Visiting the local primary school for our second visit
proved to be a little daunting, yet very exciting. We were given a group of six children to work
with to create a talking book using the app ‘Book Creator’. Having already trialled using this app in a
university seminar and during the first school visit, I felt more confident
with its use. However, I was initially apprehensive
regarding how to corroborate all of the media that was to be produced into one
talking book, especially as we were using three separate Ipads. Therefore, working as a group and also having
the support of the two Shirley Warren teachers was beneficial. As was stated, this was a learning experience
for everyone, therefore I learnt alongside my peers and the children. Group work allowed the sharing of ideas,
creating an enhanced learning experience.
This initial challenge was due to me not having had much experience of
the technology, causing some anxiety.
However, this challenge was overcome at the end of the visit having experimented
with the technology as a group.
The main thing that stood out working with the children was
the difference in enthusiasm. A couple
of children, in particular, stood out more regarding their eagerness to
contribute. This made it a little
trickier handing out the parts for the videos as some children did not want to
participate as much. There could be many
reasons for this, possibly due to timidity having just met and working with
three different adults. However, my
peers and I were empathetic and included every child. As time went on, the children who initially
seemed shy came out of their shell. This
was highly evident with an EAL child who wanted to be the news presenter. Her enthusiasm to contribute was outstanding
and we overcome the challenge of not fully understanding the speech by adding
subtitles to the whole of the combined video, encompassing inclusion.
Being handed the Ipads to experiment with some apps, the
children were instantly engaged and had fun investigating. It was surprising to see how well the
children used the Ipad and the apps. I
suspect this was because technology is widely used within the school and is
effectively integrated into the curriculum.
Moreover, these children are ‘digital natives’ and have grown up with
this technology (Prensky, 2001).
A question that arose for me in my previous blog post was
how well the children would react to the ideas my group had already created for
our chosen article, ‘to be the best that you can be’. Due to the time limit, we had a skeleton plan
for what our talk book would incorporate.
The children all agreed and understood our plan. However, I was conscious that it was the
children as the actors and the adults as the directors, with me and my peers
dictating what to do. If we had more
time, I would have rejoiced in including more of the children’s ideas to give
ownership over learning. Moreover, the
children did not really use the technology as much as I would have hoped. This was mainly due to me and my peers trying
to corroborate all of our videos within the time scale available. The purpose was to engage children in using
technology for their work; however this was not witnessed to a great degree.
Within this experience I have learnt much more about the
IPad and the relevant apps for classroom use.
A crucial implication for me is to explore the apps before using them
with children. Not only would this
reduce time trying to make the apps work, but work would be created to the
fullest potential as the children would have an experienced role model. Children will then begin to become “active participants in a digital
world” (DFE/QCA, 2013:188). Additionally,
I will use the children’s technological knowledge to further learning
opportunities.
Bibliography
DFE/QCA (2013) The National Curriculum in England, DFE/QCA
Prenksy, M (2001) ‘Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants,
Part II: Do They Really Think Differently? in On the Horizon 9 (6)
Before meeting the children I was really worried about how they would respond to us because we hadn't met them before. I felt exactly the same as you when we met the children as they were quiet and must have found it quite daunting. However once they learnt they could trust us and knew we were trying to help them, they became more relaxed which meant the work was of a higher quality.
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