Why release an app?

In an ideal world I would have continued with the free to access internet provided model that teacherLEd.com has used up until now.  In the last 5 years, however, technology has changed and the way people access the internet has changed.  The iPad is becoming more popular as a learning tool in schools and resource providers need to adapt to this.

Why not make the app free?

As described above I would have preferred to maintain the model used until now.  teacherLED.com meets its cost via advertising.  Doing this with an educational app does not seem appropriate.  The advertising on teacherLED is aimed at teachers.  No advertisement appears on a page aimed at children.  For example no IWB resource has a frame of advertisements around it as some sites do.  This cannot work with an app.  The website structure around the resources on teacherLED does not exist on an app so any advertisements, if they are to support the development costs,  must on an app be pervasive and constant.  So there are no advertisements but there is a fee.  In the apple app store prices ares are set according to tiers.  Numeracy Basics is set at the lowest tier possible except for free.  Hopefully this can support the development of future apps and not be prohibitive to those who would find it useful.

How is the app written?

The app is written in HTML5.  Not, in my opinion, the best language to write an app in.  The resources were originally intended to be universally accessible from the site.  However an experimental release of some HTML5 apps in 2011 was not successful.  Every browser treats it differently.  Testing on one browser would give quite different results to another browser.  Some people thought the resources were full of bugs and this made the site look bad.  No doubt carefully working through all of  the issues would have been possible but the time that would take to check and rewrite on each platform and browser and then to do this again when a new browser version was released was prohibitive.  All previous resources were written in Flash.  These are written and tested once and just work.  Except on platforms it is not allowed on such as the iPad.  The app store model has seriously challenged the free to the user model that previously existed by fragmenting how people can access interactive content on the web.

As the resources were already written I ensured they worked optimally on the iPad and then packaged them as an app.  Fortunately the resources suit a one to one teaching environment that tablets suit.  I have used it myself sitting alongside a child working through questions on telling the time and addition etc.

Why doe the app suggest combining the old with the new?

The resources are, in general, iPad versions of traditional teaching resources. Number squares, clocks, times table lists, that teachers and teaching assistants have long employed in small group work.  As such the app provides these people, and perhaps parents, with the means to teach in a way they are comfortable with but using their school’s new iPad rather than old dog eared card resources and counters.

What about the rest of teacherLEd.com?

This will stay the same and new resources will continue to be produced for it.  These will tend to be resources that suit whole class teaching and can use the extra power of desktop machines to provide stimulating experiences.  All existing resources and new resources produced for the site will continue to be free to the user.

Software developers have their own reasons for technological choices but why the happiness amongst those who are mostly end users of the software?  Do people really care that a program is coded in a particular language or utilises a certain piece of technology?  Granted, users of the mobile web won’t miss Flash.  Apple’s refusal to have it on their systems meant that there was no point in developers producing Flash resources for mobile.  In the end whether Flash could have worked well on mobile will remain forever unknown as it was never given the chance.  To be fair to Adobe there was no point in them persisting in pursuing what could only ever be a fragment of the mobile web as Apple looked like being forever closed to them.  The ubiquitous nature of Flash is expected to erode with it, at best, becoming a niche platform that exists only on the desktop.  For the first time, however, the possibility of it eventually totally disappearing has arisen.

So, according to many tweets from teachers and educationalists, Flash’s expected demise is a good thing; the switch to HTML5 a good thing.  The strength of belief in this is what I struggle to understand and why there is even any interest in the delivering technology.   Here are some thoughts on how the demise of Flash will impact on teachers and schools.

 What has Flash ever done for us?

Look at all of those Interactive Whiteboard resource sites out there.  Free ones like my own, paid for ones, all in Flash.   Flash was the tool of choice because it standardised separate systems and browsers. Write once deploy anywhere was Flash’s goal.  When these sites wrote a resource they could test it on one machine and then publish it online confident that it could be used on any machine.  It cannot be underestimated how important it is not to have to write workarounds for individual machines and test on many different setups.  It takes time, money, and frustration.  The more any of these occur the more the end user will pay, either in money terms  or in less free resources.

Do you use any online interactive resources that use sound?  That’ll be Flash.  HTML5 the “good thing” versus Flash’s “bad thing” is awful at this.  At the moment to get even basic sound functionality on HTML5 is a feat of programming engineering.

