Student Created Word Problems in First Grade Math

 

I worked with LeeAnn Raible recently as part of our Go Beyond Challenge. She had the idea of letting students make word problems using addition and subtraction, then they'd record their solutions with Seesaw. 

I'll embed some of their examples at the end of the poast.

She called the project Number Story Ninjas, and we also connected with another elementary school in our state to get feedback. Giving the students an authentic audience was a fun addition.

Here's the process we went through.

Step 1:  LeeAnn assigned each student a role of Writer, Editor, Graphic Designer and Problem Solver. 

Step 2:  Six Writers each created a simple word problem like the one in the picture. These were written on paper, so no tech was needed.

Step 3:  I met with the class to introduce them to Google Classroom and Google Slides. After that, the Editors typed the Writers' problems into a basic Google Slides template.

Step 4:  I copied their text to a larger Google Slides template that would work with Seesaw. Here's an example of a blank slide. It's 2000 pixels wide, so you really need to make large fonts for them to show up. 

I also added some clip art from Pixabay. Do not let students search that site for pictures, due to some content. It does have plenty of transparent images that work great for this project. I pasted possible images in a second slide, then I added the text, our logo, and the "blackboard" image to the first slide. 

Step 5:  I met with groups of two to four Graphic Designers to help them design the slides using the clip art I provided. No one felt limited by the options I chose, so that was a bonus! Their main task was choosing a title font, background color, then pasting images from the second slide to their template. They got lots of practice using ctrl-c and ctrl-v to copy and paste.

Step 6:  After I saw how they wanted the slides to look, I recreated them in Seesaw. This step was a little more time consuming than I expected, but it wasn't bad once I got the hang of it. In Google Slides, I copied the students' slides, then deleted anything that needed to be moveable. I downloaded the remaining items as a JPEG, then uploaded that to Seesaw for the background. 

I made this video for teachers, showing how I created the activities in Seesaw. Note that I cropped a lot of images from Pixabay when I put them in Google Slides. Seesaw didn't give me that feature (that I could find). So I ended up editing some Pixabay images in another program, before uploading them to Seesaw as the video shows.

Here are some examples the Seesaw activities we used:

• Dogs and Cats
• Books

Step 7:  We assigned those activities in Seesaw. LeeAnn's students were already very familiar with recording using Seesaw on iPads, so the tech part of this was easy. I met with groups in a quiet part of the school to help with recording. 

It took some coaching to get them to go through the problems in a way that would make sense to a viewer. You'll see the directions also asked them to show it with an equation and with the pictures.

I did take about 90 minutes to edit all six videos. There were minor distractions, some mistakes and some prompts from me or other students as they worked.

I remembered at this stage of the project that Liz Kolb (in her Triple E Framework) suggests co-use of devices as a research based practice, to improve engagement with the content. So I had two students work together on some problems and I could see the benefits right away.

Here are a couple examples of the finished product. I think they turned out great! When we use the project again, we agreed we will use more complex math problems. 

Two students working together on one iPad, performing an addition problem:

A subtraction problem:

Simple Informational Video Projects With WeVideo

Our high school Communications class creates video announcements each week. We have three teams responsible for "features" that are created in advance, usually outside of the studio. This year it seems they only want to focus on interviews and challenges, which result in similar interactions with staff and students week after week.

To get them thinking of other options, I recently made a tipsheet for what I call Informational Video Features. While that could be extremely general, for our class it means:

• It's scripted.
• Most likely it will have a narrator rather than someone on camera, talking to the audience.
• It uses graphics, text and still images to enhance the narration.

Here's an example we made based on a survey we gave students just before Halloween. (I know the audio is pretty bad. We have upgraded our audio equipment since making this!)

I love using WeVideo for this because (as you see in the example) they have a lot of quality, easy to use motion titles. They even have a growing list of seasonal ones, which worked great for our Halloween poll. That combined with plenty of good transitions and tons of feature video clips and images to choose from makes it the perfect choice for the classroom. (It's not free, but check out their educational pricing here.)

Here's the direction document I created to help students get started on this. It is not a tutorial for how to use WeVideo, since our students already have a lot of experience with the basics. If you need more tips to get started, WeVideo has a lot of tutorials here.

Some additional tips for using this in class:

• We often do a "Quick Poll" on our student website to gather opinions and information from our students. We use Google Forms to make the surveys and they're a great source of information for these quick video features.
• As noted in the directions, there are a few options for recording the narration. If you want to use TwistedWave, here's something I posted on this blog a few years ago about that online audio recorder.
• The directions say, "Write the script", but that can be a big challenge for students. Concisely summing up dozens of open ended responses from a survey, some percentages and possibly facts from other sources is likely an assignment in itself. Start with a small list of facts for the first time and use a rubric to help them know exactly what you're looking for.

A Quick, Simple Google Chrome Extension for Student Video Responses

Here's the most popular tool I showed at the miGoogle conference recently. It's a simple Chrome extension from Alice Keeler called Webcam Record. It records a short video clip from a webcam on a laptop or Chromebook, uploads it to Drive and automatically copies a link to it so you can paste it where you need it*.

So teachers can use this to give simple video directions and students can use it to share their thoughts back to the teacher. See it in action in the tutorial below.

You can get it in the Chrome Web Store here or have your G Suite admin push it out to users. I pushed it to all teachers and all students in grades 5 - 12.

*I do have two important things to watch for.

1. Unfortunately when we've tried to share the video using the link that's automatically copied it doesn't give the user access. I tried sharing the whole folder and it still didn't work. I showed students they can copy a shareable link just by right clicking on the video and clicking Get shareable link. It adds a few clicks to the process, but it's not bad. The tutorial below shows this workaround.
2. Every once in a while we used this on a new device, it didn't upload the first recording properly. I suggest you make a short test recording the first time you use it, just to be sure the file saves to Drive.

