Day 122 - Google Glass: Opening Eyes In All Fields - BHS AP Bio Students

This post originally appeared on the BHS Help Desk Blog  

Editor’s Note: This is the second guest post from BHS students who have experimented with Google Glass. I’d like to point out that this post was the collaborative and voluntary effort of the students. After finding out that we had a pair of Google Glass, the students of Mr. Wood’s AP Biology class approached me and asked if they could experiment with Glass. It is evident from their post and the video they captured, which can be seen below, that they are very intrigued by Glass and curious to explore its potential in an educational setting. 

This is the group of students that used the Google Glass in the Electrophoresis Lab. From left to right, we have Arvind Pasupuleti, Shivesh Shah, Aman Srivastav, Mr. Wood, Ashay Lokhande, Jay Patel, and Kush Patel. Mr. Wood is wearing the Google Glass in the picture because he authorized us to use it during the Electrophoresis Lab. His desire to integrate technology in learning has led to a much more efficient AP Biology class that is enriching for all students involved.

Encouraging Innovation

Mr. Wood encourages the use of technology to improve learning experiences. In this picture, he is trying out the Google Glass to see exactly how it works and how it can be used in his lectures. During our Electrophoresis Lab, Mr. Wood wanted us to record our method so that we could later observe exactly how effective the lab was. The Google Glass also helped us really focus in on the lab as we wanted to record the best execution of the Electrophoresis Lab that was possible. Mr.Wood is one of best teachers any of us have ever had. He is hard working and is never overlooking an opportunity to give his students an edge in their learning. The Google Glass is just one of many instances in which he has tried to acquire technology to help advance his student’s knowledge and learning capabilities.

Experience with Google Glass

This is not my first time using the Google glass, but it is my first time using them in my bio class. Below describes my first impression of the Google glass while using them in a mock trial for AP world history:

“The Google glass are an innovative technological marvel, that certainly has some productive uses…When I first saw the Google glass I was like most people, I was skeptical. How would this be of use? Would this be too distracting to be used in any formal or intensive settings? However, I was proven wrong…The most surprising thing, however, was that it did not distract the user much. The screen can be so discreet that it can be used efficiently and productively in school. During the trial of the Mongols in my AP World class, I was able to say my closing statement with the glasses on. I was never distracted by them during my speech. This was a great experience, and is one that I cannot wait to relive.” The full post can be found here.

Even though I have previously used the Google Glass, I am still baffled by it’s capabilities and effectiveness. The use of the Google Glass in science may be questioned at first, but ends up being a perfect match. Its effectiveness was surprising the first time I used them. This time, however, it amazed me with its practicality in the sciences. My precursory thoughts, in regards to the use of Google Glass during a lab, was that it would cause me to mess up in the lab. I knew that the screen would not distract me because I used them before. However, I was just standing and talking the first time I used them. Would I not have to worry about the glasses falling off while I worked? Would I not have to take extra time planning and aligning my head to get the perfect video? Would it not record the lab well enough for it to serve a purpose? The answer to all these questions was no, no it would not. The Google Glass may feel a bit odd at first, but quickly become unoticable. They do not feel like they could fall off your face, and they are certainly not a nuisance. The best thing, however, was how magnificent the 720p video came out. At times I even forgot that I had them on. The only thing that I could possibly have a problem with is that the battery heats up and can make it uncomfortable to wear after a while. However, this is one of the most common problems with new technology. It is also something that can be quickly fixed, so do not fret over such a minute flaw.

The combination of Google Glass with any science is just astounding. Google Glass provides a easy and truly hands free approach to recording data. From recording the process gel electrophoresis, to recording open heart surgery. Google Glass could become key in future scientific discoveries due to its simplicity and effectiveness. However, it can also be very helpful on a smaller scale. While recording the lab, I kept thinking to myself about how these could be used by everyone. Doctors could record surgeries to show to young med. school students. Researchers could record experiments without having to set up multiple cameras to make sure that their findings are captured. Taxonomists could even record their examination of subspecies. That is not all! The amount of possibilities are virtually endless. They could even be used well in a highschool classroom. Mr.Wood sheds some light on such possibilities when he said, “This is amazing! I could even use this to pre-record labs for all my classes.”

