10 Free Tools for your #Flipclass Videos

"We're making a video tomorrow, and I don't even know what we're using to do it, or where we're saving it, or what we're doing after we save it..."

We had the honor of hosting +Jon Bergmann in our district last week, so my colleague is really motivated to begin flipping her classroom, but she's feeling overwhelmed to say the least. So where can she begin?

The Basics: No Frills Approach to Jumping In

• Shoot video of you and/or a co-teacher in front of a whiteboard with a digital camera, webcam (we have really handy iPEVOs in our district), smartphone or tablet. Upload video to YouTube. Link to that video on your class website, email students the link, or send them to the url for your YouTube channel
• Features: 
• Easy to implement
• tools probably already at hand
• Cons: 
• Hope you get it in the first take! :) If you're not going to edit, you'll have to rehearse once or twice to hone your timing and scripting.
• Sound quality dependent upon built-in microphone

• Take a screencast of your SMARTboard using the SMART recorder. This "SMART tool" is included with the install of SMART Notebook on your Windows or Mac machine.
• Features: 
• Because its a screencast, you can focus on what you say rather than how you look
• Your students are probably already comfortable with the look of the video
• Pause button is always on top, so you can pause to change colors, insert images, etc., without adding to the length of your video
• Cons
• Some students may miss the personal connection of seeing your face and inflection unless you pair with a webcam in the recording area
• Similar to shooting with your smartphone or tablet, you'll need to rehearse or end up spending a lot of time editing (which you probably don't want to/know how to do, which is why you're using SMART recorder)

• Screencast-o-matic: This is my go-to screencast utility. You can use it as a web app or native application. 
• Features:
• All of those listed above for SMART Recorder
• Can layer recording window on top of Notebook, but also over a web browser, PowerPoint, or content-specific software for demonstrations. We have a teacher in our department who loves using Geometer Sketchpad that could really take advantage this point
• Multiple save options. Save directly to YouTube, Screencast-o-matic, or just to your file on your machine
• Can scale recording window however you like, hiding other applications you have running without closing them down.
• Clip, trim, and review clips before saving or continuing

Free iOS Apps:

• ShowMe - easy to use screencast whiteboard, import images, search library of other teacher's videos 
• Educreations - easy to use screencast whiteboard, import images, search library of other teacher's videos
• Touchcast - Can be used as a screencast whiteboard, a camera of you in front of a whiteboard, or you picture-in-picture in front of website/image
• Ask3 - easy to use screencast whiteboard, import images, classroom community and message board built in. "Ask3" is derived from the strategy "ask three, then me," so the app is designed around students collaborating and answering each other's questions from your video.
• Vittle Free - import photos, limited to a minute recording in this free version

Other Free Websites and Software with Extra Features

• Present.Me
• Features:
• Easy to set-up
• Video of you along-side slides or of you alone
• Trim/clip/review recording if you make a mistake
• Link to your Google+ account
• Cons:
• Requires flash, so not an option on iOS 
• Jing (from the creators of Camtasia Studio)
• Features:
• Available as a native app, so it will be available even when WiFi is not
• Videos stored at screencast.com
• Restart a recording if you make a mistake
• Pair with webcam to shoot yourself, too

Use a tablet to annotate on whiteboard software, or just present alongside a slideshow

Summary

Try out several tools. Find the right combination between polish and ease of use. Give yourself permission to grow in your skills presenting and editing. 

You're more likely to persevere through hiccups of your implementation of the flipped classroom if you'll allow yourself to fail every once in awhile. (So that you know what to improve upon.)

Playing School: 6 Easy Ways to "Play" in Your Secondary Classroom

I know my 3 year old daughter has a bit of a misconception of what I do at school...

We're part of a great Parents as Teachers program that comes to our home once a month to work with the kids and "assess" them every few months according to developmental norms for their age. From Lucy's perspective, Ms. Chris comes over to play with her and Landon. She doesn't know she's learning, and she certainly isn't aware that sometimes she's being tested. Its just fun.

She knows that Daddy goes to work and is a teacher, so when I told her that Ms. Chris is her teacher, she made this connection:

"My daddy's going to work to play with boys and girls."