Here's a tutorial I made for the teachers and students in my district.

Introduction to Video Editing Assignment Using WeVideo

I created a project last week for our middle school Computers class that introduces students to video editing. We use the education version of WeVideo in our district, so the project is based on that application. If you use another editor, you might still find the video clips and the assignment document to be useful.

For a final product, the students will create a 20-25 second commercial. This will require them to edit several short clips that I provide below and also make use of transitions, titles and music.

The Video Clips

To make sure this project only focuses on editing (leaving out all the work of recording), I compiled and trimmed out several short clips of free videos from Pixabay. Each clip shows rides and people at a carnival or amusement park. You can see those video clips in this Google Drive folder.

If you are using my directions exactly as I did, you'd want to make copies of those videos and upload them to a folder in your WeVideo Media. See this video for more information.

The Project Directions

Click here to get a copy of directions for the project as a Google Doc. It contains these things:

• Step by step directions
• Links to two videos that take students through the editing and finishing process
• The list of requirements for their commercial

Note that two links are left out on the document because you would have to provide those to your students on your WeVideo account. Or you might use a different editor. In that case you'd have to modify those steps explaining how to get started.

If you do use WeVideo, you will want to set the project up similarly to what I did, including adding some links to the document. Here are the steps I used:

• I copied the link from WeVideo that would allow students to add themselves as members to my account. That link needs to be pasted into in Step 4 of your document. There are several ways to add students to your account, but doing it this way worked best for this group I was working with. See this article from WeVideo for more information.
• I created a project in WeVideo called Carnival Commercial and copied the link to it so students could add access the project. See this article from WeVideo to learn about project types. I chose the Shared option and I copied the link from the lower left of that Project screen (see the picture below). That link needs to be pasted into Step 5 of the directions. 

• Finally, I shared those video clips I uploaded to my WeVideo media with anyone in that shared project.

After you do that to finish your version of the directions, share it with your students (possibly through Google Classroom) and they should be able to work through the project to completion.

___________________________

A couple notes about WeVideo:

• Students under the age of 13 should not use the free version of WeVideo. It is not COPPA compliant. If you don't use the educational version, you also won't have all the features referred to above.
• We have had a lot of success with WeVideo at our middle school and high school. However, we do find the audio is sometimes too quiet on clips we record. It won't matter in this project if you use the clips I provided, since they have no audio. I have contacted tech support about this, but no satisfactory solution was offered. 

Classroom activity for introducing students to iMovie on iPad

A couple months ago I wrote about a video creation challenge we used at the high school to help students learn to make videos on an iPad. Here's a similar assignment that we used with middle school students.

I always say students don't need much direction on how to use tech tools. They just need to know what's possible. I put that philosophy to the test with this assignment. I just listed some requirements for the video, but very few "how-to" directions.

I'm happy to say the activity worked very well! After the teacher assigned it, both of us received some videos shared to us in Google Drive*. Students had fun working through the activity and figuring out iMovie for iPad on their own.

Click here to get a copy of the assignment. It will make a copy in your Google Drive.

*I'd show their projects, but the videos were less than interesting! Step one was to learn how to make a video. The rest of the class was about making an interesting one.

Team Building Video Challenge for High School

Here's a team building exercise I created for our high school video announcements team when we started the new semester. I loosely based it on a very fun, creative game we used to play, back before everyone carried around video cameras (and high power editing software) in their pockets.

The details of the challenge are described in the document at the link below. Basically students had to work in groups of three or four to create a fictitious news story. There were other criteria as well, including five random words that had to be included in some creative way.

They had only one class period to make the video, including learning how to use iMovie on an iPad. (By the way, my new approach to introducing tools like this is to simply give them the requirements. Once they know what the tools can do, they figure out how to work them on their own.)

You can get a copy of the challenge document in your Google Drive by clicking this link. Change it as necessary to meet your needs. If you share it, please include the link to my blog that's in the footer.

Here's the video that one group produced. On it's own, it's not terribly entertaining. I think they did an excellent job within the constraints of the challenge, though, and they included all the random words (clock, cup, reward, silence and courage). They went slightly over on the 30 second time limit, but I was very happy with their efforts.

(Note that I had already told them my top tips for video projects and they created one video previously using other tools.)

Reflection assignments from the Mini-Documentary Project

A few weeks ago I posted resources from our mini-documentary project from our high school Communications and the Media class. As we were finishing the project, I realized the students needed time to reflect on all the learning that had taken place. I created these two assignments for this purpose.

This first short assignment was given when they collected most of the content for their videos, but before they finished editing.
Reflection Assignment 1

When the videos were completely finished, we gave students this longer reflection.
Reflection Assignment 2

Live High School Video Announcements

I've been working with our Communications and the Media class at our high school to produce live video announcements. We're only doing two a week right now, but we're working up to daily announcements. I love doing the announcements for so many reasons. Most importantly:

• Anyone can find a place to use their talents.
• Learning is happening on so many levels--technology, communication and collaboration skills especially. (Our studio was funded with career education funds.)
• The announcements are a great way to highlight what's working in your school.

Ever since video equipment became cheap enough for home use in the late 1980's, I've been playing around with it. This studio was my first step into professional level equipment, though, so it took me a long time to get it set up. I'm not an expert, but if you have any questions about how we do our productions, I'll be glad to go into more detail. Here are some basics.

