Paper quizzes could be a thing of the past! Digital breakouts, such as the one Elizabeth Kahn describes in her blog, offer a fun way to reinvigorate assessments that require short, specific answers. Kahn is a school librarian in Louisiana. Her blog, Tales from a Loud Librarian, recently published a piece titled "Creating a Digital Breakout for Library Orientation," which outlined her experience using Google Forms to create a digital breakout. During this activity, Kahn's students answered questions about the library in order to "break out" of the program. The students were able to use their iPads to complete the assignment. They accessed the breakout by scanning a QR code at the end of Kahn's introductory slideshow. As Kahn mentions in her blog, many of her students did not know that they could scan a QR code using their iPad cameras without downloading a special QR scanner app. This is the first of many ways in which the assignment helped the students to learn about technology.
The Google Forms allowed for short answer or multiple-choice questions. These formats would be well suited for geography quizzes or short-response assessments in which you are looking for a specific term for an answer. The program allows the teacher to anticipate possible mistakes and to enter these misspellings or different formats in advance so that students are not penalized for these errors. Kahn also describes looking over her students' answers question by question, which was easy due to the format of Google Forms. She was able to see clearly which concepts students understood and which ideas needed more class time. This could be a useful resource for determining when it is time to move from one lesson to the next, or when designing study guides and reviews.
School librarians are often at the forefront of new educational technologies. According to a 2010 piece by Daniella Smith, "technology has been interwoven into the fabric of education." Further research has revealed that school librarians who become leaders in educational technology often have good relationships with the administrators and classroom teachers at their schools (Johnson, M.P., 2012). In 2012, study found that seventy percent of the school librarians surveyed considered a supportive principal as the most important relationship-driven factor in their success as leaders within the school (Johnson, M.P.). Thirty-three percent listed teachers as the most important collaborative supporters. As Elizabeth Kahn demonstrates, the same technology that supports a fun and interactive library orientation can also support classroom teachers' lessons. However, as this article reminds us, our digital tools should never be about technology for its own sake. Instead, we should consider the students' needs every time we integrate technology into our lessons.
References:
Johnson, M.P. (2012). Connecting teacher librarians for technology integration leadership. School Libraries Worldwide. 18(1), 18-33.
Johnson, M.P., (2012). School librarians as technology integration leaders: enablers and barriers to leadership enactment. School Library Research, 15.
Smith, Daniella, (2010). "Making the case for the leadership role of school librarians in technology integration." Library Hi Tech. Vol. 28 Iss 4 pp. 617-631.
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