As researchers and creators of collaborative learning technology, we want to share useful articles, news and insights. Ahmed is a Research Associate at Newcastle University.
This week, I had a fantastic day at Broadwood Primary School. Teacher Mel Horan organised a STEAM Co. day of lots of different activities, and I was asked to host a Thinking Kit workshop. There was huge variation; from lavender bag making to writing/performing music, to rocket firing!
I arrived at 7.45am and Mel gave me my own STEAM Co. passport, which all children would also receive. It had details of all of the activities and a space for a letter next to each. The more workshops children visited, a secret message would be revealed. A nice extra touch to encourage them to try new things.
Our spot was the computer suite, and I was gifted with the company of Broadwood’s ICT/Computing Lead, Jeanette Bowden, and Bridgewater teacher, Tracy Philipson. The facilities were great - lots of iPads and fast laptops. Tracy had used our content-based apps, Digital Mysteries before so that was a helpful start. We thought the most challenging things would be the varied ages (6-11) and that they could come and go as they please. Jeanette mentioned that one thing that could be on our side is that the children would hopefully help each other. Time would tell!
Two students and I, discussing their activity
After a welcome assembly, it was time to begin. Jeanette, Tracy and I hurried back and awaited our first arrivals. Sure enough, we had a mixture of ages: 6-9 year olds. The best thing to do first was have them explore Digital Mysteries, so they knew what types of activities they could create. They particularly found ‘Who killed King Ted?’ cool and younger children liked ‘Why didn’t Amy go to school today?’ Within five minutes, many started asking when they could create their own, plus at the same time, more children appeared, ready to join in and ask what we were doing...so that was when the fun really began!
Here’s the four key things I learned:
Children teach each other
This was really lovely to see and particularly prominent, I think,
because of the flexibility of the day. The vast age difference between
some of the children in our workshop, meant that natural instincts to
help others came to fruition without us asking. With some being very
young, they hadn’t typed in a web or email address before, so older
children showed them what to do, what to type and where to click. This
meant that although being young and at this stage of learning meant they
couldn’t create a task on their own, they played a part and learned
some key skills as they went along.
Let passions shine through
If you’ve not heard about Thinking Kit before, it allows teachers and students to create their very own app-like activities for iPads. We can’t speak to everyone who's used Thinking Kit up to now, but some that we have, have told us that students have created activities on a range of things - but often curriculum-based. This is great and one of the key things that helps integrate the tool into day-to-day school life, but this day was all about freedom and creativity. For this reason, I left the topic completely open.
A task all about Batman being created:
1 & 2: Creation side. 3: In the app.
Some students needed a bit of help to think of an idea but others thought of topics straight away. 'Lightbulb moments’ included activity ideas to discuss children’s Minecraft expertise, whether Cinderella should go to the ball, Batman’s exploits and why some YouTubers are so popular!
While these aren’t “curriculum topics”, they ignited the passion the students needed in order to help them become content creators. Whilst they were getting excited that they were using their favourite hobby as part of a school activity, they were also developing many skills. A few to name; often collaboration, writing, targeting a particular audience, research, web-skills of sourcing relevant images and saving/uploading them plus general digital skills.
Don't assume
As I mentioned earlier, one of the challenges was going to be suiting the workshop to different age groups all at the same time. This then led me to believe that maybe younger children would either be able to stick with ‘solving’ our own mysteries or only creating a task with strong guidance. Now, whilst these two things definitely did work well for some children, one of the younger children actually made so much progress that he created four tasks all on his own! At the beginning, I sat with him to guide him through some of the things that were new to him but after that, he was on a roll! Whilst I’d expected only year fives and sixes (age 9-11) to create full activities predominantly on their own or with peers, this boy and a few others actually proved me wrong - with a little guidance and passion for their idea, children can achieve their goals independently. It was lovely seeing the students share their tasks with others too.
The simpler the instructions the better
Pre-Thinking Kit, we had Windows software that enabled people to create their own activities. This tool formed the basis of the Thinking Kit Creator, but our developers had to have a big cull in terms of features to make it accessible online and also to open up the tool to more children. Because we made the tool a lot simpler, we thought we had the bare minimum of what someone would need to create an activity. However, seeing primary children using the tool for myself, opened my eyes: we still had a few advanced options that can be hidden away for those who know to look for them. Examples include adding a Reading Stage or extra instruction: just their presence meant those few more precious minutes being used to ask what they meant (when these features weren't particularly relevant for a student creating a task for a peer).
The key is to suit tasks to different audiences - our original and very advanced Windows authoring tool is still very useful to some teachers, but they know what they are looking for and so the extras help rather than hinder.
Helping one of the younger students
The day was brilliant. Everyone involved - from the teachers, to teaching assistants, to members of the local community and different businesses, and of course the children - worked really hard to make the day a success, and it most definitely was!
For more information on Thinking Kit and how to get the free app and a free trial to the activity creator that the children used, please visit www.thinking-kit.com. You can also read our last blog post for details on how to get involved with STEAM Co. here.
The new year is in full swing. Teachers across the world are back to work, sharing thoughts, ideas and resources...ready for what 2016 may bring.
With this in mind, we thought when better than to share 16 ways to use the Thinking Kit. Using the Thinking Kit Creator (currently free), educational activities can be created on any browser. The user saves the activity, gets a code, then uses that code in the Thinking Kit App (free) to download the activity onto iPads (or get students to). This teams two really strong themes together - learning using iPads AND digital content creation, whether by teachers or the learners themselves.
Activities involve one main goal/objective/question and snippets of information or images to help learners complete/answer it.