We write our script in Google Docs and share it with all involved. When lines are sometimes changing moments before going live, it's the only way to keep the whole crew on track.

We use High School Cube to share our production with the classrooms, and really to the whole world if anyone else cares to watch. It's amazingly easy to do a live stream there using just an iPad with a WiFi connection. We've used that method, but normally we work from our studio. It took a lot of time to get that process up and running. Now that we've got a routine, though, it's proven to be very reliable. And did I mention it's free?

To get our stream to High School Cube, we use Open Broadcast Software (also free!). I learned about the software on the High School Cube site, but there were not specific directions for setting it up. It took a lot of experimenting, watching tutorials and guessing, but it's been working well for us

Our studio itself is a relatively low budget setup. (I was impressed with it, but when I told one retailer what I had to work with, he said we were really on the low end!) We have:

• Two HP computers with a lot of RAM.
• Two Panasonic AG-HPX 170 video cameras
• A Datavideo SE-2000 switcher
• CG-350 character generator software from Datavideo
• A couple Blackmagic video cards
• Corel VideoStudio 7x Pro video editing software
• Various mics, lights, cables, etc.

I'm actually not thrilled with the Datavideo switcher and character generator software. It does the job, but I had a hard time adjusting to both components and many times I feel they hold our creativity back. They were suggested to us based on our budget, so we do the best we can with them.

To show some of the work that goes on behind the scenes, I put together the following video to play on our announcements this past week. The narration was recorded on an iMac with GarageBand. The pictures and video were taken on my iPad and edited with iMovie on my iPad.

Mini-Documentary Project for High School

The past week I've been working with Melinda Newcombe, an ELA teacher at our high school. She teaches the Communications and the Media class and we decided this year to do a mini-documentary project.

Eventually students will be making short documentaries or informative videos about something in our school. More than just retelling facts, we are requiring them to tell it through a story or at least to include a story in the video.

We hope this generates a few segments we can use in our regular video announcements. I helped kick things off with a few thoughts and examples in a presentation. I also created some worksheets to aid students in planning. We are still working through the project, so I'll add notes, examples and other resources as they come.

Resources we used are below, but I want to point out first what a huge help the Stillmotion videos on storytelling have been. I used them last year in a similar unit I posted about. I refined that lesson and have used the Stillmotion videos slightly differently, but their information was foundational in our approach.

This is the presentation I used as an introduction. It mostly served to show a few clips of informative videos in different styles. The first is a video I created for our district several years ago when I was completing my master's degree. It was good for catching our students' attention with scenes familiar to most of them. The other videos are more well known, but in all cases I'm sure you could find any number of excellent clips online that will suit your needs.

Note that we are encouraging students to find a story, not just to retell some information. The description of a story (a character who wants something and overcomes conflict to get it) comes from Donald Miller's books A Million Miles in a Thousand Years and Storyline. I wrote about those ideas at length here.

Students formed groups of three or four and they used this worksheet to review the ideas and plan their videos.
     Documentary Worksheet 1

Then we showed this second video from Stillmotion. I love how the use of keywords can sharpen the focus. This worksheet followed.
     Documentary Worksheet 2

I also created this short video as an example. I was pressed for time last week, so it's rough. That's fine because it gave us something to evaluate. Most importantly, it shows realistically what we can accomplish with technology available to our students.

We will be using this planning worksheet in the upcoming week. 

     Documentary Planning Sheet

Note that this refers to some different options for technology, such as Movie Maker or iMovie on an iPad. We have some laptops available for students, but some prefer to use their own devices. This requires us to keep an open-ended approach to the technology. This, along with the infinite options for documentary topics, is a stretch for both of us teachers involved!

As I said, more details, examples and resources will come as we finish up this fun unit.

Shadow Puppet App for Digital Stories and More

I've been very impressed with the free Shadow Puppet iPad app for quick digital slideshows. In the past I've written a lot about 30Hands as my favorite tool for creating these, but I have to say Shadow Puppet is now my go-to app.

I'll post a quick example video I made below. Here are the features that impress me the most so far:

• The intuitive interface allows you to quickly arrange some photos and record narration.
• You can add titles, zoom in and pan and also draw on the screen.
• The Edu version and website has some great resources for the classroom including image search engines and lesson ideas.
• It exports to the Camera Roll so you can share it how you like, transfer to a computer and even edit it in other applications.

The only downsides I've seen so far:

• The area for the image is cropped to a square shape rather than a 4:3 or 16:9 rectangle. 
• The music plays during the recording if I use that option.
• I got confused at the end of the creation process. I wasn't sure if I was previewing the video or finishing it.
• I'm not sure if this is a problem with my YouTube app or the video created by Shadow Puppet, but when I upload it, the audio is a few seconds off from the video.

For an app that should work well with almost every grade level, those are minor quibbles.

If I'm making a quick story for our high school news or a highlight for my church Facebook page, I'll go to the more robust iMovie. For the classroom, though, Shadow Puppet is my current recommendation to students and teachers. Download the Edu version now and give it a try!

Tips for Classroom Video Projects

This is an updated list from a popular post I wrote last year. It's my attempt to compile the tips I find myself repeating to teachers and students whenever I help with classroom video projects.

I have enjoyed making movies and videos all my life and certainly one of the most rewarding parts of my job is getting to share the experience with students who are new to the process. Videos are a great way to showcase learning and I've been having a blast this year as many more teachers in my district are assigning video projects. I updated my previous list and regularly send this to teachers before we work together.

I'll probably keep adding to and refining this over time. If you have any comments or other suggestions, please share them.

If it would be helpful to have this as a single document, I have a Google Docs version here.