Where has all the free stuff gone?  This is a question that might well be heard more and more with the demise of Flash.  Teachers like free resources.  Finding that ideal, freely accessible, IWB resource can often save a teacher hours of planning or creating their own.

One suggested theory of Apple’s dislike of Flash was that it could damage its app store model.  If fully interactive resources exist online, either for free or subscribed to, Apple is cut out of the money.  The response of developers is to release everything as an app.  You pay for these.  Granted some are free but most aren’t especially in a full format.  If they are free because of advertisements the ad will be prominent  in the resource.  The option to put ads in the site but leave the resources clean of ads just can’t work in an app.  Nobody can argue that a learning resource is not negatively  impacted on by prominent advertisements.  Without Flash there is no way to reach a big enough cross platform audience to support the development with non-prominent advertising.  If nobody uses Flash all of the old resources will die as the Flash Player becomes unmaintained and incompatible with new browsers and operating systems.  All the free stuff might be gone.

Maybe these sites will switch to making free resources in HTML5.  Maybe, maybe not.  None of a developer’s work in HTML5 is protected – anyone can steal it.  Do people want to make their work free and see others pass it off as their own?  Support for HTML5 is not universal now nor is it likely to be so for some time to come.  Granted certain aspects are finalised, others require a specific implementation per browser.  Internet Explorer 10, not the new current IE, the next one, will not be fully, HTML5 compliant.  The extra graphics power that HTML5 needs from a technology called WebGL to allow advanced graphics, of the kind Flash offers now, is not planned to be included in Internet Explorer ever.  So you can use one of the browsers that does support the resource you want to use.  But what if you can’t?  Internet Explorer is often criticised but of teacherLED.com’s  65,000 visitors last month 47000 were with IE.  Of these only 7000 were with the most recent version and hence HTML5 compatible IE9.  So in the last month less than a quarter of my site’s visitors, presumably teachers,  have been able to use my new resources produced entirely in html5 but which  took 10 times longer to test than a flash resource.  And still I get comments from people with setups that should work but don’t, or at least not properly.  It might be a standard one day but it isn’t yet.

Most schools in the UK don’t maintain multiple browsers on their systems.  Even the ones they do have are not updated to recent versions that often.  Flash produced frequent, automatic updates, that allowed new features to be added frequently.  Is this likely to change so that schools have multiple up to date browsers to suit the site that is to be used?

HTML5 will catch up though right?  Well, HTML4 was finalised in 1997, HTML5, as of now, isn’t finalised.  14 years later.  In that time Flash has led the way through every feature that HTML5 aims to have and many that it hasn’t even thought about.  Design by committee may be democratic but it isn’t known for agility or speed.  The HTML working group expects it all to be done in about 2022.  And no, that isn’t, sarcasm that is the expected date.

I don’t doubt that HTML5 will eventually make good on its deficiencies.  But that isn’t now.  For now we will have to get by with a probable winding down of Flash development and a fragmentation of the support for different web based teaching resources.  Expect to test a resource at home then find it won’t work on a school computer.  Expect less new resources as nobody wants to invest time and effort into what people seem to be happy to see as a dead platform.  Will the IWB resource sites rebuild using HTML5 instead of Flash? Perhaps some but probably not all.

What emerges in the end is almost certainly going to involve using the app stores of various companies for rich educational content.  This model is now established.  A rational choice for the developer of an educational resource might well be to go this route rather than the website access that we now use.   And as these app stores take a 30% cut from the developer’s prices expect the cost to be higher than you might think.  Will this new model be our choice as educational content consumers or what has been dictated to us by corporations that have made us think that the delivering technology is important rather than the outcome?

Perhaps in the future we might remember the good old days when we could go online on any internet connected computer and access excellent, free teaching resources that saved us valuable planning time and brought interactivity to the lesson.  Will we remember that so many seemed so happy at the demise of the technology that allowed that?  Until people were told not to like Flash had they ever even really thought about it?

To learn more about the Flash HTML5 debate there are a couple of excellent articles here by developers who work in both and whose points I have used in the above:

8bitrocket

G Skinner

Feel free to disagree in the comments below or to respond by twitter. @teacherled

As detailed here HTML5 promises universal compatibility across all web capable devices and no reliance on proprietary technology.  Promises but does not yet deliver.

