After spending a lot of time prevaricating, I have finally enrolled for an M.Ed course. I’m still a little concerned that juggling study around my full-time job will be a challenge – especially since I’m starting a new job in September. However, I’ve been successful whilst studying French at A Level and then at Level 1 (1st year undergraduate) whilst working full time, so I know I can do it. I’ve also been unsuccessful with language courses in the last two years (in the sense that I didn’t complete all of the assignments needed to pass and get the ‘points’ for a qualification – but I still learned a lot), so I need to take lessons from that and make sure I manage my time and avoid over-committing myself.
After looking at the courses on offer from various universities, I finally selected the Open University. I like the fact that I can work largely when it suits me – clashes between evening classes and school events such as meetings, training evenings, parents evenings etc caused some of the problems with my language learning last year. I’ve studied with the OU before and was impressed with the quality of the materials and the support on offer.
My first module will be Educational Enquiry. The course materials arrived today, so I can start my studies during the summer holiday.
Whilst working through the introduction to the course, I started jotting notes on paper, but then I remembered that I have a learning (b)log – so why not use it to post my reflections, thoughts, drafts etc as I work through the course? I realise that posting my own personal musings in a public place adds to the general clutter on the t’Internet, but this blog is supposed to be a place where I reflect and learn. Of course, should anyone wish to offer any comments on whatever I’m rambling on about, I’ll be happy to hear from you.
My students and I been trying out Mouse Mischief in our lessons over the last couple of weeks. It’s great – I never knew PowerPoint could be so much fun!
First things first: what is Mouse Mischief? It’s a free add in for PowerPoint 2007 or 2010 which allows you to connect multiple mice to one PC, rather like a voting system. My school already has a voting system that works with PowerPoint, so why have I been so totally won over by Mouse Mischief?
1. It’s really easy to use.
Once the software has been downloaded from the Mouse Mischief homepage and installed, an extra tab appears in PowerPoint:
The Multiple-Mouse tab is very easy to use, it’s simply a matter of clicking the buttons. Anyone who can use PowerPoint should be able to do this without any trouble at all, but you will find lots of advice and step-by-step instructions on Microsoft’s Mouse Mischief site – actually, the site is really helpful, I think they’ve done a really good job on this.
Making an interactive presentation is pretty intuitive: start by adding a new slide, then decide to leave it as a normal slide (which won’t show multiple mice – useful for learning objectives, teaching points etc), or make it interactive. Interactive slides can offer a choice of yes or no, or they can be multiple choice (with 2-10 answers) or even a drawing slide. Setting the correct answer on a multiple choice is mater of two clicks. I really like the fact that once I’ve assigned a correct answer I can see a big tick on the screen, so I’m unlikely to make a mistake (when I’m using the presentation with students, the green tick only appears once they have all answered).
Mouse Mischief also easy to use in the classroom, in fact it’s some of the little details that have really won me over:
the teacher’s mouse/keyboard is always in control
the multiple mice only appear on the interactive slides
I can hide the students mice with a single key stroke (down arrow) and switch them back on once I’m ready – great if I want to build in some thinking time, or make sure that the students understand a key word or phrase before they answer
the students get one attempt at answering each question (unless the teacher refreshes the slide)
as soon as students have answered, their cursor disappears – this is such a nice, practical feature, I love it!
the students get feedback about which mouse was the first to select the correct answer, which really encourages them to join in promptly
2. It’s amazingly popular with students
There’s a really cheesy video on the Mouse Mischief You Tube channel. Just take a look: students who are so bored that they’ve turned the film into a dull, old black and white movie are magically transformed into thrilled and enthused Technicolor learners.
“Pfft," I thought to myself. Then I had to do a little mental climb down as I watched my Y7 class undergo a similar transformation. They love it.
3. It’s a really useful Assessment for Learning tool
As soon as the last student has clicked an answer, the results appear: I can see how many opted for each choice and the students can see which choice was correct. One click hides this, so we can go back to the slide and discuss problems if we need to.
4. It’s reliable
Our current voting system has been a bit glitchy, especially since I upgraded to Office 2007. A frozen screen doesn’t help the lesson along. So far I’ve only used Mouse Mischief with seven mice, but it has behaved itself perfectly.
