iPads, YouTube and QR Codes

Every other month my grade level displays student work on one of three hallway boards. March is our month and with all the craziness that has been going on in 4th grade lately we were having a difficult time deciding what to display. My teammate, Evan, suggested that we post students' leads to the Super Power stories they are currently working on. I liked the idea, but wanted to jazz it up a bit.

What about posting QR codes?

Last summer at the ISTE conference in San Diego, many of the presenters were displaying QR codes with links to additional information. It was so much fun to scan the QR code and access the additional resources that I wanted to use them with my students. 

As my team was discussing how we would share the students' work on the board, I thought it would be fun to have the kids record their lead and post a QR code so students, teachers and parents could listen. Now I had to figure out how to do this.

The experiment begins

My students began by using AudioMemos Free to record their leads. Once a student made a recording they would then email the file to me. As my email began to fill I realized that none of the recordings had an URL that I could use to make a QR code. I also realized I really didn't want each of the almost 90 fourth graders emailing their files to me. I had to find a different solution. 

Let's make a video

Watching my students create their audio recordings made me stop and think, "Hey, they should be using the camera to record themselves! That would be much more interesting." Now I had to figure out how to get an URL attached to a video. After much trial and error, I finally realized that YouTube would be the easiest way to upload video since it will give each individual recording its own URL. 

First, I created a new channel on YouTube for our school at http://www.youtube.com/user/CentennialElemCO 

Having our own channel helps me organize the student videos and provides an email address that can be used to send individual videos; thus saving my inbox from exploding. Additionally, I am able to monitor, manage and edit information posted to the school channel. 

Next, I created a Google Form where the URL could be copied and complied into a spreadsheet. This helps me keep all the recordings organized by student name, URL and class. Once the information is in the spreadsheet I can copy the URL and paste it into a QR generator createqrcode.appspot.com which gives me a QR code. 

Students as creators

My students have become adept at moving back-and-forth between apps and websites on their iPad Minis. They were able to work together to create quick videos of each other reading their Super Power leads then email the video to YouTube. My class then visited the two other fourth grade classes and used their minis to video every fourth grader in the school reading their lead. Personally, I think having my students conduct the recordings for the other classes was the highlight of the project. My students were so focused and engaged as they organized and directed the recordings of the other fourth grade students they didn't even realize they were learning how to be great leaders.