Presentation on uses of apps to foster New Literacies at the NCState New Literacies Workshop, Raleigh, NC, July 2012

1. Using Apps to Foster Learning
New Literacies in the
Classroom
Richard Beach, University of Minnesota,
rbeach@umn.edu
Google Docs Version of apps handout:
http://tinyurl.com/bt8s3r
k
Using iPad and iPhone Apps for
Learning with Literacy Across the
Curriculum
http://usingipads.pbworks.com

2. QR code: Google Docs
handout

3. Backchannel comments:
http://todaysmeet.com/N
CNewLit

4. Affordances of iPads/iPhones
 Touch:
◦ Intuitive navigation of texts and
virtual worlds
 Portability/storage/ownership
◦ Personal learning device
 Social reading/writing
 Multimodality
 Collaboration/communication

5. App affordances: Literacies to
learn across the curriculum
(app iTunes links on handout)
 Accessing/Analyzing Information to
Learn
 Reading Digitally to Learn
 Writing to Learn
 Discussing to Learn
 Images to Learn
 Audio/Video to Learn
 Games, Simulations, and Drama to
Learn
 Reflection to Learn

6. Accessing/Analyzing
Information to Learn:
Wikipedia
 Qwiki
◦ includes videos, images, graphs, and
entries for millions of topics
 Articles for iPad
 Wikipedia Mobile
 Wikipanion Plus
 Simplepedia
 iWiki

8. Social, collaborative reading &
writing to learn
 Social reading/writing:
◦ Study: two 7th graders reading each
other’s annotations (Coiro, Castek,
& Guzniczak, 2011, 61st LRA
Yearbook)
◦ Exposed to alternative response
practices that may differ from their
own
◦ Acquiring new ways of interpreting
texts

9. Collaborative Task
What caused the downfall of the Mayan civilization?

10. What will happen when Abby and Starfish
work collaboratively?
In what ways might their patterns of
strategy use remain the same or change?

12. Findings: Shifts in Abby and Starfish’s
Individual and Collaborative Stances
Thoughtful Gather
Purposeful Summarizer
Aesthetic Summarizer
Reflective Analyzer

13. App affordances: Social
reading/writing shared responses
toKobo Pulse

texts
◦ http://tinyurl.com/6v7oy9w
 Readmill
◦ http://tinyurl.com/6tldeng
◦ Video demo http://readmill.com
 Subtext
◦ http://tinyurl.com/6v6fgxg
◦ Video demo:
http://www.subtext.com/education
 Students share annotations, chat with
other readers, and view what peers are
reading

14. Using Diigo social bookmarking
for sharing annotations
1. Add Diigo to your iPad or computer
toolbar
2. Find an online text
3. Highlight sections of the text
4. Click on the icon to add a Sticky Note
response
5. Have other students add their responses

15. Diigo annotations: Pro-con
readings: benefits of energy from
wind power
th
 7 grade students iMelanie
Swandby’s
◦ Lighthouse School Community
Charter School, Oakland, California
 Students posed questions for each
other
◦ “What does that mean, virtually
free?”
◦ What are some things that use
energy or power?”

16. Adding sticky-note
annotations

17. One student’s annotation: Pro
wind turbine essay

18. One student’s annotation: con
essay

19. Students responding to each
other’s annotations

20. Dialogic interactions through
annotations
“There is a bad and good thing about
this. Bad is it kills birds passing by.
Good it makes energy cleaner.”
 “Tarnished with wind turbines? Aren't
wind turbines supposed to be a good
thing? Why are they complaining
about the turbines? it doesn't even
look bad.”

21. Use of annotations for summary
writing
 I am perplexed in choosing if wind energy
is a good courses or bad source. While,
wind energy is a good source because
it’s renewable and needs nothing more
but construction, it can also cause
irritation and attention of some people.
Wind turbines are loud, noisy, and risky.
Even though, it doesn’t cause any
greenhouse gases in the air, wind
turbines are harmful to wildlife and
space. More birds die by getting hit by
wind turbines which is very dangerous to
our wildlife.

