Steven+Weaver-Puppetpals

Steven Weaver-[|Puppetpals] [|Puppetpals HD] Tech tool 2: I chose to do a tech tool that I read about in one of our assignments Called Puppet Pals for the iPad. This application is a live animation app that allows you to move and direct characters while you narrate through the microphone. The free app gives a set of fairy tale type characters and backgrounds. You can choose up to eight characters and layer them so they have spots in an order if desired. The characters are two dimensional and very basic but with tricks like shaking the character while they talk the play is easier to follow. Characters can be pinched to make bigger/smaller and rotated. The most obvious way to use this app is to see student’s creativity and story making (process, misunderstandings, next steps…). So writing would be the major content area that this app would be geared toward and I would say the levels that it could hit are all depending upon the student’s ability to use the features that are quite basic. I can actually see some 3-5 year olds using this appropriately if taught how to use the app features. Some other ways to use this though are to have students use it as a means of explain a lesson or skill learned (they could use the characters to explain the borrow first method in math, or the life cycle of a flowering plant). I see the strongest attribute of this being that it will help students to use dialogue and can later at appropriate times transfer that skill into their writing. The plays that are made can be up loaded/exported to your photos and then from there up loaded to youtube or emailed, which could be a great way to keep parents up to date on students work. I could see this being a great tool for 2-5 grade when used in different ways (writing, explaining newly learned skill…) but I think that with help lower grades could use it, and in some circumstances higher grades can find uses as well. I think there are a lot of possibilities for this app to be used as a tool for students showing teachers, peers, and parents that they have mastered different skills.

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