Korpa je prazna
It is almost universally accepted that History is one of the core subjects taught at school. Studying and knowing history is often seen as a stepping point for getting into a more specialised Humanities courses at a university level. In many countries History is a compulsory exam for those who want to go into studying Law, Economics, Politics, International Relations, Sociology, Psychology, History of Art etc.
However, according to different studies only 7% of American school students age 13-17 and 12% of American high school students reported that History and Social Studies were their favourite subjects. This makes History approximately three times less popular among American students than Maths. In the UK, where school education is much more specialised than in the US, moderate love for History is illustrated by the percentage of sixth form students who choose to study this subject. Around 11% of British students took History A-levels in 2009-10, which made History the 6th most popular subject overall and the 3rd most popular humanities subject among British high school students.
Although I do find this lack of interest in History striking, I realise that it is not lack of interest from students, but rather the way we teach History at school, that presents a real challenge. History can be extremely interesting, but it can also be extremely dull, especially when it is turned into the endless memorization of dates, that are often taken out of the wider historical context.
Here at Mozaik we are passionate about History and really want this wonderful subject to flourish in classrooms all over the world. One of the ways we are hoping our software can inspire students to learn history is our absolutely unique educational tool called “Time Machine”. Time Machine is designed to help students make connections between historical personalities according to their nationality, profession, date of birth and (in)famousness.
Time machine includes a huge database of historical personalities that is not only regularly updated but is also customised for the local curriculum of your country. It also includes direct links to Wikipedia articles about every historical personality that is included into the database. As most of our educational tools, Time Machine has an inbuilt test function, that lets users test their knowledge of historical personalities. Users can choose from six different test modes that include a huge database of preset questions about chosen sets of historical personalities.
The idea behind the Time Machine educational tool is simple. We wanted to create an interactive educational resource that would show that historical connections are built on much more than just dates. Studying history is one of the best ways to develop logical thinking and learn to build complex connections between separate blocks of information. Time Machine is one of the ways to illustrate this power of History.
Register on mozaWeb to try Time Machine for yourself, or access the tool in mozaBook. If you'd like to know more about Mozaik's tools for history, read our post about “Hall of Fame,” another great tool in the mozaWeb and mozaBook library.
Elementary Technology is a distributor of mozaBook and mozaWeb in the UK. Based in Telford, Elementary sells educational products directly to schools, including interactive whiteboards, projectors and visualizers. When we met the folks at Elementary, we knew the combination of their hardware offering with the mozaBook software and interactive content would make a great solution for teachers!
The staff at Elementary are very active in their sales strategy, traveling all around the country, making presentations in primary and secondary schools, as well as attending workshops, conferences and exhibitions, such as the Bett Show. They also organize their own exhibition, inviting many schools and showing off a range of digital education products alongside their commercial partners.
Last year several Elementary employees came to our headquarters in Szeged to participate in one of our partner training sessions. During that time, they learned about the mozaLearn solutions and the ins and outs of using mozaBook. As enthusiastic participants, they even began planning and creating presentations that they could use on their sales tours while they were still here at training.
If you’d like to find out where Elementary Technology is going next, check out their social media pages. They regularly share information and photos from their presentations and workshops on their Twitter, YouTube channel and blog.
We’re proud to introduce one of our latest projects: Mozaik Education has teamed up with Microsoft and Lemberger Bildung to bring students in Austria the eduTab, a functional tablet including mozaBook and mozaWeb access. The idea behind eduTab is that students should be able to buy one product which already contains just what they need, without searching for the hardware, apps, learning content, insurance and accessories separately.
That’s why eduTab was designed as an all-in-one solution, ideal for students to use in the classroom and for homework and independent learning at home. EduTab was officially announced at Microsoft’s Education Summit Austria in Vienna in November 2015. If you would like to read more about the event and eduTab, please have a look at the Microsoft Austria website (in German).
EduTab includes the mozaBook software and interactive digital content pre-installed, and also comes with a protective cover and insurance to provide an well-rounded learning experience that is both innovative and practical. For more details about the eduTab, including specifications and the option to purchase are all available on Lemberger Bildung’s website. We hope the eduTab enriched with mozaBook and mozaWeb will give Austrian students a great learning experience!
One of our partners, Prosveta Publishing House in Bulgaria, has been filming and publishing webinars about their digital books on mozaBook and mozaWeb. The webinars show how the digital books can be accessed and used in classroom and how teachers can incorporate the interactive content into their lessons. After the live broadcasts, the webinars can be found on their YouTube channel.
