Choose Your Own Adventure

When students create their own Google Slides to demonstrate their learning, they are taking ownership over what they know and can do.  Allowing students to share some creativity will also enhance their connection to the content.  One way to do this is by having them create a Choose Your Own Adventure story in Google Slides.

When you create and share Google Slides, you can link certain slides to another slide.  That makes it possible to create a slideshow that will jump around in a specific order of your choosing.  See the example below.

When you are on a certain slide, that URL is unique and will link to that slide. Many students and teachers have used this to make interactive stories in Google slides based on other topics they have studied. See the examples below from around the web.

Treasure Hunt
The Secret Village
Butterfly Friends

Here are some other helpful resources for a project like this.

Planning Template
StoryboardThat

Cornell Notes

Notetaking continues to be an effective way to transfer knowledge to long term storage in the brain, and also offers a means for faster recall of information.  With the inclusion of technology in the classroom, it remains to be seen what impact typing vs. writing might have on this phenomenon.  Regardless, notetaking is an important skill that can be done in variety of ways, but Cornell Notes is an effective means for both traditional and digital means.

Cornell Notes was developed by Dr. Walter Pauk at Cornell University.  This focused means of taking notes allows for greater retention.  There are ten steps to the Cornell Way:

1. Create Format
2. Organize Notes
3. Review and Revise
4. Note Key Ideas
5. Exchange Ideas
6. Link Learning
7. Learning Tool
8. Written Feedback
9. Address
10. Your Reflection

You can read more about this method here or watch a video about it here.

A printable version of this format can be found here.
A digital version for use in Google Drive can be found here.

Reflection and returning to these notes is an important piece of retention.  It is important to scaffold instruction to return to the information and allow students to interact and reflect on their notes.