March 2018
Issue 4
MVHS PATHFINDER A Newsletter for MVHS Teachers who like to wonder and stray
This Week’s Issue
THIS ISSUE INCLUDES: ___________________________ Video Note-taking
Providing students with videos (or making them yourself) is a great way to enhance the teaching VIDEO NOTE-TAKING of a topic or skill. This week’s issue covers ___________________________ services that allow student to take notes on those videos and for teachers to check those ADD-ON OF THE WEEK: notes.
FAST ADVANCED GOOGLE SEARCH AND WORD CLOUD GENERATOR
Fast Advanced Google Search and Word Cloud Generator Many people don’t use Google’s advanced search options. Often this is due to the lack of ease of use. This week’s add-on makes searching in ___________________________ Google a lot easier.
POSSIBLY USELESS: ZAP SPLAT AND DIG CC MIXTER
Zap Splat and Dig CC Mixter When students create presentations the best way for them to liven them up, or make them more professional, is to use music. This week’s issue ___________________________ focuses on where to find copyright free music and sound effects for classroom use.
ARTICLE: EVIDENCE BASED TECHNOLOGY- A REVIEW
Article This weeks article is on a study that looked at hundreds of various research studies on technology and the classroom. They found some commonalities about what the research showed.
MVHS PATHFINDER
April 2018
Issue 4
Video Note-taking
Timelinely
You know that feeling. You assigned a great video that you want students to really analyze. You even tried to keep it under 10 minutes, because research shows that anything over this can result in viewers losing interest. You have a lesson planned out and all it requires is students pay attention to the video. Then what happens? Students come to class thinking they watched it closely, but you quickly learn your definition of “closely” is very different than theirs. Closely for them means glancing at it every so often while doing something else. We know that is not close enough because we have done the same thing sometimes.
Timelinely like the other services in this week’s issue allow teachers or students to post notes on videos as they watch them. The notes are embedded into the timeline of the video. Students or teachers simply enter the URL for a youtube video and Timelinely’s interface does the rest. Along with notes, students or teachers can add videos or other websites to the timeline of the video. This can allow for extension activities that go beyond the video and allow for differentiation.
So how do you get students to watch videos carefully and closely? This week’s issue focuses on different resources teachers can use to help students focus and help teachers identify when students have been paying attention closely.
Activity/assignment ideas include having students find a video and add their own notes, questions, websites to the video. Teachers could assign videos and have students take notes on the video using Timelinely and submit those videos to the teacher. One last feature of Timelinely that is really neat is the ability for students and teachers to comment on the notes on a video. This allows students to have discussions around a video with one another and also for the teacher to provide helpful feedback. One shortcoming of Timelinely is it only allows notes to be taken on youtube videos. If the video is some other service, like Vimeo, you are out of luck. You can find an example of a Timelinely video at this link.
MVHS PATHFINDER
April 2018
Issue 4
TurboNote TurboNote is an extension that can be used with YouTube videos. The extension does a number of things, but it’s primary function is to allow viewers to place notes at certain points of videos, so that they (and other viewers they share the video and notes with) can easily find important points in the video. Think of it like close reading a video. Within the classroom, teachers can assign videos to students and ask them to take detailed notes on the video. The video can be something everyone is watching or something that only a handful watch and then share with others (like Jigsawing a reading). Students can share their timestamp notes with other students and the teacher. A really great feature is the ability to save the notes to a PDF and then share that PDF. This gives a really quick look at what students thought was important and made notes for.
The last cool feature is students and teachers can watch a video together and take notes on it together using the “watch together” feature. This can allow some really great collaboration.
Click the video above to watch a tutorial video MVHS PATHFINDER
April 2018
Issue 4
ReClipped ReClipped is like TurboNote but with a couple features that set it apart. Like TurbonNote, ReClipped allows viewers to add notes at certain time points of a video. Unlike TurboNote, these notes are not sticky notes that are placed over the video, but are more like a word document that is a bit cleaner and easier to view. Viewers of the video and notes can then click on specific time marks of each note to be taken to that part of the video. One of the features that makes ReClipped different, and possibly better for teachers and students, is the ability to create “snips” of times in the video that have notes attached to them. What ReClipped does is automatically set a start point and an end point of 30 seconds (or a different amount if you choose) that shows just a small section of the video.
