The Quiver 3D coloring app was formerly known as ColAR. It’s available on both Google Play and the iTunes app store as a free app. However, there are some in-app purchases on the free app. Another option is to purchase the Education version of the app, which includes all of the content.
I published a post about this augmented reality app at the end of last school year, lamenting the fact that I had discovered the free Planet Earth page too late for my 1st graders to experience it. This year, I knew I wanted to include this page as they learned about the continents, so I made sure to add it to my lesson plans before I forgot.
Yesterday, the students were introduced to the continents with a cute SmartBoard lesson involving a traveling guinea pig. We also used my handy floor map (best $22 ever spent!) and the huge wall map I made (longest hours of my life) to see the continents in many different ways.
Then I asked the students to label and color Quiver’s Planet Earth page. With a little instruction on how to use the app, I set them free to explore.
As I predicted, they were completely amazed to see their own writing and drawing come to life in 3D. The other features (seeing the world at night or during the day, etc…) also fascinated them.
The one challenge of the app is getting the iPad the exact height above the paper to correctly “read” the page. This meant the page could not be on the table, but needed to be on a chair or the floor for my vertically challenged 1st graders. They adjusted to this quickly, but it also became a new activity when one of the students (accidentally?) waved her foot over the page.
“Look! It’s showing my foot!!!!!!” This, of course, led to a mass migration over to the iPad that suddenly had a shoe-shaped continent.
“What else can we try?”
“Let’s try a pencil!” I found this suggestion intriguing as it actually appeared that the pencil was pointing at a particular continent. This seemed like it might have educational uses. Granted, 3D-ness would not be necessary for that image, but it does make it more fun.
The pencil suddenly became less exciting when I found a Lego zombie that had been left behind in my classroom. This, of course, inspired more enthusiastic experimentation. Because. You know. ZOMBIES. That makes geography so much more fun.
As usual, this lesson did not go the way I expected. But, if it makes it easier to remember that South America and Africa are two rather large continents separated by an ocean zombie, then I’m not too worried as to whether or not learning took place.
Plus, they rocked the assessment at the end of the lesson.
Want more ideas for augmented reality in the classroom? Check out this page of resources.
