Lower School Mounts Interactive Art Exhibition

Every April the Art Center Gallery comes alive with art works made by lower school students. Bright, bold, and playful, it is the exhibit that emphatically announces the start of spring and the one that makes us want to be young artists again.  Art Teachers, Jess Grisafi and Alia Tahlvidaran, shepherd these creative and agile minds along into all realms of sophisticated thinking about how art is made and why it matters.  This year Grisafi and Tahvildaran created an interactive art exhibition that offers visitors two experiences of the art works: original art on display in the gallery and an online gallery of student work and their process.  Linking these on line sites to a scan-able QR code, visitors to the gallery can use their  smart phones to view additional content. When asked about where the idea came from Grisafi noted, "The QR codes were Alia's brilliant idea!  We have many online galleries of student art work and process posted on Smug Mug.  The photographs tells stories, and evoke conversations about the students' ideas, techniques and experiences in the art room.  Our hope with the QR codes, is to create an additional avenue for families to connect to these images."  Tahvildaran notes, "The LS Art Exhibit shows the beautiful finished pieces of artwork, but in a way the artwork is the final chapter of an eventful, dynamic process. After watching videos, looking at images, reading stories, engaging in discussions, and seeing demonstrations, our students begin to create. When children create artwork they often sing, talk aloud about what they are making, or work quietly with intense focus. The QR codes were meant to give visitors to the LS Art Exhibit a behind-the-scenes tour of the creative magic happening in the art rooms every day—the process that leads to the product."

TI-Npsire Navigator System Makes Statistics Interactive

Ruth Carver, Chair of the US math department has been a change agent for the teaching of mathematics during the whole of her career.  An early adapter of technology in the classroom, her recent work with the TI-Nspire Navigator System is changing the way students interact with each other and the subject. The TI-Nspire Navigator System uses the school's network to connect student and teacher computers for realtime assessment and instruction. When asked about the the process Carver shared this: 

"Working with real data is an integral part of AP Statistics. In the past, this was not always easy to accomplish. In addition to finding relevant data sets, I would have to type them into my calculator and transfer them one at a time to student’s TI-84 calculators. This process was time consuming and also not an optimal way to utilize class time. It also pretty much ruled out using bigger, more interesting data sets. Using the system, I can copy a data set from the internet into the software version of the calculator on my computer and wirelessly transfer it to all of the students in the class. Voila! Within seconds we are ready to explore the data. The system also work seamlessly with the Smart board.  I can view all of the student’s calculator screens on the Smart board and select a student to be the presenter, allowing the rest of the class to follow what she or he is doing on the calculator in real time.  I can also add a link on Smart to a video clip or article that will give the class additional insight into the data that we are investigating. I have utilized the recording feature on Smart to produce interactive review lessons which can be accessed on the course site on the VLE in addition to applets for investigating statistical concepts and other interactive lessons.  Smart + VLE + TI-Npsire = an engaged an interactive math class."

What We Are Reading

Keri Smith is a self proclaimed Guerilla Artist. She is also the author and illustrator of many best selling books on creativity, innovation, and inspiration.  How to Be An Explorer of the World is one of her early books, a guided journal that encourages readers to analyze the world like scientists and artists as if they are seeing it for the first time. Upper school faculty and students will be working with this book and a variety of others by Smith that will be profiled here in the coming months.  In the meantime you can learn more about Keri Smith at her website and blog. 

Mixing It Up With Mixed Reality

Middle School Science teacher, Jim DiFranco and his sixth and eight grade students are changing the way they come to know the principles of motion and energy. Utilizing SMART technology, imported 3D content, a document camera, and hand manipulated computer controls, students are able to visualize everything from earthquakes and volcanoes to cell structure.  By sharing his SMART notebook with the students by way of the SMART board, the class can interact with the 3D content by holding a patterned cube under the document camera and linking it to a 3D object.

Jim DiFranco reports that this process, "has transformed my teaching because it further allows me to maximize the potential of SMART via 3D content. Aside from being able to share this content with students through notebooks for them to manipulate at home, the document camera with mixed reality allows them to further explore and interact (virtually) with objects and simulations in class that deepens their understanding of key concepts."

What We Are Reading

In his groundbreaking book, Creating Innovators: The Making of Young People Who Will Change the World, Harvard Professor Tony Wagner explores the best ways to develop the innovative capacity of our students. Bringing readers on a tour of our education system and the most forward thinking schools, colleges, and workplaces, he provides a road map for innovation and change for educators and parents alike. You can read more about Tony Wagner, innovation, and creating change on his blog. 

iPads and Google Drive Transform Storytelling

Each year, after learning about many forms of folktales and researching animals native to the continent of Africa, third grade students in the lower school are asked to create their own "pourquoi" stories, or the reason something came to be. For years students typed their story into Microsoft Word on laptops and teachers edited it using a flashdrive. This method however effective, was clumsy and time consuming.

Teacher, Kathy Wyszomiersky and Assistant teacher, Andrew Dolan wanted to create a physical book as well as a companion digital version. After exploring an iPad app called Book Creator, they settled on Google Drive, an online program which allows users to create and share files as a means to build their digital books.  Google Drive keeps track of any changes made to the document and saves it automatically allowing students to see their revision history. Using an iPad app named Sketchbook Express Pro, a graphic design program with responsive touch, students used a stylus to create images related to their story. Once pictures were completed, students imported the pictures and text into Book Creator. In book creator, students chose layout, created background colors and images, and added sound to each picture to make a sound effect, some even making an audiobook of their story. Andrew Dolan reports "It was really an amazing project and the students far exceeded our expectations. They are so intuitive with technology and showed they can multitask easily in many apps."