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Welcomed to Ed Tech Tuesday. Today we're going to
Look at one of the whiteboard apps. Rich, which one are we going to focus on?
There's a number of these different interactive virtual whiteboards, and the one
We're gonna look at is called ShowMe. It's a free app that you can download
Readily in the App Store. Well we all like to hear the word "free." Free is a great thing
Are there any drawbacks on this one being free: advertising or
Anything like that? No, I actually really enjoy the fact that we aren't cluttering this app
With advertising when we see it; it's really nice that way. Let's go through a brief demo
So we can overview the app for you and take a look at it
I'll go ahead launch that app and the first time you launch it you'll be prompted
To set up an account with email and a password of your choosing
I've already gone ahead and done that, and as you can see here along the top
It has my name and more account information successful there,
A set of different demonstrations or lessons that I have recorded
Using my finger or stylus writing right on the surface at this tablet,
Much like if I were to use a pen and write on a traditional whiteboard
So I thought we'd go ahead and take a look at one of these ShowMe's, as they're called
That sounds like a great plan, as a sample presentation. Here's one that a high school student recently did
For me on the quadratic equation
They go ahead and they model and write out the equation here
And we don't have the sound turned on, but this program actually records your sound,
Which is a great way to go because you can narrate
What I love about this is as we're looking at apps and we're considering
How we can get students more involved in their learning, this is a great example of that
Because the purpose is to show their thinking
And maybe there's an area where they're having a breakdown in thinking
Or they have it, we can actually assess that with an app like this
Yeah it's really nice. I'm gonna go ahead and pause this now. I can favorite it
Using the heart and then that shows up in a list as well
When you're done completing, which we'll walk through in just a few moments,
You'll have some other options to share and
Do some other things, but what you can do as a teacher is a couple different things
One, you can record all the lessons that you teach. You don't have to have access
To a website or even know anything about creating a website because
As soon as your work is done, it gives you the option to save that
And find it easily through ShowMe
Let's go ahead and do a sample creation of one. Click "Create" in the
Upper right hand corner
You'll see a couple of different things going on up here in the top
But the place to start is this small circle at the top
I've gone ahead, I see down below there the time marker where it says
Five seconds at this point
Great, it seems very easy. And we can, when
We're done. And real quick, Rich, this is capturing our voice
If we're recording
Yes it is. So that the voice explanation is in the background and you have the visual part, too
That's right
And I can easily insert pictures using the icon
Along the top on the left-hand side there, I can erase different things,
I can use different colors
Let's save this here. I can see a thousand different uses for this; this is great
It's really nice. I click "Save" ShowMe
It's gonna go ahead, and once I'm done here I can preview it
I'm going to click "Save." I can name it here and
For this case I'm gonna call it "Test 1" just for some simplicity
I can add different tags or different descriptions, different categories
The purpose behind tagging things is to help you simply organize them
And be able to find them later or
Other people who you're collaborating with can find it. That's exactly right
So in this case we're just gonna say Language. I can choose different
Topics, and from here let's say,
Just for the sake of an example,
I'm done. I post this, meaning that it's already automatically going to their server
And now it could be shared.
If I want to share this, there's a number of different things I can do.
I can make this available to everybody. I can make it private
So only I see it, so if you're worried about students sharing their work and their voice
For privacy, I would definitely want to do that for the students. You can do this right here
And then under "Share" you have an opportunity to post to Facebook, which I would not
Recommend doing for your own personal account, and sharing student information
That way, but you could simply use email
If it's one of your own lessons, and your school or
District's policy allows you to share your work on some of these social media
Networks, then feel free to do so here. What I I'm seeing here is that this
Is a lot like Khan Academy. You're getting to play Khan, so to speak
So you wanna make sure that this is for appropriate uses, but
If you did have a school site Facebook account, it could be a
Place you could put it. Absolutely, which would be great
Let's take a look at one last component, and that's "Explore"
What's really nice is there's a huge community, thousands of teachers and
Students, that have created content around a number of different topics
I myself have not come across any inappropriate material yet. I think that's a
Really neat thing. So you want to preview though,
Just in case. And then, as you can see along the left hand side,
You can search for content matter
By subject, or along the top in your search. That's what all that tagging was for
Tagging all comes back to play here, so
That's a really quick overview of ShowMe. Just one
Last recommendation that I would have is this is great for new teachers and also teachers
That are switching grade level, because you can then
Look at other people's work and get a refresher. Rich, any last pros or cons
That you have for this app?
I don't know that I would necessarily say it's a con, but like most things related to the iPad
Make sure that you're connected to the Internet through your school district's wifi
In order to post this material as soon as it's done, and you've recorded something,
You're gonna wanna have it up on the web. Other than that I just wanna make sure
That if anybody's going to be using it in their classroom with students, and you're
Recording students doing demonstrations,
That you've taken care to make sure that the proper forms and permissions have been
Secured
That are consistent with your district and school's policy to make sure the student
Data is safe
And I think the pros speak for themselves. It's a great app. Thank you for sharing