Nate Berens EDU 642 Blog: Berens Week 5 Augmented Reality Artifact-AURASMA

Berens Week 5 Augmented Reality Artifact-AURASMA

Use in the classroom:
Essential Question: How do mysteries like that of Oak Island relate to modern history and what can they teach us?

Lesson: I created a poster that displays the commonly used five W"s associated with researching a new historical topic (WHO,WHAT,WHERE,WHEN,and WHY). The students in my high school all have iPad Airs, and are very fortunate to have access to them, I view this activity with the Oak Island mystery a liken to that of a very simple webquest via Aurasma. After making sure all students had access to the necessary tech or were grouped with someone who did. Students would be directed to download Aurasma, and I would model how to sign up and use it (with another sample assignment). Next I would hand out evidence sheets for them to record information related to the five W's and remind them they have one class period to complete the following tasks. Read/watch/visit all of the sources included in the Aura from the poster, record notes, and answer the assessment questions or write a reflection to explain their understanding. Finally, I would take my class down to the media center or an open space in the school where I have this poster (and others) if I wished to extend the activity or focus on other skills like corroboration several posters containing the five W's on different topics could be plastered around the work area.

Objective: I can use the Aurasma app to explore historical mysteries in digital activity by investigating and contrasting information gathered about the five W's (WHO,WHAT,WHERE,WHEN,and WHY).

In a time crunch I only created the one artifact for the assignment. However, now that I know how to design a lesson using AR technology like Aurasma, I an eager to create some inquiry based lessons with it.

Once again this technology would be a great asset or tool for student centered learning and a fun way to grow my students tech savvy.
Secondly, I see great potential for using Aurasma in cooperative learning activities and in stations. Each station could contain a different topic, a different piece of the puzzle or a different source to analyze/compare the information gathered on an evidence sheet a group member (writer) recorded information on.
In researching Aurasma, I found a high school using a bulletin board outside of their department hallway to review/remediate content with Aurasma, and teach procedures/expectations.
The time required to create a FUNCTIONAL aura could be an issue, over a long weekend, in a PLC meeting, or when I am planned ahead or over the summer when building curriculum, this is when and where I could see Aurasma being developed as a legitimate and meaningful learning tool for my students.

Augmented reality tech can be edutainment and the tasks you design with them could be simple as in my sample or complex. The use of technology like this gets my students excited to learn and a more engaged learner.
AR tech matches up with the best practices discussed in earlier reading from this class regarding inclusion, differentiation, and modalities.
The simple design and EQ of the sample ensure a higher level of student success in the lesson. If I placed ten auras on the poster it might overwhelm them. I focused my design attention towards common language, keep it simple and use language the kids are familiar with (from there I can introduce new terms-when prior knowledge is accessed).

I have never used augmented reality technology in class or in my lessons before, largely, because I did not know much about them. I an eager to create some inquiry based lessons with it and use it to use/review expectations.
I have an idea of how to use this technology with our PBIS team and hopefully engage our students with their own words, voice recording, and video of them modeling appropriate behavior.
AR seemed very complex to me and not really useful with high school students, but after seeing so many teaching integrating this technology into a wide variety of contents and applications, I look forward to further exploration and experimentation with it to have another tool to reach for when planning my next inquiry based lesson or simulation.

The artifact comes alive providing substance to each of the five basic categories surrounding my artifact, WHO shows an image of the Knights Templar and if you click on it, it leads to more information to help build backgroud. WHAT reveals a video that explores more introduction material about mystery and history of exploration surrounding the island. WHERE shows a map of the island and if you click on it, another map appears illustrating where the island in question in located in relation to Canada's east coast. WHEN shares a GIF timeline of the exploration and discoveries from the island and if you click on the animation, it leads to more inforamation. WHY generates a map of the money pit a vertical shaft that in theory possesses great treasure, and if you click upon the image you will be directed to another website that allows more information about the treasure and Oak Island.

This augmented reality activity provides maps, a 3-D graphic timeline, video, and links surrounding the topic: the mystery of Oak Island.
Essential Question: How do mysteries like that of Oak Island relate to modern history and what can they teach us?
The following is a list resources used to create my artifact:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e8/Oak_Island.pngw=169623

MaryFebruary 18, 2017 at 8:25 PM
Hi Nathan, I appreciated your points about AR being used for edutainment as a "hook" to getting students attention and the time required to create the Aura. One of the concerns that I had was any time delay or challenges that students have with scanning may deter people from using it or lose interest quickly. I enjoyed the activity this past week and will give consideration to the selective use of AR to support learning. Great idea about using it for stations in coop education!

Nate Berens EDU 642 Blog