Popplet and Story Mapping

Today we decided to make a plan for the stories we are writing by using Popplet. Popplet is an app that allows the user to create webs that include words, photos from the library, photos that you take, or simple drawings that you can make right in the app. Students worked together in groups to make a plan for their stories that included the characters, setting, problem and solution. Once students had these basic ideas I encouraged them to expand their ideas to include descriptions for their characters and more details about the setting.

It is so interesting to walk around and watch students negotiate the French language trying to think of the right vocabulary word and then subsequently try to figure out how to spell it. I love to hear them all share their different spelling strategies (word wall, personal dictionary, a book in the classroom, sounding-it-out...).

Here are some Popplets:

Next week students are going to use these webs to write their stories using the Book Creator app.

Labeling and Doodle Buddy

Writing comes in so many forms. Today, my students practiced labeling. I began by showing them a few suggestions on how to use the iPad by projecting its image via my classroom projector and VGA adapter. I showed students how to use the camera app to take a self-shot. They learned how to turn the camera around and where the actual lens is located.

Once they had a photo, I showed them how to open it up in Doodle Buddy to use it as the background for labeling. Students then identified the parts of their body in French. Once complete, I took a screen shot and saved it then emailed the photo to their Evernote account (e-portofolio) by writing the child's name in the subject line (i.e. @John). All the finished photos are now saved in the student's Evernote personal notebook.

Faces iMake and descriptive writing

I love this app! It is very funny and really gets the right brain working. Students worked alone to create a funny face. Then, they saved their pictures to the photos on the ipad. I downloaded the photos to my computer and then printed them out.  We are learning to write descriptive sentences in French using sentence frames (i.e. Voici __________. Il a___________. Il est __________.)

I printed their 'face' and they used it to write. The results were very impressive and lot's of fun to share. I love a lesson that involves laughter and imagination, and a lot of student engagement :)

What do you think? Have you used this app in your classroom?

Here are a few finished sentences and the whole class display. I also created a class book for students to read a share.

Creating a cooperative story using My Story

Today I decided to throw caution to the wind and just jump right in. We are at the end of our Life Sciences unit on living things, with a focus on bears. I thought it would be fun for students to work together to create a story about a bear.

I wanted to do a lesson that involved some discovery learning. I showed students the iPad and what app we would be using-My Story-and then I put them in groups and sent them off. The only request I made was that the story should be about a bear. Length, and content was completely up to them. It was very exciting to see students all around the room huddled around their iPad deep in discussion. The language I was hearing was amazing!!!! It was like music to my ears.

(As an aside, I started a new reward system to encourage more French out of my very capable students. Every time I hear a complete sentence in French, I give the student a 50/50 ticket. He/she writes their name on it and then places it in my fish bowl. At the end of everyday, I pull a name to choose a prize from my box (pencils, erasers, pens, mini-pads etc). Wow, what a difference that made :) After 10 tickets students get a certificate to recognize their effort.)

Anyways, back to the story creating. Students were having a lot of fun. They were engaged, working collaboratively, problem solving and practicing their oral French skills. I moved around the room and provided some support to facilitate the creative process. After about a 40 minute period, I stopped the students and we shared the stories to that point. (I have requested a cable to connect the iPads directly to my projector to ease the sharing process but alas I do not have it yet so until then I simply held the iPad up while the students explained their story.)

Then I came to my first challenge. I had to create a log where I recorded which groups were working on which iPads as each story would be saved only to that iPad. I still have a few questions about this app:
1. How many stories can be saved?
2. How can I delete a story? (I made a test and now I can't delete it) I now know how to do this: simply return to the view books page and select delete....I don't know why I found this hard before.
3. What is the best way to share the stories? We used the 'share' button to export our stories to ibook.
4. What will happen when the iPad is updated? Will the stories remain if one iPad is simply a mirror of the others (I think they are all mirrors...)? I imagine no, so they will need to be emailed...I think...
5. If I load them to the iBooks section of the iPad will they still be there when it is restored?
Questions, questions......

I am looking forward to working on the stories again tomorrow. I will see about sharing the stories here once they are complete (ummm, I wonder how I do that?!)

Update February 1st, 2012
We completed our stories. Students recorded the audio that goes along with their story. Then we used the 'share' button on the app to export the stories to the ibook app as a published book. Students can view their stories and listen to the audio in the ibook app. Below are some photos of the students engaged in the process of creating their stories (and they were very engaged!). (It was crazy hair day!)

Here is a video of one of the stories the students created. Sorry for the poor audio but it was recorded during lunch.

(For all you French teachers out there, I am aware of the grammatical errors but I chose not to correct them in this context as it was not the goal of this task. I wanted to honor their efforts and cooperation and it was simply impossible for me to correct all of the errors while maintaining an efficient work-flow.)