Tag Archives: ICT

Using data logging technology with special needs students

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Many departments have small numbers of data loggers, stuck at the back of cupboards with flat batteries, neglected because no-one really knows what to do with them.  Perhaps they don’t get used because you haven’t got a class set or because the teacher lacks the confidence to use them in front of a group of tech-savvy students.

My advice – if you have PGCE students get them on the case.  PGCE students have to show capability in ICT skills and what better way to learn than by mastering data logging equipment and rolling out activities to the rest of the department.

Data loggers are excellent tools for SEN students – hopefully the ideas below will encourage you to dig yours out and get them up and running again!

Using data loggers as a digital measuring device

At the simplest level just using a data logger as a digital thermometer works.  It is easy to read and using like this is a good way to introduce the technology to students.

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Using data loggers on the IWB to show live data

Most data logging equipment can be connected to a PC and used to show live data from an experiment on the IWB.  You could even get students to take regular readings from this live data, building up skills like timing and recording results, whilst keeping the activity simple.  This is especially useful where there could be health & safety implications from the experiment.

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The image shows the data captured from an experiment investigating the insulating properties of dog fur!  This graph was displayed at the end of the experiment, with live data being displayed on the screen as the experiment was underway.

Data loggers also allow many students with poor numeracy skills to visualise the results and answer questions like ‘did the temperature go up or down?’ which they might not have been able to do from a table of numbers.

Using data loggers to capture data and create a graph of results.

For students who lack the necessary coordination or organisational skills to collect results over a period of time, why not give them a data logger and get the hardware to do the work for them.  Students are released from the requirement to collect readings at fixed intervals, they don’t have to struggle to read the thermometer and the data is even graphed at the end by the data logging software.  More advanced students can even export their data into Excel.

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This graph shows the temperatures collected during the dog hair insulation experiment (unfortunately I didn’t start the data logging collecting data until we had finished using the live display on the IWB).   Again this allows students with poor numeracy to visualise the results, and to make comparisons between the different data sets collected (e.g. which temperature dropped the fastest? the most? the slowest?)

Do you use data logging hardware/software with SEN students.  Leave me a comment and share your ideas with others.

Using PowerPoint with students who have special needs (PowerPoint is not just for presentations!)

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We’ve all seen PowerPoint used where students are asked to prepare a presentation on a topic.  More often than not this turns into a cut-and-paste-athon and students can’t always be said to be engaging with the content of the lesson.  There is also the time one spends playing with the fonts and animations (and I’ve seen adults guilty of some pretty bad presentations on this score too!).

I looked for some other ways that PowerPoint (and possibly its Open Office equivalent Impress) could be used as a teaching tool with students who have special needs or perform below national expectations.

Sequencing

Give students a presentation in which the slides are in the wrong order.  Tell them to put the steps in the right order and then give a presentation based on the new order.  It is a good idea to use pictures/slides in which the order is ambiguous or where there could be more than one correct answer.  For extremely weak students this could involve sequencing photographs from a previous lesson e.g. ones taken during an experiment.

Example: Year 7 students (Wikid Science – Forensics) are asked to solve the mystery and explain how the forensic investigator came to be in hospital covered in burns.  Students have to solve the mystery and put the slides in the right order.  They then present their ideas to the group where they receive peer assessment/feedback.

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Audio (or video) annotation

Give students a presentation with information to be interpreted on each slide.  Pupils must record an audio or video clip for each slide with an explanation.  Play back to group, possibly with some peer assessment.  Can also be exported as a video clip.

Example: Year 7 students (Wikid Science – Extinction) are asked to interpret the graphs and say what they mean.

Completing presentations

Using a partially completed presentation you would ask students to complete it.  This could include adding suitable graphics to text already created (or vice versa) or adding existing information to a scaffold.

Example: In this writing frame I would ask students to add information to each slide from planning through to conclusions and present it.  Students can add extra information and peer assessment information about the content.  To differentiate the activity, add more detail to the scaffold (e.g. sub-steps).  Students then present to another group or the whole class.

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Story telling

Ask students to prepare the narration and present to a pre-created presentation.  This is similar to adding narration but is simpler to organise and doesn’t require microphones.

Example: In this presentation on the water cycle (from the TES resources site) students have to explain what is happening and present to another group of pupils (or the whole group depending on numbers)

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Multiple choice questions

Just as it sounds – using a presentation with a quiz, let pupils answer the questions individually at computers, or on the IWB in a group.  If you search Google you can find pre-created templates, or you could make your own.

Example: Multiple choice quiz on plant classification.  Plays a different sound for right and wrong answers.

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I hope you found some of these ideas useful.  Please leave a comment below (or via the contact me form at the top of the page) if you did, or if you have any questions.

Using Google Documents to work collaboratively

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I’ve used Google Documents in class before but the need had never arisen for pupils to write on the same document at the same time. With collaborative working being an important skill in science, I decided to get my year 7 class to work collaboratively on the same document. Their task was to write a press release detailing their lab test results for their CSI topic. With all the pupils having SEN (we are a special school) , the amount of text was going to be small which makes the process a little quicker.

I created the document with a table to be used as a writing frame or scaffold for the pupils, giving them the basic structure to complete. I asked the pupils to complete a different section of the press release and colour coded the boxes so they knew which section was theirs.  I shared the document with the pupils and invited them to complete their section.

Pupils were fascinated by seeing the text of their classmates appearing as they entered their own.  The flicker you see as the page updates didn’t seem to bother any of them, in fact they didn’t notice it.  Pupils entered their text and we reviewed the completed document.

Not only was this approach far more productive than writing their own reports, pupils had to communicate with each other and tie their contributions together.  This wouldn’t have happened working individually.