Through this Master's program on Educational Technology, we have learned about so many different tools to use with technology. With so many tools to choose from, it's hard to decide which one(s) to use. I find myself wanting to use all of them, but I know that wouldn't be good for me or my students right away.
My school is going 1:1 this coming school year, and I could not be more excited, especially for our students. With that being said, I have decided I want to flip my 8th grade math classroom. So I've been looking for a tool that I can use to help make videos. I have used Animoto a few times for projects, and I love it. For myself, I want to use it to make video lessons for my students and parents to be able to watch at home. I tried this a few times this past year to test it out, and I got great feedback from students and parents. Parents loved it because they could see how we did things in class and could in turn help their child. Students loved it because sometimes they would get home and forget how to do a problem. They would turn on the video and get what we did in class. This provides a great segway into differentiated instruction. Students can work at their own pace with the videos. It also helps the lower students see things more than once.
Another way I would use Animoto in my classroom would be for students to complete projects/assignments for my class. They could make a video showing step by step how to solve a problem.
One problem I would have with this is those students that don't have internet access at home. For them, I would give extra time to complete and offer extra hours before or after school for them to come in and get help or just have time to work with Wi-Fi.
What are your favorite video tools to use in the classroom? How else would you use Animoto in your classroom?
Animoto would be a great way to record lessons and post them. In addition, Animoto could be used for a variety of purposes. Students could use it to introduce themselves to the class at the beginning of the year. In an English classroom, I think it would be beneficial to have students present their procedural writing using Animoto. They could go step-by-step in the presentation. In a math classroom, you could have them explain the rationale behind their thinking. Kind of like a think aloud, but have them record it and illustrate it using Animoto. Great post Andrea! I have never used Animoto, but I am hoping to this year.
ReplyDeleteThat is an awesome idea to record video lessons! I think parents would greatly appreciate that. I don't know how many times I have had parents say "I just don't know how to teach them that" or "You guys do it so different than how I learned it." So this would really help them out with homework. Thanks for the idea!
ReplyDelete