It is nearing NCEA exam time in my world. And so I have been busy making exam question walk through using Microsoft Office Mix and the snip tool on my surface pro 4. Office Mix is a super handy add in for powerpoint that lets you make video tutorials with ease. The surface stylus just makes writing these answers and equations easy as. It has been a while since I blogged about how I use Office Mix in class (you can see one of my first goes HERE, or some more about the features HERE and if you want to earn more about it I suggest you check out the Office Mix web page) so I thought I should give an update on my favourite go to tool. You can also add PhET animations with ease, or include webpages for students to browse. And after the recent #hacktheclassroom hack from fellow kiwi Subash my mixes might just get a little neater – I’ve put a link to his video at the end of this post 🙂
Making the exam walk throughs
My go to for Mix is exam walk throughs. To start with, I head over to the NZQA web page and find the exams and schedules I want. Then I take a picture of them using snip, and make the picture the back ground on the ppt slide so I don’t accidentally grab it and move it during my recording.
Then it is as easy as hitting the record button and away you go
Once you have finished the recording, you can either save as a video file to upload to youtube etc, or upload them to the office mix site. I tend to just upload to the mix site, and then share the links.
I also try to remember to tell my students to pause the video and attempt the questions first…. not sure how many do though!!
Here are some examples – feel free to share them with your class if you think they would find them useful.
https://mix.office.com/watch/1atew6a4k0rsq
https://mix.office.com/watch/kp68bvqtf7pf
https://mix.office.com/watch/ygnyvp07mgk5?lcid=
Student Mixes.
I have also played around with getting my students to make a mix to explain their thinking behind the exam answers. These have also been shared with the class so they can use them for their revision too. Some students are definitely more theatrical than others 🙂
https://mix.office.com/watch/s9zcsmd4dxc3
https://mix.office.com/watch/fwhdtswsgehl?lcid=
Mixes for feedback
Again, a quick video to provide feedback for students works really well. I have found this particularly useful for the (sadly, this year too many) times I am away. Students will email me a photo of their work, and I will complete a mix for feedback for them
https://mix.office.com/watch/1sw53iulm1bmo?lcid=
Mix for relief
It has also bee really good for relief – the students seem to really like a video of me talking and will listen better than if I was talking to them live. Sigh
https://mix.office.com/watch/l0tjid9bm6ui?lcid=
So while none of these are especially bright and shiny, they are really useful ways I use this tool in my teaching and learning, and can make the arduous task of exam preparation a little bit less stressful. Students appreciate being able to rewind ideas.
And with the awesome #hacktheclassroom hack from NZs own Subash, my mixes have gotten a little neater – although I still ignore the gridlines at times. You can see his hack and how to make the mix presentations neater below.
ibpossum takes on tech 