  A Second Experience with Google Glass

During this lab, I was one of the lucky ones able to actually use the Google Glass. When I first heard of such a product, I honestly doubted the capabilities of a “wearable Android-powered computer” on your head; however, my experience with Glass quickly changed my thoughts. When putting on the Glass for the first time, there was no trouble integrating the miniature display into my vision. With the display in the upper right hand corner, I was able to see things just as clearly and fully as usual. The only difference was that my head now possessed a computer. After about a minute of silently jerking my head up and down and swiping away at the touch-pad on the right side of the glasses in amazement, I was finally able to gather my thoughts. I was astonished at just how much information I could see just with a swipe of my finger! After saying the magic words, “Ok Glass”, I was once again amazed. From the list of commands, I was easily able to begin recording a video. I continued on with the lab procedure as usual, and I was able to successfully complete my part of the lab without any trouble. The screen in the corner was no intrusion on my lab activities. The process of recording a lab normally required 2 people, and resulted in cramped up workspace and a poorly angled video. This was not the case, however, with the Google Glass. I was able to perform the steps without having someone follow me around and stick a camera into my field of view. In addition, the 720p video produced in the end was both high quality, and at an angle that really gave an insight into the process of a lab experiment. This product really gives a new meaning to putting oneself in another’s shoes! When I finished with the Google Glass, I could not imagine the endless applications of such a product. I can see Glass being used in places like laboratories, or even on the streets of a city. While I only sampled a fraction of the capabilities of Glass, the full potential of this product has not yet been reached. I cannot imagine the change the innovative Google Glass will bring to this modern world.

Applications of Google Glass

After learning about how Google Glass worked, I was extremely amazed that such a device existed! Being able to try it out was an extraordinary opportunity, and the glasses felt like they were straight out of a science fiction movie. With the features available on Google Glass, I could easily tell that these would be come in handy for other things rather than just lab experiments. For example, if you wanted to look up a picture of a cell undergoing metaphase in mitosis, the glass could pull up a picture within seconds! I can see the Google Glass improving in the future and becoming more widespread and used by more and more people.

Features of Google Glass

Google Glass is a wearable computer with an optical mounted display that is being developed by Google in the Project Glass research project. Google Glass displays information in a smartphone-like hands free format that can communicate with the Internet via natural language voice commands.

Here are seven cool features for the Google Glass:

• Record Videos & Take Pictures – The Google Glass can record 720p videos and take pictures at 5 MP without requiring the user to touch the hardware. Just say the word and Google Glass will take a picture or record a video. The photos and videos will be stored on the 12 GB of usable flash memory out of the 16 GB total of the device, and can also be shared on social networking websites or emailed.

• Show Messages – The second cool feature is that Google Glass will show you text messages as well as emails you receive. It will also allow you to reply to them by voice commands.

• Finding Information – If you are in the habit of asking a lot of questions, you will love the Google Glass because you can google unknown things in an instance. You simply ask a question and the device will pull the answer from the internet. For example, you can ask when the Statue of Liberty was built or to give you a few photographs of a bacteria cell dividing and the device will display the results in front of your eyes.

• Maps – Google Glass uses the popular Google Maps, so that users will be able to record the course of their journey or to just look up locations by using voice commands.

• Video Sharing – Google Glass can also show the world that you are seeing, which makes any event a memorable experience for everyone. If you are attending a family function, sports event, or a concert, the Google Glass will allow you to share the feed with your friends and family in real-time and make them a part of the experience.

• Google Now – Google Now, the digital voice assistant for Google, has been integrated in this device. Google Now uses natural language to answer questions, make recommendations, and perform actions. It will keep track of your daily habits, such as when you leave for office or the websites you look at when browsing the web. It will give you recommendations for other sites on the web or even give you weather updates periodically.

• Language Translation – This feature is neat and comes in handy when dealing with situations abroad. The user just needs to ask Google Glass to translate a phrase/sentence from one language to another and it will satisfy the user’s needs.
  

