The Reflective Educator

Education ∪ Math ∪ Technology

Author: David Wees (page 31 of 97)

November 26, 2012 / 0 Comments

Simplified e-portfolios for young kids

I’ve been hoping to implement e-portfolios for students from k to 12 at my school for a while, but have always run into a stumbling block – how I can simplify the process at the k-5 stage so that it is easy (ideally for our students to do themselves) and not too time-consuming for our teachers. I think I finally have a solution to this issue, and I’d like to share it to get some feedback and to improve what I’ve started. I’m writing this as a bit of a guide to getting started, and to share my work so far so that other people can benefit and improve upon my work.

I’ll describe the set-up I’m working on first. The basic idea is to set up a station where students can put their non-digital work underneath a webcam, enter in a pass code (or a user name and password, potentially) and have their photographed and added to their own personal eportfolio.

 

eportfolio webcam setup

Hopefully you can see from above that I have my laptop hooked up to a webcam, and that the webcam is pointed toward the table. In this case I’m using the IPEVU webcam, but really any webcam that can be easily pointed at a table will work. The idea is to have a station like this permanently set-up in a corner of our school.

Hobbling together code from many different sources, I’ve created a plugin, which you can download here (released under an Attribution required, Non-commercial, Share-alike license with permission from my school). It is still very rough and needs lots of work, but the basic functionality works. Think of it as a proof of concept, which I need to have working before I can move further with this project at my school. I strongly recommend not using this plugin with a production site until all of the wrinkles are ironed out! It may have huge security holes!

Inside the saveData.php there is some code that needs to be changed before you will be able to use the plugin. If you open the file up in a text editor (I like Programmer’s Notepad), look for the following lines:

// @TO DO
// 1. Have this code randomly generated for each student upon sign-up.
// 2. Have a table somewhere to make looking these codes up for students easy for teachers
// 3. Match the code to student blog id
$allowed = array(
 '12345' => 1,
 '22222' => 2,
 '23432' => 3,
);

These lines tell the program the relationship between the pass codes and their associated blogs. Currently, you will need to modify these manually, but the eventual plan is to make this much more user friendly (possibly randomly generated pass codes, downloadable in CSV format). Add whatever pass codes and associated blogs you wish to and save the file, but you can probably start with these pass codes for testing.

This plugin is designed to work with WordPress 3.4, but will probably work with most WordPress versions as it using some functions which appear to be somewhat stable over different versions. You can install the plugin just by unzipping the attached folder, and dropping it into the plugins folder in your WordPress installation (you will need to edit the saveData.php file to change the include path to your WordPress installation).

Once you have the files for the plugin in the right place, while logged into your WordPress site, navigate to www.your-wordpress-site.com/wp-content/plugins/eportfolio/ with a browser with getUserMedia enabled (which as of writing this post was only true for Chrome 21+, Firefox 17+, and Opera, but you can test to see if it will work in your browser by navigating to the previous link). You should see a prompt asking for permission to access your webcam, which you should give.

Now, you should be able to enter a title (which is optional – by default the format is "My Work – dd/mm/yyyy"), enter one of the chosen pass codes, and click on "Take Snapshot."

If you then navigate to your WordPress site, you should see that whatever blog you chose has a new entry. Voila, 1 click to post!

Hopefully all of this works for you, but more than likely it will not. This may because I’ve missed a step explaining my set-up (or you did…), or because your set-up is different than mine. Please let me know. I’m also looking for collaborators on this project, particularly if you know how to code. I also need people willing to try out this system with actual students to get some feedback on whether or not it is as easy to use as I hope.

November 25, 2012 / 1 Comment

Internet filters should be in our students’ heads

During #EdcampLBC, I tweeted out the following:

To be clear, at a young age I think internet filters are necessary, and in a k to 12 setting it is probably a good idea to filter out porn, hate sites, and sites that contain computer viruses and malware. That being said, our internet filters based on hardware or software are easily bypassed, and our students will live in an (mostly) unfiltered world once they finish school. One obvious strategy is to use a gradual release of responsibility, and to recognize that our learners are learners in all domains. Mistakes will happen, but if we protect our students too much, they will not develop their own internal filters. So I suggest that we use heavy filtering for our youngest students and gradually remove the filters as our students get older.

November 24, 2012 / 4 Comments

A math question

I’m working on a system where students will be able to post their non-digital work directly from a scanning station to their eportfolio blog. I want to make the system simple enough that young kids can potentially use it themselves (and ask our teachers to review the portfolios of our students periodically). To this end, instead of asking our students to enter a user name and password, I’m considering asking them to just enter a 5 or 6 digit passcode made of numbers, letters, or a word (which would be recorded somewhere for easy access for the younger students).

What I hope to avoid are collisions where two codes are so similar that students end up accidentally posting to each other’s blogs (either different by only one digit, or by two digits being transposed). One thought I’ve had is that I can use a barcode or QR code scanner, but as this may be challenging to set up, I may need to use a simple passcode to begin with.

My question is, what is the minimum passcode I can use while minimizing the chance of a passcode collision for our nearly 500 students? I’ve done some work figuring this out for myself already, but I’m curious about some other approaches.

November 22, 2012 / 6 Comments

Different multiplication strategies

I’m investigation possible models for learning multiplication. Below there are 7 possible models or algorithms. I’d like to know if you know of more models. I’ve found 12 different models for understanding/doing multiplication over at Natural Math, but have not found explanations of all of these that I can easily share.

Interestingly enough, many of these videos define multiplication at the beginning of the video with no sense that there are other possible definitions.

 

Binary multiplication

Line Multiplication

Lattice Multiplication

Area model

Repeated addition

Using arrays

Chip model

November 17, 2012 / 4 Comments

Connected Leadership

I’ve put together this presentation as a conversation starter for tomorrow’s Edcamp Leadership conference. What do you think the implications of these changes in our society are for educational leaders?