I'm not suggesting that your entire curriculum needs to be game-ified (although MangaHigh is my favorite) or that we need to change teaching styles (if you're generally a curmudgeon, you'll feel and seem fake if you try to do what someone else thinks if "fun"), but that everyone in the room will be more productive when a little bit of play is introduced.

And honestly, I think its good for all of us. Some days, I feel like this:

My wife, who stays home with our two little ones, is a great blessing to me because she saves me from most of those days. She has her own struggles as our children's first teacher, which she blogged about yesterday and has me reflecting more on today. (Being a good mama on a bad day)

Do you ever get so caught up in learning objectives, your curriculum and or mastery of content that everything else going on in your classroom gets lost? I did this to my daughter yesterday morning at the breakfast table. Good. grief.

Per the morning tradition, I was reading to Lucy out of the Jesus Storybook Bible during breakfast while she ate her cereal. Beth reports that the kids usually really enjoy this time and always ask, "More Bible, please! And cereal." This is where my "teacher" training totally got in the way of Lucy totally enjoying the morning's reading of The Prodigal Son - instead of just reading the story, showing some excitement, doing my very best character voices, and letting the narrative do its work, I kept checking for understanding and comprehension. With my 3 year old. Sure, she was able to answer my questions and was "engaged," but she certainly didn't really seem to enjoy the story. She asked for more, but kind of in a "this wasn't as great an experience as usual" kind of way. LOL

After some gentle(?) encouragement from Beth (who always supports my character talents) to just read the story, I'd say Lucy and I both had a much better time, and she was asking the questions the second time around.

Kids expect to have fun, enjoyable, memorable experiences at school because that's how they begin their educations. Somewhere in the system, we (I) kill a lot of those expectations because there are tests to prepare for, kids that don't "deserve" to be rewarded with a fun lesson, and content that doesn't readily lend itself to games.

1. Listen to music (and I don't mean classical).
I believe the research that classical music helps students learn, or raises tests scores, and have a Mozart playlist on Spotify for my "everyday" music, but sometimes its good to indulge yourself, or your students and play something you and/or they really like.

If you're afraid of the lyric factor, allow yourself to have a lyric-check policy. You don't want to play anything offensive, so go ahead and check those lyrics with any of these 5 tools. You can also search on Spotify, Playlist.com (or even YouTube) for "clean" or "edited" versions.

2. Laugh at yourself.
I shared this image with a few of my classes last week. I used it as an example of how I always try NOT to stand, and then the kids told me the ways I DO stand. At least they're watching. :) (Apparently I have this arms crossed, shoulders hunched thing)

3. Give high fives, elbows, fist bumps.
This is my number one ice breaker when I have a crummy attitude toward a student or they have one with me for the day. Its also a day-maker for a lot of kids. Henry Wong advises in The First Days of School that you give out hugs as students enter the classroom. That's obviously inappropriate (and often times undesired) to do with secondary students, but free high fives in the hallway? Just make sure to pump the hand sanitizer.

4. Use color.
Students don't suddenly lose their taste for colorful, welcoming, designed classrooms just because they're older. Sure, you probably didn't have that bulletin board class in your secondary ed courses that all the elementary teachers rave about, but that doesn't give you an excuse for boring, blank walls.

And don't stop the color there - let your students color. Your interactive whiteboard, tablets, and even regular whiteboard have dozens of colors of available to them. Don't YOU get bored writing only in one color? (Bonus points for having your students color code their notes. For example, each step of a  solution in a math class is color coded to show process, or in a Lit class, character notes one color, themes in another, and foreshadowing in another).

5. Have kids create.
Lucy's teacher recently just told her to draw a picture. Lucy was just doing something she loved, but Ms. Chris was assessing all kinds of spatial, kinesthetic, and imaginative benchmarks from just a few marks. With proper pedagogy of learning expectations and scoring guides, I think its possible to do the same with secondary students.

Giant rolls of butcher paper, video tutorials, stop-motion lego, ebooks, regular books, songs, websites, images, etc. Here are some iPad specific examples. They can even create mobile games for assessment, review, or constructive activities. (Free game designing tools)

6. Play boardgames as a class or in small groups, but make requirements for moving correct responses to questions.
I like this for:

• Differentiation - you can ask different groups different questions
• Immediate feedback
• Collaboration
• Quick gratification

Implementation tips: 
I see my kids collaborate more willingly and effectively in their game teams when I stick big whiteboards in front of them.  There's magic in those insanely expensive pens.
Project a physical gameboard with the pieces using a document camera, create your own simple version in your interactive whiteboard software (I did this fairly easily with squares and rectangles for Monopoly, and was able to make 3-way Connect Four), or find your favorite web-based version.

