One of our core iPad apps at Pine Glen is Explain Everything. This is a rich app with lots of functionality that makes it perfect for tasks where students have to demonstrate their learning. For base level functionality, it can be used as a drawing tool, a a collage creator, and a slideshow creator. The really rich functionality, however, comes in with its recording capabilities. Explain Everything can record both audio and what’s happening on screen at the same time.

Second grade students have a science unit in the Fall on trees. I met with Miss Varrell a few weeks ago to talk about how I could work with her on this unit. Last fall we had the second grade students go outside to take pictures of trees and create a collage using Skrappy. This year we decided to make the technology component a stronger part of the assessment process for the unit by switching to Explain Everything. Students would now record themselves explaining the evidence they discovered for either deciduous or coniferous trees.

 

Unit outline (technology piece only)

  1. Review iPad procedures and introduce Explain Everything App’s drawing and recording functionalities
  2. Introduce Camera app, go outside and take pictures of either Deciduous or Coniferous Tree Evidence
  3. Introduce picture import and text features of Explain Everything, students create collages
  4. After writing with teacher, students record audio over their collages and upload to YouTube

Standards addressed:

Massachusetts Writing Standards:

  • 2.5 With guidance and support from adults and peers, focus on a topic and strengthen writing as needed by revising and editing.
  • 2.6 With guidance and support from adults, use a variety of digital tools to produce and publish writing, including in collaboration with peers.

Massachusetts Speaking & Listening Standards:

  • 2.5 Create audio recordings of stories or poems; add drawings or other visual displays to stories or
  • recounts of experiences when appropriate to clarify ideas, thoughts, and feelings.

Massachusetts Life Science Standards, PK-2:

  • Recognize that plants and animals have life cycles, and that life cycles vary for different living things.
  • Recognize changes in appearance that animals and plants go through as the seasons change.

Burlington Public Schools Information & Digital Literacy Standards:

  • P2.1 Demonstrate the proper handling of devices and applications
  • P2.2 Learn about input devices and a variety of keyboarding options
  • P2.5 Use devices and applications to create content

Technology Assessment:

  • Observed students for proper care of iPads and basic functionality
  • Completed video includes at least 5 photographs, a title, the student’s name, and audio recording. In Explain Everything, the file was saved with the student’s name as its filename.