For Teachers

Set expectations at the start for requirements and the project timeline. I suggest a one page assignment sheet that answers these questions:

• What course content is required in the video?
• How much creative freedom will students have? For example, can they be serious or silly? Possibly list options for types of videos, such as skits, documentary style, newsroom style, etc.
• How long do you want the videos to be?
• When will each phase of the video (planning, recording and editing) be due?
• Where will these be recorded?
• How will it be graded? If you have a rubric, include it, or at least the criteria, on this sheet.
• What will they have to turn in (if anything) at each phase and how will they submit it?

Keep realistic, tight deadlines. Set the time you want students to use for planning, recording and editing and stick to it no matter what. Many students will take far longer if they are allowed to. Let them know they must work outside of class if it’s going to take longer.

Share the work when students are done. Share the best videos as much as possible. Post them to your own blog or website and any school public pages, etc. Of course, be sure you have permission to share images and video of the students before you post anything publicly.

Read over the list of student tips below and be sure students are aware of the ones you consider important for the current project.

For Students

Be realistic when planning. Unless you’ve created videos before, don’t plan special effects or anything that will require advanced editing.

Use one camera if at all possible. Using multiple cameras makes it harder to get all your videos in one place and file compatibility can be more of an issue. Even better, if you use an iPhone, iPod or iPad, edit right on the device with iMovie. **Note: Record photos and video to the Camera Roll, directly into the iMovie app.

Don’t plan to use music you can’t easily access and legally download at school. Part of any tech project is to learn the rules of copyright and fair use. It is not legal to use someone else’s song in your videos unless they have given permission. Here’s my favorite site for downloading free music. The composer gives permission for any use as long as you credit him in the video as he explains on his site.      
                           http://incompetech.com/music/royalty-free/

When it’s time to edit, bring any USB cables that work with your camera so it’s easy to transfer files. When all else fails, it’s possible to upload your videos to Google Drive, then download them to the computer you are using for editing. This will take awhile if you have long videos, though, so cables are best.

Plan in detail. It's more fun to start recording, but poor planning will result in either lots of frustrating editing or a poor final video. Good planning includes a detailed script for all dialogue or narration and a storyboard showing the basic camera views for each shot.

Make sure you are recording files you can edit later. This means you have to record with a camera, phone or other device that creates a file format compatible with your editing software. I recommend doing a quick test with your equipment first. Record a short clip and try to edit it with your editing software.

Hold your camera, phone or device in the landscape position. Not only is this a pet peeve of mine, if you get this wrong it immediately makes your video look amateur. Shoot with YouTube and the big screen in mind so your possibilities are not limited. The graphic below is one I made based on one I found from another teacher on Twitter. I don't know if this site is the original source of the image, but I found it here.

Think about what the viewer is seeing and break up the scene accordingly. Does it make sense to stand back with the camera and just record the whole scene as if it were a skit? Or would different camera angles throughout make it more interesting? Would close-ups of certain action help tell a better story? Is there anything in the background that will distract the viewer from what is most important?

Listen before recording. Is there background noise or bad acoustics that echo when actors talk or make other sounds? Choose a quiet location.

Listen carefully when you are recording too. Be aware that a distracting noise (squeaky chairs, doors closing, etc.) while someone is saying a line can't be removed later. We often block these things out easily when listening to someone in real life, but when watching a video they are impossible to ignore.

Speak clearly when being recorded. Probably everyone involved in the video knows the script and knows what is being said, so everyone understands the lines. The viewers don't have that advantage. Pay attention to how fast you talk, how loud it is and whether or not the words are distinct.

Record too much rather than not enough. Start recording several seconds before action will start. If someone will say, "Action," or otherwise alert everyone to start, be sure they wait at least a second after the camera has started before they cue the actors. It is so easy to trim a few seconds off the start or end of a clip in editing. Compare that to the case when the camera person turns off the camera immediately after the last line or the actors start talking as soon as the camera starts. Those make for bad edits later.

If you have the time, get two good takes of each shot. You can overdo this, but generally if everyone finally gets a good performance once, the next one will be even better. During editing it can help a lot to have a couple choices for the take that will end up in the final video..

When acting a scene, don't look at the camera or the people behind the camera. It is very common for actors to look to the person working the camera as if to say, "Did we get it right?" Those looks can ruin an otherwise great take and sometimes you won't notice them until editing later.

To sum it up, remember you will have a much better final video if you…

• Plan carefully.
• Pay attention when recording.
• Always consider what the viewer will see and hear.

Digital Storytelling for Middle School with WeVideo

I created a digital story assignment to introduce WeVideo and we tried it out this week.

It confirmed for me that WeVideo is a great tool for the classroom. This assignment results in a digital slideshow, so we were only uploading photos. I'm not sure how well it will work with video, especially long clips, but I hope to try that out soon.

For now, it is my recommended editor when teachers ask me for a resource to create narrated slideshows.

For our assignment, I took 10 pictures of students in various poses. The students had to arrange at least six of these pictures into some short story in WeVideo. They were required to add a title and end clip as well as captions and some panning and zooming.

Here are the resources for the assignment:

• The assignment sheet - This includes directions, requirements and links to the tutorials.
• A shared folder on Google Drive with the pictures - These 10 photos were taken ahead of time.
• Video Tutorial 1 - This shows how to get started in WeVideo. It shows the basics of the interface, how to upload, arrange, add captions and titles and also how to pan and zoom.  Note:  The tutorial refers to uploading the photos because in our class we didn't store photos in Google Drive. You can upload from Drive or you could save those photos above in a different folder.
• Video Tutorial 2 - This tutorial shows how to add music and how to publish and share the final video.

