporate social studies topics and the NFL. This lesson is the fifth and final lesson in the unit, which challenges students to use everything they've learned to create the "ideal NFL stadium." They are expected to brainstorm with a group of their peers to come up with the most essential parts—the "needs"—of a stadium that would make it work for the team's fans. Technology comes into play at the end of the lesson, when students must select and element of their stadium to present. They must tell the class about the element, how it works, why the team made the decision to include it, and share any other relevant information regarding how it works in relationship to the team's relative or absolute locations or the physical and human characteristics of the area.
The technological tool that I chose to use for this lesson was ShowMe. ShowMe is an interactive whiteboard application that allows people to create lessons or share ideas using a whiteboard. All you need is a tablet and the app and you are ready to go! The app is free of charge and there are no limits to your recording or lesson-creating abilities. ShowMe is a great app for teachers because it allows them to use the app to teach or review subjects in a quick video that can be shared with students. Students, however, benefit from this app also. When students learn how to use this app, they are able to display their information in a unique and more accessible way. Additionally, it could be used to have students teach each other about topics in class.
ShowMe is a relatively simple app to get used to. All you need is a username and password and you can begin creating your interactive whiteboard activities! Once you log into the app, there is a screen that looks like the screenshot to the right. When you pull up the app, the whiteboard is blank and ready for you to use! All of the features for customization are included at the top of the screen in the black toolbar.
The blue button to the far left is the button that allows a user to save the ShowMe. It can either be saved as a draft or as a completed project, so this is helpful for users that are pausing between slides or recordings!
The features along the toolbar include a tool for adding text, an eraser, a tool to add pictures from the internet or other sources, an undo button, and a feature that allows a user to clear all the drawings or the entire whiteboard. There is also a button to record any audio in the middle of the tool bar. When the audio is being recorded, there is a stop watch that comes up at the bottom of the screen to keep the time of the whiteboard lesson. There are several colors to choose from as well, so users can pick and choose from them in order to choose which work best for the lesson. On the far right corner, there are two arrows. These arrows represent the slides that are in the lesson. As you flip through the slides, blank slides appear. If a teacher wanted to plan a whole presentation, they could create slides in advance and flip to them during the recording!Using the app, groups will be expected to record their presentations. Each student will create one slide featuring the element of their ideal NFL stadium that they are presenting. They may write whatever they'd like on their slide, but I will model that students should include some sort of summarizing sentence that quickly states what their element is about. Each group member will record their sections, creating a short video with all group members information included! This particular activity aligns with the North Carolina Essential State Standard for technology, 3.TT.1.3. This standard states that students will be able to "use technology tools to present data and information (multimedia, audio and visual recording, online collaboration tools, etc.)." At the end of the lesson, these videos will be shown to the whole class as a closure piece.
In order to model what I expect of the students, I created a short ShowMe video in which I explain an element of an imaginary NFL stadium that I am working on. In the video I talk about a drink stand that sells drinks for $1. I explain why me and my group chose to include this in our stadium and its importance. Using the picture upload feature, I uploaded the drawing that I created—just like what I expect my students to do! Check it out to see what I expect from each of my students as their summative assessment piece of the unit!
Although I really love using this app with students, I think that it was so helpful for me as a future educator to become familiar with it and its usefulness in the classroom. I am so excited to be able to incorporate this into my lessons, because I think that it has a valuable place and can play an essential role—especially when it comes to reviewing or re-teaching. In the future, I plan to model homework questions or other at-home using this app and post the videos to my school website or class homepage. What an incredible bank of resources I can create for my students!
Although I did not have the opportunity to do this with actual students, I feel as though this would have been an engaging piece to my lesson and a unique way to end a unit.
References
[ShowMe logo]. Retrieved November 16, 2016 from http://www.gallitzvi.com/uploads/8/6/3/2/8632116/7812127.jpg
[ShowMe logo]. Retrieved November 16, 2016 from http://www.gallitzvi.com/uploads/8/6/3/2/8632116/7812127.jpg
[ShowMe whiteboard]. Retrieved November 16, 2016 from http://media.showmeapp.com/files/1000111421/pictures/thumbs/2033948/last_thumb1432181031.jpg
