Explain Everything

Explain Everything….more than a screen recorder

by Jon Orr

I’ve been loving the app Explain Everything more and more! Yes it’s great because when students record their work it forces them to think more about language and ideas than they are used to. I like that! That is what drew me to the app in the first place. But I’ve been loving it even more….. I’ve been using it lately NOT to record work. I’ve been using it to deliver content to students in a new way. We can use the app as a sort of enhanced digital workspace! Here is an example: 20140523-111859-40739536.jpg

Click the picture to download the Explain Everything file

I created this for my lesson on periodic functions. Here is why this is awesome……

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Instantaneously Awesome!

by Jon Orr

So check this out!
Our lesson in Advanced Functions is “I should be able to determine the instantaneous rate of change of a function at a particular instant.”

Here’s what went down….

We began by grabbing an Explain Everything file from our Google Drive.

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We watched Dan run!
After watching his run I asked… “Draw a prediction in the file of his Elevation Vs. time”

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We used AppleTV to share our graphs…..brave students shot their graph up for display and for everyone to judge! Students were asked to support their prediction.

We then moved to the next slide….. And saw a Desmos graph of mimicking most of the student predictions.

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Students were then asked to use the secant line on the desmos graph to:
1. Find the average rate of change between 2 seconds and 10 seconds.
2. Estimate the instantaneous rate at exactly 2 seconds….by manipulating the points.

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After a consensus on what everyone thought was the instantaneous rate…and a discussion on what that means….we moved to the next slide to verify our result by looking at the tangent line at 2 seconds.

Lastly, we verified those results by calculating the instantaneous rate at 2 seconds using algebra!

Overall it was a pretty we’ll received lesson!
Any thoughts/feedback?

Sorting Out Explain Everything

by Jon Orr

There are lots of great things in Math being done with the app Explain Everything! Explain Everything has been the go-to app of choice for many teachers, students to showcase learning and understanding.
Students in my class have used this app to explain major concepts from the course. For example, a student used the app to create a video on the differences between Direct and Partial variation.

The app can be used for other great uses besides video recording…

I have been using the app to create short Sorting activities.

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 Click the picture and download the Explain Everything .xpl file.

 

The white space in the app allows users to easily move, rotate, and sort images on the screen. In the example above, as a warm up my students were asked to sort the solution to the equation in the correct order. We then had discussions on steps to solve equations.

Below is another sorting activity on sorting out linear relations. They were asked to match up tables, graphs, equations, and descriptions.

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 Click the picture and download the Explain Everything .xpl file.

 

Another sorting activity: For MPM2D or MCF3M or MCR3U – Sorting the Quadratic Formula. Students were asked to sort out solutions to solving equations by completing the square. After sorting a number of solutions, they were asked to sort the general development of the Quadratic Formula.

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 Click the picture and download the Explain Everything .xpl file

 

With Explain Everything’ ease to make how to videos, and sorting activities…..it’s a must have on your iPads.