1:1 Application

In the coming year, were my students given iPads to use in a 1:1 setting in the classroom, I would be able to take my students outside the walls of our classroom to collaborate with others around the globe.  Already in my class the students are doing several different assignments that incorporate technology, and have done at least one assignment that took them outside the walls of William Fremd High School.  During this school year, for example, my students were involved in a project in which they were trying to get a cell organelle elected president of the cell.  As part of their campaign, the students were required to promote their organelle and smear at least 5 others.  The students were encouraged to use Twitter or Facebook to help them accomplish their goal.  As a result of going on to Twitter, my students began interacting with scientists from around the globe!  The project took on a life of its own as first cell biologists in England began tweeting with my kids, followed by biologists in France, the Middle East, and the United States.  At the end of the project, the students used the website Storify to turn their social media work into a story that summarized the highlights of their project.  They were able to incorporate any videos they made during the project, any tweets they sent out, any Facebook or Tumblr pages they made, and add captions underneath them to create their story.  Here are links to some examples of what my students produced that would fall under the Facilitate and Inspire Student Learning and Creativity Standard:

This first link is from a group whose organelle was the ribosome.  One of their tweets highlighted in this story has an active link to the video the group made as part of their project.  Creating and editing the video would have been really easy for them had they had an iPad and an app like iMovie!

2nd Hour Ribosomes

This next link is from a group whose organelle was the Endoplasmic Reticulum.  This Storify story does a great job highlighting all of the ways in which the students used technology on this project, from using Twitter to creating videos and memes to support their organelle.

3rd Hour Endoplasmic Reticulum

Finally, these students chose to use poetry in their Storify story to highlight their work on Twitter, which won them the election in my 3rd period class.  Talk about incorporating writing and creativity into science!

3rd Hour Cytoskeleton

In addition to the student-directed project above, my students also complete many other assignments involving the use of technology, including learning about the discovery of the structure of DNA.  For this, they use a website that I created using resources at DNAi.org.  This project would fall under the Design and Develop Digital-Age Learning Experiences and Assessments standard.  Here is a link to the website:

Discovery of the Structure of DNA

Finally, my students use my website as a resource for learning as well.  Almost all of the documents they need for class are linked there, as are many answer keys for review assignments, PowerPoints used in class, videos to watch at home, and my blog for the parents that communicates what we have done and will be doing in class each week.  Here is a link to my webpage:

My Webpage