Student Voice: Business Incubation & App Creation

This week the CollabLab welcomes guest bloggers Sean and Wendy, both juniors at Elk Grove HS.

Hi, I’m Sean Duffy and I partnered with my classmate, Wendy Rosenquist, to create our business, Údar. Both Wendy and I attend Elk Grove High School. We are part of the brand new EGHS Business Incubator program, which provides us with the resources and determination to create and pursue our business. In this new class, students, such as ourselves, are placed into a supportive environment where they are allowed to create their very own businesses. In its starting year, Elk Grove's Business Incubator program had 14 unique businesses that competed against each other in front of a panel of judges in order to continue on to compete against Wheeling High School's winning business incubator teams.

Údar won first place in Elk Grove High School's "Shark Tank" competition and went forth to face Wheeling's teams in D214's first ever Start Up Showcase. Once again Údar won the competition in a decisive tie between a rivaling businesses from Wheeling High School. From this experience I can say without a doubt that this new class offers a new and unique experience in learning while also bringing forth an exciting opportunity to gain an excellent foothold as a business in the real world! We can say that we will be taking this class once again without a doubt and we look forward to any competitors that are prepared to enter the EGHS business incubator program!

From Udar's website: "We are a mobile game meant for fun and enjoyment! Everyone has a story to tell, and that's where we come in. Check out our promo video below to learn more!"  Follow them on Twitter @Udar!

Spring Break

By Mark Heintz

Spring break has come and gone.  Here in Chicago it snowed two days and barely got above 30 degrees. At least I got to use my snow blower.  But, that is not the point of this post.  The point is to show the power of spring break.

Spring break can be a time for rejuvenation before the final push of the school year.  It can be a time for students to take a break from the stress of exams and homework.  It is nice to have the students recover and see the last quarter with fresher minds.  They come back a little more willing to learn. However, spring break can be a time for students to get ahead or caught up.

There are forty-two videos John Green created for world history.  They are amazing, and I use them as review for the AP exam.  In Schoology, I have all forty videos posted with a short little quiz that a former student Deanna Duffy helped create last year.  I set a calendar for the students that starts over break to have them watch all the videos by the exam, watching about one a day over the next forty days.  In total, it is over 400 minutes over video.  Several of my students used their spring break to complete ALL the videos.  Every one of them.  I am continually impressed by the amount of time some students put into their work.  Now to be fair, there were some who did not start their videos at all. But many did more than they needed and used their break as a time to get ahead.  When the students finish all their videos, they get a badge in Schoology called the Fault in Our John Green.

Using Videos to Transform Learning

Posted by Linda Ashida

Over the course the school year, the ITF / DTC team has supported colleagues, and learned from them, about a variety of innovative uses of video to transform learning with their students.  This post will share highlights from several teachers.

Advanced Strength and Conditioning (PE 866) - Mike Radakovitz

Although Mike does not currently teach a 1:1 pilot class, but since the majority of his students have iPads, he has taken advantage of the technology to improve student progress with their lifts in PE 866. Mike asks his students to use their iPads to record their peers when they do their lifts. After practicing the lifts, and for the summative assessment, the students upload the videos to an assigned Media Album in Schoology.  From the Media Album, all students in the class, and the teacher, have access to the videos. 

From there, the students are asked to use a rubric to complete a self-assessment and a peer-assessment. Mike builds coaching skills into the peer assessments.  He asks each peer assessor to articulate: the criteria for a quality lift; what the peer did well; what the peer needs to improve; and, specific steps to make the needed improvement.  Students are much more engaged in the learning process.

French classes - Kirsten Fletcher

Language teachers can all probably remember spending the better part of an entire week for students to do presentations in front of class to assess their speaking skills.  With 1:1 technology however, teachers can streamline the process, save instructional time and improve feedback! One way to have students to create video presentations and, just as Mike did, have them upload the videos to a Media Album in Schoology.

Kirsten recently did this with her French 2 students. Students created video presentation on a Francophone country using the apps Educreations or ShowMe.  They uploaded their videos to an assigned Media Album in Schoology, and then they were asked do a self-assessment of their own video, and to watch the presentations of three other students and offer feedback aligned to the speaking rubric.  Having all of the videos curated in one Media Album creates a class portfolio of student work that Kirsten can use in a variety of ways.  She can highlight examples of quality work for future students and she can use the videos to facilitate individual student progress conferences.

Orchestra - Maura Brown

1:1 technology also streamlines and improves the assessment process for Maura.  Instead of meeting one-to-one with every student for a playing test, or having the entire class listen while individual play, she has her students use YouTube Capture to video record each other for their playing tests.  That way students can self-assess, peer-assess, revise their work, and submit their summative playing tests to Maura via email. She developed clear how-to guides for using YouTube Capture, along with guides that explain the assessment process.  You can see the resources she created on this Collab Lab Page

Do you have examples to share?  Please comment below.  Would you like to try some of these ideas in your own classes? If so, please come see us in the Collab Lab!  We would love to brainstorm ideas with you!