5. It’s cheap
The Mouse Mischief add-in is free. (I know PowerPoint isn’t free, but like many teachers, I already had that installed.) I purchased six cheap wireless mice (just £5 each). They aren’t great, but they’ve done the job. I already had a powered USB hub. Six mice is enough – I just divided my bigger classes into teams. Then I realised that I could plug in my wired mouse and give it to a team sitting at the front. That works well – even with a class of 32.
The number of mice is limited (about five for machines running Windows XP SP3, about 25 for Vista or Windows 7), but even 25(ish) good quality mice will be a lot cheaper than a voting system. My small set of mice will be heading to my new school with me in September, but I’m hoping to have persuaded my current school that it’s worth making a very modest investment in some hardware to allow even the least tech-minded teacher to create interactive lessons.
OK, so what are the drawbacks?
There aren’t many to be honest, but these are the main ones:
Mouse Mischief doesn’t work with transitions or animations. This isn’t something I make lot of use of, but it would have been better to know that before I spent ages animating a set of cubes to show how to work out volume.
I’m not certain about the drawing slides. They could work really well, but the classes I’ve used this with have simply gone crazy with the mice and scribbled everywhere.
It’s not easy to tell which mouse belongs to which student. I’m thinking of taking some screenshots of the different cursors so that I can print and laminate them, then get students to collect the appropriate one and put it on their desk where I can see it. However, the classes that I’ve used this with have quickly got used to it and been pretty sensible with the mice, so I may not bother.
There isn’t any sort of record to show who got each question correct; something that is possible with our existing voting system. On the other hand, I use this data only rarely – and only when I’ve got a small enough class that they have one voting handset each. Easy solution – I can continue to use the voting system when I want the data, but I’ll use Mouse Mischief – which is easier to set up and more fun to use – if I don’t need the data at the end.
How much is an interactive whiteboard? How about £5? In fact, for that price, you can have an easily portable interactive whiteboard. Interested?
Actually, I’m cheating a little: I’m assuming that you already have a classroom with a projector and either a laptop or desktop computer (which is the case in almost every classroom in my school). If you have, then you just need to add one cheap and cheerful wireless mouse.
I bought a few mice to try out Mouse Mischief (which is brilliant – I’ll post about that later), but then I realized that even one wireless mouse could be a pretty useful teaching tool that allows students to interact with any program. I just pass the wireless mouse to a student and they can use it to interact with whatever is on the board: that could be selecting answers; completing drag and drop tasks; playing educational games or doing anything else that the touch surface on an interactive whiteboard would allow.
I’ve tried this with several classes and it’s worked brilliantly—students pass the mouse to one another with less disruption than when they come out to the whiteboard. Since the students aren’t standing in front of the whiteboard there are no issues with shadows or other class members being unable to see. Some students who are extremely reluctant to come out to the board will happily use the mouse from their seat.
Only one student can use the mouse at a time – but since most interactive whiteboards can only be used by student at a time, that’s not really a great disadvantage.
As a teacher, I can easily take back control at any time—all I have to do is unplug the receiver for the wireless mouse.
I’m sure I’m not the first person to think of this—in fact I can’t believe this idea has only just occurred to me—but it’s been a really effective way to involve students. I’m sure I’ll be doing this a lot in future. In fact I have a strong suspicion that I may have rendered my very expensive SMARTboard redundant. Mind you, there are no SMARTboards at the school where I’m working from September. I’ll just take my £5 mouse.
The maths department at Birley recently purchased 12 iPod touches for use in lessons. I’ve been getting them set up and trying them out. They have caused great excitement in my lessons – in fact, just seeing the iPods was enough to drive some of my students into a frenzy of excitement!
Anyway, this is very much a voyage of discovery for me: I’d never owned an iPod or an iPhone, so there’s been a bit of a learning curve – helped enormously by recommendations from some of the fantastic people I follow on Twitter.