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What's most important? 

Making the effort, and trying play that feels natural to you. Just like different instructional strategies have higher yields in different settings, what play works in the classroom next door may well flop for you. Don't give up, and don't punish yourself. 

Have fun.

Browser-based Interactive Whiteboard Software - Desmos

Have you ever...

• Panicked because your interactive whiteboard's software stopped working?
• Wished you could edit your whiteboard lessons from home without installing more software?
• Wished you could share/email your whiteboard lesson to a parent or student with the same interactivity they would have with your file in class? (NOT a pdf, .doc, or ppt)
• Wanted to embed your lesson content on your class blog or website?
• Wanted an easy to use graphing calculator online?

Web start-up Desmos recently presented at TechCrunch Disrupt with a browser-based solution to interactive whiteboard software that is not dependent on any branded hardware OR software.  Our district uses SMART Notebook and can port those lessons at express.smarttech.com, which I've used this summer on the laptop I'm projecting from that doesn't have the software installed.  It's better than nothing, but its functionality is scaled down dramatically to basically opening files, inserting text, and drawing freehand.  You can't even insert images.

The software is still in alpha testing (as of the end of May), but I've applied for an account and hopefully will be able to play before the new school year starts.

Oh, BTW, I haven't even gotten to the graphing calculator that IS already live! (Which may end up being an even bigger deal; color-coded, cartesian and polar coordinates, zooming, sharing, integration with the whiteboard app)

Here's some video:
Graphing calculator -


Desmos founder, Eli Luberoff, at TechCrunch Disrupt -


You can read the original article from TechCrunch here.

Things you might also be interested in:
Other online graphing calculators:
graph.tk - HTML 5 grapher.  Color-coding, zooming, screenshots
Graph Drawer  - color-coding, point and function plotting, save as .png, not as user-friendly

Other whiteboard tools:
express.smarttech.com - Create basic SMART Notebook files and open any previously saved
www.dabbleboard.com - Doodle freehand and make shapes, insert images, sharing

Lessening My Lesson Load

This photo was taken from my camera phone right after 1st hour was over.  I read pieces of a book over Christmas Break called Never Work Harder Than Your Students, and those few pages did a lot to free my time and rethink the priorities of my time in the classroom.  I think it has improved my instruction because I've had to be more creative in order to present my lessons with "less" work.

One factor that significantly contributes to my workload is rewriting notes and homework assignments on a different board when I move between the 3 different classrooms I travel to.  Using the SMARTboard for notes and interactive tools alleviates some of this hourly repetition, but if the computer is down or the server is slow, then I end up having to use the whiteboard and rewriting notes in subsequent classrooms.

The kids give me some trouble over having my cellphone out, but I think it models good mobile device use, which is a good thing.

Prezi for Math Notes

Prezi is a presentation  tool that allows you to create concept maps and notes on a single canvas.  You can zoom in and out, create frames for emphasis, resize text, doodle, and map paths to create a slideshow.  Think tag cloud on steroids as one analogy.

I'm sure that it would work great in an English, Social Studies, Science (minus chemistry equations), or other general elective class, but using it for math notes is a big chore.  Writing in the presentation is easy enough, but you cannot permanently group the numbers together (as is a snap in SMART Notebook), which makes resizing written text next to impossible.

So, all told, it took me about 2 hrs to create this.  To best understand a Prezi, check out mine.






















It probably goes without saying, but my Prezi does not nearly capture the potential for the tool. Much better examples and ideas exist on their website.

Math use:  Unless I get dramatically faster at creating these notes, Prezi's practicality is nearly nonexistent when compared to just jotting notes in my IWB software.  The extra pizazz could be worth it occasionally, however.  One thing I really like is the ability to embed my Prezi into this blog or an assignment on our district's class website/news service, Edline.

Other word of note:  The computers at our school are going on 3 years old, so keeping up rendering the javascript was quite a task for them.  It worked better at home on the laptop from this summer.