Electronic Quiz Boards

This is one of those easy things to make that students get excited about. An easy set of review questions can be turned in to a kinetic activity for students. Students use the boards using a small circuit made of a light bulb and a small battery. I use a bulb and wire cut from an old strand of Christmas lights and a AA battery. Students connect one end of the wire to the hole near the question, for the orange vocabulary one on the right for instance they would hold this wire to the hole under #1. That wire connects to the light bulb and to the battery and the other end connects to the answer choice the students use. If their answer is wrong, the light bulb won't light up. If they are right and choose D. Ampere the light bulb will light!

These are easy for you to make or for your students to make. You can use use either card stock or a manila folder, the advantage of the manila folder is that the back can be hidden. You or your students must write questions with multiple answer choices on the front of the paper. Ample spacing will be necessary. Using a single hole punch, make a hole next to each question and near each answer choice.

Cut small strips of foil half an inch wide. On the back of the paper connect the question to the hole of the correct answer choice so it covers the open hole at each end. Be sure this strip doesn't block any other holes. Cover the strip with masking tape, it's easiest to cover it by matching the length of the foil to the length of tape. Put a small piece of foil behind the other answer choices, this foil can block more than one answer choice as long as it does not touch the correct answer choice foil. Again cover with masking tape. From the front there should be no differences in the look of the multiple choice answers.

On the left the orange example board is  the vocabulary matching one shown above. In this type the insulating masking tape is important so that the light bulb only lights when the correct term is matched with that question. The other answer choices not used are given foil and tape but aren't connected to the question side and thus will never light the bulb if chosen. On the right a close up of the example one I added red circles to show you where the original hole punches are. Make sure the foil you added to the wrong answers (so that they don't look any different from the front) don't touch the piece of foil that connects the right answer to the question.

 

This takes a small amount of prep but the engagement is much higher. Students are more excited to check their answers to problems when they can visually see the light bulb light up. You can also use a small electrical buzzer the same way. How else do you think you can use this technique?

EnCorps Encore

The EnCorps STEM Teachers Program contacted me in early 2014 to ask if I could present at one of their programs. After learning more about their mission to recruit, help transition and support experienced STEM professionals in their efforts become teachers, I agreed.

I was impressed when their executive director, Elaine Guarnieri-Nunn, came to Los Gatos High School to meet with me. She described the EnCorps program and we discussed my own transition from an aerospace engineer to a high school science teacher. I recalled it being difficult to get accurate information about what was required to become a teacher. I remember resenting being told by the math credential department at San Jose State University that I was not qualified to enter their program with "only" a BS in aerospace engineering and eight years of experience as an astrodynamicist.

I also remember considering changing my mind about becoming a teacher because of the murky bureaucracy I was trying to navigate. I can't help but wonder how many potentially great teachers have changed their mind about leaving their current profession by the unnecessary and burdensome requirements and financial costs of the credential process. Programs like EnCorps can help them navigate these difficulties and inspire them to continue.

My first Encorps program was the Northern California Spring Institute held at Microsoft in Mountain View California in 2014. One of the sessions gave teaching job application tips. It included mock job interviews conducted by a local middle school principal. There was a session on using maker activities in the classroom, and breakout sessions for prospective math and science teachers. 

I was in charge of the session for science teachers. I presented Peer Instruction and other techniques for making classroom instruction interactive to about 20 EnCorps participants. The day included time scheduled for the EnCorps participants to network. Hearing them talk about what they were going through brought back memories of my own experience. It sounded like things had not improved much for those wanting to change careers to teaching. The existence of the EnCorps program was a ray of hope.

I didn't hear from EnCorps again until early this year when their new executive director, Katherine Wilcox, asked me to present at their Summer Residential Institute in June. I agreed to do a breakout session for science teachers. This program was much more extensive than the spring institute. It occupied three days and participants stayed overnight in the rooms at the Clark Kerr Campus at UC Berkeley. 

After looking over the program, I decided to attend all the sessions on Saturday. The Garden Room was packed at 9:00 AM with over 150 professionals interested in teaching STEM subjects. The first session was about some of the more recent ideas on pedagogy with some insights into teacher credentialing programs. The co-presenters were Rick Ayers and Kevin Kumashiro from the USF School of Education. I found myself saying "I wish I would have known this when I started" over and over during their talk. Their friendly disagreements about some of the finer points of pedagogy demonstrated that teaching is more of an art than a science. 

The next session was about project-based learning. It was presented by a highly enthusiastic Bob Bachmeier. He is the Sacramento coordinator for Project Lead the Way. This is an engineering curriculum that is finding its way into many high schools, including mine. Bob explained the many benefits of having students learn by working on long-term projects that are relevant, authentic and challenging. We got a taste of this approach with a quick bridge building activity. 

Bob inadvertently demonstrated how to resume teaching after a disruptive event when two hawks flew into the room. They screeched, collided with the windows, and swooped low over our heads. The large doors were opened, they found their way out, and Bob immediately picked up where he left off!

For my session I selected things I wish I knew about when I first started teaching. I also was asked to incorporate elements of NGSS. I started out with scientific models. To demonstrate the essential elements of scientific models I brought my collection of Mystery Tubes. These are large, sealed PVC pipes with four ropes extending from them. Students are asked to develop a model of the inside of of the Mystery Tube by making observations and conducting experiments. It is the kind of activity that can engage middle school students and adults. 

I had difficulty getting them to stop experimenting so we could move on to a discussion of whiteboarding with this and other class activities. I then passed out clickers and demonstrated Peer Instruction with a short lesson on Newton's Third Law. This proved especially effective for the participants who were interested in becoming biology teachers. They started out not being able to respond correctly but by the end were confident of their answers. I finished with a quick look at online homework and my experience with WebAssign. It took me many years to learn about and implement all of these effective techniques but it only took them ninety minutes. 

