DENSI Learning Day 3: An Unconference Day & Closing Celebration

“Unconference…what is that?!” I found myself asking several people when I saw it on our schedule. Well, basically, an unconference day is organised by inviting people to address the whole group with either things they’d like to share with others or things they’re hoping others will share with them.

I actually missed a session earlier that day, as there were two sessions I wanted to go to, so I asked Karen Ogen to kindly share what she showed in the session I missed; I used this opportunity to film myself in front of the group, as this is the reaction you get…

How to Look Really Popular at DENSI2015

…anyway! After we organised what the sessions would be yesterday, today was the unconference day and there was so much to choose from! The sessions lasted about 45 minutes each and were less presentations and more about talking and sharing experience and knowledge of the topic or asking others to share what they know.

So the unconference day turned out to be amazing and attended the following sessions:

6 Ways to Show What You Know (hosted by Dennis Grice)

Dennis shares some exciting ways for children to show what they know and discussed how paper pyramids could be used to create a setting, with a character inside. Then, using Yakit Kids or Chatter Pics you can animate the character to bring it to life. This video could then be saved, with a QR code stuck at the bottom of the pyramid so people can scan the code, to bring it to life. This idea could also be used for dioramas (shoebox environments).

THOUGHT: QR codes should be a way forward in our school…maybe have them on display boards with content that comes to life?

Dennis also shared 30 hands, which is a presentation tool. The children take photos of the events (such as a science experiment) and then order them. They then decide how long each slide should play for and dub over it to explain what’s happening in their experiment. It’s just another, more virtual way of presenting experiments so that they’re not always written.

Augmented Reality in the Classroom (hosted by Karen Ogen)

Augmented reality really captured my interest as it’s something we don’t really use enough of. Karen did say though that we shouldn’t use something wow like this, just for the sake of it.

Somebody brought up Google Cardboard too, however this is Virtual Reality, not Augmented Reality.

Karen then suggested a whole range of AR apps:

• Elements 4D
• Anatomy 4D
• ZooKazam
• Chromville
• Enchantium
• Quiver
• Moonwalking
• Google Translate
• Augment
• Aurasma
• Owney (travelling dog for the US postal service)

She also suggested how you can create your own tags which will animate into a 3D object by searching for 3D files for use, such as ‘.obj’ files.

BreakoutEdu Locked Room + Pancaching (hosted by Patti Duncan)

Patti presented this session and suggested that to create a ‘locked room’ experience, you can use the BreakoutEdu website for ideas or kits, or create your own.

To do that, you always need to start at the end and work your way back to the starting point. She also suggested how some of the things the teams need, should be split up, so that there’s more to the task and it’s more complex, e.g. if 4 books are needed, place them in separate places.

Possible Books with Links:

• The Eleventh Hour: A Curious Mystery by Graeme Base
• Escape from Mr. Lemoncello’s Library by Chris Grabenstein

There are lots of possible applications for a locked room, such as Science, English, Maths, etc. – however they wouldn’t be so much a locked room, but more of a puzzle which requires collaboration and team work.

Patti also suggested putting distractions into the game, things which will throw them off for a while, e.g. if they find something incorrect, they’re sent to the teacher, who will then explain that they’ve gone wrong and to think about it again.

21st Century Pen Pals & Virtual Field Trips (hosted by Cheryl Lykowski)

This was similar discussion to the session about Mystery Skype but it was added to by Cheryl and others; Cheryl explained that she uses debriefing and writing of a reflection piece after a Mystery Skype to address anything they children might be thinking, for example one of her sessions the other class were quite rowdy so discussing this was a good way to re-address how her classes behaviour is much more what she would expect etc.

It was reiterated that the children should use etiquette, such as “It’s your turn” and “Just a minute please” to keep interaction smooth or ask for more time.

Useful resources to help find 21st Century Pen Pals:

• Skype in the Classroom
• E-Pals
• Skype Translate

I also made connections with everyone in this group so that we already have potential Mystery Skypers for our classes.

3Doodler

I got a chance to play with a 3Doodler pen during one of the sessions today, however, I have to say, I wasn’t impressed. It barely worked and when it did, the plastic came out so fast, it was difficult to actually make anything. It’s a shame as I think it has a lot of potential.

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The Closing Celebration

Our closing celebration was amazing! It was history themed, so we had to dress up as someone famous from history. I went as Julius Caesar; in fact we all went as Romans, dressed up in our togas.

Most of ‘Team UK’

217 Dorm Buddies

    

Alex, Heather & I                                                              The Crowd

This was an amazing socialising end to the week! I had such a laugh and the UK group took part in the ‘Lip Sync Battle’, miming to S Club 7’s ‘Reach’.