Multimedia in Education

Prior to leaving for my surgery, I gave each student a 6-page packet of questions for them to ask an adult as part of my Career & College Explorations class.   Students then used iMovie on their iPads to narrate the information they learned as a result of their interview.  I am happy that I planned ahead to give students the information so that the majority of them did the interview portion during their February vacation from school.  In addition, I scheduled to have our Tech Integrator come into each of my CCE sections on the first day after February vacation to review how to use iMovie, how to import images, and how to add voice narration and background music for their projects.

The various sections in the packet walk students through the process of career planning and goal setting.  Sections included were “Focus on the journey”, “Following one’s heart”, “Change is constant”, “Accessing their allies”, and “Learning is ongoing.”  The questionnaire concluded with a two-paragraph writing prompt that students submit after sending me their iMovie projects.  Below is a sample that I received today from one of my students:


"Having interviewed someone with significant work experience, I will definitely look at the working world differently. I think I'm more optimistic about getting a job after college, because Sara was able to do so. A well-educated, hardworking employee is always in demand. I also realize that it's normal for someone to switch careers, which makes me feel better about having to choose what I want to do at such a young age during college, because I can always choose something else later. Another thing I learned during my interview is that not everyone has a lot of parental guidance like I do, and so now I'm more grateful that my parents are invested in my future. I also think that there are more factors to being happy in a job than just liking the work. As Sara showed me, having nice bosses, coworkers, and mentors is equally as important. Something else that this interview made me think about is how much work experience Sara had by the time she graduated high school versus the fact that I don't have any at this point in my life and I'm not planning on working at all during high school. Still, my experience with community service is already much broader than hers has been in her entire life.

Sara's career path was definitely based off of what she was good at and what she liked to do. She chose to do work in the computer science field as a result of her talents at doing math. However, Sara wasn't fully happy because she wasn't interacting with people as much as she wanted to, and she didn't feel like she was helping the world be a better place. She always liked being around people and helping them, from working with young people at a bakery to helping young kids learn how to swim. This is what ultimately led to her switch to medicine. She was good at being a systems analyst and at being a physician, but the latter was more fulfilling."  (E. Stanton)



I have had students do this project each semester for the last two years so despite being away from school, felt fairly comfortable having my sub doing this 2-week project with them.  I have started receiving projects via email over the last few days and so far, most of the ones I have viewed are excellent.  I found a few students did not pay attention to instructions and instead of writing out the questions and then narrating a summary into iMovie, they actually recorded the individual they interviewed …. leading into a few very dull, long videos. 

Creation occurs in all content areas regardless of the student’s age.  In fact, I feel it is even easier for young children to be creative with the use of an iPad since it is far easier for them to manipulate the device with their finger or input from their voice than it is with a mouse on a PC or Mac.  I feel creation for students may lend itself to be easier in science and ELA due to the inquisitive interest of students and their love to communicate be it through writing apps, social networking, or collaborating with peers.  As for Math, I’m not quite sure.   I know that my Accounting students cannot use their iPads to access the online site that goes with our textbook because the site requires the use of Flash.  For other math-related courses, however, I am confident that by manipulating data on their iPad screens, they can certainly complete any task that so far has been thrown at them.  In addition, there are tons of apps available for math (and other academic disciplines.