This basic assignment lends itself to a lot of modification for different needs. Here are some suggestions:

• Have the students take their own photos.
• Have another class take the photos.
• Instead of using actors in the photos, students could set up action figures or maybe even objects.
• They could draw the pictures digitally or on paper.
• Require editing of the photos. For example, speech bubbles could be added.
• Narrate the story and have students read the dialogue.

If you use this assignment or you have suggestions for other changes I'd love to hear from you!

Examples from the Smart Jams Math Music Video Project

Here are five samples from our first time through the Smart Jams music video project. I highlighted our work in detail on my Music in the Classroom page. I also included video tutorials for the entire process so teachers or students could do similar work.

Due to privacy concerns, we did not get permission to post the full videos online. The versions here will give you a great idea of the quality of the songs. The videos have been modified (mostly with panning and zooming) so that students cannot be identified.

These are a few of the songs I'm most proud of for reasons noted below.

Best singing performance - Multiplying Fractions - Most students opted for a rap when they performed. It is a lot more work for all involved when they choose to sing as these girls did, but the performance turned out very well.

Best rap performance - Rounding Like a Hero (Rounding to the Tens Place) - This is a great example of how a short, simple rap can focus on the content and give students a chance to let their talents shine through.

Best songwriting - Truckin' Like a Tractor (Reducing Fractions) - I liked the similes and rhymes in this short song a lot. The quiet girl who did the rap really came to life when I started recording!



Example created using just the iPad - This is remix of the first song. After I got the chords from UJam, I created the music using Smart Instruments in GarageBand for iPad. I also played a guitar track using the iRig adapter. Next, I created the video using only still pictures and iMovie. It's a good example of what can be accomplished relatively quickly with all content creation on this amazing device.


Example of WeVideo - Long Division - These students were a joy to work with and they put a lot into their song. It's one of our best, but I also share it here because I finalized this version in WeVideo. All other videos were done with iMovie, but I wanted to see if WeVideo could be used as a simple, free alternative on a PC. My conclusion is yes, but I had to publish this twice before the published version matched the sync of the edited version I worked on. I can't say how common that is, but it was somewhat frustrating.

I'll be glad to hear any comments you have on this project and the final products!

Games, Tips, Insights and Music in the Classroom - My top 10 posts from 2013

Crystal Owen and me introducing our math music video project

2014 will mark three years since I started this blog. My early posts focused mostly on some games I created for Promethean boards and response systems.

Three more years of putting the theories of my studies into practice have led to a much wider spectrum of topics. Most recently they highlight the creative work and insights that have made this year the best of my career.

I now can write about better games, tech tips for many applications and deeper insights into what's really going on in school. Most exciting for me personally has been the increase in work with music.

My role in education is like oil in the machine. Most of what I do isn't the main point, but it's vital to keep things running. 

I was happy to find my list of top 10 posts (in terms of views) written this year reveals this. It includes a good mix of all of these topics and many came from the past four months. Here they are in order, starting with the most popular.

6 Ways to Teach Like an Artist - I'm so grateful to find this was my most viewed new post. The thoughts behind this one sum up not just a year, but my career of 20 years in education (and maybe 40 years of going to school). I like this original post, but the ideas that emerged from it have led to a theme and series of posts that reveal my journey. It has been my gift and message this school year.

Coming Soon - The Creativity Game of Movie Trailers - This final creativity game marked a turn in my attention from classroom games. It stems from a dream project, far more significant than just a game, and I'm glad to see it got attention over the months since I created it.

10 Tips for Recording Video in the Classroom - A lifetime of loving video creation came together in this list of practical tips I repeat constantly whenever we do such projects in class.

What's It to Ya? Randomizer for Class Presentation Games - I don't know why it took me so long to think of this, but it's probably the best way to play the game that I have written about the most. This Flash app selects five cards from my game of values and opinions. Free and very accessible, it allows groups or a class to take advantage of all the critical thinking games and activities based on the simple game.

My Attempt to Encourage Creativity - I'm a little hesitant to include this one, but I am glad people found it useful. When a group of students were afraid to make their own music video, I decided I better take the plunge first. I'm not a vocalist and my video is one of the few I made that has a thumbs-down on YouTube, but it made my point and kicked off my favorite project of my career.

Creativity Exercise for Creative Writing - This is the low tech, party game version of the movie trailer game from the number two slot. Cards can be printed and the game played in small groups.

8 Things I Emphasize When Teaching About Game Design - I love making games and I get excited when I can teach about the process. Here's how I address it in class, and most of this has nothing to do with the how-to of making a game.

How to Inspire Creativity and Teach Content - This is a very practical post about a process I use to create music videos in under 3 hours. I have had a lot more practice with it since I wrote this in April, so my regularly updated page about Music Creation in the Classroom is the go-to place for updates.

6 Reasons Your Students Need to See Your Mediocre Art - Back to my artist theme, this one comes from my personal experience of sharing my less than amazing talents. It meant a lot to me that Kevin Honeycutt tweeted about this one. He is directly responsible for the thoughts behind it and his attention to it helped it make this list.

Middle School Music Video Project - At the end of March I finally completed my first music video project with a class. Everything else was in theory, but this first attempt brought it altogether and the results made my year the best yet as a teacher. Two things worth mentioning:  

• I showed this video to Kevin Honeycutt and it led to our grant funded project on my Music Creation page.  
• The story I tell in this post was the bridge from music video projects to the Teaching Like an Artist theme that wrapped up the year.

Editing videos for the Smart Jams project

When the songwriting and recording for the Smart Jams math music video project was all wrapped up I ended up with audio files, pictures and video for 23 projects. That means I spent a lot of time editing over Christmas break!

