Sandoz 5th Graders Go Birding with Livescribe Smartpens

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Wow, these few nice days have really gotten me thinking spring – bulbs, birds, green leaves…  Maybe it’s got you thinking about your spring field trip for you and your students!

Last spring, Dayna Derichs, 5th grade teacher at Sandoz Elementary with Millard Public Schools in Omaha, borrowed a classroom set of Livescribe pens for their spring outdoor field trip. Dayna inquired about birding with Livescribe smartpens at Lake Zorinsky.

I was so excited to see how this would work, because I have long thought Livescribe pens would be fantastic for outdoor field notes and especially a birding trip!

Prior to their birding experience, the students created field notebooks in which they would take field notes on their trip. They taped a section of Livescribe paper to each page so that it would be available to record birds as they took their note.

Here’s the note we received from Dayna after her Livescribe birding experience with her students…

Thank you SO much for loaning us your technology!!!!!  It was so terrific to see the kids explore nature and get excited about capturing their observations with the smart pens.  Really, it was a lot of fun.  If it’s ok, can we keep them till next week so all the classes can go back through their books and listen with the pens?  Also, I wanted to tell you that I took some pictures and a short video of the pens in action.  Check out my class website linked down here at the bottom.  It is so fun to watch the kids.

Thanks again!

Dayna Derichs, 5th Grade Teacher
Sandoz Elementary

We encourage you to think about how you can use your technology outside of the regular classroom. Many time technology allows you to much more on a field trip than you could without it – gather feedback, assess students, create accountability.

What could you do with engaging technologies on your next field trip to make it even more engaging for your students?