Using Technology to Inspire Learning

From This Day in Technology History:

January 19, 1983

The Apple Lisa, the first commercial personal computer to have a graphical user interface and a computer mouse, is announced. At a cost of $9,995, the Lisa ended up being a commercial failure for Apple, but many of the technologies developed for the Lisa made their way into the Macintosh computer.

Technology has come a long way in less than 40 years!

Our students are now digital natives. Most of them have not lived during a time when a cell phone was not in nearly everyone’s hand. Technology has been woven into their lives at school and often at home as well from an early age. 

This past year, technology has made it possible for us to continue offering our complete, balanced, and inspiring Saint Andrew’s education. Students use classroom technology tools to interact with their peers and teachers—through live chats, discussion forums, video feeds, or other mediated formats. Our faculty harness technology in the classroom to bring textbook readings to life through multimedia and interactive whiteboards are used to draw complex STEM concepts or formulas. Similar technology also allows for gamification—where students can engage in tournaments with their peers or engage in debates in breakout rooms, for example.

Here are a few other examples from Ms. Peters and Mrs. Marcel of how they have continued to inspire learning through the use of technology.

From Ms. Peters:

In 5th grade, we have been studying matter and molecules. Since we were not able to share beam balances, we played an online simulator that allowed us to still measure mass and calculate the weight. 

In 2nd grade, we have used Chrome Music lab to visualize and experiment with sound while avoiding any use of our mouths! 

In both 4th and 5th grade, we have used the PHET simulations to visualize and experiment with difficult concepts about wave energy and molecules.

In 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade, I transformed running games that we would have played in stations outside into an online card game through a clickable Google Slides game. All students loved the chance to journey to the center of the Earth in the rock cycle, evaporate into a cloud in the water cycle, and survive a dangerous path to migrate to winter grounds.

From Mrs. Marcel:

In Middle School Technology classes students have been working on creating their own websites using Google Sites. Armed with knowledge from digital citizenship lessons about credible sources of information and copyright/fair use, students were able to put an interesting spin on their website topics -- Create a credible-looking website that is designed to give misinformation...the wilder the topic the better (and more challenging).

Through the process of creating these sites, our middle school students learned about effective website design elements, finding information to support their claims, and enhanced their skills of editing images to fit their needs.  They also learned how to properly cite their sources of information in order to give proper credit.  Here are screenshots of a few of the sites.

 

As we’ve started the new semester, middle school students will transition to a coding and programming project. Rather than focusing on becoming masters of a specific programming language, students will focus on understanding the concepts and building blocks of programming, practice logical thinking, and work to develop intuition about how computers solve problems. Students will choose the language they will use for coding based on their prior experience and comfort level with coding then create a game, app, or website to demonstrate their understanding.

If you have a student interested in digging deeper into coding and programming projects, Mrs. Marcel suggests these two sources for your consideration.

Hour of Code

https://codeguppy.com/index.html