22. Backchannel comments: Social
reading/writing to learn:
http://todaysmeet.com/NCNew
Lit
 Reactions??????????
 What are some ways you
could use apps to foster
social reading/writing to
learn in your classroom?

23. Accessing/Analyzing Information
to Learn: QR reader apps
 Create QR code images
◦ Entering in a URL in a QR create
site such as Qrafter, QRstuff.com,
Kaywa, Tec-IT, QR-app
 InsertQR codes into texts
◦ provide other related texts or
pose questions

24. Digital concept mapping
 iPad apps: iBrainstorm, MindMeister
for Ipad,, Sundry Notes, Idea Sketch,
Total Recall, inShare, iMindMap
MindNode, iThoughtsHD, Popplet Lite
http://tinyurl.com/3o6a3wy
 Hierarchical/logical relationships between
key concepts

25. 5th Grade Students: Popplet
Lite for Concept Mapping
 5th grade students
in Laura
Kretschmar’s class
at Lighthouse
Community Charter
School, Oakland,
California
 Lesson on rare
earth metals to
address the
question, “What is
gold?”

26. Mateo’s initial map: What is
gold?

27. Mateo’s revised map

28. Twitter apps
 Twitter Apps such as Twitter,
TweetCaster Tweetbot, Tweetdeck,
Twitteriffic, HootSuite
 Create class account
 Use Twitter hashtag for your class
#JonesHistory10AikenHS

29. Twitteriffic

30. HootSuite

31. Collaborative writing/data
collection: Google Docs forms
 5th graders: Weaver Lake
School, Osseo, MN
 Data on parasite presence in
Monarch butterflies
 49% had parasites

32. Graphic novel app: Teacher
guide: http://www.freespirit.com

33. Tools4Students (25 graphic
organizers): Second graders:
Lorax Garden app

35. Story/children’s book writing
 StoryKit, Storyrobe, Book Creator,
Bookemon Mobile, Picture Books,
Writer's Studio, StoryPatch,
Demibooks® Composer, StoryBuddy,
My Story, MoglueBooks, myebook,
StoryJumper (for younger students),
Tikatok

37. Comics/graphic novels
 Comic Life, Strip Designer,
ComicStrip CS
Shttp://tinyurl.com/6or7bvz, Comics
Creator, PhotoComic, Comic Touch
Lite

39. Apps for Sharing/Publishing
Writing
 ePub: Mac Pages (soon to be
on iPad Pages)
 Apple Author (requires OS
Lion): iBooks
 Dotepub or Inkling books
◦ Human Biology Inkling
textbook

40. Discussing to learn: CMS
platform options
 OpenClass (free; linked to Google
Apps)
◦ http://www.joinopenclass.com/open/view/t
1
 Edmodo (free; also an app)
◦ http://www.edmodo.com/
 Schoology
◦ https://www.schoology.com/home.php
 rcampus (cloud-based)
◦ http://www.rcampus.com/

41. Discussing to learn:
Collaborize Classroom
http://tinyurl.com/7xdcejl
 Free platform for classroom
discussions
 App/Web-based
 Extensive curriculum resources
 Focus on fostering students
collaboration
 Professional development

44. Discussing to learn: Google+
Hangout: Up to 10 people

45. VoiceThread: Multiple audiences
share responses to the same
images

46. 5th Graders: VoiceThread for
Studying Dinosaurs
 Extinction of the dinosaurs:
◦ supernova, volcanoes, or an asteroid.
◦ Volcanoes
http://voicethread.com/share/2454743/
◦ Supernova
http://voicethread.com/share/2544219/
◦ Asteriod
http://voicethread.com/share/2545658/

47. VoiceThread affordances:
Literacy practices
 Collaborative shared reading
◦ Mediated by focus on same images
◦ Learn from each other’s focus/practices
 Scientific thinking: claims/counter-
claims
◦ Exposure to competing arguments
 “The asteroid couldn’t have caused the
dinosaur extinction because the asteroid only
landed on one spot and there were dinosaurs
everywhere.”