There was a math breakout session run concurrently with mine by Lybroan James from the New Teacher Center. This organization applies the growth mindset to teachers, believing that every teacher can become an effective teacher. My only regret of the day was not being able to attend Lybroan's presentation.

The last session was presented by Aaron Vanderwerff and his team from The Lighthouse Community Charter School. They described their Creativity Lab, a maker-based instructional component to their curriculum. To demonstrate their approach they challenged the participants to form teams of five and construct a chair from cardboard that could hold 180 pounds. This gave them a good idea of how engaging this form of instruction can be. 

The session shattered the idea that some of these future teachers might have about spending their class time enthralling students with lectures. Changing perceptions about the teacher's role in the classroom might be the most important achievement of the EnCorps program. The teaching profession has always had a respect problem because many people think they know what teaching is about because they watched people do it for many years. This can create a perception that teaching techniques are static and that there is little left to learn about pedagogy. This one day of the three-day program did a lot to dispel these myths.

At the end of the day there was a reception that included food, adult beverages, and lots of great conversation. Encorps recognized the achievements of their graduates with awards and the potential of their future teachers with scholarships. With the critical shortage of STEM teachers and the increasing need for STEM graduates, it is good to know there are organizations like EnCorps addressing these needs. If you are considering becoming a STEM teacher or you know someone who is, I urge you to have them contact EnCorps today.

PTSOS2 Afterlinks: Clickers, IP, and Keynote

Dan Burns gave a demo of the Renaissance clickers he uses at Los Gatos HS.

Paul Robinson has adopted Qwizdom clickers at San Mateo HS.

I have adopted iClickers at Rio Americano HS.

We also had an extensive demo of Interactive Physics by Paul Mitiguy. Because otherwise, we wouldn't have covered mechanics (again)!

Lastly, if you have a Mac and want to make appealing and engaging presentations that won't look like presentations students have to sit through in their other classes, I highly recommend the use of Apple's Keynote, part of the iWork productivity suite.

Clickers: First impressions

Attending a national meeting of physics teachers is a great way to get a "big-picture" view of the profession. I've been lucky enough to attend several American Association of Physics Teachers national meetings during the course of my career. One thing that's been a perennial topic of sessions since the late-90s is clickers: personal response systems.

Anyone who's seen "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire" knows the gist of what the technology allows one to do. On the show, clickers are used whenever a contestant "asks the audience." And who could forget this instant classic of polling-gone-wrong?

Clickers have been used in introductory physics courses at colleges and universities for over a decade. Their use in large lecture sections allows a level of interactivity not previously possible. The instructor poses a multiple choice, "clicker question," and the 200+ students click their response. A receiver tallies the votes and sends the information to the instructors computer. After a given interval of time, the polling is closed and the result is displayed.

Students get a chance to test-drive the new material presented by the instructor. The instructor get instant feedback on how well the new material is being absorbed. This kind of interactivity is gold in the lecture hall. Book publishers are bundling clickers with textbooks. Universities are looking to standardize clickers campus-wide. And so on.

An important benefit of clickers is that they allow students to vote anonymously. "Low-tech" polling can be done by calling for a show of hands for each possible answer. Not only are students reluctant to reveal their preference for a potentially wrong answer, many simply focus in on the "smart kid" and raise their hands when he or she does.

It seemed to me that this technology could be put to use in the high school classroom, too. So I attended AAPT meeting sessions over the years to become conversant in clicker pedagogy. And this year I researched the several vendors and varieties of clickers on the market, and wrote a funding proposal. The school decided the proposal merited funding. In late January, the clickers arrived. I put them to use within hours of unpacking them.

Of the many vendors and varieties of clickers on the market, I went with i·clicker. The i·clicker solution in not tied to a particular piece of software: some clickers are tied to Microsoft PowerPoint or thier own proprietary software. With i·clicker, the voting software "floats" above whatever program you present with. I'm a huge fan of Apple's Keynote, so it was important that voting software not cramp my style or require a major rework of my existing instructional presentations. I think there are some clicker systems still out there that are not Macintosh-compatible. Unacceptable.

As you might imagine, students love the clickers. They like voting for their answer when a question comes up. And they're always eager to see the results of the poll. I've been able to modify instruction on-the-spot in response to clicker questions asked in class.

The cost to turn my classroom into a polling place was roughly $1400. For that we got 40 clickers, a base station, two instructors' clickers, and the software. If I use them only this year, the cost is about $10 per student. If I use them for 10 years, it's $1 per student. College students pay at least $25 for an i·clicker (other clickers are generally more expensive).

This technology does not shatter the earth, nor is it The Savior of Education. I'm still learning how to maximize its efficacy in the classroom. But it is appealing and engaging. (If I didn't think students and administrators were reading this, I'd say the clickers were "sexy.")

And so far, so good.

C'est la morte

Le contestant d'exposition de jeu est défié une fois demandé quel objet satellise la terre. L'assistance n'aide pas.

I'm not sure if that made any sense.

I am sure that this does not. It shows a clip from the French version of "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?" The question is "What revolves around the Earth?" the choices are A. The Moon, B. The Sun, C. Mars, or D. Venus.


We should take no joy from watching a game-show contestant squirm under the weight of a question that is clearly difficult to the general public. But I guess this is like witnessing a sibling getting disciplined. Instead of a graphic, anecdotal indictment of the US educational system, this clip slams the French.

Watch carefully at 1:27 as the host betrays a touch of frustration with the results of the audience poll.

Aristotle and Ptolemy live on! Thanks to The Amazing Randi for the link.