Since release it seems like every machine I try shows another issue.  Firefox 6 on Vista showed a very interesting kaleidoscope but not an interactive clock.  XP Firefox I’m assured by a commenter on the above post runs the resource terribly.  Firefox works fine on Win 7 but doesn’t look as good as IE9 on Win 7 however IE9 isn’t preloading the images correctly so the first time the clock face is toggled there is a clock with no face shown for a bit.  Safari on Mac and iPad seem excellent.  So much for universal compatibility.

It is my fault for doing research now that should have been done before.  My thinking process went along the lines that I didn’t want to exclude any user from the resources I make.  If Apple devices continue to grab a higher proportion of web users, as is predicted, than the proportion of those who can use a Flash based site decreases.  When/if this reaches a certain point the owner of a Flash based site will have to choose: rewrite everything or be content with only reaching a limited section of the web.

I find it quite disheartening writing resources that may have a shelf life or will be limited in audience.  Hence my decision to switch to HTML5.  The response and my own experience suggests, though, that we are in a time of uncertainty where we have stepped backward, before going, hopefully, forward.  Flash used to give us universal compatibility.  Now it doesn’t work on vast numbers of Apple products.  Flash is in the hands of a single powerful corporation.  HTML5 is defined by a standards committee.  Sadly browsers are created by competing powerful corporations and each one has little differences.  There was only one Flash Player and it always worked the same assuming it was updated with new revisions.

Then the next problem.  This is specifically to do with schools and I should have thought more about this before.  I have yet to go into a UK computer suite that is using any operating system higher than Windows XP.  Most of these have only Internet Explorer as a browser.  XP cannot have IE9.  Which is a problem as IE9 is the first of this browser that can use HTML5.  Firefox can use HTML5 on XP but the HTML5 performance I have seen, and been told about so far, is poor.  I’m not sure why this is so, it may be that XP machines are likely to be older so less powerful, or it may be that XP doesn’t have some of the features of later versions to support the graphics.

I’m only speaking from personal experience here but many UK school IT technicians (not all, some are great) are very conservative about their networks.  They have a working network and they’re not going to risk that but by changing the configuration.  Such as putting more recent browser versions on them or different a browser altogether.  I remember a tweet from  Danny Nicholson of the Whiteboard Blog mentioning that a school he had gone to provide training to did not update its Smartboard software so as not to confuse the teachers.  This lag in updates is all too common in schools and it is difficult to tell the reasons from the excuses.  Sadly a culture has evolved in some school technical support that a working network that requires minimal maintenance is the goal rather than one to support teaching and learning using the most modern tools available.   Now, if the network is brought to a grinding halt it is these technicians who get the blame so this conservatism is in some way understandable but the result is the same.  A network configuration that is identical to the first one that worked well after its instalment in around 2007.

Where does this leave teacherLED.com?  It looks like a fork is necessary.  If a resource particularly suits tablet devices I’ll make it in HTML5 and anybody with a desktop who can use it is a bonus.  If it is a resource that particularly suits whole class teaching I’ll produce it in Flash and exclude tablet users.  There is an argument that the right development tool for the job should be used and this is representative of that.  I disagree.  This is the step backward to which I referred.  Producing for the web is, at the moment, like producing software for PC or MAC.  Your software is for one or the other.  Until recently software produced for the web was for the whole of the web.  Now I have to choose what platform on the web I wish to serve.  Let’s hope it is one step backwards and two forwards and that those forward steps happen quickly.

For those who don’t follow technology developments Apple refuses to allow Flash player to run on any of its mobile devices.  Microsoft is also reducing the reliance on Flash for web experiences in its new Windows 8 operating system.  Flash Player is a virtual computer meaning that it works like a separate computer running on another.  This virtual computer means that software designers can write for it rather than have to produce a different program for each computer that exists.  In teacherLED’s case each IWB resource will work identically on a Mac, a PC or a Linux based machine.   But if there is no Flash Player on a computer they cannot work on it.

Apple chose to not allow Flash Player on the iPod Touch, iPhone, or iPad for a variety of reasons.  These reasons have not gone unchallenged but rather than get into whether it is right or fair this article will attempt to explain what this means for sites that produce resources and teachers who use them.