48. Screencasting app: Doodles and
audio voice-over for collaborative
reading/writing/video
 ShowMe, Explain Everything,
VoiceThread, Screenchomp,
Educreations
 7th grade students at Lighthouse
Community Charter School
◦ Mendelian genetics
◦ Created ShowMe presentations

49. Students ShowMe’s: Genetics:
dominant vs. recessive traits
 “If a brown eyed and a blue eyed parent
had a baby, what color eyes would the baby
have?”
 http://www.showme.com/sh/?h=ibbycYS
 Mother and father birds and baby bird
 http://www.showme.com/sh/?h=RNKspgu
 Pea plant genetics
 http://www.showme.com/sh/?h=GC6q3nM

50. ShowMe affordances: Social
reading/writing/video synergy
 Unfolding doodling  voice-over
talk
 Use of ShowMe for prewriting/revision
◦ Testing our/erasing doodles
 Collaborative focus on same images
 Video: Rhetorical sense of audience
 Use science disciplinary literacy
◦ Images, charts, figures as data evidence

51. Screencasting: Students or you
create how-to tutorials for peers
 VoiceThread, ExplainEverything,
Screenchomp, ShowMe,
Educreastions
 Snapguide http://tinyurl.com/ctkslx8
◦ Students:

52. Screencasting: feedback
 VoiceThread, ExplainEverything,
Screenchomp, ShowMe,
Educreastions
 Video response to writing: Jing
◦ http://tinyurl.com/3kkw4am
 Speeches/drama: Formative
Feedback for Learning
http://formativefeedbackapp.blogspot.
com

53. Peer feedback: Reading/writing
connections
 Video: Better Reviewers are Better
Writers http://tinyurl.com/c36bv96
 ELI review: Web-based review
◦ 1. Select peer reviewers
◦ 2. Reviewers reader using criteria
◦ 3. Reviewers respond
◦ 4. Writer strategizes revisions
◦ 5. Teacher obtains student work/reviews

54. Backchannel comments
 Reactions??????????????
 What are some ways you could
use screencasting apps:
VoiceThread or ShowMe in your
classroom?

55. Discussing to learn: Teen
texting: Pew Research
 63% text daily
◦ Median number sent daily was 60 in 2011.
 39% cell phones
 35% face-to-face socializing,
 29% social-networking messages,
 22% IMing
 6% emailing.

56. Texting/message apps
 iMessage (iPad or iPhone),
Messages (Mac), AK
Messenger!, textPlus Free
Texting + Group Text, Textie™
Messaging
 Classroom-based texting
systems: Class Parrot,
Kikutext, WeTxt, Remind101,

57. Class Parrot: School texting

58. Tom’s Messenger
http://tinyurl.com/7v7klxw

62. My message on Tom’s
Messenger

63. Another message

64. Games/simulations/drama to
learn: Game/simulation/roleplay
apps
 Tiny Tower, CityVille Hometown, My
Town 2, Trade Nation, Farm Story,
Epic Citadel (medieval fantasy town
with a cathedral).
 Students creating characters and
stories based on the Epic Citadel
medieval setting
http://www.porchester.notts.sch.uk/citad
el

66. Apps for planning/organizing
instruction
 Nearpod http://tinyurl.com/6ts55kp
◦ http://new.nearpod.com
◦ videos, polls, sketching tools, or featured
presentations
 GoClass http://tinyurl.com/chbmeke
◦ http://tinyurl.com/blgogqs
◦ SHOW (online resources), EXPLAIN (add
notes), ASK (questions for students)

67. App uses/recommendations
 EdReadch channel (MobileReach,
MacReach)
 Appy Hours 4 U
◦ The TechChef4u app
 The iPad Show
 The Daily App Show
 TWIT channel
 Tech Chick Tips