I’m finding it difficult now term’s started to manage to experiment with some of the technology I’ve been given – it was pretty hard to find the time even at Easter and I’m amazed by participants like Sue who seem to be managing to try something new out at least twice a week! I’ve been reading Sue’s blog and she’s been using one of the DigiMemos we were briefly told about at the last session: http://skambalu.edublogs.org/category/digimemo/
I was taking in too much new inforation at the time to really latch onto what they were all about, but reading Sue’s blog I can see how they work and am keen to try them out if I get a chance.
What I’m thinking might work is to use them with exam classes – for example, recently I did some work on how to write effectively about sentence structure in texts with my AS language and literature class. I then got them all to try and write a paragraph based on what they’d learnt, share them in small groups and then nominate some particularly good ones, which i took and photocopied, stuck on a sheet and photocopied again, before giving back to them all. This was all very laborious, especially as it involved 2 trips to the photocopy room, and also frustratingly delayed the ability to share the work collectively (we read some bits out, but many people (myself included) find it hard to focus just on words without something to look at as well and I could see the faces glazing over!)
So my idea is that, as exams approach, it would be great to use DigiMemos with my 2 AS groups, to do that sort of shared writing – I’m assuming it can then be loaded onto an IWB screen and annotated to show good features and things that could be made even better. It sounds from what Sue said that you can then convert the handwriting into text, in which case it could be put into a Word document and even loaded into Fronter if one of the pieces was a good exemplar.
This could be anytime in the next 4 weeks but after that wouldn’t be any good as they’d have gone. My only other idea would be to do the same with my year 10 as preparation for their summer exam, but there are 27 of them and a few more hairy characters, so I’d be more comfortable with my AS groups of 9 and 14 relatively sensible individuals!
Judy/Sue – it would be good to hear your thoughts on this – knowing the equipment, whether you think that would be a good use for it – and Judy, whether there’s any scope for me having access to a set. With the numbers in my groups, a half set might even be enough.
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April 22nd, 2007 at 4:23 pm
Tessa, these are great ideas and well within the scope of the digimemo. How about Borrowing the A4 Pad for a week and seeing how you get on with it you could even get the students to try it out. Then we could meet, I could even try to timetable an 8:30 meeting, or earlier, at your schools to evaluate the work and then collect the pad whilst we look into scheduling some of the A5 digimemos for you to use if you thought it would work. I will install the software onto your computer on Tuesday and then you can see how it works? Do you have an interactive whiteboard in your room?
April 24th, 2007 at 5:15 pm
Didn’t get a chance to speak to you about this today – such a whirlwind of new stuff again! But yes, i do have an IWB in my room and the plan sounds good, so maybe we can install the software on wednesday instead?
May 1st, 2007 at 6:13 pm
Tessa how are you getting on with your digimemo? What do the students think of it?
May 2nd, 2007 at 7:01 pm
Tessa we have some A5 DigiMemos for sale at £35.00 each, do you think your school might be interested in buying any? Please let me know!
May 4th, 2007 at 2:43 pm
Judy – don’t know if you’ve heard but we had Ofsted at APS this week, so I’m afraid that experimentation has very much taken a back seat! I’m hoping to have more of a play this weekend and then try it out with a revision class the following weekend if it’s possible to keep it a bit longer. I’d have to have done more with it before I could presuade the school to buy anything so I’d have to let you know on the A5 purchase later. Let me know if it’s OK to keep it a bit longer.