We’re excited to introduce this community to another "Eduporium Featured Educator" interviewee. Every month, we’re highlighting an educator who uses EdTech to empower his or her students with much greater learning opportunities. We love being able to share these stories and their work with you and hope that this series continues to give all educators encouragement to try new things in the classroom! This month, we’re featuring Mark Wakita, a science teacher from California, who loves to use drones, VR, AR, coding, movie making, and more to enhance student learning in his classroom!
Mark Wakita
Middle School Science Teacher and CS Teacher, Red Hill Lutheran School, Tustin, CA
Q&A:
How have you used EdTech effectively in your instruction?
This year, as in years past, we use a host of different EdTech solutions to reinforce instruction. This includes using virtual and augmented reality to transport students to landforms around the world, to provide a 3D representation of our solar system in their hands, to view 3D animated creatures for life science studies, or to give kids immersive rides on a roller coaster inside a cell (also used for science-based narrative writing).
Students also implement science journals by logging reflections on their studies on personalized web pages for these different topics. Concepts on velocity, kinetic energy, or the writings of instructional text (creating their own science experiment to demonstrate concepts) are also reinforced through our RHLS Drone Corps. Students also design algorithms to demonstrate some scientific principles (like the water cycle and the rock cycle) with advanced students even moving these algorithms to code.
Online simulations for genetic breeding and dissection are also used to reinforce understanding of genetics and heredity. And, finally, our student-created minute movies demonstrate learning and presentations using green screens for weather studies. This helps students understand the practical applications for EdTech in addition to the science concepts these tools support.
What do your students enjoy most about using EdTech?
The general feedback I get from students is that EdTech is engaging, easy to use, and it reinforces material. One unanticipated byproduct is that the use of program design and coding in our science class has stirred general interest in coding and what coding does. In addition, EdTech offers built-in differentiation, helping students at both ends of the academic spectrum. Finally, I’ve heard from some students and their parents that, in the case of the genetic breeding app, it was so addictive that students were not only doing this at the dinner table but got their parents engaged as well!
Letting the students comment, here is some feedback regarding the use of EdTech.
“I like the virtual reality because you get to experience what specific places look like in 3D. This makes you feel like you’re actually there but you’re really not.”
“My favorite thing is that it’s easy to use…and we can explore more stuff that’s not just in a book.”
“Every different type of technology we use is all very entertaining to play with and experiment.”
"I really like how it’s interactive and makes class more fun."
“It makes learning more fun and sometimes easier to understand.”
“I love that we are allowed to be creative with our websites and slides that we make.”
“I can learn how to code some cool stuff—maybe even games if we’re good enough at coding.”
What interests you most about Eduporium?
Eduporium, especially all of their blogs (Tips & Tricks and News & Updates), provides insights into people, new products, and strategies that can make EdTech come alive. The Eduporium Featured Educator series is particularly inspirational in highlighting peers who are actively using EdTech to reach students.
We thank Mark for speaking with us! If you know of any educator who is doing exciting things with EdTech, feel free to recommend them (or yourself!) for us to feature by emailing us with your short blurb about how you’ve used STEM tools to empower your students! Find out more about how Eduporium can help revamp your classroom, library, or makerspace across our site. Create an account to save with your discount!