Peter Pappas »
22 May 2013 »
In Ed Tech, How To, Publishing, Strategies, Students, Visualizations, Web 2.0 »
Haiku Deck visualize
Haiku Deck is a great iPad app for building academic vocabulary - and its free. It provides a student-friendly tool for teaching common core vocabulary standards with motivation and creativity. Good defining skills are rooted in collaborative negotiation of meaning rather than memorizing glossaries and testing via two-column matching questions. The genius behind Haiku Deck is its simplicity - just type in text and use its built in search tools for related terms and images. With minimal design choices, student can focus on visualizing vocabulary and sharing their thinking with peers.
Haiku Deck add text
I'm not going to offer a Haiku Deck tutorial. It's easy to learn, and has some thoughtful online help. Instead let's look at the steps a student might use to visualize the term "freedom."
- Create a new Haiku Deck.
- Type in the term or phrase.
- Tap the image icon and Haiku Deck displays a selection of high-quality and copyright-free images. Scroll down for more.
- Don't like the images? The "similar tags" column offers related terms. Tap on one and the image selection updates.
- Select an image and the student is offered a chance to "add some additional text." They could use that space to explain the association between the image and the term.
- Tap the + sign and create another slide following the same process.
Haiku deck search
I see so many options for using this app. Create decks of synonyms vs antonyms. Let students explore terms for a close reading, defend their choice of images, or contrast multiple meanings. Only have a few iPads? Let the students collaborate in a collective deck. Perhaps the first student picks the image and the next student curates the choice of image in the "additional text." Have a term that doesn't turn up any good image matches and you've created a chance to explore synonyms in the "similar tags." Still can't find relevant images for the term? Then you have a chance to speculate why the system isn't turning up usable images. BTW - don't worry about student using inappropriate words. Haiku Deck does a great job of screening those out.
There are lots of options for sharing student work. Completed Haiku decks can be saved to the web and viewed on any device. You can share decks via email or social networks. They can also be embedded in a blog or exported to PowerPoint or Keynote.
Common Core State Standards (CCSS) divide vocabulary among a variety of disciplines and grade levels. The standards focus on multiple meaning, context clues, figurative and connotative meanings and the impact of specific word choices on meaning and tone. Haiku Deck could be used to support all of these goals.
Tags: Apps, Close reading, Common Core, Defining, Haiku Deck, iPad, Visual Literacy
Peter Pappas »
05 May 2013 »
In How To, Literacy, PD, Strategies, Teachers »
Teachers everywhere are concerned about the impact of Common Core. But they won’t benefit from lecture-style PD that itemizes specific strands and standards of Common Core. Promoting curricular “checklists” doesn’t build capacity, it fosters either resistance or mindless compliance. Don’t talk about “close reading” – do it!
Here’s five PD essentials to support teachers in transitioning to close reading and the Common Core. Teachers are too savvy to fall for an empty promise that something is “common-core-aligned.”
Tags: Charlotte Danielson, Close reading, Common Core, Critical thinking, Higher-order thinking, Plainfield CCSD 202, Reform
Peter Pappas »
26 April 2013 »
In Commentary, Literacy, Social Web, Strategies »
Here’s a suggestion for high school teachers. Postpone a lesson you had planned for next week and use the time to explore the cacophonous infosphere spawned by the apprehension of the suspects in the Boston bombings. If that media circus tells us anything, it’s that we need a lesson in digital hygiene and responsible use.
It’s also a good chance for students to hone their close reading skills. The events should be fresh in everyone’s mind. Ask students to reflect back on network news and social media coverage of the manhunt using these three critical thinking prompts: What did it say? How did it say it? What’s it mean to me?
Tags: Boston Marathon, Close reading, Common Core, Critical thinking, Higher-order thinking, Information landscape, James Gleick, News, Storify, Twitter, US History, Visual Literacy, Watertown
Peter Pappas »
22 April 2013 »
In History / DBQ's, How To, Literacy, PD, Strategies, Students »
The Common Core encourages students to more closely read a text (in all it’s multimedia formats) by answering three critical questions: What did it say? How did it say it? What’s it mean to me? Here I model a Common Core close reading of my visit to a museum exhibit. I’ll dig a little deeper into the three questions with a few more prompts and provide answers as if I were a high school student reflecting on their experience.