Let’s start with ten apps that have worked well for me in the classroom:
1. Arithmetick This is a free app (recommended by @colport – thank you!)
As the name suggests, it’s great for practising basic arithmetic. Choose from add, subtract, multiply, divide – or a combination of these, pick a level and get started. I’ve used this with students in Y6 working at level 3/4 and with a foundation group in Y9. A few of them couldn’t keep up with the timer and opted for a practice session rather than the game, but most students opted for the game, got really competitive and tried to get high scores. Verdict: Great for practising multiplication tables, in multiplication and division form. Also good for number bonds.
2. TwentyFour Lite This is a free app, there’s also a paid version.
I used the 24 game as an intro to BODMAS/BIDMAS with Y7 students working at level level 5/6 . We played this as a starter activity. They loved it, several of them went home and downloaded this onto their own devices. Verdict: Nice version of the game, shows working step by step (which was ideal for me). The free version is fine for classroom use, but any serious 24 addicts would probably run out of games and need to upgrade.
3. World Maths Day 2010 This is a free app (recommended by @misterel – thank you!)
I used this with some of my Y10 form group, they really enjoyed it. Verdict: Nice app, wide range of levels available, but it does require an age range setting – which is reset via the settings screen, not from within the app itself. Not a big problem, but will need re-setting if I use this with younger students.
4. Guess My Age This is a free app
I downloaded this one (it’s an app version of an old trick – maths teachers will recognise it!), but didn’t ask students to try it. A lot of them tried it anyway – and are amazed by it. Verdict: The students love this and want to know how it works – but I’m not telling! I’m sure they’ll work it out sooner or later.
5. Dynamic dice This is a paid app (currently 59p)
We use assorted dice for probability work. This is nice for students, they like shaking the iPod to roll the dice. Verdict: The students like this, but it does present a distraction when we are supposed to working on other things, so I think I’ll save this for the next round of probability. It’s intended for use when playing games, so it doesn’t record the scores, which we would need to do in a maths lesson.
6. Coin toss and Heads Tails Both are free
Two coin flipping apps, which I was trying out for probability work. Verdict: Heads Tails is the better of the two for maths, because it records numbers and percentages of heads and tails. Good for gathering data rapidly, without the need for students to record anything.
7. Algebra Level 1 This is a paid app (currently 59p)
Solve simple equations, selecting an answer from a list. Verdict: Worked well as part of a revision session with Y7. I didn’t want to restrict myself to using multiple choice questions, so we started with this and then moved onto Mathmaster Algebra.
8. Mathmaster Algebra This is a paid app (currently 59p)
Solve simple equations, but this time the answer must be typed in using a keypad. The students competed to get a high score. Verdict: Worked well as a revision activity, following on from Algebra Level 1. It got a fantastic response from the students – they were really engrossed.
9. Falling Algebra 1 This is a paid app (currently 59p)
Solve simple equations, but this time the answer is selected from a cloud of falling numbers. Verdict: This drove me mad – but Y10 loved it, so it’s a keeper.
These were originally on a wiki, http://bccpgce.pbworks.com, but since I’m handing control of that over to the student teachers, I though I’d better keep a copy of my own:
Starting out with Educational Technology
The aim of the session is to provide you with some starting points and ideas that you can incorporate into your teaching. You should also be aware of some of the issues surrounding e-safety and professionalism.
I won’t be doing handouts for this presentation – all the links and resources are here:
Introduction
A bit about me
Why are we here?
QTS standards
Starting a journey
It’s all about the learning
Tools I’ve chosen are either available at Birley or free
Alvin Trusty shows you how to imporve your presentations (nb this is a long video – around 45 mins, but worth taking the time to watch. It is also for an American audience, so the copyright rules aren’t exactly the same as in the UK)
Dan Meyer redesigns a slide Sounds simple, but there’s some very thorough analysis of how this would be beneficial to the learners.
Visual search with Spezify.com - demonstrated by Dai Barnes using Screenr. Spezify allows the results of a web search to be displayed graphically: pictures, photos and snippets of web pages appear. Of course some of these may not be suitable for school – Dai uses this as a teaching point and discusses what should/shouldn’t be clicked on, but obviously teachers should do the search and check the results before they use Spezify with a class!
News search with newsmap.jp (don’t be put off by the japanese domain name – results are in English). Nice for tutor time, as well as for looking at current events.
How do you decide if information is reliable? How do you teach this skill?