Flash Player is unlikely to disappear from desktop machines any time soon.  It is on nearly all of them.  Resource sites that have made heavy use of Flash, such as mine, will remain usable for a long time to come for their intended purpose.  However, while it is ubiquitous on desktop machines, and likely to remain so,  the growing number of mobile internet connected devices means that its overall presence across all internet using devices will decrease.  Furthermore while mobile devices other than Apple’s will allow Flash the performance is not good.  Flash seems powerful on a desktop machine because of the sheer amount of power available.  Any virtual machine can only provide a fraction of its host’s power as it has to translate between the virtual machine and the real machine on which it resides.  No problem on a desktop but an issue on the significantly less powerful mobile devices.  Additionally the harder a computer has to work the more power it drains.  Again not a problem when connected to the wall socket but a different matter on a mobile device.  All of these conspire to leave Flash as not the universal solution it once was.

All sites will have to think about how to deal with this.

The options:

Ignore non Flash enabled devices.
Definitely an option – particularly for IWB resource sites.  An IWB can display an iPad’s output but cannot yet be interacted with via the whiteboard itself but most IWBs are connected to a desktop computer.  Therefore nothing changes.  Flash remains a powerful and common platform which continues to evolve.

Go native. 
Produce each resource specifically for each machine in its own language.  Most apps fall into this case.  Here the performance is not an issue.  There is no need for a virtual machine to translate so no performance is lost to this.  On the downside every platform needs a specifically created resource.  Those produced for an Apple device will not work on any other machine.  In the case of Apple a developer must also pay to be able to put his or her creations on to a device.  The facility to make a program for, say an iPad, and then try it on the iPad does not exist out of the box.  The outcome of this is that most apps produced this way will end up on the App store as downloadable apps that have to be paid for in some way or perpetually show advertisements.

Use HTML5.
The language of the web is undergoing revision.  As part of this there are new possibilities.  One is called the Canvas tag.  This allows things that were previously only possible on Flash to be done on a browser that has not had any new plug-ins, such as Flash Player, added to it.  In particular this allows manipulatable elements to be displayed on screen.  As this is a web standard all browsers should support it and it is not dependent on a plug-in being downloaded.

The downside to HTML5 is that while it is meant to be a standard, in practise each browser does things slightly differently.  Whereas a resource programmed in Flash will work the same on any machine, as the Flash Player is controlled and updated a by its owning company Adobe, HTML5 may have differences across browsers.   At the moment it is also less sophisticated with less features available to the programmer, or at least they are much harder to implement.  Neither is it as a powerful.  The sophisticated games seen on Flash are not yet possible in a standard browser.  Furthermore schools are very slow to update.  Technicians often prefer to maintain the status quo that works rather than update to new software versions.  HTML5 requires a recent browser.  In particular Internet Explorer 9 is the first of the IE browsers to be compatible so if your technician has not upgraded the school browsers (they should) HTML5 resources will not work.

The route I have decided to take with teacherLED is to use HTML5 where possible to maximise future compatibility and not ignore the growing popularity of tablets.  Where the extra features are required I will use Flash.  While I hope to in the future release some natively developed apps I am keen to continue to provide free to access, advertisement free resources to teachers.  At this point it is impossible to provide a working solution for all users, I either exclude newer technology which is gradually making inroads into the classroom, or I exclude those whose schools are not upgrading their browsers. If you do have an up to date browser you will have free choice over what to use.  Flash or HTML5 resources.

Unfortunately as I am the only person working on this site the creation of multiple versions of each resource is not feasible.  That being said the first resource to use HTML5 is a new version of the popular Clock Spin.  Another post will explain why I’ve done this.  Actually this post explains why I’ve changed my mind in only 2 days.

NASA/courtesy of nasaimages.org

The 4th part of a series describing how the Mission to Mars resources on teacherLED.com can be utilised in a themed series of lessons.

The intention behind the Mars Angle IWB Resource was to bring in an aspect of a class’s previous learning to the session but it could also be used as an exercise alongside the initial learning of angles.  The presentation of the resource allows it to slot into the theme of mission to Mars but is really just an exercise in estimating angles.  As such it can work well as plenary exercise after a lesson angles.  I may come back to this resource and provide a version less thematically formatted for those that want it purely for lessons on angles. 

If the students are not secure in the use of angles I use this resource to provide a quick recap.  It uses a similar interface (it shares a significant amout of programming!) so compliments Mars Angle well. 

My use follows the same format as for the previous resources discussed:  A short practise session at a computer (the simulators in our Mission to Mars theme) before going on to the “real” mission at the IWB with all eyes on them.  The background to the challenge that is given is that the craft that relays their signals back to earth has lost the correct alignment for its solar panels and that they have to manually adjust them.  Again, with enough time, this allows some consideration of how communications now relies on satellite technology.

