Handheld pilot program shows early success

Fulton County Schools (Georgia, USA) is piloting handheld computing using iPod Touch devices equipped with Studywiz Spark Mobile.

The interim findings of the pilot indicate that the use of Studywiz Spark Mobile has increased student engagement and motivation. The early success of this project, along with Studywiz Spark Mobile being selected as a finalist for a CODiE Award in the US for the second year running, confirm that mobile learning is the hottest space in online education!

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Go Compare …

We have a GTP student in school who when she saw Studywiz said how easy it was to use. She has come from a Moodle school and although she said it has some nice features it was not easy to navigate and took ages to put resources up for the children. The comment went on to look at other platforms such as uniservity which looks a bit like moodle and it was twice as many clicks of a mouse to get a homework resource up.

It is interesting that LPs these days have developed considerably but with flashy front end graphics but the core functionality and easy of use must out way the glossy cover. If it is not totally user friendly teachers will not use it. One example of a LP I came across recently was they had a nice testing feature where you could add multiple choice, multiple answers and compare words type questions but there was no facility to let the children know what questions they got right or wrong. They only got a mark! Where is the learning power behind that - pah!

LPs are all about extending, enhancing, enabling learning 24/7 in a flexible way. The hint is in the title.

Still continuing to develop our use of this and embed in best practice. We still need a generation of teachers who think learning and enable technology to assist. Not sure what others think?

Sharing Files and Documents via Mobile Devices

I recently came back from a training session in Tuscola, TX at Jim Ned High School. Had a wonderful group of teachers and administrators who were looking at how they could use the Studywiz Mobile portal with their iPod Touches.

I discovered an interesting argument that came up once I started talking about sharing documents within Studywiz. When we start to look at sharing documents via mobile devices, such as our iPod Touches, what will be the best classroom practice for accessing documents? Would it be faster to access files via the web portal of Studywiz or the mobile application?

What we focused our discussion on was if the students will be or not be connected to their wireless network. Teachers that will requiring students to review PDFs, movies, audio files, etc. AWAY from the school would be needing to store those items in a shared eLocker. Then the students can use our mobile application to retrieve those files to store on their Touch hard drives.

If the focus is blending information from documents IN the classroom, having the files in a handout or multi content activity would provide a more organized manner of distributing those items to the students. The other benefit is controlling when the students can see/open those files.

I was encouraged that throughout the training, we were able to share our thoughts and ideas about the expanding world of teaching with mobile technology.

iPods in our Spanish Class

For those of you who have been following us, we decided to experiment with iPod Touch in a Spanish class for 11-14 year olds. We allowed the students to have these devices 24/7. We taught the students how to access their mobile application for Studywiz and how to use their mobile eLocker. I sheepishly admit that the teachers didn’t make best use of the mobile eLocker as we are novices at the mobile approach but we are getting there. The kids however, loved having Studywiz access on their iPods and quickly found themselves accessing everything from their other classes too.

We are having to wrap up this particular project and give the iPods to another group of students so they too, can have a go. Parents are determined to get one of these devices in the hands of every Spanish student next year. Why? Well, even we were shocked at the transformational educational process when you give the student control over their own learning, with a well-directed teaching facilitation. Can’t wait to do more and better utilize the mobile eLocker next time.

Check out our new film: http://gallery.me.com/regina.cockerill#100321

Regina Cockerill, TASIS England Technology Coordinator

Make Yourself Redundant!

For the last couple of days I have been off work ill (ahhh poor me). I was disappointed as I had planned to get the children to upload their 2Create presentations to their blog so they could share these with each other and engage in some peer evaluation through commenting as well as show their parents.

I was fine to sit at a computer, so rather than wait a week for the opportunity to come around again where the impetus would be lost, I decided to use a screen recorder to create a video tutorial for them. I uploaded the video to a multimedia activity for them and left a message with a member of staff briefly explaining what I wanted the supply teacher to do (tell them where to view the tutorial). I took a look at the end of the school day at the blogs entries they had created and almost all of the class had managed to follow the tutorial correctly, allowing them to proceed without me being there!

Despite the title of this post, I’m not suggesting that everyone on their death bed boot up a screen recorder and upload a days worth of tutorials to Studywiz. What i am suggesting is that video teaching, or to be more exact video learning can prove a valuable tool in the classroom. As a teacher it can give your lesson structure freedom and satisfy even the most hardened ego as up to 30 children simultaneously view and listen to you. As a learner you are able to pause and rewind, taking your learning at your own pace.

It also opens doors to a host of exciting possibilities. For example, with a few class computers, netbooks or Ipod Touches you suddenly have a resource that children can choose to use to support themselves independently, in addition to support from you as a class teacher. Taking this further, with a class set of computers or Ipods, video tutorials could contribute to personalised learning with children choosing their own learning paths and reflecting about their learning in order to continue their chosen path.

@primarypete_