The Thinking Kit App can be used individually, but works brilliantly as a group activity too. It seamlessly allows for multi-touch and engages learners in face to face collaboration as they learn. There is a dedicated Reflection Stage and lots of tools to help them become better problem solvers, critical thinkers and team players.
So, without further ado, let’s get started…
Simple grouping tasks - add lots of images, pieces of text or both then get learners to sort them accordingly. Get students to use the ‘group tool’ to give groups a name and sort the snippets into them. E.g. Lots of images of animals and facts on vertebrate and invertebrate - students must then create mini groups, e.g. ‘mammals’ and drag and drop the relevant snippets into them.
Reading - break up a large topic into lots of digestible snippets which students can read together to answer an intriguing question about the topic. E.g. Introduce your class to a piece of literature by giving them key points of the book before they read the full text. Or do this afterwards as a reflection activity.
Ordering task - Get learners to sort the snippets/images into some kind of order, whether that’s chronological, size or even relevance. E.g. For history, add key moments in time and get students to arrange them correctly.
Custom background - Add a map or image and get students to move the slips into the correct space E.g. Use a map as the background and have students put countries in the correct place on it, or have a human body as the background and get learners to place the names of bones in the correct place.
Problem solving - Have an engaging story based problem accompanied by an open question to answer. E.g. A maths murder mystery - learners must piece together elements of the story and clues, do the maths involved and put forward an argument as to who could have been the killer.
Questions and answers - Add 10 question slips and 10 answer slips then get students to match them up. To make it a bit harder, don’t answer some of the questions - they can add them with the Note Tool. E.g. A more ‘fact-based’ subject would go well with this, perhaps scientific reactions or checking understanding of storylines in a book.
Quickly create an activity on breaking news - The Thinking Kit Creator is ideal for getting something together for the following day (or same day) if a sudden or unexpected event occurs which you want to address with students. E.g. There may have been a natural disasteror a world crisis. Educators could use the current high awareness of it to create an activity and get students to understand it better/share their views.
Learners on a school trip - With access to a camera, smartphone or tablet, students could take these devices on a trip and record their own evidence. They can then create a Thinking Kit activity and use their own images and notes to work on it themselves or as an activity for other groups. E.g. An example is ‘Does Warkworth need a bypass?’ Students would go there, take pictures of the place, record some local statistics and possibly ask some locals’ opinions.
SOLE session review - If you haven’t heard, SOLEs are “created when educators and/or parents encourage kids to work in groups that they form, and are free to change, to answer big, open questions by using the internet” (SOLE toolkit). The origins lie in Professor Sugata Mitra’s Ted-Prize winning talkhere. For more information go to School in the Cloud. Give students a big question and carry on a SOLE session as usual. Following their research, the groups could make a Thinking Kit activity with what they have discovered. They could then ‘do’ the activity at a later date or get their fellow students to! E.g. In the Greenfield Arts’ session, they used the question ‘What makes us human?’ Before/after the class discussion they had, to answer this question, groups could use their gathered information/views to create activities for each other.
Encourage discussion on difficult issues - An activity can be created on a more sensitive issue in a ‘different’ way to the norm. The snippets could include different points of view, facts and engaging images. Working through these in small groups will be less intimidating than as a whole class, it will be easier/less daunting for students to speak up and those at the end who feel more confident, can then engage in a whole class discussion. E.g. Topics such as bullying or sex education can be broken down and discussed as small groups as an introduction. A ‘scenario’ can be given through a Thinking Kit activity and students can begin to understand ‘taboo’ subjects through relatable stories and even ‘give advice’ to the characters in them.
Work on different strands of the same topic - Split the class into groups of three, then give each group a different strand of topic to research. They then create an activity themselves to share this with other groups, so they learn through each other. E.g. The topic may be key figures in history - each group focuses on one, creates a Thinking Kit activity, and gives the code to another group for them to learn about a different strand to what they created theirs on.
Ice breaker activity - Thinking Kit could be used to help students get to know each other better, whether that’s because they have just met (new class) or they have had a long break. Students could create an activity about themselves for others to use or get into pairs, then their partner creates one about what they have discussed.
Revision - Educators could create an activity for students to ‘do’ when early on in the teaching of a topic. They could do it upon completion of teaching of that topic, then again a few weeks later to see how much they have remembered. Alternatively, students could create one on their own. Understanding, interpreting and then reiterating points in their own words can be great for retention of information. When they do this a few weeks later then again nearer an exam, the information will be more likely to soak in.
Record of learning - Use the ‘reports’ feature of the Thinking Kit App to review how students have done in a particular task. Students can print or email these reports too, which include the list of content of an activity, screenshots of the process of doing an activity and anything they have added, e.g. named groups or notes.
Whole class discussion - When students have completed a session on the Thinking Kit App, one (or more) group’s session can be played to the whole class as a point of discussion. Using this dedicated Reflection Stage on a projector for example, can open up the class to share their views and get into a debate.
Differentiation - If learners are at different levels of their understanding of a topic, or you would rather lightly ease some groups in, you can create different versions of the same activity. Just get the core of information in, save it, add more things (whether they are images/information to make the task easier… or more complex things being added to broaden the activity) then click ‘Save As’.
We hope these have been interesting to read through and that you enjoy creating your own activities or getting students to themselves.
Thinking Kit is out now. The Thinking Kit App is always free, and the Thinking Kit Creator has a completely free 30 day trial. All you need is your email address and your name! Register at www.thinking-kit.com/signin. No other details are required to sign up.
It's fascinating for us to hear about all the ways Thinking Kit is being used. Let us know how you've used Thinking Kit by emailing info@reflectivethinking.com.