Tags: Anatolian, Artist, Close reading, Common Core, Comparing, Critical thinking, Flipped classroom, Higher-order thinking, Istanbul, Museums, Pera Museum, STEM, Summarizing
Peter Pappas »
27 March 2013 »
In How To, Literacy, Strategies, Students »
Close reading requires students to consider text (in it’s different forms) through three lenses: what does it say, how does it say it, and what does it mean to me? Here’s a three step process for mastering this Common Core skill using the guided reading of a TV pharmaceutical ad. You’ll have a chance to compare visual elements, narration and musical soundtrack.
Tags: ASCD, Close reading, Common Core, Comparing, Critical thinking, Higher-order thinking, Summarizing, Visual Literacy, William Kist, Writing
Peter Pappas »
05 March 2013 »
In Ed Tech, History / DBQ's, Literacy, Publishing, Strategies »
My latest multi-touch iBook “Progress and Poverty in Industrial America,” is now available for your iPad – FREE at iTunes. Critical thinking questions based on Common Core skills help students “think and write like a historian.” It’s a great resource for use in the classroom, and serves as a model for teacher or student curation of historic content into interactive digital DBQ’s.
This 18-page iPad DBQ guides students through the historian’s process. “Stop and think” prompts encourage a deep reading of many notables of the Gilded Age – including Russell Conwell, Henry George, Andrew Carnegie and Stephen Crane. Visual source material includes posters, 1908 Sears Catalogue, a gallery of photographs by Lewis Hine and video of one of Edison’s early Vitascope films.
Tags: Andrew Carnegie, Common Core, Comparing, Critical thinking, Curriculum, Deep reading, ebook, Essential questions, Henry George, Higher-order thinking, iBook, iBooks Author, iPad, Lewis Hine, Russell Conwell, Stephen Crane, Vitascope, Writing
Peter Pappas »
12 February 2013 »
In Ed Tech, History / DBQ's, How To, Literacy, Strategies »
CCSS offers an incentive for teachers to use historic documents to build literacy skills in a content area while empowering students to be the historian in the classroom. But document-based (DBQ) instruction in this context requires four key elements to be successful:
1. The right documents.
2. Knowing how to look at them.
3. Letting students discover their own patterns, then ask students to describe, compare and defend what they found.
4. Basing the task on enduring questions, the kind that students might actually want to answer.
My new multi-touch iBook – “Workers Win the War: Toil and Sacrifice on the US Homefront” – embodies that approach. Here’s how.
Tags: Common Core, Comparing, Critical thinking, Curriculum, ebook, Engagement, Essential questions, Higher-order thinking, iBook, iBooks Author, Innovation, Motivation, Relevance, Rigor, US History, Visual Literacy
Peter Pappas »
06 February 2013 »
In Ed Tech, Strategies, Students, Teachers »
Here’s a TEDx video – The Future Will Not Be Multiple Choice – that showcases the power of a PBL / design-based approach to learning. While you watch it, try to think of a meaningful career that looks like filling out a worksheet.
Tags: Creativity, Critical thinking, Curriculum, Design, Engagement, Essential questions, Google, Higher-order thinking, Innovation, Motivation, PBL, Reform, Relevance, Rigor, Test prep
Peter Pappas »
09 December 2012 »
In Events, How To, Strategies »
There’s a great new free iBook that I highly recommend as a source for project based learning and team building activities for middle school students through adults. “Innovation Challenges – Mind Workouts for Teams” is available – free at iTunes.
It tells the story of a great program at Saint Louis University, designed to promote creativity, innovation, and the entrepreneurial mindset through novel challenges. The book is a detailed how to for 22 challenges – team supplies, facilitator supplies, tips, learning outcomes and variations. It’s a treasure trove lavishly illustrated with photos and videos. Challenges run the gamut from STEM to marketing and sustainability. The iBook also details how to replicate the competition at your institution.
Tags: Creativity, Critical thinking, ebook, Engagement, Higher-order thinking, Innovation, Innovation Challenge, Motivation, PBL, Saint Louis University, STEM
Peter Pappas »
28 November 2012 »
In Commentary, PD, Strategies, Students, Visualizations »
This clever and fast-paced 6-minute animation provides insights into how teenagers learn. An “insider’s guide” to the teenage brain, it answers the question – “If you were a teenage speaker brought in to address a crowd of teachers on the subject of how you and your peers learn best . . . what would you say?”
Done in hand-drawn whiteboard / voiceover format it sets out eight essentials for learning, including my favorite – reflection. Share it with your students and see if they concur or use it as a discussion starter for your next faculty meeting.
Tags: Amusements, Bloom, Critical thinking, Engagement, Motivation, Relationships, Relevance
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