History Technology Project Ideas

As a follow up to our focus on technology integration at the department level, and after meeting with all department heads, below are detailed a number of technology project ideas (using either the iPads, the computer labs or the 3D printer) specific to your department. It is our hope that at least one of these ideas might inspire you as you plan out your courses for the rest of the year.

1. Using Google My Maps to create custom maps of historical and political events. Students can create their own maps with points of interest, images, text and directions. Here are the detailed steps for creating a Google My Maps: http://www.educatorstechnology.com/2015/08/excellent-google-maps-tutorials-for-teachers.html. And you can see some examples made by our middle school last year here: http://blogs.hebronacademy.org/technology/2016/04/22/grade-6-google-maps-ski-trip/.

2. You can take custom map making to the next level by using Scribble Maps (https://www.scribblemaps.com) which allows students completely annotate a Google Map with lines, shapes, links etc. Here is a good example of what a student project can look like: https://www.scribblemaps.com/maps/view/LollyRun_
TelarahRutherfordAberglasslyn/LollyRun2016

3. I want to highlight a couple of alternative timeline apps to Timeline 3D, which I know has quite a lot of limitations: https://itunes.apple.com/app/timeline-maker/id527025710?mt=8, https://edu.hstry.co, https://timeline.knightlab.com

4. One project that could be used in most classrooms is the student creation of an interactive textbook using either the iPad app Book Creator (https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/book-creator-for-ipad/id442378070?mt=8) or iBooks Author (http://www.apple.com/ibooks-author/) in the library computer lab. iBooks Author is the app Trevor used to create his writing textbook. Students could create these for themselves as study guides or for younger students and they can contain all types of media, graphics, audio and video.

5. Create a screencast with the Explain Everything app. This app lets you import all kinds of media and files and lets a student basically record a presentation as a video into the iPad. It records all their movements and annotations within the slides as well as recording their voice. Is very useful for students to plan out and explain a complicated concept. This gives you a good overview of the app: http://blogs.hebronacademy.org/technology/2015/02/19/explain-everything/

6. Here is an excellent Apple classroom example of how a History unit could be taught in an iPad classroom: http://www.apple.com/education/teach-with-ipad/classroom/tudors/

7. Here are a couple of different services and an example of some interesting infographics that can be created using technology: https://infogr.am, https://www.canva.com/create/infographics/, http://www.informationisbeautiful.net. These are creative ways of visualizing data and could be used for presentations or classroom displays.

8. There is a large selection of historical and strategy games that are available on the iPad. These are interactive games that contain a lot of useful content. Here is an example: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/battle-of-the-bulge/id521833787?mt=8)

9. Historical interviews/podcasts/recordings using AudioCopy or GarageBand. This could be as simple as recording scripted conversations or role plays and then editing them for errors, or creating complete radio shows with professional postproduction including a soundtrack, sound effects, etc. This presentation gives a good overview of podcasting in the classroom: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1lRc8rAVVNR61VR6JnEhspH84W93v
NZ8VMX6GL3Lmo4U/present?slide=id.g838051e1d_2_3

10. Creation of historical artifacts, buildings and archeological sites in 3D. Using modeling tools like SketchUp, Tinkercad and Sculptris students are able to create all kinds of 3D shape and objects that can then be printed in physical form. Multiple objects can be created and then positioned together to create more detailed models, for display or presentation. Here is a good overview of what has been done with our 3D printer so far: http://blogs.hebronacademy.org/technology/2016/10/21/3d-printer-update/

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