To date Prosveta has recorded webinars for their digital textbooks in subjects such as art, geography, natural sciences, music, mathematics, economics and others. In addition to covering features and functions of the digital textbooks, many of the webinars also show how teachers can create additional content for the books in mozaBook.
Our Bulgarian partners Keisiem and Prosveta have translated Mozaik’s digital content into the Bulgarian language and, with the help of our mozaBook Editor platform for publishers, Prosveta has already uploaded over 100 interactive textbooks for teachers in Bulgaria to use in their digital clasrooms and have plans to add more.
Prosveta introduced mozaWeb back in September, where students can use the digital books online and now they are introducing mozaBook for teachers to make the digital textbooks a part of their class presentations.
Webinars are a great way to show off the features and uses of mozaBook for a wide range of subjects and grade levels. We wish Prosveta much success with the webinar series and hope many teachers and students will benefit from using mozaBook and mozaWeb in Bulgarian schools and classrooms this year.
One of the services we provide is training and certifications for our international partners in the mozaLearn system to independently hold training sessions for clients in their local market. This is an important part of our business and our partners' business, because we believe that training teachers to use technology is an integral part to the success of digital education and we encourage our partners to hold training sessions for the teachers in their market. One great example of this is a recent training session held by our partners in Egypt, GIMPEX at their office in Cairo.
The training participants came from Exzellenz Zentrum, an institute for language education which hosts a joint post-graduate program between Ain Shams University in Egypt and Leipzig University in Germany. Students who participate in this program of study have already completed a college degree and would like to continue their studies in the German language, with the goal of earning a master's degree in teaching German or Arabic as a foreign language.
GIMPEX held a 2-day training on the effective use of mozaBook in teacher training for the lecturers who conduct the joint degree program. The trainees will eventually use mozaBook as a part of their pedagogy in training Exzellenz Zentrum students who are working towards their teaching degrees. During the training session certified mozaLearn ICT expert trainers from GIMPEX gave the trainees overview of many of the features in mozaBook, focusing on the basic features of the software and many of the tools available in the system.
The group will meet again for a third day of training during which the course participants will make their own presentations using mozaBook. The trainees will also continue to learn about and practice using more features in mozaBook. We bet the training participants will create some great presentations!
GIMPEX is planning additional training programs for later this year. If you'd like to follow the latest developments and news about mozaBook in Egypt, please visit the Mozaik Egypt page on Facebook. If your company is ready to offer a comprehensive digital presentation and content solution for K-12 education and provide training in your region, please contact us for more information.
The third dimension is the best dimension! 3D holograms, images, and now printing- 3D is a way to view things that has continued to fascinate us for decades and still today shows so much potential in a variety of industries. This post is going to explore the benefits of using interactive 3D models in the classroom.
First of all, I’d like you to think of 3D models simply as a teaching resource that can be used in a variety of subjects. Typically, what first comes to mind is the use of 3D resources in the sciences - anatomy, biology, geography - but it’s possible to use them for history classes, mathematics, literature, or even in discussions with students about current news events.
The evolution of the Mozaik 3D
3D is a very important part of the mozaLearn digital education system. Originally the type of 3D models (created by the development company Rendernet were created for visual design, construction, real estate and advertising, but the developers at Rendernet saw a lot of potential for their models in the field of education. We started out about 7 years ago with a modest number of models, 10 to be exact. The developer and animator team grew, and so did their capacity to produce more models. Eventually Mozaik and Rendernet joined forces and today our catalog of 3Ds has grown to 1,097 with no sign of stopping!
Our models have come a long way in every aspect, from design to content to capabilities. They have also come to life in new forms! Some of our individual 3D models are now available on the iOS App Store and Google Play for Android to download and use directly on your smartphone or tablet.
About their use in pedagogy
Let’s take a biology class for example. A teacher can introduce a new animal with photos or a video, start some discussions about its habitats and habits and then use a 3D model to go further, exploring the animal’s anatomy in detail. The end result is a deeper understanding of the animal with the added benefit of keeping students’ attention by using several different learning sources.
A similar strategy can work for all subjects, chemistry is my next example. If a chemistry teacher would like to introduce a new molecule, he or she can send 3D models of the molecules to all students’ tablets, so they can explore the structure in an interactive manner. Afterwards, the teacher can show a video experiment or conduct an experiment in his/her lab, so that students can take the next steps to understand the molecule’s chemical interactions.
How about history? Teach your students about ancient cultures by asking students to explore the Wonders of the Ancient World 3D model and watch the video. After asking some questions about the ancient structures, give the fun task of asking students to open the Walk function in the City of Babylon 3D and explore the walkway.