As of today (1-5-2014) I have completed 14 videos and eight more of the songs are mixed down. Over the next few days I'll finish the rest. I haven't had much time for blogging through all this, but here are a few things I learned:

• I wish we would have piloted this with only one or two classes! I really enjoy the entire process, but managing all the files is quite a task.
• I am editing the videos this time around because I need to see the whole process and the project took enough class time already. The overall goal was to identify a simple process and have the students compile the audio, pictures and video themselves in the future. I learned a lot about this and I'll post the information in the weeks ahead.
• I originally planned on having each video play through the song three times. Previous materials I posted referred to that. Now that I look at what I have recorded and how much editing is before me, though, I see it's far more realistic to just repeat the song twice.
• I need more structure to the picture and video recording portion. Some of the factors (creativity, attendance, timing, availability of devices...) caught me off guard and what I have to work with is making editing take longer. I'm sure that by the time I finish all of these I'll have a much better list of guidelines for that phase of the process.

For now, here's a compilation of a few videos I have completed. I blurred the faces because we haven't had a chance to get signed release forms from parents. Also, I wanted to see how that feature works on YouTube.

Comments are welcome!

Wrapping Up Smart Jams in the Classroom

This was probably my last week in the classroom for the Smart Jams project. (Check my Music in the Classroom page for the full outline of this math and music video project for elementary grades.)

While it has been five weeks, I really only met with most classes about nine times for 45 minutes each. That comes out to around six to seven hours of class time. It's more than I wanted, but I have learned some ways to save time. I will write all of that up in a later post.

This week most groups were finishing their signs for their video.  Meanwhile, I met outside the room with groups to record the parts for their video.

A lot of students had big ideas of how their video would look, but I told them we had to be realistic! The project involves 23 videos altogether and we simply didn't have time for lots of effects and different settings. To keep it manageable, I told them we had about 20 minutes per group for recording. Most times we were done in 15.

Almost all the students had a lot of fun performing for their video. It was good to be a part of a project with so many smiles and much laughter.

Here's the general process I used for most groups as I recorded the content:

• Make and record a problem in Explain Everything that will be displayed on screen during the first time through their song. Ideally they created this problem on their video planning sheets. Some wanted to work the problem on paper instead.
• Get pictures of each of their signs.
• Take video of dancing, displaying the signs or, in some cases, lip synced performances of the song.  We used the Video Star app for this. (Small note: Video Star was updated this week with a feature for using multiple devices to record a performance. I haven't had a chance to try this yet, but I hope to next week. If it works as described this could be an excellent feature for multi-camera productions.)

I finished with about half the groups this week, so next week I will pull the others from their regular music class activity to finish up.

Here are other notes about this week:

• When students finished recording I told them I needed some logos and designs for my Smart Jams portion of the website and for my MACUL presentation. They created these with the same low tech approach as their signs.
• I gave half the students a post-test. Those students were given a pretest before we started, so I am curious to see how much they learned about the math in this project. I still have to check those.
• Speaking of work, I am still touching up recordings, working in UJam and processing pictures. The vocal performances varied quite a bit in quality. I had to line up audio on the beats in almost every case. Sometimes it took only a few minutes. In other cases, the students' rhythm was way off and it took me way too long to get something that's barely satisfactory. I am going to speak with Crystal about the best way to address this in the future. One thought is that with a group that struggles (often because of absences), she would perform the main parts and we would have the others just do backup vocals here and there. I will write a full report on recording and processing files along with demo videos and more notes on what I learned.
• Video editing is going to be my big job over Christmas break. While I am going to polish up a couple outstanding examples, most videos will be very simple. I am going to limit editing to 15 - 30 minutes and work exclusively on the iPad for those.

10 tips for recording video in the classroom

I updated this post in October 2014. I added a few tips for teachers and created a Google Docs version too. The new post is here.

Given the popularity of this post, I created a video version of the tips. It is embedded at the end of the list.

I would think many of these items are obvious, but as much as I have to remind students I know they're not obvious to everyone.

• Plan in detail.  I know it's more fun to start recording, but poor planning will result in either lots of frustrating editing or a poor final video.  Good planning includes a detailed script for all dialogue or narration and a storyboard showing the basic camera views for each shot.
• Make sure you are recording files you can edit later.  This means you have to record with a camera, phone or other device that creates a file format compatible with your editing software.  I recommend doing a quick test with your equipment first. Record a short clip and try to edit it with your editing software.
• Hold your camera, phone or device in the landscape position.  I didn't think to remind students of this until we started letting students use their own devices.  Remember that computer monitors are always in landscape.  Don't hold the phone or iPad so the image is taller than it is wide.  It might work great for Vines or other clips you send your friends, but it really weakens the final product no matter how good everything else turns out.
• Think about what the viewer is seeing and break up the scene accordingly.  Does it make sense to stand back with the camera and just record the whole scene as if it were a skit?  Or would different camera angles throughout make it more interesting?  Would close-ups of certain action help tell a better story?  Is there anything in the background that will distract the viewer from what is most important?
• Listen before recording.  Is there background noise or bad acoustics that echo when actors talk or make other sounds?  Choose a quiet location.
• Listen carefully when you are recording too.  Be aware that a distracting noise (squeaky chairs, doors closing, etc.) while someone is saying a line can't be removed later.  We often block these things out easily when listening to someone in real life, but when watching a video they are impossible to ignore.  
• Speak clearly when being recorded.  Probably everyone on the set knows the script and knows what is being said.  The viewers don't have that advantage.  Pay attention to how fast you talk, how loud it is and whether or not the words are distinct.
• Record too much rather than not enough.  Start recording several seconds before action will start.  If someone will say, "Action," or otherwise alert everyone to start, be sure they wait at least a second after the camera has started to cue the actors. It is so easy to trim a few seconds off the start or end of a clip in editing.  Compare that to the case when the camera person turns off the camera immediately after the last line or the actors start talking as soon as the camera starts.  Those make for bad edits later.
• Along with that, if you have the time, get two good takes of each shot.  You can overdo this, but generally if everyone finally gets a good performance once, the next one will be even better.  During editing it can help a lot to have a couple choices for the take that will end up in the final video..
• When acting a scene, don't look at the camera or the person behind the camera.  It is very common for actors to look to the person working the camera as if to say, "Did we get it?"  Those looks can ruin an otherwise great take and sometimes you won't notice it until editing later.