When used with teams I insist that each member has to be responsible for setting one angle totally independently with no input from the rest of the team.   In the mixed age/mixed ability groups I often have this has proved an excellent opportunity for peer teaching.  The older/more able students who were confident in their technique for estimating angles passed on their knowledge and techniques to the others in the 15 minute “practise session” I give them at the computers before they do it for real at the IWB.  This has been very effective in building the ability to estimate angles in children who were at first unsure.  Having one of their friends explain the strategies they used, combined with the need to play their part in the team, really focused their attention and they engaged well asking questions and clarifying their understanding.  The explaining child gets a confidence boost and experiences the need to communicate their knowledge clearly.

After each of the team has inputted their angles enter is pressed.  Then each team member gets up to adjust the dial that they initially inputted to attempt to get closer to the target.  Depending on your group you may allow a discussion on what each of them needs to do but it is usually best to not allow conferring when one is at the IWB or else they tend to rely on the team rather than their own judgement.

I award points to the teams depending on which managed to get the angles within the tolerance limits in the fewest attempts. 

This was the final discussion of the IWB assisted part of the Mission to Mars sessions I run.  The next parts will discuss some of the other aspects of the sessions that may save you some time in planning your own sessions on a similar theme.  I also hope to produce further IWB resources on this theme.

As with all of the entries in this series feel free to add your own ideas for spaced themed lessons.

View part 1 of this series.

View part 2 of this series.

View part 3 of this series.

NASA/courtesy of nasaimages.org

Mars Lander

This is the 3^rd part of the Mission to Mars series of posts to illustrate how the Mars themed IWB resources on teacherLED.com may be used and why they were created.  This focuses on Mars Lander the IWB resource at teacherLed.

This is always a favourite with children as there is no problem to solve but it does provide an intense exercise in communication skills and teamwork.  Many of the children I have run these sessions with have poor teamwork skills and put little thought into how best to communicate their ideas to others.  This activity demands the 3 members of the team work together and communicate clearly and concisely. 

As always I try to give some real world justification for the activity.  For this one the film Apollo 13 provides it.  The scene where the astronauts are attempting to manually readjust the trajectory of their craft by each controlling a different aspect of the craft is shown to the children.  Unfortunately there is a little bad language in this scene.  I have created a version where this is muted out but for copyright reasons I can’t make it available. Just be ready for with the mute button if you use the original.  Showing this does really help, though, when the children start bemoaning the fact that it is a much easier task if only one takes the controls. You can point to the precedent.

The children are then told that they have a certain amount of time to practice on the simulators (laptops or class computers).  At the end each group will have a certain number of attempts to land the craft in reality at the IWB computer with the whole world (the class) watching and listening to their communications.

Depending on the social skills of the group this can be quite fraught to begin with as members of the team feel they are being unfairly blamed for repeated crashes, or somebody feels their instructions aren’t being listened to.  This being the case it is a good idea to get back together as a class after about 10 minutes to discuss the various areas of friction.  Discuss what happens when everybody shouts instructions at once, what makes a clear and concise instruction and whatever aspects you feel needs addressing.  Once teams settle on a method, usually one commander giving a limited set of instruction phrases, progress starts to be made.  It remains a tricky challenge but is certainly doable. 

One other aspect of the resource is that introduces the idea of solar interference which allows a link to a discussion about the sun, solar winds, sun spot activity and its potential impact on our communications here on earth.  It takes an artistic liberty in the predictability, duration and frequency but it serves its purpose.

I usually award points for each successful landing a team completes at the IWB.

View part 1 of this series.

View part 2 of this series.

NASA/courtesy of nasaimages.org

The second part of a series detailing how the Mission to Mars IWB resources may be used in a themed set of lessons. Part 1 is here.

Mars Rover

Find the IWB resource here.
While the use of this activity is described here in part 2 no order is intended to be suggested. The resources are linked by theme but they are not interdependent.

I don’t tend to use this resource in the emergency context that was detailed in the previous part of this series. It is actually very difficult. It is a puzzle that was published decades ago by H.E. Dudeney. He didn’t use robots exploring Mars but it is otherwise the same.

