Showing Off Our Stuff with Seesaw

I was invited into a Kindergarten class last week to help get them reacquainted with the Seesaw app. The teacher and I know each other well, so there was not a pre-lesson meeting to discuss much more than "how to do Seesaw".

Explaining the task

Working with each other

Making a final check before uploading

We put the students into pairs and had them take a picture of each other. They then shared with each other and looked over the pictures to see if they were OK to post. At this stage, the students are not ready to do much more than that at this point in the year.

We are working on trying to bring the design cycle into the younger years this year. 

I also liked how we were able to include asking others about uploading photos and checking before posting. 

Suggestions for Seesaw

Written in the Spring of 2020

Seesaw is great, but after using Seesaw for these three weeks for online learning, I have a few suggestions:

1) I love the links to the assignments. But they only work after assignments are posted. Could the link to the scheduled post go to the "posted" assignment?

2) It would really help if we could format announcements.

3) It would also help to be able to schedule announcements.

4) I like the skills. I would also like to see a rubric tool in here.

5) Could we have the option to change the way to calendar looks? I usually think of weeks starting with Sunday.

6) Could it be possible for activities to "gray out" for those students who finish them?

7) It would be awesome if some sort of report (checklist) could be generated for the daily assignments.

Using Book Creator to Convert a Paper Book to a Movie

*Another unfinished post I am just now publishing.

The Grade 1 teacher came to me with a project to digitize the books the students had written. Since our Grade 1 classes are on Seesaw, we decided it would be best to make them publishable to there. I have a natural inclination to movies vs books when it comes to student work, so Bookcreator was a natural fit because books can be exported as video files.

We did this project last year, so I knew it would be great. Last year I looked at this project through the lens of tech integration. This year, I was looking at it through the lens of the new ISTE Standards for Students. Specifically, under the standard for Creative Communicator, there is a substandard that reads:

Students publish or present content that customizes the message and medium for their intended audiences.

Book Creator is an easy way for students to narrate a video. It also gives them the option of different sizes for their books.

Using BookCreator to publish stories

A photo posted by Thomas Hammerlund (@thomashammerlund) on Nov 22, 2016 at 6:37pm PST

Students use Book Creator to make their books. When you publish them, you can publish directly to YouTube so the books become a video. Any voice annotations in the book will also be annotations in the video.

How to Post to Seesaw

We started using Seesaw as a digital portfolio this year. And while it is great, my students have had issues remembering how to take pictures so I made the following infographic for them.

Work in progress

Make a copy for yourself here.

Original

Lessons Learned

Every day is a learning opportunity. Sometimes you don't need to look too hard; especially when you are learning something new yourself.

Here are a few lessons I have been reminded of the first few weeks back in the classroom.

1. Relationships Matter
2. Prime Students to Learn
3. Seesaw is awesome

Relationships Matter

I think the quote goes, "Kids won't learn from people they don't like." (I think this goes for all humans.) I took time to get to know the students since I am a new teacher to the school and I didn't know anyone.

In a school, however, there are more than students in the building. I was reminded that building relationships with all people in the building because you never know who you will need to turn to for help.

Prime Students to Learn

This I didn't do this year. I was so focused on getting to know the kids that I [tried to] jumped into the learning, but soon found out they weren't ready. Now in the third week, they still aren't ready, but they are getting better. 

Next year, I would spend the first-week building relationships and priming the students to learn while doing some project-based learning. 

Seesaw is Awesome

I was so happy when I heard that my new school was going to Seesaw this year, and it hasn't disappointed. 

Parents are happy to see students in action at school, and I am happy to share with them. I don't remember a year with better communication between myself and the parents.