Creativity Tools

    Creativity tools are an excellent resource for teachers in the classroom. They provide the ability for students to be creative when showing their content knowledge. Some creativity tools I explored include: iMovie, Prezi, and Flipgrid.    

iMovie allows for students to upload a video that they recorded. They could use a variety of tools to record the video: phone, tablet, or camera. Once they upload their video into iMovie, students can edit the video using a variety of tools. Students can edit the video to add in additional screens, such as a photograph or a text screen. This would be a great tool to use for students to create a trailer for a book, to create a video of the students completing a drama unit by creating a video of a performance, or creating a video reenacting an important scenario from history.

    Prezi allows students to create a presentation that can zoom around to various content that students created. This gives the students flexibility to create a presentation that shows their knowledge of a specific topic and allows students to add a variety of resources from the internet into their presentation. While I believe that Prezi allows for students to create content, I do not feel it reaches a higher level of affordances for students to reach a state of analyzing what they have learned. Prezi’s are a nice tool for when students are reflecting on what they have learned and help to show what students have learned, but I do not think the technology within a Prezi is reaching higher order thinking than other creative tools online. Creating a Prezi over the cattle drives of Texas and having the requirement for students to have at least one section of their presentation include an audio file of them discussing the cattle drives on the Chisolm Trail and what the cowboys endured would be an example of a Modification level of integration of technology. According to the TPACK Model:

    Content: The student understands the political, economic, and social changes in Texas during the last half of the 19th century, and can explain the growth, development, and impact of the cattle industry. (TEKS 4.4)

    Pedagogy: Students will complete a variety of readings over the cattle drives, some digital texts, some paper texts. Students would need to have been previously taught how to use Prezi and shown how to create and upload an audio file into their Prezi prior to the completion of this assignment independently.

    Technology: Once students have been familiarized with how to use Prezi, students would need the use of a laptop or desktop computer to allow them the ability to create this presentation.

    Flipgrid allows for social learning by providing an opportunity for students to have a discussion via video. Students create a video response to a discussion post. Students can watch their classmates video and share a discussion on their thoughts on the video and share responses. Flipgrid provides a digital way to share thinking with video. For example, students could be asked to share an example of how to use partial product to solve a math problem. From these, students would create a math problem to solve using a partial product, and then they would create a Flipgrid to share their problem and talk other students through how they used partial products to solve. This allows for students to think critically about what kind of problem they would need in order to use partial products, and then they would also have to explain virtually to their classmates how they would walk through the problem and find the solution. Flipgrid is very open-ended, which allows for teachers to ask open-ended questions so that students could respond in a variety of ways to show their thinking.  This would be an example of a modification level of integration.

     Content: Students will use strategies and algorithms, including the standard algorithm, to multiply up to a 4 digit number by a 1 digit number and to multiply a 2 digit number by a 2 digit number. Strategies may include mental math, partial products, and the commutative, associative, and distributive properties. (TEKS 4.4D)

    Pedagogy: Prior to completing this assignment, students would need to be taught how to use partial product to solve multiplication problems. A Flipgrid would be used as an assessment of their ability to analyze how to use partial products to solve. Students would need to have been previously taught how to use Flipgrid, and how to respond to students’ creations to include a discussion on if they agree or disagree with their explanation of how to solve partial product problems.

    Technology: Students would need to have access to a tablet or other technology piece with a camera so that the student could record their response. Students would be creating their problems independently and sharing their explanation via video, which allows for students to analyze their understanding of partial products using technology.

    Overall, I think that Flipgrid would be the one tool I would use in my classroom. It provides a fun and engaging way for students to create digital responses, and it allows for a wide variety of uses in the classroom and it is easy-to-use and is user friendly, even for younger students. Creativity tools provide a plethora of support to learning, as they can reinforce the understanding of topics, they provide the ability for students to take a deep dive into higher order thinking, and they allow for students to have experience using technology to help support their learning. Creativity tools differ greatly from paper activities (such as just completing a worksheet on partial products), as it provides an opportunity for students to be creative and use their knowledge to show that they have solidified the concept and they could teach it to another person. My least favorite creativity tool was Prezi, as I felt that it takes a lot of time to set up and create and at times it felt overwhelming. I didn’t feel like I knew when I was done adding materials, and I could see how students who get distracted by photos and videos could add too many resources from online and not focus on sharing their understanding with others. While I don’t care for Prezi all that much, I still think that students could find value in using it as it provides an opportunity for students to complete additional research as needed and it gives them an opportunity to create an item that gives them the ability to check for their understanding on the topic.