To sum it up, remember you can save a ton of time in editing with careful planning and by paying attention.  Consider what the viewer will see and hear.  After you make a couple videos thinking like this you'll appreciate your favorite movies and television shows all the more!


Based on your experience, what advice would you add to the list?

Lessons on Video Production - A project from our high school career education video studio

The career counselor and I talked last year about the possibility of using some of the career budget for video production equipment.  My thinking was that just through the process of making a video we could focus on many careers and good career skills.

She also noted that we could make short segments about careers and play those videos each week in our high school.

In the end we were both excited by the possibilities.  Over the summer I was able to go on a fantasy shopping spree.  We now have two great Panasonic cameras, two powerful HP computers, a quality Datavideo switcher, lights, mics and software.  I still have to wonder if I'm dreaming every time I realize I am paid to work in this studio.

To start using it, I had the opportunity to meet with the students in our Communications and Media class in the early weeks of the school year.  It was great talking to them, showing examples and hearing their ideas forming.

Assignments and Resources

Activities about planning a video
Since we don't have the studio ready, this gave me a great time to focus on planning a video.  (Students always want to grab the camera and jump into the fun part.)  So we started by watching this excellent video by Stillmotion on the Four P's of Storytelling.

Then I gave them this worksheet about planning an imaginary documentary.

After watching Part 2 of the Stillmotion series we completed this worksheet which focuses on the importance of using keywords to hone in on your purpose.  Students enjoyed the exercise of finding the Four P's for their favorite movies.  The Four P's Worksheet 2

Next we talked briefly about creativity and I used my Say Anything flipchart and the Coming Soon Storytelling Game to practice the concepts and explore other ways to describe good stories.  (Coming Soon is based on Donald Miller's Storyline and uses this definition of story:  A character who wants something and overcomes conflict to get it.

I also showed the class the top three videos from the Stillmotion challenge.  (Note that on that page they include other resources related to the lessons on Vimeo.)

We discussed some things that worked and what didn't with the three short videos.  This led to a brief look at the Pixar Pitch from Dan Pink's book To Sell is Human.  Some of the book is summed up here, but this is the pitch based on Pixar's great storytelling formula:

• Once upon a time _________ . 
• Every day, _________ . 
• One day, _________ . 
• Because of that, __________. 
• Because of that ,__________ . 
• Until finally, _________ .

Then this third worksheet required students to practice using all three methods to create a short script for a video. The main requirements were that it had to be one to two minutes long, it needed to tell a story and somehow it had to teach a life lesson.
Script Assignment 1

Thinking about the production process
Next we discussed the role of the director in video production.  Students completed a worksheet similar to this one.

I was excited about this whole lesson because I remember when I was in high school and I read about directors, I couldn't imagine what they did.  Wasn't everything all set out in the script?  Of course, I was limiting my ideas to what I saw on the screen.  I hadn't considered the infinite number of ways a script can be interpreted.

So to give an example of how a director can interpret the script, we worked through an activity I have always wanted to try.  First I printed a section of this script from Dead Poets Society.  I love that movie and it proved to be a safe bet most of our students hadn't seen it.  We took the scene where Mr. Keating calls Todd to the front of the room to sound his "barbaric yawp".  It amounted to about three to four pages.

I summed up some of background leading up to that scene, then three of us read the script.  I was the narrator, the teacher played Mr. Keating and a student played the role of Todd.  I told the students to visualize the action in the theater of their minds.

After we finished reading it, we watched the actual clip from the film to see how the director interpreted the action.

During production I found myself repeating (or wishing I had repeated more) my usual advice to directors and actors.  I compiled those 10 tips for video in the classroom in this post.  That list attracted a lot of attention, so I created this video summary that could be presented during class.

After production
We finished recording and editing most videos this week.  There was a ton of learning going on for all of us as we created videos on many devices.  I wrote this reflection assignment so they could evaluate their own learning and consider possible improvements to their videos.

Career videos
Here is our first attempt to assign a career related video project.  The assignment requires students to research a career and report on it.  From a production standpoint, it also lets us test our full studio setup for the first time.  The final videos will be shown to the rest of our high school students.

Middle School Music Video Project - The Scientific Method Rap

I worked with Andrea Thelen and her class this past marking period.  The class is called SETS - Students Engaged in Technology and Science.  This is a video project we assigned at the end of the course.  The hope was to follow a process like I outlined in this post from last year about music creation in the classroom.

As it turned out, we almost ran out of time.  I worked with the group of students to create the lyrics and we recorded a rough version in the very last days of the class.  I took some time on spring break to spice it up on my own.  Details of the process are below, but here's the final result.  

It is not perfect, so I pose this as a challenge for other groups.  Do something better!

Here's the Project Process:
First I had the students do this assignment to research and review the scientific method.

