Google Forms--Fast to Make, Fast to Take, Fast to Tabulate!

Using Google Forms turned out to be a learning curve, as all our assignments have been, I wasn't fully expecting. Yet, one that will probably be the most far-reaching assignment for the research classes I teach in middle school. PRISMS [Problem Solving and Independent Study for Middle School] is a semester-long research class where the students must generate authentic data to prove, disprove, or add to what they have located about a topic of their own choosing. Some produce surveys, some interviews. All are carefully constructed along time-honored techniques any good survey- or interview writing uses. Google Forms, by it's user friendly capabilities bypasses many of the stumbling blocks common to producing a mature and worthwhile data-gathering tool: the introduction, types of questions, order of questions, the ebb and flow of the questions to hold the survey-takers attention.

Surveying opinions among the troops.

In the assignment, I prepared a PechaKucha 20x20 survey that would gather information from my Gifted Academic Program students about doing a PechaKucha activity. I'm not particularly looking for numbers as I am thoughts...the reasons behind actions. By gathering opinions on one Spreadsheet I can make quick comparisons. This online version of surveying opinion is fast to make, fast to take, and fast to tabulate. [OMG, that rhymes!!  How cool is that!] Quizzes would be much easier to produce and administer too for the same reasons that this survey was to produce.

Gourd Spiders

I tried to email the survey to my sister so she could serve as a test subject, and although she is in the Google system she could not access it -- even with permission from me to accept her. Making it public [sharing it] made the difference. So, it can be sent to others as a link in an email so it opens in another page (and showing the theme) or it can be sent embedded in the email so the person doesn't have to leave their email page to answer and send back.

School, gourd chapter, after-school activities - Forms have many used and may well be the reason this gourdhead chomps at the bit to make changes in how classes are run in the near future!

Prezi

Teaching a research class to 6-8th grade gifted thinkers can be a lot of fun and allows me freedom to use irony and absurdity. Yet, even though gifted students can get concepts quickly and move on, they are still children and need to be taught. At the beginning of the semester, I teach question skills: the question formulation technique and Bloom's Taxonomy. Research is question driven and without these basic skills, their research efforts will be nothing more than producing a report or term paper. They need to understand what their thinking process is in order to proceed to original thinking. They know at any given time I will ask, "Where are you in Blooms?"

Wuertz Gourd Farm

In this assignment I explain Bloom's Taxonomy with the metaphor I use in class--cows. In keeping with the theme of this blog, it ends with a reference to gourds: a greeting at the Wuertz Gourd Farm of a cow sculpture wrapped in a Mexican serape with a snake gourd tied to its head and a sign that plays on the word gored. The kiddos will love it!!

Prezi is a presentation tool, related to a PowerPoint except that it is dynamic. It can incorporate PowerPoint slides, YouTube videos, pdfs, etc....it can be used online or offline, it can used as a collaboration tool between students, among teachers, across company teams. The editing tools are easy to navigate: the path moving from slide to slide can be changed easily, slides and images can be added or deleted, text added and subtracted. The basic level has limited capabilities but serves the purpose if the intent is to present information without the sophistication of different typefaces and backgrounds. But, as I said, the basic tools serve well. Movement is more interesting than a static image as the good folks at Cornell say.

Cow Gourd

The zooming aspect can be unnerving, especially when type is rotated from crazy angles to get it right-reading for viewing. Students in middle school will probably like it because it's soOOooo cool and Crah-AAzzYY!  Re-doing this for a teacher presentation, I would limit the 'whipping around' aspect a bit and approach the information more straightforward.

Many ISTE NETS-T standards are represented by this technique and assignment. First, #1--facilitating and inspiring student learning would be painless since I could begin a Bloom's lesson with Socratic questioning about the concepts of Bloom's, then show this as a model of walking through the 6 steps of learning before asking them to produce a Prezi example of walking through Bloom's.  This would naturally lead into standard #2 of designing and developing a relevant learning experience of not only Bloom's but of using a digital tool to express knowledge by the students building a Prezi of their own to show how a topic of their own can be applied to Bloom's. Standard #3 is modeling the process of a technology system to communicate information....their Prezis would go on to teach Bloom's to each other and perhaps other classes.