 

November 5, 2012 / 5 Comments

Internet safety

I’ve created the following presentation to use as a conversation starter with our grade 8 and 9 students. The objective is to have a discussion about the Internet and safety. I am framing the conversation with the idea that our non-digital selves co-exist with our digital selves, and that non-digital citizenship and digital citizenship are really two aspects of the same part of our personality, rather than being completely separate things.

I’d love some feedback.

(Can’t view the presentation above? See it here)

 

Updated:

Here is a brief explanation of how I intend to use this presentation, which will probably make it more helpful for you as an educator. Lots of ums and aahs in this description as I did it in a hurry to get it up.

October 30, 2012 / 1 Comment

Math activities for a measurement unit

Our 3rd grade students will be doing a unit on measurement soon. These are the specific standards for the measurement unit that we hope to address. I’ve been asked to brainstorm some activities for students in this unit which can be extended or modified to meet the needs of a wide range of learners.
 
BC Precribed learning outcomes in 3rd grade related to measurement
  • relate the passage of time to common activities using non-standard and standard units (minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, years)
  • relate the number of seconds to a minute, the number of minutes to an hour, and the number of days to a month in a problem-solving context
  • demonstrate an understanding of measuring length (cm, m) by- selecting and justifying referents for the units cm and m- modelling and describing the relationship between the units cm and m- estimating length using referents- measuring and recording length, width, and height
  • demonstrate an understanding of measuring mass (g, kg) by- selecting and justifying referents for the units g and kg- modelling and describing the relationship between the units g and kg- estimating mass using referents- measuring and recording mass

Here’s what I have so far:

  1. How long is a minute?

    Have students work in pairs. One student has a timer, the other student has nothing. The person with the timer says "go" and starts the timer. The other student waits (without counting or saying anything) and tries to say stop when they think a minute has gone by. Then students switch roles. Play this game once at the beginning of class, and once near the end of class (ideally just before a break), and have some of the students gather the data from the entire class and compare the numbers from the beginning of class to the times just before the break.
     

  2. What day of the week will your birthday be next year?

    Have students work together to try and figure out what day of the week their birthday will be on next year. Challenge activity: What day of the week will your irthday be on in 20 years? In 80 years? Students will choose to adopt different strategies, but you should not let them look it up on a calendar (but they are free to make their own calendar to make it easier to calculate).
     

  3. How many times will my heart beat in an hour?

    Have students measure how many times their heart beats in either 10, 15, 20, 30, or 60 seconds (or all of the above) with a partner, and then try and calculate how many times it will beat in an hour. Some students will realize that this is a multiplication problem, others will start creating lists of numbers to add together. Extension: How many times will your heart beat in a year.
     

  4. How long is a foot?

    Have students measure different things in the room with their feet as the unit of measure (to the nearest half a foot if possible – support tip: ask students, is it nearer to 2 feet or 3 feet?). Have them compare their answers to the same things they’ve measured. Talk about the need for a standard unit of measurement, which is exactly the purpose of centimetres, metres, etc…
     

  5. How heavy are things?

    Activity: Using a balance scale (which we have in the science lab in the senior school) have students measure a bunch of different things around the classroom (like pens, etc…) and compare the weights of the different things together. Now, ask the question: how many pens weight are these things? Now you can have students try and determine, using the weight of a pen as a reference, how heavy various objects are in the room.

October 29, 2012 / 4 Comments

Resources for mathematics enrichment

I’m currently putting together a list of resources for our elementary school teachers to use to enrich their mathematics classrooms. Our basic philosophy is to provide opportunities for all students to engage in rich mathematical tasks, and to add breadth & depth to their program of mathematical study, rather than accelerating through the British Columbia curriculum.

I’m looking for more resources for each of the areas below, but I don’t want to over-whelm my colleagues with options. Any suggestions? Ideally I’d like resources which are straight-forward to use, and which promote the philosophy described above.

 

Resources for enrichment

Problems with open-ended solutions.

Puzzles

Math contests

Games

  • Choose games which have some basis in logic & reasoning to solve, or which require students to use mathematical skills in context. Eg. Monopoly is a terrible game for logic & reasoning, but a good game to practice addition & counting in a financial context.

Programming

Real life contexts

  • Find ways the mathematics students are learning is present in their current life
  • Provide opportunities for students to learn interesting mathematics (perhaps even outside ‘the curriculum’!) that occurs in nature
  • Sample activity: Have students take photos of things which appear to be mathematical to them
October 25, 2012 / 6 Comments

Math apps

I recently realized that I have a tonne of different math mini-applications that I’ve built over the years, and I will need to take the time to catalog them at some stage (note that some of these will just not run in Internet Explorer). For now, here’s a list of the ones that might be useful, in no particular order:

October 23, 2012 / 6 Comments

Is this a necessary use of technology?

Steve Wheeler shared this video on his blog after describing constructionist learning theory. I’m not really clear on what, if anything, this robot adds to the activity of playing Snakes & Ladders. What would be different about this activity if students had to move a marker instead of pressing buttons on the robot to get it to move? Is this a necessary use of technology, or an extravagance?

I tend to lean toward the latter for this particular example. I am a supporter of technology use in schools, but we need to be thoughtful about our use of technology and given it’s expense, try and choose technologies which we can see will have an impact on student learning, rather than technologies which can be easily replaced with something far cheaper.

Can you see other ways that this particular technology could be used in a more powerful way, one which will impact student learning, and which requires this technology?

« Older posts Newer posts »

Archived posts

Calendar

July 2025
M T W T F S S
 123456
78910111213
14151617181920
21222324252627
28293031