{"id":1256,"date":"2012-01-09T12:11:14","date_gmt":"2012-01-09T16:11:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/etechplace.org\/fitzpatrick\/?p=1256"},"modified":"2012-01-09T13:08:14","modified_gmt":"2012-01-09T17:08:14","slug":"angry-birds-in-2012","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.fjfitz.com\/?p=1256","title":{"rendered":"Angry Birds in 2012"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Being that 2012 is a mudslinging<\/del> election year, I am officially joining the campaign[1. This campaign is completely fictional and only exists in my head.] for Angry Birds<\/a> to be on every device possible.\u00a0 I know it is a game, but since when are games banned from classrooms, especially strategy games?[2. When I had a classroom of my own, I had a class set of chess boards.]\u00a0 Out of all of the apps and potential I have my devices, Angry Birds draws me in every time.\u00a0 I am OK with this addiction. It is not just a game in which you hurl colorful birds towards cowardly and sometimes awkwardly dressed pigs.\u00a0 In order to receive full credit for destroying the pigs dream of world domination, you have to do some serious thinking.\u00a0 The popularity of Angry Birds will help teachers introduce different types of projects that will be used throughout the school year.\u00a0 Here are some ideas for using Angry Birds in your classroom.<\/p>\n

A level a day:<\/h2>\n

Classroom teachers, especially at the elementary level, have daily morning work assignments.\u00a0 These assignments usually include a daily math or language arts problem. Why not include a screen shot of a level of Angry Birds?\u00a0 Look it as a puzzle instead of a game.\u00a0 The students could write the directions, or sketch, what they think would be the best order to complete the level with the highest score possible.\u00a0 Because it usually takes more than one bird to complete a level, the students have to think a couple of steps ahead.\u00a0 Teaching the students to think ahead is not just a skill that is needed to be successful at this game, but it is important skill to have in many academic areas and life.\u00a0 If you have an interactive whiteboard, this would be great way for kids to display their ideas for a successful high score. There are more than enough levels to do one a day.<\/p>\n

Language Arts:<\/h2>\n

I see a lot of potential for using Angry Birds in Language Arts.\u00a0 I would love for there to be a Three Little Pigs: Pigs vs Birds.\u00a0 <\/em>Sure the Big Bad Wolf couldn’t blow the houses down, but the individual characteristics of each bird could certainly get the job done.<\/p>\n

Since each of the birds has it’s own personality, biographies are another potential way to incorporate Angry Birds into writing.\u00a0 Unleashing students to document the life stories of the birds would be an entertaining read.<\/p>\n

The 4 Icon Challenge<\/a> originated from the DS106<\/a> class offered at the University of Mary <\/a>\"\"<\/a>Washington<\/a>.\u00a0 The 4 Icon Challenges makes creators think about how they can summarize a story, book, movie, or in this case a game using just four icons.\u00a0 This is a tough task for many students, but it can be practiced using stories that they are already familiar with like The Three Little Pigs<\/em> or Angry Birds.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Art and Language Arts can go hand-in-hand with Minimalist Movie Posters<\/a>, also a potential DS106 assignment. Minimalist Movie Posters make students streamline a summary from four icons to one overall theme.\u00a0 This will challenge students to truly think critically about the what they read or watched in order for one clean poster to be created.\u00a0 Because the posters are meant to be minimalist, great art skills aren’t required.\u00a0 Again this idea can be used for topics (including historical events), stories, novels, and movies that are studied in your classroom.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Science:<\/h2>\n

There are many different ways to use Angry Birds in science.\u00a0 There are topics, such as physics, that I have no business talking about that can integrate the use of Angry Birds.\u00a0 The scientific method and the skills of data collection, data analysis, and experimentation can be practiced with the use of Angry Birds.\u00a0 There are videos and links below that will take you to examples of the use of Angry Birds in science.<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.ictsteps.com\/2011\/06\/angry-birds-in-the-classroom\/<\/a><\/p>\n

httpv:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=KYh80PmMg_s<\/p>\n

Angry Birds and Physics<\/a><\/p>\n

Math<\/h2>\n

Having just worked with 5th graders on mean, median, mode, and range, Angry Birds would be a great way to study these topics.\u00a0 However, since the scores generated on certain levels can be quite high, a calculator or spreadsheet that uses formulas, may be a handy tool to have available.\u00a0 Students could find the average number of points scored by each bird.\u00a0 The mean, median, mode, and range of each class member’s attempt is another potential activity.\u00a0 Older students could determine the speed that the birds reach during their flights.<\/p>\n

While I know that the chances of seeing Angry Birds in every classroom across the country is low, the potential is there for a couple of educators to use it effectively in their classroom.\u00a0 Just the mention of Angry Birds in a Kindergarten classroom generated cheers and excitement, why not sneak some learning in….<\/p>\n

Additional Angry Birds ideas:<\/p>\n

http:\/\/ilearntechnology.com\/?p=3970<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Being that 2012 is a mudslinging election year, I am officially joining the campaign[1. This campaign is completely fictional and only exists in my head.] for Angry Birds to be on every device possible.\u00a0 I know it is a game, but since when are games banned from classrooms, especially strategy games?[2. When I had a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,99,12,13,14,15,101,103,4,10],"tags":[145,113,131,119,120,112,133,39,108,37,33],"class_list":["post-1256","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-1st-grade","category-21st-century-teaching","category-2nd-grade","category-3rd-grade","category-4th-grade","category-5th-grade","category-creativity-and-innovation","category-critical-thinking-and-problem-solving","category-ideas","category-kindergarten","tag-21st-century-teaching","tag-apps","tag-art","tag-education","tag-fun","tag-ipad","tag-language-arts","tag-math","tag-science","tag-social-studies","tag-web2-0","post-preview"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.fjfitz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1256","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.fjfitz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.fjfitz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.fjfitz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.fjfitz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1256"}],"version-history":[{"count":24,"href":"https:\/\/blog.fjfitz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1256\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1315,"href":"https:\/\/blog.fjfitz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1256\/revisions\/1315"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.fjfitz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1256"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.fjfitz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1256"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.fjfitz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1256"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}