Wednesday, Sept. 30 You are six weeks into the school year. Describe one new tool or strategy you have implemented. * How and why you are using it? * What impact is it having on you and your students?
My students are using the TI Sensor Tag. It is a device that has the potential to monitor motion, humidity, barometric pressure, temperature, and light. Their assignment is to download the app and explore its possibilities. They will create a lab for one of its functions, and carry out the lab, collecting data and screen shots to display visual displays of their data. This tools has the potential to give students real-time data, allow them to analyze their data and draw conclusions from their own experiement. I am allowing them to use their creativty to initiate their own experiments and report out to the large group.When I worked on this project this summer, I felt a greater investment because it was one which I developed with my lab partner.
At Day 2, my students are excited to use the tool and have assembled into new groups and using their devices. They are figuring out the “bugs” associated with their individual phones. They have all identified a unified problem..one sensor is not working. It is proposed to related to the battery strength even though the battery were activiated by them. We will try new ones on day 3 and see if the problem is resolved. It has helped to inform them of my expectations from the outset and they are all working with enthusiasm to complete their tasks. I will introduce the project app tomorrow and allow them planning time to divide and assign the tasks. This will allow each student to satisfy their accountability aspect for the total group.