This week in the AT&T Classroom the West Main second graders have been exploring digital tools for writing. Building from their writing work with Haiku Deck, this week the students have been using Puppet Pals HD, a free iOS app that can be used to create digital stories with animation and voice-over audio. The app offers templates with backgrounds and characters that students can use to create an animated movie with their recorded voice. Puppet Pals is a very engaging tool for encouraging students' creative thinking and language skills while also providing an opportunity to focus on the necessary elements to build a story. This morning the students were also introduced to Toontastic, a free iOS app that allows students to draw, animate and share cartoons. The app offers several adventure themes that include backgrounds and characters for students to use to create their animated story.Students are also able to add audio to their story by recording their own voices. Using tools such as Toontastic to create digital stories provides opportunities for children to use higher order thinking skills to organize and design the story elements and the traits of the characters. It also provides an opportunity for students to utilize auditory, verbal, visual, and kinesthetic modalities in combination to create a very personalized and meaningful product that reflects their learning.
