Multi-Media Text Sets (MMTS)
Post date: May 17, 2015 9:05:26 PM
written by Kate Petty @techclassroom
It seems that everyone is telling us about some amazing new apps for the classroom and, before we know it, we have students going to one app for 5 minutes and another app for another 5 minutes.Why is it that no one is showing us how to cohesively organize all this amazing media into one place for our students to access?
Lisa Highfill, a Bay Area educator, finally figured out an outstanding way to, very simply, create a document for our students to use. She calls them Multi-Media Text Sets and all it is is one document with a two column table. Listed in the first column are places on the Internet you want your students to visit, read, analyze, watch, etc. Listed in the second column is the activity you want your students to do with each media resource. Take a look at the image on the right. It is a lesson I adapted from Lisa's Avalanche lesson on her larger unit: Earth in Action. You can see a YouTube video in listed first - this is a purposeful step. My igniting excitement about the topic (done here through a video showing skiers and snowboarders caught in avalanches- it shows no one getting hurt) you can create an initial engagement with the topic.
So here is what you need to know:
- Click on the image to the right and make a copy of the Google Doc.
- Change the title and image to fit your unit.
- Change the media to go to various places you want your students to go.
- Change the tasks on the right to the activities you want your students to do with each piece of media.
- Note: The more "tasks" you give them, the more grading of different documents you will have. If you notice the actual column header it says "I learned/Makes me think:" sometimes a simple reflection in the box itself is plenty.
- Share your new set through Google Classroom or with your students as "View Only" in Google docs and ask them to FILE > Make a Copy.
Bonus!
This activity makes a perfect round of rotations for your students. Whether you are 1:1, have a few devices, or just a computer lab, consider using this activity in a rotation cycle over a few days. It works like a gem!