Google Glass  - Future Implications

When looking at my peers wearing Google Glass during our lab, I was reminded of science fiction movies where similar glasses were used.  Just a few years ago, no one could have imagined that such glasses would become reality and that high school students would be able to experience this technology first-hand.  While Google Glass is undoubtedly beginning to change the way students are learning and actually experiencing curriculum, this technology is poised to change every facet of our lives outside of academia.

In the future, it is conceivable that everybody will own a pair just as most of us own a cellphone.   While only in its relative infancy and being used in a trial phase, Google Glass is beginning to already change the way people live their lives.  Currently, Virgin Atlantic staffers are using  (trail phase) Google Glass for first-class passenger check-in and foreign language translation of notices.  Educators are already using Google Glass for instructional purposes, and coaches are using the technology to gain better data perspective on player performance.   The New York City Police Department is using the glasses to evaluate law enforcement procedures.

With the exponential rise in technology, battery life will increase, applications will be developed, and processing speeds will increase, all contributing to widespread use of immersion technology.  The design of the head-mounted glasses will evolve, resulting in a streamlined and cost-effective device with greater functionality.  Surgery, gaming, journalism, and law enforcement are just some areas that will be impacted in the future, giving give rise to ethical, legal, and moral dilemmas never faced before. It is not hard to imagine surgeons using Glass to access patient history and locate incision points. A doctor will be able to spend more time with his patient and arrive at a diagnosis and treatment plan faster due instant access to patient data, drug interaction information, and reference data.  The sports enthusiast will never miss a game, soldiers will use the technology to increase situational awareness in the field, and watching movies and gaming will become more realistic than ever imagined. The possibilities are endless with Google Glass, and this is only the beginning.

Day 90 - Technology in the Sciences at BHS - Mr. Wood's AP Bio Students

This post originally appeared on the BHS Help Desk Blog.

Guest post authored by BHS students Ashay Lockhande, Arvind Pasupuleti, Jay Patel, Kumaraman Srivastav, Shivesh, Shah and Kush Patel which highlights the way they are using their iPads as members of Chuck Wood’s AP Biology class.

Over the course of the last three years, Burlington High School has begun to adopt the iPad into everyday academic uses. The usages of the iPad are virtually unlimited with the ever-expanding variety of applications suited for almost every course imaginable and the ability to unleash a student’s creativity. Over the last three years, both students and teachers have come to greatly appreciate the iPad and its many applications.  This is especially evident in Mr. Wood’s AP Biology class.  Many uses of the iPad have manifested themselves throughout the year and yet, many remain “unexplored.”  The iPads have created an ideal learning environment for students where they can take detailed notes, share information and notes with each other effortlessly, and open their textbooks on their iPads without lugging their textbooks in their backpacks and hurting their backs.  As you will see, the iPad has virtually unlimited usages and will continue to be used as a tool necessary to the academic student.  Here is a glimpse of the ways the iPad is used in Mr. Wood’s classroom.

Note-Taking

In this picture, a student is taking notes by using the Notability application on his iPad. He has an external bluetooth keyboard that connects to the iPad. In this situation, the student is easily able to take quick and efficient notes that will help him prepare for a test. Notability is a very powerful application that will transform how you work. It helps one sketch ideas, annotate documents, sign contracts, complete worksheets, keep a journal, jot travel notes, teach a class, make a presentation and much more. With iCloud support, your notes stay up to date on all your devices. Notability also helps record lectures and meetings, which adds on the the note-taking experience.

Microstope Photographs

This microscopic image was photographed with a smartphone. The image represents the late metaphase of the cell cycle in onions. Smartphones are useful in an AP class because they can be used to record images and share it among classmates. Taking a picture with a smartphone is relatively simple and produces clear images. With the advances made in smartphones, many models offer built-in digital cameras with immediate snap and send functionality. This allows remote fieldworkers to instantly photograph and send images/videos of anything. Photos can also be modified and labeled using the Notability application. Smartphones make sharing photos/videos quicker than ever before. They benefit students in the majority of their classes.

