Stikine Middle School students explained to a statewide audience how they are using technology to cope with the pandemic-induced changes in their education.
Members of the sixth grade class spoke at the Alaska Society of Technology in Education virtual conference Feb. 16, talking about ways technology has helped them learn throughout the year.
The organization promotes access to technology information resources for Alaska students.
Laura Davies, teacher for the sixth grade class, said she and her daughter presented at last year's conference, but this year she had the idea to let some of her students do the presenting.
"Madelyn, because she's my daughter, got to travel with me, but I said I wish I could bring my whole class with me," Davies said. "We talked about that in fifth grade, and because this was virtual, I was able to do this virtually (this year)."
Student Jackson Carney said, "I like the fact that we were able to tell people who had never heard about Flipgrid, or Skype, or the house system, to tell people how to use it in their school," adding, "It was really cool, even though we were younger than everyone else that was watching, almost everyone, to tell them stuff they didn't know."
The students had an hour to give their presentations, which included the Alaska-themed "house system" their school is using to divide up students to keep them safe during the pandemic; collaborative projects with the Wrangell radio station; using Skype to communicate with other classrooms around the world and learn from each other; and using Flipgrid to record videos and collaborate with others for school projects.
"One time, we got to Skype with a Sweden school, which was pretty cool," said student Brody Gardner. "It was pretty fun. We do it once a month-ish."
Student Andrei Siekwitch was in the same presenting group as Gardner. "We presented about Mystery Skype, Flipgrid, and the radio station. We talked about how we used Mystery Skype to connect online with others, and Flipgrid. We talked about the Elizabeth Peratrovich project we did, and also the persuasive speeches we recorded and played on KSTK."
It was a good learning experience for her students, Davies said. Students picked their own topics, wrote proposals about what they wanted to talk about, and worked in teams to create their presentations. Davies was just the editor and facilitator, she said, explaining this was a mostly student-run assignment.
It was quite popular at the conference too, she said. The class got a lot of positive feedback and heard other teachers would like to do something similar in the future.
"I want to say thank you to Ms. Davies for getting it all set up for us," Carney said. "It was really cool to be able to do something like that. ... Pretty sure everyone here would definitely present again if they had the chance."
Student Alana Harrison concurred. "I think just overall it was really fun to have that experience. ... I don't think many of us have presented on a big conference like that, so it was just a good experience."
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