In the late Fall of 2018 I handed an iPad to a student of mine and asked her to try Apple Education's Everyone Can Create Drawing resource. I did so after noticing her passion for drawing and illustration. What happened next was an eye-opening experience. After just one class of work into the dense but engaging program the students asked if she could take my precious iPad home at nights and on the weekends to continue working on the program. I reluctantly agreed as these iPads represented the first full-sized iPads I had ever had in my career and the smell of "New" wasn't yet off of them, It was the best choice I ever made. Eleanor returned day in and day out with new creations inspired by the chapters of the iBook simply called Drawing. She would start by showing me her designs and then when I asked why I was seeing what I was seeing she would explain in depth the concepts she learned and mission established in the chapter. The program gave real flexibility as to what she chose to draw while keeping her focussed on the goals of the skill at hand. She blazed through the work with her added nights and weekend effort and gripped the iPad firmly when I said "Okay, you're done. Can I have the iPad back please?" It turns out that Eleanor had an idea. As she was working through the program and due to the season we were approaching, she identified a real problem that she wanted to solve, Eleanor wanted further enrichment. She wanted to finally, for the first time to her knowledge, bring to life the toys for the Who girls and boys from the classic story How The Grinch Stole Christmas. YES! The HooWhunkers, Trum-Tookers, Tar-Tinkers, and even Zoo-Zivver-Car-Zay! Even though the toys were imaginatively named there was never any visual evidence illustrated for each of these favourite Who Christmas Activities. She was going to communicate her understanding of these toys to the world!
Using the Apple Pencil and new iPad she drew a full collection and using the Werble iOS app the drawing came to life with something a little extra. Her she is introducing her work and below are her rough work sketches early in the process. This will truly be a project she remembers years from now and I hope she remains inspired by the process as she chooses her post-secondary education life. All of this success caused me to created a new program at my school called Everyone Can Graduate where ALL of our students complete one or more of the Everyone Can Create programs and of course the Everyone Can Code program. I teach all of the students so in a way, Everyone Can Create and Everyone Can Code have become graduate requirements at Caledonia Regional High School. I can't wait to see students develop skills through engaging learning content on the iPads. I hope to have much more soon!
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Benjamin KellyI'm an experienced Global Minecraft Mentor, Published Educational Researcher, Microsoft Innovative Educator Fellow, Apple Distinguished Educator, TeachSDGs Ambassador and grade 6-12 technology teacher. @BBTNB Archives
May 2024
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