I didn't show them any examples of existing videos.  Instead, I just asked them to write the lyrics for a rap after they did the above assignment.  This group featured above turned in some great work, but I was disheartened to find a very similar version online!  We had a talk about using online content in acceptable ways and how to give credit where it's due.

I then worked with them to write the lyrics shown in this final version.

Using my iPad with an iRig Mic Cast microphone, I recorded the students while they rapped.  I made one simple track using the Smart Drums and then recorded their vocal part on a few other tracks as we accumulated takes.  This took longer than I expected, but it was a great learning process for them as we had to tweak their lyrics to fit the beat.  After class I took time to put the good takes in order.

The students then took the iPad while I worked  on the same process with a second group.  They used the free Video Star app to record their lip sync performance.  They came back with one rough take.  I told them to go do a few more.  In the end they had four videos.

I should note that Video Star is a great, fun app for adding effects to a lip sync performance.  But I was glad that three of the four takes that these students gave me did not use the video effects.  Instead, they just used the app as a means of syncing their performance with the song.  I suggest that because it's better for a polished video to add the best effects during post-production.

The videos that the students made at that point were acceptable for purposes of the class.  We were out of time anyway, so I did not have a chance to take them through the editing process.

Since it is spring break, though, I had a lot of time to play around with it on my own.  I did the following:

• I created a few background tracks using options using UJam.  That site makes it easy to try the options, download an mp3 and then try another version.  I made two that I liked based on their hip hop styles. One important point to note is that UJam was a great seller for this project.  The students liked how it immediately spruced up a vocal track.  I was disappointed we didn't have more time to use this in class, so I hope to start the project earlier in the marking period next time.
• I combined, rearranged and mixed the vocals and UJam track using my old version of Music Creator. While I did put in some effects from that program, mostly I choose it over Audacity only because it lets me easily cut the tracks right at the measures.  This makes it extremely easy to move parts around and repeat them.
• I then combined the parts from their video performances with my audio track using Corel VideoStudio.  I love the program, but see the details I wrote about the good and the one big negative I had.  I really enjoy video editing, so I had fun with this.  I have to admit it took several hours just to make this short video, though, and it is not realistic that our students would have created something this complex within the usual time limits of our classes.  I hope to get them there someday though!

Doing this project with this group was my dream project this marking period.  I was hoping to give them something to make the class very memorable.  Since it was rushed and we worked around other distractions, I'm not sure I achieved it.  I did build a couple important relationships, though, and I set the groundwork to do much better the next time around.  

I have always said that nothing provides an option for more content and important skills at a variety of levels like a good video project.  Though it can complicate an already complex process, I'll go further and say that a good music video project adds several other advantages to the mix.  Not the least of which is that the students who are hardest to hook often have a love and talent for music.

My Attempt to Encourage Creativity - The Quadratic Formula Song (All Over 2a)

I'm working with a group of middle school students and I told them the final project for the class will be an educational music video.  They were not so sure they liked the idea of singing or being in a video.  In an effort to encourage them, I took the plunge and finished an idea I had been working on.  So here goes.

(The chord sheet for the Quadratic Formula song is here if you're interested.  If you perform this in class, I'd love to hear about it!)



It's not easy for me to play something like this for the students, but I wanted to take the step and encourage them to do something better.

I'm not sure if it looks like it, but the video itself took a long time to create.  We won't have time for something that complex in class, but I think they can do better at making a complete song as opposed to a short chorus like I wrote.

For anyone interested in the process, here's a rough outline of what I did and the software I used.

I knew I wanted to make a song about the quadratic formula.  I obviously didn't write any lyrics.  The formula was the chorus.

I used VoiceBand on my iPad to improvise a melody over a click track.  If it's not apparent, I don't sing that well and the pitch correction in VoiceBand helps me end up with something workable.

From there, I put it in UJam.  I was going to create the whole song in UJam and I might still do that.  When I saw some of the simple chords that came out of one version, though, I realized I could play that on guitar.  I changed what UJam gave me for chords.  I also played around with the melody and rhythm quite a bit after that initial idea.

I programmed the bass, drums and a simple guitar part in the GarageBand app on my iPad.  I recorded my actual guitar using the iRig guitar adapter.  I recorded the vocals (including the spoken part) with the iRig Mic Cast.

To polish the vocals a little more I used GSnap in Audacity for pitch correction.

The song was not done at this point, but I had an idea of how I wanted it to flow.  I started gathering video. Almost all of the video was created or captured with my iPad.  For the stop motion segment in the middle I used Stop Animator.  For the other animated sequences I used DoodleCast Pro.  There's also a short segment of a screen capture where I grabbed the Daum Equation Editor using Screencast-o-matic.com.

I couldn't get a good mix of the audio on the iPad, so I exported each track and converted them to .wav format using Zamzar.com.  I brought them into my very old version of Music Creator.  I'm sure an updated version would do a lot more, but I just use my old version because it lets me split, copy and paste right on the beats of the song.  I could do this on the iPad or the MacBook with GarageBand, but I'm used to years of playing around with Music Creator.

I'm not a sound engineer by any stretch, but after getting a mix I could live with, it was time to tackle the video editing.

I used iMovie on my daughters MacBook to add a few effects to the clips of me playing the guitar.  Other than those, all the video was done in Corel VideoStudio.  As I wrote previously, I was unhappy with Corel's customer service awhile back, but I do still love that video editing software.  I am always amazed at the level of control and effects that I can achieve for relatively little cost and effort.

When it's all said and done, it took way longer than I hoped (easily over 20 hours, but I lost count) and it's far from perfect.  I am happy with it as a first effort and I look forward to seeing how it encourages my students.