Life's just fun and games

This week we visited Learning and Teaching Scotland's Consolarium in Dundee, where we got the opportunity to try our hand at the latest video games they believe can be used in the classroom.

It was a great way to further our knowledge on what Sharon Tonner had shown us in a previous lesson using the Nintento Wii and some games she had used with classes previously.

I believe that making our lessons more applicable to the digital natives we teach can only benefit their learning as they will be able to associate with what they are doing in the classroom as they have done it before at home.

Some of the games we looked at were:

• Eye Pet (Playstation 3)
• Mario Kart (Nintendo Wii)
• Nintendogs (Nintendo DS)

We also looked at the potential for using software development tools in the classroom. This would give children the opportunity to create their own games in the classroom and at home. One toolkit I have looked at since our visit is the Unreal Development Kit. It is a free download, and after a period of adjusting yourself with how it works it becomes quite easy to use. I wouldn't recommend it for younger classes though, this is a great tool to use in the upper stages of primary school, through to secondary.

Best of all, it's a free download, so you can try it out for yourself.

 Dazzle 

Week 7: Collaborative Working

As part of this elective we worked in small groups to create wikis, short movies and an animation. This involved using various software and tech.

I believe that the developments in technology facilitate the ability to work collaboratively without having to meet face to face. In particular the ability to communicate with others via social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter has enabled me to contact my peers to discuss academic matters. We also made use of Google docs and Etherpad in order to share information with one another. This meant we could all work on our own in our homes but we were collaboratively working by the magic of Web 2.0.

However I must, as always, be critical of this.

I personally believe that it benefits the process of collaborative working to physically get together and work in the same place, it means that everyone is fully interacting with the task in hand, rather than updating their Facebook update or tending to their online farm.

The use of Etherpad was effective for our group as we were able to arrange times to meet up on the pad and discuss how we would create our Wiki and short movies. There were, however, some problems when some of us lost connection, couldn't make times due to other commitments or had to leave during an online session. These tools work effectively, but everyday life does get in the way. I believe that had we met up at a location to work together then we wouldn't have had some of these problems.

A good point was that we could contribute to the pad and the other members of the group would receive our contribution the next time they logged in.

Another programme I have discovered is Google Wave. Google have been marketing it heavily as a collaborative learning tool for the classroom.

So, would I use the internet as a resource to enable collaborative working in the classroom?

Of course.

The children, as digital natives, know about this technology. They use it to interact with one another everyday, so it would be foolish to discard it from the classroom. The class teacher needs to research and think thoroughly about how the web can be used in this way and eliminate any potential threats before it is used.

 Dazzle 

Week 6: Animation

This week we were looking at bringing the magic of animation to the classroom by using a piece of simple software called Digital Blue.

We started by thinking of simple stories we could animate using plasticine models and simple backdrops and decided on re-creating the tale of Jack and the Beanstalk by using simple plasticine animation.

The process in creating a plasticine animation requires five frames of each still image which is altered slightly every time to give the characters movement. We worked in our group with two people moving the models, one person photographed each frame and another directed what was to be moved and by how much.

This software we were using facilitated the process as it had a simple layout that was user friendly and would be simple to use in the classroom with a tutorial from the class teacher. The process also promotes creativity as the children will be in control of how their characters move and how their short movie will look when it is finished.

Animation can also be used to reinforce other areas of the curriculum as you can see here, where a primary school in Edinburgh uses animation to promote their "Health Week".

The only problem I can see with animation being used as a lesson in the primary school is that it could take a few lessons to create a video and this could affect the quality of the work the children do as they would have to set their characters and scenery in the correct position to continue filming. Despite this, I still believe it is a valuable learning experience and would be incredibly fun if it is taught effectively.

 Dazzle 