Annotating Pictures

With the use of an iPad, a student is able to draw on pictures using an app such as Notability. Shown on the picture to the left is an image of an onion root cell taken during a mitosis lab.  The picture was taken with a smartphone, though an iPad would have worked in the same manner.  After taking the picture with a 13 megapixel camera, students were able to see which cells in the onion were in which phase of cell division.  To count the number of cells in each phase of cell replication, we imported the photo into an editing application, where we could mark each type of cell with a dot.  Each dot of a different color represents a cell in a particular state of replication.  The stylus, without a doubt, was useful in pinpointing each minute cell and marking it with a dot.  Without the help of the iPad, counting the large amount of cells may have been a very difficult task.

Chromebooks & Cameras 

In the picture shown below on the left, a student is making use of a Chromebook in order to easily type up a lab report. Technology also facilitates the integration of data – graphs and tables are easily added to the lab report. Below shown on the right, a student is using his iPad camera which serves as a data capturing device in AP Biology. By taking pictures of the slides, it saves the student time by having the image on their iPad — no need for drawings. Phones can be used as helpful cameras too.

Drawing Diagrams & Typing Notes

Students can not only take written notes, they have the ability to draw pictures and diagrams on their iPads. A stylus is very helpful in this case. A wide variety of choices are available on the iPad to help the student make his/her diagram as detailed as possible. Students have the ability to take notes on the iPad. It is faster and more efficient to type out notes rather than handwriting them. Furthermore, this allows the student to carry one less notebook, which may not seem like a lot, but definitely decreases the weight of a student’s backpack substantially.

Capturing Lab Data Firsthand

Through the use of an iPad, one can display and record data. The iPad can be used to take pictures and videos of an experiment. These pictures and videos can be implemented into students’ lab reports to give the reports a whole new dimension to the project. With the tap of a screen, the collection of one’s observations and data is no longer a problem. A student’s lab report is around a couple thousand words, on average. However, they say that a picture can say a thousand words. Then imagine how much a video can say? This is how the iPad is able to add a whole new dimension to traditional lab reports and experiments.

Notability

Shown in the picture below on the right is a diagram of a cell as drawn by a student in a note-taking application on the iPad.  As mentioned, taking notes, both in the classroom and at home, is easily done with the help of the iPad.  The most commonly used app for taking notes at is Notability.  This application has the capability of editing documents and pictures, taking notes (typed and hand-written), and recording audio.  Notability also has the capability of synchronizing data with Dropbox accounts.  This means that your notes are automatically backed up to your Dropbox account, so you can view them from anywhere there is an internet connection!  This multi-faceted application is a favorite among students enrolled in almost any course.

Data and Graphs

Whether creating a data table or a pie chart, recording data during labs is a piece of cake for biology students.  Certain applications allow for data to be inputted in the forms of tables, and they regurgitate them in the form of splendid graphs and charts, which accurately represent the data.  Even handwriting data tables and graphs is a simple task when you have a iPad! Using applications such as Notability allows one to simply create graphs that can be modified at free will and look spectacular!

The students have been able to see the advantages of the iPads first hand, but have the teachers acknowledged these advantages? A.P. Biology teacher Mr.Wood sure has. He believes that they can have a large and positive impact on the students. He has a saying, that “It is just another study tool that you need to take advantage of.”Mr. Wood emphasizes that one should take full advantage of his/her resources to help themselves succeed. He not only allows students to use this technology in the classroom, but he also encourages it. He reminds us to bring our iPads to class whenever we have a lab so we can use it to help collect and record our data. However, this is not the only time we may use our iPad’s.

Mr. Wood sees the advantage of technology, especially the iPads, in everyday lectures as well. He encourages his students to look up pictures or the related topics on their devices during the class discussions. He knows that he is not a walking database, though he is close to it, so he wants kids to search up whatever he does not know, or cannot show. This is mainly with the iPads, but is not limited to them. The iPads have certainly changed what and how kids have been able to learn in their classrooms, and has allowed teachers to widely expand their teaching capabilities. Mr. Wood has embraced this change and has allowed his students to benefit from it. The iPads have truly been an effective educational tool.