Transformations and “Animations”

Several weeks back, Kyle Pearce posted this idea on Twitter:

 

Funny.  I’d been creating short, silent videos across the miles!

 

Thus [SILENT SOLUTIONS] were born.  Kyle has a collection posted on YouTube, and mine live in an 8th grade Nearpod lesson collection, found here.

My 7th graders taking Math 8 Pre-AP this year are currently studying transformations in the coordinate plane.  With topics that rely on visuals that move, [SILENT SOLUTIONS] have been very effective!

In each Nearpod lesson as an “Entry Ticket”, students are prompted to sketch a specific transformation in the coordinate plane using the “Draw It” feature.  Though they have experience with ideas like “slide”, “flip” and “turn”, the idea of plotting specific coordinates is new.  We explored rotations yesterday, and students were surprised at how challenging it was to rotate a given figure and find the specific points of the image.

When they submitted their drawings, a super-fun unintended thing happened.

Once students submitted their drawings, I displayed them on the big screen at the front of the room.  As I began clicking through their work, I noticed that as I clicked more quickly, the student sketches looked like an animated cartoon.  They loved this because they could see the variations in student drawings in what appeared to be a moving picture.

The lesson continued.  Students examined the coordinates of correctly rotated figures and generalized the patterns.  A-ha!  Now that they knew what to do, they made it a goal to create 100% accurate “cartoons”.

Watch this:

Screen Shot 2015-02-07 at 8.45.57 AM

 

 

 

 

 

To see a sample SILENT SOLUTION video from the rotations Nearpod lesson, watch this:

Screen Shot 2015-02-07 at 8.48.14 AM

I wish I’d recorded the students’ reactions to these SILENT SOLUTIONS videos.  The affirmation a simple video like this provides for students who rotated the figure correctly compared to a crowd’s cheers at a major sporting event!  And for those who messed up, there were moans and gnashing of teeth.  🙂

P.S. As an added bonus, I got to hang out with @emi_nearpod and @EdZNearpod this week, who were in town for #TCEA15!  Sweet!

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4 Responses to Transformations and “Animations”

  1. Nikki says:

    Hi Cathy,

    I’m not able to access your collection but also trying from my iPhone so that might be the issue 🙂 we are going 1:1 nextvyear with chrome books. I know you post a lot of apps for iPads. Are there any classroom “must haves” of apps/sites that you use that are also compatible with chrome books?

  2. Josh Tappan says:

    Once again, another awesome Nearpod application in math class. Instead of just showing the answer, this “silent solution” solution really helps students understand the thought process and steps required to find an answer. You (and Kyle) rock!

    -Josh

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