Augmented Reality, Money and Numeracy!

An AR App that I stubbled across whilst on my quest of searching for engaging AR Apps, was Money Vision App. This app is free, however, the Australian currency is 0.99c for the upgrade.

Basically once you launched the App, Money will freely fall across you iPad screen and look as if there is real money in the room or image you are looking at. I saw a massive about of potential in this App.

Firstly, I mirrored my iPad to the IWB and launched the App. The students were sitting on the floor and once they realised there was money appearing in front of them, they reached out and tried to grab it. Hilarious to witness. I took a screen shot (hold on home button and power button, letting go of one) of this happening and emailed the image to my class. From this the students were encouraged to write a narrative story based on someone coming into the classroom and scattering money around the room. Some quality writing was achieved.

The second open ended activity I did was in numeracy. I called one student at a time for a photo using the Money Vision App. I asked the students to lie on the floor and pretend to catch the money that was falling on them. I once again took a screenshot and emailed it to them. The students could do this themselves, however, I didn't want them to purchase the App.

Using the photo students count how much money is caught in the image. 

The learning outcomes were for the students to count how much money was on their photo and the amount was what they had won. The students then graphed the currency into bar graphs in the denominations they had caught. ($5notes=$15, $10notes=$90 and so on). The students used the gesture ability of zooming in and out to really make the most money and count correctly.

These graphs were completed in their maths books, a photo was taken of this work using the iPad and shared into their Evernote Digital Portfolios (Refer to this Video tutorial on creating Evernote Digital Portfolios)

How to Create Student Digital Portfolios Using Evernote from Junior School on Vimeo.

They then used Keynote to represent more graphing techniques and write a description of what the session involved. Obviously the image they were emailed was placed onto this Keynote slide. Again the students saved the slide as a PDF and saved to Evernote for assessment purpose.

Two students also embedded a movie into the slide they printed using Aurasma. They gave it another level of augmentation by recounting and reflecting on what they learned and had been completed in this numeracy session. To extend others students, we looked at pie graphs and converting their winnings to currencies of other countries.

We also took the task further by ranking the winnings, working out the class mean and mode. This activity was enjoyed by all and met many learning intentions.

Graphing the denomination of Notes caught from the Money Vision App. 

iPad's, Augmented Reality and Writing

iPad's, Augmented Reality and Writing? 

The ‘age old’ sentence starters on the board or rocket writing is something of the past. To stimulate and engage students to write we need to engage them with a ‘carrot’ that will enhance their digital minds. Augmented Reality is that ‘carrot’. The list of AR Apps in this document can be used to create narratives, comics, exposition writing, instructional writing and may even cross over into integrated curriculum. Students are taking screen shots and using these images from Augmented Reality Apps to build and plan their writing.

Apps such as StripDesign BookCreator, Pages, Keynote or something that allows publishing of written work, can have images from AR Apps placed into them. Allow students to screen shot the images that appear and create work that is original creative and stimulating to the students, enhancing their written skills through a digital augmented feel. 

The learning intention was to Empower, Enhance and Engage. The following list of Apps I have used to stimulate, engage and further enhance students imaginations in writing. The students downloaded the Apps and took screen shots or photos that involved them storyboarding a narrative story that incorporated the AR app of choice. For example one student used the ARDinoPark app to write a book in BookCreator about the dinosaur causing havoc in the school. The students also blended the images taken in with Wordfoto App to give the image a very artistic and appeal feel that made the reader feel apart of the story. 

The best part of this was seeing the students become 'Authors'. Publishing books created in BookCreator, sending this book to their peers, parents and others and having this book saved to the various iBooks on the receiving persons iPad.  Very powerful!

LIST OF APPS: 

ARDinoPark

This free App allows you to bring dinosaurs into your school/classroom. The students take screen shots and build story boards around the images taken.

String

You will need to head to Powered by String Website to print out the PDF triggers to see this app in action. The four triggers will allow images to appear in a 3D reference. The students take screen shots of these images and generate stories depicting what may happen or has happened. 

The Blob from String.

THE AMAZING SPIDERMAN AR APP:Within my class we have revived the excitement for comics and comic books, by using the App StripDesign and some of the above AR apps. But the one that really grabbed the attention of the boys was the The Amazing Spiderman App. You need to go to the Amazing Spiderman website to print the five PDF triggers out that allow the app to work. 

Using the PDF's and the app the students told a comic story by that screenshots of Spiderman attacking the villain, climbing the building and or shoot his web. 

The comics created gave a true indication of an imagination, telling a true narrative story and focused on a genre that students really have not seen before or been exposed to. 

Using Heart Cam App and seeing its Effects. 

These examples are from a student is a reluctant writer and someone who more than likely not engage in writing with a pen and paper. I was impressed with the fine motor skills and detail the students took to take screenshots in a precise manner. It is difficult to get an image of Spiderman oncer you point the camera at the trigger. But children are more capable of this as they are used to playing so many computer games.

I had huge success with this app and linking it to writing.

The following Link is to a Rubric I created to guide my students through creating an iBook in Book Creator it was another fantastic session and has created some create writing using ARDinoPark, String and the triggers associated with this app. and the new AR apps I discovered. LiveButterflies and 3D AR, Dragon Detector 3D and Virtual Snow. Using these Apps and a variety of Back grounds the students created some very good iBooks. Rubric for Book Creator assignment. 

An App Called Aurasma!

An App Called Aurasma - Augmented Reality for the Classroom? 

It has been an outstanding experience and find in working with the App Aurasma. Basically this App allows the students to embed their own video footage to triggers they create or a trigger they have selected. I was extremely impressed with how easy, seamless and fundamentally practical this Augmented Reality App was.

You will need to download the the free App Aurasma. Have the students create an account. Once in the chance now is to work out how and what to use this App. for.

BOOK REVIEWS:
What the students have done is created triggers by hand that are related to book covers of the most recent book they have read. My goal for them was to write a book review script and make a short movie using the iPad camera, edit in iMovie or encourage them to be creative an make an animation using Puppet PalsHD or something similar.

We found that the Movies Reviews needed to be no longer than 1min30sec. in length otherwise the movie won't upload to Aurasma and embed into the trigger. The process of embedding the movie to the trigger is quiet straightforward and once this is done the students share their Aurasma experience view email to their peers. This allows anyone with Aurasma App to view the movie once the camera is positioned over the trigger.

The students had a ball working and creating the book reviews and showcasing their final Augmented product from the Book Review wall.

POSTERS:
Another way Aurasma has been used is for project work in particular topics. The students researched certain subject areas, created a movie and embedded this into triggers on a poster. This I will say was self directed and generated by the students based on their initial exposure to the book review experience.

I can see many other areas for Aurasma to be used and currently investigating this in more depth with my students. It is an App that allows students to be be creative, meet the curriculum needs, collaborate with their peers and demonstrate how to link many facets of technology into one particular avenue. Augmented Reality has been listed in the Horizon Report as a form of Technology that will bee seen more in Education over the next five years.