This allows teachers to assign small sections of the video for students to focus upon. The other feature of ReClipped that is not shared by other tools, is that ReClipped keeps the videos and notes you take on a “board” so you can easily access videos you have taken notes on. You can share these boards with colleagues and students, which would work great as a collaborative video sharing tool. The notes and clips you create can be shared publicly, privately, or to a board that is shared with others. ReClipped does allow students and teachers to take videos on multiple video sites beyond YouTube such as coursera, Khan Academy, and Vimeo.
Click the video above for a visual tutorial
MVHS PATHFINDER
April 2018
Issue 4
Google Extension of the Week: Fast Advanced Google Search One aspect of searching for topics on Google that is often overlooked is the ability to do an advanced search. Fast Advanced Google Search can narrow down very broad topics and make it easier for teachers and students to find what they are looking for. Fast Advanced Google Search is an extension that sits in the chrome toolbar (top right of the window). With just one click teaches can search google in a more advanced manner. By using the advanced search teachers can more quickly find what they are looking for.
Google Doc Add-on: Word Cloud Generator Word Cloud Generator is a really easy and fun add-on that allows teachers to easily turn any document into a word cloud. While this may sound like a silly thing that has no educational purpose, it can actually be used a number of ways. One way teachers could use it as a pre-reading activity. By taking a long or challenging document and putting into a work cloud, teachers can quickly show students which words or phrases they will be seeing a lot. They could have the students predict what the reading will be about based on this, or answer any questions, or point any words that may be challenging. Another way to use it, would be for teachers to create a word cloud of student responses. This would give a dry report some “life� and engage students more. MVHS PATHFINDER
April 2018
Issue 4
Possible Useless: ZAP SPLAT AND DIG CC MIXTER
Zap Splat is a website that has a number of free sound effect resources and music. The site is easy to use with the sound effects and music organized by category. Each has a preview so students and teachers can easily hear the sound before downloading.
Dig cc Mixter is a site that has thousands of copyright free music that students or teachers can use. The site makes it really easy to use as there is a search bar, which users can use to find really any genre of music they want.
Overall both resources are a wonderful way to liven up videos, presentations, or any other visual media students or teachers create. The best part of each is the music and sound effects are fair use and copyright free. It is really important that students are taught the importance of digital citizenship, which means following the law. So if students will be creating anything that will be shared with the outside world, they should be encouraged to use the fair use and copyright free material.
MVHS PATHFINDER
April 2018
Issue 4
Article: Evidenced Based Technology- A Review In a 2017 study, May Escueta, Andre Joshua Nicow, Phil Oreopoulos, and Vincent Quan did a meta analysis of over 100 experimental studies in education technology. The researchers found some interesting commonalities between all these studies including: Computer Assisted Learning(CAL): The research seems to indicate that CAL software has promising results in improving particular student skills. The most common CAL software used was review or learning modules where students worked on an completed a particular skill. Students, especially in Math classes, found the most pronounced results when CALs were used to individualize student learning and help create a pace that worked best for the student. Also, CAL software allowed teachers to more easily identify those students that were struggling. CALs are most effective when used as in-class tool or as part of mandatory homework. However, the research showed that simply providing the resource or software was not enough. Teachers had to actively use and engage with the tools in their classroom. Technology-based Behavioral Interventions: The use of technology to correct behavior (examples include text message reminders or nudges for students to take certain actions, also showed promising results. The use of technology for these actions by teachers consistently improved student learning outcomes. The efforts were most effective when used to encourage one time behavior like completing course registration or completing a survey for the course. Online Courses: The research consistently showed that students taking classes were instruction was conducted in person generally outperformed their peers in online-only classes. Students in blended classes, which had both online and in-person instruction, performed just as well as students in in-person courses. To Long Did not Read Summary: Overall the big takeaways from the research seem to be what a lot of teachers have known for a while. Technology is best used in the classroom when it is integrated into the classroom, and not a replacement for the traditional classroom. Additionally, technology can play an important role in not only teaching students content and a skill, but also in helping them to manager behavioral expectations.
MVHS PATHFINDER