Sharing with Explain Everything

My target group of boys are loving creating responses to a range of text using Explain Everything. However, we are finding it tricky and time consuming to find a good way of sharing our thinking and learning on our blogs.

The boys first tried uploading screenshots of single cards of work to their blogs. However, this didn't truly capture their thinking and learning as it only showed the end product, not the process. Then one of the boys wanted to share his learning by creating a movie. This has caused all kinds of problems when trying to upload quickly and easily. We have tried uploading to Vimeo from Explain Everything but this seems to keep failing at the final rendering stage. We then tried uploading to the students drive then embed on the blog. This isn't ideal as there are many steps to complete and this only works the students manage to get the permission settings right. Hmm...

My next step is to find a quick and easy way of sharing their movies that is intuitive and quick. I'll keep you posted.

Making a Start With Explain Everything - William

It has been an interesting journey so far using Explain Everything with my year 6 students. I have found that some of my students have younger siblings who are using iPads and Explain Everything for their learning. Some of my students have the perception that Explain Everything is junior work only and they must be behind to be working on this app. It has taken a while to get them fully engaged and motived to learn using this app.

For others it has been completely freeing and motivating. One young man named William has been absolutely loving it and can't wait to create another movie. This has suddenly turned him on to reading and is very keen to share his learning with others in the class.

Below is one of his first responses to a text using Explain Everything. You can see that he has wanted to record his voice whenever possible. When he has played this back he has laughed at how he reads and told me he would like to work next on his use of expression. This is incredibly exciting to me as it is providing the motivation for him to come to school each day and learn. Before this he was very sporadic with his school attendance.

Teacher Inquiry 2015

How can Year 5 and 6 students use iPads for higher order thinking in creating tasks?

This year I am teaching in a year 5 and 6 modern learning environment with 1-to-1 devices. When reflecting on my practice from last year I want to increase the cognitive value that my students gain from their independent creative tasks. I found that last year more emphasis was put on 'how to create the digital learning object' rather than showcasing the learning in the digital learning object. 

So, this year the focus for my inquiry is setting a range of digital creation tasks to facilitate higher order thinking. I have decided to start with reading tasks and look at using the app Explain Everything. I am keen to find out:

• What kinds of tasks facilitates higher order thinking?
• How might these tasks differ from lower achieving students through to higher achieving students?
• Can I use SOLO and Explain Everything together to ensure that the tasks I set are in fact higher order thinking?