Santa Goes “High Tech”

Using technology in order to transform the learning process is an ongoing goal in 3^rd grade this year. One of the most common ways to accomplish this is through the use of apps—self-contained computer programs or pieces of software that are designed for a specific purpose, especially when downloaded by mobile device users. For this particular project, we used multiple apps, a technique called app smashing, to bring a one-dimensional, paper image of Santa to life.

Students were first asked to disguise a printed-form of Santa in a way so that he wouldn’t be recognized as himself. Once we’d finished with our decorations and/or embellishments, we then learned about persuasive writing, with each student writing a persuasive paragraph to convince their reader that their colored image of Santa was, in fact, not Santa. Next, we applied an app called “Yak It” in order to make our disguised Santa figures talk. The video outcome of this was then created as an overlay to their actual Santa image, using the “Aurasma” app. When engaged with this particular app, each individual Santa was brought to life, speaking to the listener as he—the disguised Santa—presented his argument, in the voice and written words of its corresponding paragraph author—as to why he is not the actual Santa but, in reality, someone else!