The “Mission to Mars”  lessons that I run are not intended to just provide a theme to problem solving but allows expansion on more general ideas of science, space, technology etc. With a brief presentation on the history of robot probes to planets a discussion can be had on what the implications of the limitations of power and communications etc are. The limited efficiency of photovoltaic cells can be discussed when talking about the need for robots to be used efficiently. The delay in radio signals being received between earth and the robot can lead to discussions on how pre-programmed the robots need to be. Such subjects can also be linked in with work the children or doing or have done in science.  It also provides background to the building of their LEGO 8547 Mindstorms NXT 2.0 Robot that is also part of the sequence of lessons.

With this real world justification of the task ahead the children are given the mission and its constraints (again shown on the Mission Briefing screen of the resource). The children can work at a computer and open up the resource to work on or it can be done just as well using squared paper, a pencil and eraser. Just make sure they draw the grid boundaries to the correct size.
It is unlikely that primary aged children will complete this mission in the defined number of steps very quickly so at certain time intervals the next step of the solution may be shown on the IWB. This is also a good puzzle to let the children (and their families) attempt at home so you may decide not to give too many steps away. 

Ending this activity can be done like with the Mars Circuit activity or to avoid another “winner takes all” situation you may award points for 1st 2nd, 3rd etc as they show you the answer on paper with the 1st team finally closing the problem by demonstrating it at the IWB.  To avoid making it too easy for the children to find the solution at home I will only provide the solution if you request it in the comments below.  I will not send it for a couple of days to prevent cheating unless your email address is clearly a staff one.  Note I cannot guarantee a quicker response.

View part 1 of this series.

View part 3 of this series.

NASA/courtesy of nasaimages.org

One of the sequence of lessons I run is based on the theme “Mission to Mars”. Originally this was based purely on a set of missions designed to reach various learning objectives using the LEGO 8547 Mindstorms NXT 2.0 Robot
robotics set.  (I will go into more detail on that at a later date).  While this has been successful I felt that I could round this out into a more varied set of activities that introduce or revisit other skill areas or curriculum knowledge.  To this end I have started to construct a set of of IWB based activites that I have recently shared on teacherLED.com for everyone to use.  These could be useful for any space themed lessons or in most cases as a standalone activity in support of another learning goal.

Here I wanted to discuss in more detail how I use them in my sessions to hopefully give you some ideas on how to incorporate in a way that suits you and your lessons.  This part 1 will give you the background to the resources and how one of them can be used.  Subsequent parts will highlight the use of the other resources

Background                                         

The Mission to Mars sessions are typically 6 sessions of around 2 hours per session.  They are introduced to the children as a set of missions that are meant to simulate the challenges engineers and scientists might face in learning more about Mars either via manned or robotic visits.   The children are broken up into groups and I introduce a competitive element to the challenges by scoring teams on the missions they complete.  I like to keep everything representative of some aspect of reality so this competition allows us to discuss the international competition that resulted in the space race that led to the moon landings.  As I have found 3 children can be usefully employed on the Lego Mindstorms robots that is the group size I use.

Using the IWB

The IWB is used as a kind of mission control point.  Activities are introduced on the IWB either as an emergency situation or a stand-alone activity. 

This depends on the ability of the class as a whole.   The ongoing task of the groups is to construct and program their robots according to the current mission.  If the group is socially and academically able enough the IWB activities become an emergency situation that springs up on the group with no warning.  The group then need to work out who to allocate to the task, or whether to transfer as a whole to the new task, and then pick up the original task later.  This often provides some superb discussions as the children have to honestly appraise their own skills.  They consider efficiency, the value of sacrificing self interest for the good of the team and fairness.  The whole idea of being derailed from one task to another and then back again is often a novel experience for the children.

For weaker children the extent of this derailment is judged on the situation.  In many cases they provide an introductory mission to each session so that they still are able to develop their skills but aren’t overloaded or confused.

However the task is introduced the IWB becomes the focus of the mission and is where the teams’ efforts stand or fall.

The activities

As each group in my sessions has access to a laptop for the robot programming they are able to access what the same resource as is on the IWB and use it as a “simulator” with which they can attempt to improve their skills or find a solution before employing it in the reality of the IWB for all to see.

Mars Circuit

Mars Circuit IWB resource can be found here.

The groups are told that the wiring has become loose on their equipment and that they need to repair it within the constraints of the mission.  (Which are detailed on the resource opening screen).  This usually goes from cries of “impossible” to a solution in quite a short time.  It is by no means a long task so works as a quick derailment task. 

