Open Response Questions: Steps

Great page for teaching students how to go about answering a written question.

Open Response Questions: Steps.

 

Why I love to have students using Educreations in an iPad classroom and how to walk through.

I was first introduced to the powerful simplicity of Educreations last year when I was working with Paul Andersen. Educreations is a free app that allows students and teachers to create a presentation that they can annotate and record their voice to. I love that it’s free, easy to use, but most of all I love the instant feedback students get through self assessment when using this app and the quality of work and thinking that my students produce.

Here I walk you through how to create an Educreation presentation
(apologies for the background noise) http://www.educreations.com/lesson/view/how-to-make-an-educreation/6933060/?ref=app

In my science classroom I use this app to have students explain a key concept they have studied in class or to present the findings of an investigation they have undertaken. Give students a time limit for the length of their presentation for example they could work in pairs to create a 1 minute presentation. Be firm about your time limits, students may need to re-record to get within your time limit. Remember you have to watch them all and 15 pairs going 1 minute over the limit means an extra 15 minutes of your time. I have found short time limits produce high quality work as it forces students to synthesis their thinking. You could pick the best presentations and share them with the class or school and this is another incentive for producing quality work. Ensure students have a quiet place to record. This may mean allowing students to go outside into the hallway etc. in small groups to record their presentation once they have put it together. I haven’t had any issues with this just remind them if your expectations before they go out.

You will be amazed at what your students create.

Students as Text Analysts

Most educators today would agree that involving students in critical thinking is imperative to the learning process. So how can we make this a sustainable element of our pedagogy?

Santoro (2004) provides a useful example of how to provide scaffolding in order to allow students to take on the role of text analysts.

An example of engaging students as text analysts:

Students review a series of recent newspaper articles that focus on one aspect of the current unit of work and answer the following questions: