Today, students in Diane Pas and Teresa Masiarczyk’s science classes at Smith began working on their Mahara ePortfolio pages for their Earth Science unit. Ms. Pas & Ms. Masiarczyk began by introducing students to Mahara with a Google Doc posted on their Google Classroom. Students worked through the steps to create their pages and upload a profile picture. Then, they ventured outside to begin collecting artifacts using their own devices by snapping photos of scenes that exemplified earth science. These teachers intend to use student photos to give them a preliminary look at their conceptions of earth science before starting the unit. Take a look as the events as they occurred during one of their early classes below.
Ms. Pas and Ms. Masiarczyk’s organization and positive demeanor with students made this initial activity a huge success. Note some of the key aspects of this classroom that are key to integrating technology:
- The teachers circulate through the room, helping students take the next step. All of their interactions are entirely positive.
- Students understand the protocol for getting help: they each have two cups, one green and one red. In order to ask a question, they were to keep working but switch their cups to red.
- Ms. Pas and Ms. Masiarczyk show enthusiasm and awe as students make progress at a faster rate than she expected. As you will see in the second video, this transfers to student-student interactions as well. Students can be seen encouraging each other.
- Students are encouraged to work at their own pace and then help others who are not as far along.
After creating their pages, students ventured outside to collect artifacts for their ePortfolio pages. These students will continue to build their pages throughout the unit to showcase their learning progress.
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Ms. Pas helps students on Mahara
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Students take photos for their ePorftolios
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Student collects artifacts to show his understanding of earth science.
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O. L. Smith
Finally, take a look at how Ms. Pas helps students set norms for using their own devices as part of the activity.