I have also used it in maths lessons to encourage persistence and thinking skills. In all situations I find it important to discuss with the group, after they have completed it, how important it is to not give in too quickly but to think carefully.  It is a useful challenge to the sometimes ingrained habit of children to dismiss a problem as too difficult for them if they don’t see the answer in seconds.

This task does not necessarily need a computer for each group as it is doable on paper and a printable version is downloadable from the site.

When a team believes they have the solution the whole team must memorise it.  One is then randomly selected to  go up to the IWB and put their solution into “reality”.  From the moment they touch the IWB I give them 1 minute to complete the task.   This lack of control over who demonstrates the solution means that weaker members of the team aren’t left in the dark.  Whoever solves it will be required to explain and demonstrate it to the rest of their team.  A great opportunity to develop social and language skills.

 If they fail they may not approach the board again for 2 minutes.  This prevents lots of speculative attempts just to use the IWB.

View part 2 of this series.

View part 3 of this series.

Sifteo Cubes are something I hope do very well as I am eagerly waiting them to reach the market so that I can use them with children and develop software for them.  They are somewhere between the physicality of the Soma Cube and the virtuality of the IPad.  A set of little touch screen cubes that communicate with each other and a computer to run downloadable games and puzzles. 

As any of the students I have taught in thinking skills sessions will know I love spatial puzzles.  This was never more evident than when I sat for hours, burning my fingers on hot glue, making 20 Soma Cubes out of 540 little cubes so that we could explore the challenge that once fascinated a large section of the readership of Scientific American.  These 27 little cubes stuck into defined shapes can form a cube or a myriad of other shapes.  However aiming for a predetermined shape such as on Soma Bingo is a mind straining feat. 

If Sifteo are lucky they will pick up something of the fascination that the Soma cube had when it was first described.  Martin Gardner in The Colossal Book of Mathematics recalls how thousands of readers contributed new shapes and many commented on how it had eaten up their leisure time as they set themselves new challenges.

Reading the Sifteo blog post it was the following sentence that made me think of Soma.

“Children and adults can manipulate the cubes to understand the qualities that the mappings represent and experiment with the designer’s rules for how they relate to each other.” Sifteo Blog.

This idea of manipulating cubes and seeing how they relate to each other is obviously an intrinsic part of Soma.  Watch a child (or an adult) start using Soma and at first you will see a quite clumsy trial and error approach.  With familiarity, though, you see the experimentation begin to form clear ideas on how the pieces relate.  Awareness builds of which pieces are most likely combined to form key parts of the final shape.  Dead ends are reached less often as the puzzler develops a “feel “ for when the remaining pieces just can’t work together.  The original creator of the Soma Cube, Piet Hein, clearly had well developed spatial reasoning skills.  He defined the pieces and then worked out if they could fit into a cube.  All while being in a quantum physics lecture.  Clearly he had multitasking skills too.

As much of a masterpiece of simple complexity that Soma is, it is only single purpose.  It is in this flexibility of purpose and the exciting possibilities that dynamically changing pieces have that attract me to Sifteo.  True, we could have all of this on a screen but this is not spatial in the same way.  Children have plenty of practice at visualizing 3 dimensions as represented on a 2 dimensional plane (many computer games).  In the same way that on screen versions of Soma cannot hope to replicate the tactile and spatial elements of the physical puzzle my hope is that Sifteo will bring physicality to on screen activity.  The idea of a piece of the puzzle changing depending on its spatial position relative to the other pieces or to which way is down may open up whole new genres of puzzles.  Sifteo is right at the beginning of its introduction to the world yet looking at some of the videos for it on their shows some amazing potential. Having made the very wise decision to open up the software development for Sifteos there will hopefully be a wide variety of imaginations going to work on creating learning activites unlike anything else. 

I don’t think any new concept needs to push anything else out.  There will always be a place for the low tech purely physical puzzles as well the activities and problems completed on a screen.  Sifteo holds great promise to occupy a middle ground that with well chosen software can bring about a whole new way to develop skills such as spatial reasoning.  Here’s hoping that Sifteo lives up to its promise and makes it to the point where I can actually get hold of some.

I originally obtained a set of Lonpos 505 Puzzle (505)
to use in the classroom to use for lessons and investigations based on pentominos to go with this IWB resource.  While pentominos are easily made from card I felt the more tactile engineered look of these pieces would add something to the lesson.  

