Bringing it all together!

So all year long we have kind of stuck with Doodlecast Pro as our go to app for creating class videos.  Mastering an app has paid off and we have created 4 wonderful videos as part of our social studies unit.

Our unit is about our community and the focus of this project was to identify buildings within our School neighbourhood.  We brainstormed a list of buildings and then set out with our Grade 7 computer buddies to take photos of the buildings.

Prior to heading out, we discussed how to take good pictures as well as taking more than 1 picture so we could later choose the best one.  Of course we also talked about traffic safety, sticking together as a group and turn taking.  When all the pictures were taken we headed back to school.

The next day we got into groups and used the Doodlecast app to create our videos.  We developed a list of criteria needed when we talked about each picture.  We said we needed to name the building and it's purpose as well as the community helper that worked there.  As a group with an adult supervisor, we talked about each picture and decided what we should say.  The adult wrote it down and then each student had a turn to read the description.  Students had the opportunity to insert the pictures and format them to fit the screen.  I am confident that most students could create their own Doodlecast if they had to!

The final step was to convert it to a youtube video - super easy and fast to do which is why I LOVE Doodlecast and then we embedded it on our class wiki!

I even learned something new with this project!!!  Voice CAN be deleted without losing the whole project!!! YAY!  That makes this app even better.  You need to click on the picture until to opens up and little box with the word trim in the bottom right corner, you can then pull the recording back to the previous picture and click trim.  It will delete just the voice for that picture.  It also deletes the picture but it is easy to reinsert!

Enjoy one of our 4 videos! I know we will enjoy viewing them tomorrow!

 

Ipad Buddy Project

Our class pairs with a grade seven class once a cycle in the computer lab.  Our buddies normally teach us things like logging on to the network, opening our wiki, and using wordle or word documents.  They also teach us how to use Spelling City and Mathletics.  Our computer buddies are VERY helpful!

This year I decided to use some of that computer time for our buddies to do an ipad project with us.  Since we have 5 ipads, 5 groups under the supervision of Mrs. Fisher are participating in the first project.

The project is called THE IMPORTANT PEOPLE AT ECOLE MCISAAC SCHOOL.

Prior Knowledge:  Our grade one class composed a list of all the important people that work with us in the school.  We also identified their job title.  This was part of our Social Studies unit.

Students were first taught how to use the camera and how to reflect on the pictures they took.  They were allowed to delete and retake pictures that they felt were not good.  Students then headed out to take pictures of the people from the list.  This is all that was completed during the first class.  

Our next steps include using the Pictello App to insert the pictures and create text to identify the people and their positions.  The completed stories will be viewed by the rest of the class as a Social Studies presentation.

Once the first group have their projects completed, another group of 5 will begin a new project.  The criteria for the project will be the same, but the project will likely have a different theme.  I am allotting 3 classes for each project.