Deconstructing Keynote (or PowerPoint)

So Markette turned me on to an article a couple of weeks ago entitled 'PowerPoint is Evil' by Edward Tufte. He basically said that,

Audiences consequently endure a relentless sequentiality, one damn slide after another. When information is stacked in time, it is difficult to understand context and evaluate relationships. 

He goes on to remind us all that we need to 'Respect our audience' when giving a presentation or teaching a lesson. I'm as guilty as anyone for using PowerPoint (or Keynote for us Apple people) to present lessons. At this point it's out of habit rather than based on any pedagogy. I can tell when students just can't take any more notes. They ask ... 'are we taking notes today'? Yes, I think notes are vitally important in helping students retain and be able to refer to important information, but I'm beginning to wonder if there isn't a better way, like Flipping.

To this end, I've been attempting the Flipped Model Vicki and Molly have had so much success with. I've been using Doceri to record 'Screencasts' as well as something new I discovered while reading an article in iTunes U. I'm recording right in the application Keynote (desktop version) in short, 5-8 minute, sessions. I've had to totally redo them to make them flow nicely, but I think the quality has improved. I have even started putting in little 'Easter Eggs' to check if students are watching to the end. When the kids get to class the following day, I give them a 'Ticket-in-the-Door' consisting of 1-3 short questions that are EASY if they watched the video, but painful if they haven't. The 'Easter Egg' becomes a bonus for them ... just to get them in the habit.

1. I create the Keynote.
2. I record my voice while manually advancing slides and transitions.
3. It's SHORT ... no more than 10 minutes and that's pushing it.

Here's the link to one that I did this week:  Allotropes

Today I did a lesson on Periodic Table Trends (I know, riveting) that I typically do with a Keynote. However, today I used only parts of that file and instead had students use their iPads to discover these trends on their own. The free App EMD-PTE is a periodic table with MUCH more information available for students to explore:

• atomic mass
• weighted atomic mass
• electronegativity
• atomic radius
• ionization energy
• state of matter

I would state the trend and loosely guide them to discover it for themselves with the tools in the App:

Electronegativity of the Elements

Ionization Energy of the Elements (Silver is shown).

In this way, THEY see what happens to the electronegativity and ionization energy of the elements without having to listen to me drone on about them. They OWN the information. They make the connections to what we're learning in class and in lab. AND they are playing with a chemistry app. What's not to love about that?

Stem & Leaf

The only class I am not "flipping" my classroom for is my Intro to Stats class.  These kids need more active learning in class and are probably the kids I trust most to use the iPads on a daily basis.

Today I had them work on some online questions, these were not graded, collected or recorded in any manner at all.  All students worked SILENTLY on the questions, and only one student asked how I was recording their answers.  I gave students a time limit on answering the questions, and then gave them a one question quiz afterward; this worked PERFECTLY!

I had found the questions on a site called "Mathopolis".  HOWEVER- I had posted the link on my website so students could go directly to the questions that I intended them to answer, and it did not take them to where it was supposed to.  So I had to revise their directions, and make sure every student was able to get to the correct place- so first set it was a FLOP.  By 5th set I had figured out how to get students there in as few as 5 clicks! Blah!

Another fun thing that I did, that doesn't really involve iPads, was I had the students make themselves into a human stem-and-leaf plot.  We used the stairs in the back of the building, I put the "stems" on the railings, and they were the leaves.  I took a picture of them, and then when we were back in the classroom projected the photo so they could make their stem-and-leaf plot on their paper.  It was really cute. Below are the pictures of my little Gremlins.