Teachers TV resource – for teachers. Obviously be aware about age appropiateness of websites etc if you use this type of activity with students.
North Pacific Tree Octopus (Google key words: tree octopus), or provide a direct link: zapatopi.net/treeoctopus.htm
Boilerplate (Google key words: boilerplate robot), or to avoide the unhelpful search suggestion that includes the word hoax, provide a direct link: www.bigredhair.com/boilerplate/
allows automatic backup - I do all my bookmarking with diigo and it exports automatically to delicious. I can be part of two networks and I have a backup – just in case
To teach students how to do a presentation without a script
To encourage students to vary their vocabulary (for example considering alternatives when the word ’said’ appears in large letters when students analyse their own creative writing)
Using Samarost 2 as a stimulus for creative writing. [nb: Chapter 1 is free, the full version costs $5. There are some Google ads, at least on the free version] It tells the story of some aliens who visit a planet and leave with the inhabitants’ dog. An adventure to rescue the dog ensues. It’s very nicely animated and can be used as the basis for descriptive or imaginative writing. A new version is expected soon, there is also Samarost 1, but this contains characters smoking hookahs, so might not be suitable for use in school!
inanimatealice.com is really good for digital storytelling, students can discuss what is happening, predict what will happen next, talk about the images or discuss the choice of music. They may even be inspired to create a story of their own.
Create or choose your own starting point – it doesn’t have to be fictional:
Etherpad is an online collaborative writing tool. It was recently acquired by Google, but the code has now been open sourced, so other versions have started to appear – such as primary pad which is for use in primary schools. Keep a lookout for new versions – lots are now starting to appear.
A number of people (originally up to 8 people, but this may change as people play with the source code) can write at once; each person’s contribution is highlighted in a different colour, so it easy to see who wrote what. There is a chat window at the side, also colour coded. There is a time slider that can be used to see how the writing developed over time.
Steve Kirkpatrick is a teacher who used this really effectively. He played an animated Batman clip from YouTube, students were split into groups and asked to describe short sections of the clip (it’s only one minute long). The clip is full of action and vivid imagery, so it’s an ideal stimulus for descriptive writing. The students collaborated on Etherpad to produce the written work. The teacher can enter the Etherpad and check/correct work – with their contribution clearly highlighted. Read more on Steve’s blog here.
Issues:
Need to check that Etherpad actually works – some firewalls block it.
The pads may be public, so in theory anyone can enter the discussion.
Students don’t tend to start this in an organised way, so it is worthwhile either modelling how different group members should start at different points, or even putting names in for them to show where to start.
How Dan Stucke amazed his class with Google forms:
He used Google forms to set up a survey and asked his teacher network (more on that later!) to complete it. Students were hooked by the sudden appearance of their own data. Once exotic locations from around the world started to appear there were oohs and ahs! Forms and data were used to generate discussion about quality of questions etc.
One disadvantage – pupils can put rude words in and there’s no way of checking who it was.
Dan recently did an even better versiopn of this which included the use of Wallwisher. The people who completed his survey left feedback about the questions on postits.
Forms are also good for pupil surveys
Maths maps Another brilliant project started by Tom Barrett. These are all aiimed at KS2, but why not adapt it to suit your own subject and key stage(s)?
Taking control of your professional development:
Networking with other professionals and sharing ideas online
#movemeon What happened when Doug Belshaw asked educators to share hints and tips using Twitter and the #movemeon hashtag? Lots of people joined in to share their ideas and create a really interesting crowd-sourced resource.
This isn’t just for new or trainee teachers, we’re all learners, I’m sure everyone can find something in here to make them think ‘I’ve got to try that’, or ‘I used to do that – why did I stop?’ Doug and Stuart Ridout have done a great job with the book. Best of all, the e-book is free, so what are you waiting for? Go and download one.
I teach maths and ICT at Birley Community College, a secondary school in the UK. This is where I'm planning to share links and explore ideas that I find useful or interesting - hopefully other educators will also find something of interest here.
Thanks for dropping in. Feel free to comment.
NB: Any opinions expressed here are those of the author or commenter; they don't (necessarily) reflect the view taken by Birley CC.
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Posted by: Lois Lindemann on: August 24th, 2010 
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