Jeneane Allgood-Blog Post #4--2nd PBL observation

In leiu of a 2nd observation, I asked Dawn to help me figure out a good way to have students individually upload pictures of their plants each week to chart their progress and hold them individually accountable. I was thinking I would use something like Dropbox or Google slides, but Dawn was able to offer me some other suggestions that she thought would work better and also allow for better collaboration and presentation. She showed me "emaze", and more specifically, demonstrated to me (one on one) how to use it. We discussed how students could use it and we felt like it would be a good idea to have each student make their own "photo album" in emaze (which kinda looks like a slide presentation). They could share it with their other group members and also share it with me.

We also realized that students needed more collaboration opportunities. So, today I introduced "emaze" to students and showed them how to use it, using a very basic example that I had created. I also typed up a direction sheet so that students could set up their emaze accounts at home and get started.  Students will be responsible for creating their own emaze. They are required to have a title slide, which details which factor they are investigating and which type of seed they are growing. They are also required to have an "experiment design" slide, where they will provide details about their experimental set-ups. Each week, they will post a weekly update with pictures and measurements of their plants (this will be due by Thursday morning). Thursday night, students will look at and write down comments and/or questions about their group members' weekly progress. Then, on Fridays, students will be given some time to meet with their group and troubleshoot any problems that they are having with their experiment.

I like that Dawn encouraged me to use emaze, a website that I was unfamiliar with. I believe most of my students are unfamiliar with it, too, but as I told them, "If I can figure out how to use it, so can you." I like that students are working on their own emaze (which we will later pull information from in order to make a group emaze). I am also trying to give them a lot of freedom on what their weekly update pages will look like, but I offered some suggestions on what it should include, like observations and measurements. I am excited to see what these emazes turn out like!