Wednesday, March 25, 2015

Formative Assessment Using Educreations


As I've mentioned before, I visit K-2nd grade classrooms twice a month to introduce and implement the Depth and Complexity icons.  I use this time to encourage students to think differently.  Last week I introduced the Changes Over Time icon.

We talked about what this means and discussed many different things that change over time including people, relationships, and landforms.  We watched the YouTube video of Enemy Pie by Derek Munsen.  When it was over, we discussed how the relationship between the narrator and Jeremy Ross changed as we read the story.

I wanted to make sure that the students understood changes over time and could explain it in their own words.  I decided to use the Educreations App to allow them to demonstrate their understanding.

After giving each student an iPad, I explained that they needed to draw a picture of something that changes over time.  As I walked around the room, I saw that they were drawing many different things.



When the drawings were complete, we used the microphone to explain our drawings and how they change over time.  I asked to students to save their projects under their names so that I could go back and watch them later.  When I went back I watched them, I was very impressed with their explanations and drawings.





After thinking about it, I realized this would be a great way to start a writing activity.  Ask students to illustrate, tell a story, and then write their story.  This would be the perfect opportunity to demonstrate that writing is simply speaking on paper.

Using Educreations as a formative assessment turned out to be a great a lesson and the students loved it.   Just wanted to take some time to reflect on this activity and share how this app can take an ordinary lesson and make it extraordinary.


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