Group Project

This week my group for class and I created an activity where students would use a mobile device (I-touch) as a learning tool. Dave and I both used the mobile devices in our classrooms; he teaches middle school and I teach elementary school. Our group wanted to compare how a similar lesson would go.

Today begin my lesson I had a short mini-lesson on making predictions by looking at the text features in a nonfiction article. Next, I split students up into 5 groups by having students count off 1-5. Students gathered in their groups with 2 QR codes. They were asked to scan the first QR code which would lead them to todaysmeet.com. This was not the first time my students were scanning a QR code but it was their first time using todaysmeet. I was a little nervous how it would go but throughout the activity most of my students had little to no trouble at all. They made great predictions based off of what we had discussed and were able to use the technology fairly well. The one thing I noticed my students didn't do was to talk with each other about their predictions. They were able to submit their predictions but there was really no discussion happening at all. This could have been due to many reasons: (a) they didn't have enough time or (b) they needed more modeling as to how to have discussions (to name a few possibilities).

After making predictions students were asked to get with a buddy from their group and practice the "I read, you read" strategy with the article they had just made predictions with. 

Next, students were asked to scan the second QR code, which sent them to  (an app, which is also a website) lino-it.com. Again, they were familiar with this site. Here students were asked to create one post-it describing one idea or fact they had learned throughout their reading. Almost all of my students were able to do this. The few that did not have the opportunity were still reading when it was time to switch subjects.

Overall, I absolutely loved this activity. All of my students were engaged and were using technology to enhance their learning experience. There have been many times throughout my technology-integration attempts that I feel students didn't learn much and the whole lesson was a complete disaster. As I reflect on each lesson I am starting to see that those previous lessons were important because it helped my students grow in their understanding and abilities to problem-solve and use these new technologies. I truly believe that they are now getting to a point where they can use them fairly easily and in a way that enhances their learning of the core subjects and the technology at hand.