Students Teaching Students iPad Technology at the MHS iCreate Workshop

Art Rage/ Animator HD Group in Foreground / Photo by M. Weiss

The MHS iWizards conducted a free* iCreate Workshop for seventh and eighth graders on Saturday, January 17.  The iWizards consist of 9th-11th grade students who share an enthusiasm for the iPad.  Through a collaboration with the MHS Art Department**, they designed two one-hour sessions for the participants:

1) Students took photos, and became acquainted with how to employ some of Photogene's many editing effects. They then dropped them into iMovie, learning how to quickly add sound and add features.

2) Students created drawings with ArtRage. They then they discovered how to animate the sketches with Animation Creator HD.

Both groups experienced using AirDrop* and enjoyed each other's productions on LED projectors via Apple TVs.

The sessions were entirely taught by the iWizards who turned out in force in order to give lots of 1:1 help to our guests.  The iWizards created their curriculum through several weeks of before-school meetings.  The following sequence of extremely short videos outlines a portion of the animation group's instruction.

The session began with an iWizard demonstration of what could be achieved with ArtRage/Animation Creator HD

After the projects were completed the iWizards worked hard to collect the files through AirDrop and then mirror them onto the projector.

The Animation group gave a Mercy souvenir to projects that stood out. Below I have videoed one winner's creation.  Pretty impressive considering the kids only had an hour to learn two apps and create their masterpieces!

This final brief video shows photographs from the day's fun.

Photos by L. Baker and M. Weiss

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*Mr. James and Mr. Bank from Mercy I.T. set up 20 loaner iPads for girls who did not bring their own. They also created a special wifi for our guests and prepped the projectors (with Ms. Corte's assistance).

**Thank you, Ms. Smith, Ms. Rife, Mr. Poris (Art teachers) and Maureen Weiss, Jen Stark (Admissions) for all of your help.

The Old Professor

This summer I will turn sixty.  How odd that my professional career would have taken such twists and turns at a time of life when most of the folks at my last high school reunion had either talking about retirement or had already done so.

Two years ago I became an administrator at Mercy, and now I've decided to do a little moonlighting.  On Friday, I signed a contract as Adjunct Assistant Professor in the Teacher Education Department at Madonna University.  I'll be instructor for a small section of Masters Degree students in Leadership in Technology.

"Classical Scholar" CC photo by lisby1

I'm very excited to teach the course, and I feel like I do have some experiences to share in this area.  Nevertheless, it has been about thirty years since I attended a university class.  And though I logged lots of college classroom time as a student, those traditional academic qualifications have little to do with my new role.

I think that it is very telling that I find myself in this position due to factors like this blog, being an Apple Distinguished Educator, and my professional learning network.  

Ironically, many moons ago I entered (but eventually abandoned) a doctoral program in Instructional Technology-- a field so new at the time that my advisor pretty much had to create my program as we went along. I do not regret some of that coursework but of course it has little bearing on the course I will be taking.  What I view as my strong areas for Leadership in Technology have largely come through collaborations with folks like Lucy Gray, Katie Morrow, Tom James, Susan Smith, and so many others.

Well, this will be another fun challenge and I expect that I will learn more than I teach.

Our iPad Orientations Move on Apace!

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IT Director, Tom James (center) leads 31 students through their iPad Orientation

Today, Tom James (IT Director) and Gary Bank (Network Administrator helped 31 students set up their iPads at an iPad orientation. These sessions are required of students when they pick up their new iPads.

Tom and Gary show the students the basic functions of their iPads and cover. They explain the AppleCare+ warranty. They then get them logged into the Mercy network and registered with Apple ID so that we can deploy their apps to them.

The students are then sent on their ways to play with the iPads until school starts. On August 24, ninth graders and transfer students will get a very detailed hands-on orientation to Mercy technology-- a vital, growing feature of our curriculum

A Truly Mixed Tech Environment

My friend and colleague, Tom James (Mercy's Director of IT), shared some interesting numbers with me, a couple of days ago. At most recent count, our students have ordered 274 iPads. Of course our incoming ninth graders are mandated to purchase the Apple product. However, one third of the purchases have come from our returning students.

Thus, we find ourselves in a unique situation. Those schools which are adopting the iPad find that the price point allows them to put classroom sets of devices in their students' hands for the first time. Our circumstances of transitioning from a Windows laptop to and iOS tablet brings some special advantages and challenges. An obvious advantage is our seven years of experience in 1:1 computing. Most of our staff and students flourish in a digital learning environment and come to the iPad with immediate ideas of how to leverage it.

Still, our teachers will have a special challenge. Unless they have an all-ninth grade class, they will be in a mixed environment. In other words they will have both HP laptops and iPads in the same classroom. (And such will be the case for three years). Fortunately we are not buying our training for this "off the rack". We are have developed a unique professional development scheme for our coming circumstances, and our tech department of Tom and Gary Bank (Network Administrator) help us quickly surmount challenges as they arise

Personally, I think a mixed environment is fantastic as this replicates the real world where there exists no Microsoft, Apple, or Google monopoly on the types of computing folks use for work and pleasure. In fact we have decided to embrace the mixture by providing our student with both Mac and P.C. multimedia labs. As our Principal frequently remarks, we are not an "Apple", "HP", or "Google" school.

I find the prospect of this unique challenge daunting, but exciting. I believe we will all rise to the occasion and make something very special happen.

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Creative Commons photo by markchadwickart