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Techno Trouble

We all know that dealing with technology will have it's own set of troubles, but when you are asked to use it daily in as many ways as possible, it can throw you off your game when it's not working right. The iPad goblins were up to know good this week and things were acting up, but I am blessed to have such amazing ITS's that I didn't even go an entire day offline. But in the panic of the morning the trouble started, I was able to reflect a learn a lot myself about this pilot
1. No one should be so special that when their private source of top notch technology isn't working, that you might as well call it a day. I had just pulled out my iPads when I discovered they were on the fritz, and my 1st reaction was to pout and stomp my feet. It was a good reality check to remind myself, wow, I am super blessed and we will not shrivel up and die without them. #realitycheck
2. Tech takes a lot of work. I realized I had more time in the day, not coordinating iPads between each class or fixing device problems. Nobody's spiral notebook needed my attention, and it was kinda nice. #kickinitoldschool
3. I missed them. The lessons are more engaging for both me and my students. Paperwork is not fun to organize either and I have had so much less paper work to deal with, more streamlined procedures, easy access to needed items, and better student grades. It has only been 5 weeks and I am already attached. #nextgenforlife
4. #myITSrocks

So enough about my reflective thoughts, what did I get to do with them?

A few classes got to use Name Selector for random selection of partners or order of group presentations. 

Dance 2 was the next class to make the transition from paper journals to Google Classroom and Quizlet. It was very successful in the other classes and I was excited to roll it out to them for our new unit. 

Ballet and Jazz classes used Quizlet to study for their test which they took in Edmodo. My Jazz 4 class used an Ab Workout app to warm up for class. It had some pretty rocking music with it which made us laugh, which of course made ab work harder while at the same time, taking something old and making it new and fun again. 

Dance and Media of course steals the show with a ton of fun activities. We began the explorations of shape and emotion which lead to the figure-ground concept of photography. Homework of images exploring this concept were shown. Then students explored body shape, facial expression, and emotion. They paired up to take photos of a partner moving through shapes without being able to have them pose, stop, or repeat anything. They then finished their partner photos of stick-wall-ball-pretzel shapes and used Perfect Captions to lable their favorites. They then loaded those into Animoto for a quick photo story app that could help add an emotional element to the photos. We then watched a video and viewed pictures to discuss how lighting can change the emotion, shape, meaning, and figure-ground relationship too. Lighting photo projects are coming up next! 
















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