On receiving the package I enjoyed the amusing, not quite right translations on the box.  This is a “great companion of loneliness”  it seems.  I was a little surprised to see the long list of patents for this puzzle though.  Pentominos as a concept are far too old to be patented and I’d be surprised that just changing the shape of the individual units from square to spherical would be enough to claim a patent. 

Taking the unit out of the box I found that the puzzle is contained in a nice white plastic, clip shut, case.  It is reasonable made with an almost full length plastic hinge which shouldn’t break too quickly as these things often can.  The case has indentations to hold the pieces in position for the various puzzles. 

Inside are the pieces.  These are little plastic spheres connected to each other.  They are decent enough and I suppose I was expecting too much but the product photos suggest a higher quality finish.  For the price they are what you would expect but those photos had suggested a more executive toy style finish. 

While looking at them in their indentations tiling the 11×5 layout something didn’t seem quite right.  It seemed to be the wrong dimensions.  And it is.  There are 12 traditional pentominos each of 5 units so they tile a rectangle of an area of 60 units.  Not 55 as here.  On closer inspection I realised this was not a pentomino set.  The pieces don’t seem to be formed according to any rigid rule as the pentominos are.  This has some pentomines but also some quadrominos and one trionimo.  I suspect this is what allows the patent as it is a unique combination of pieces that allow the rectangle to be covered but also to form a pyramid for the 3d puzzles.  So I suspect the rule to which they are formed is to meet the sum of 55 units and be able to form these two shapes.  As an aside this left me wondering how unique this combination of pieces  must be to allow them to fit together to fulfil both of these aims.  This will take a more gifted mathematician than I am to answer so if anybody does have an idea please leave a comment.

The manufacturer cannot be blamed for this incorrect expectation although I have noticed a couple of online retailers do describe the peices as pentominos.  I made the assumption that it was pentominos and there were no misleading claims.  But I think it is a mistake that others could make so worth mentioning.

Despite this it is still fit for much of the purpose for which I brought it; to encourage thinking skills and persistence with problems.  It comes with a colour booklet containing many problems that scale up in difficulty.   The increase in difficulty is nicely graduated and very useful when working with children.  From using other puzzles in the classroom I have noticed that starting from too easy and building up is better than starting at a doable, but more difficult level.  Children like to have some success behind them to buoy up their confidence before they reach puzzles that require persistence.  I think the omission of answers is a mistake.  I was pleased not to see them in the main book as they can prove far too tempting for children to not take a peak.  For use by a teacher, though, the answers are essential.  Not because we couldn’t work them out, of course, but because we don’t have time to.  For use as a self guided learning tool this is fine but if you want to use a set to provide a whole class lesson it is a bit off putting for teachers to have to spend the evening before working out and recording solutions for fifteen or so of the puzzles. 

I wouldn’t necessarily set them the task of doing all of the easy puzzles but one per page (there are four on each) allows that feeling of progress made.

The main way I have used them is with a group of very able children who relish the chance to exercise their mental dexterity in a competitive way.   I call out a puzzle number and the first group who has a member show me the solution gets the point.  The students have become interested in the pyramid building puzzles that they also saw in the booklet and have enjoyed working through them at a more sedate pace in their break time.  When children want to carry on with puzzles rather than go and play I think that can be seen as a big endorsement.

The children have enjoyed using them and as with many puzzles you do see a development in thinking skills.  Like with the Soma Cube the children begin to see ahead further with practise.   The children begin to spot when they are painting themselves into a corner before they go too far as they begin to think about the problem as a whole and not just about fitting in the next piece.  The booklet irritates a little when it makes some over the top pseudoscientific claims about its benefits for the brain.  “It stimulates 95% of our underused brain potential”.  This usual marketing hubris can be ignored but as with any puzzle that children focus on and engage with it does observably help develop broader learning skills.

For me the only let down was my own mistake about them being pentominoos.  Not because I can’t use them the way I intended with the children but because I had hoped to provide some supporting software for use on the IWB that other teachers could use with these puzzles and their class.  Due to the patent this is something I am now not able to do.  For the price though this is a useful object to have in a classroom as a single piece for when children choose their own activities or with a set as a whole class thinking skills development lesson.  In particular it could work as a follow up or precursor to the lessons using a Soma Cube detailed in this article.  Recommended.