Annotation for
Teachers, using existing devices
Annotating texts is something that English teachers love to
do, having this process visible to students is often considered a complex task.
With appropriate willingness to experiment with existing technology, you need
never have to gesture wildly at a section of a book in front of 25+ students
again.
The only things you really need for the simplest form of
this is a smart phone, some bulldog clips, some school chairs and a metre
ruler. The bulldog clips are to keep the book open and relatively flat; the metre
ruler is to provide a base for the smart phone to sit above the text and you
will need some standard issue school chairs to balance the ruler and device on.
The finished product looks something like this, with either a smart phone or
tablet:
This set up works perfectly for doing annotation in-between
or before classes. If you are using a device like a surface pro, or any device
that can be flexibly rotated into a ‘tablet mode’, you can attach cables to
your classrooms projector to have this produce live to the screen of your
classroom. I use a program called ‘OBS’ (Online Broadcasting Software - https://obsproject.com/ ) that is free and
open source. It is also very easy to learn and use. This will produce what is
visible on your screen to the projector and also allow you to record it. This
includes picking up audio of you, or your students talking others through the
thought processes of annotation as they do it. Allowing students to copy the
annotations and be aware of the thought processes that produced them.
If you are without a tablet-like device, the next best
option is the smart phone, but this adds another layer of complexity as you
have to share your screen wirelessly with the projector. For this purpose I use
a software called ‘Reflector’ (https://www.airsquirrels.com/reflector)
that costs about $11 and is available on both Android and IOS devices. It will
do the same job as your projector cables and again, for this process I would
also use OBS to record the screen of your laptop that will have an image of
your smart phone’s view on it. Again, audio can be collected from both or
either sources without difficulty.
In terms of creating a hazardous-looking assemblage of
chairs at the front of your room and then laying reasonably expensive devices
precariously on top of it. There is a more portable and professional-looking
option, that should cost under $10. This product comes to us from the lazy
world of eBay, where you can buy flexible plastic clips with reticulated arms,
that are originally designed so that people do not have to hold their phone or
iPod, whilst on the toilet, or in bed. Searching for ‘iphone flexible holder’
will produce a range of reasonable examples. The outcome is a less stable
result than the above, but produces perfectly fine output that I have used many
times in the past years without issue.
Lastly, if you have tried
each of these methods and have developed a habit of using video to show
students annotation there is a fully paid option. These devices combine all of
the elements above into one specifically designed piece, they have a stable,
heavy base, a built in light, auto-focus features, built-in Microphones and so
forth. They do start at about $100-200 dollars however, so I woudn’t recommend
starting at this point, but rather moving through the makeshift forms above to
see if the techniques described have pedagogical utility to you. The device
pictured is an IPEVO VZ-R that has served me very well. Good luck trialling
annotating semi-digitally with your students!
Running Word Count: 23,747
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