MET:Explain Everything App
This page was originally authored by Megan Dodsworth, March 2014
Introduction
An app to explain anything and everything!
Explain Everything is an interactive whiteboard and screen casting application available on the iPad and Android tablets. It allows users to write and move objects on a whiteboard style screen with the added bonus of making a real time audio and video recording. Explain Everything enables users to create, annotate, animate and narrate design projects by capturing what is happening on the screen and share their final project it via email or cloud based Web 2.0 services. This formidable tool has been said to be a superhero version of PowerPoint.
History
Developers
MorrisCooke is a mobile app development studio responsible for the creation of the Explain Everything app. The company was founded in April 2010 by co-founders Bartosz Gonczarek and Piotr Sliwinski. Both creators describe themselves as technology enthusiasts with a backgrounds in corporate software development and entrepreneurship. The headquarters of MorrisCooke are located in Wroclaw, Poland. They work cooperatively with partners in the United States in the development and progress of their product. MorrisCooke’s objective is to create innovative educational, productivity and creativity.
Release
Explain Everything™ first hit the market in August 2011, and soon took the educational world by storm. Explain Everything 2.0 came a year and a half later with a refined user interface and updated menus and functions. Explain Everything™ is available:
- iOS version on the App Store for $2.99: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/explain-everything/id431493086?mt=8 (It can be purchased at a lower cost in in bulk: https://volume.itunes.apple.com/)
- Android version on Google Play Store for $2.99: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.morriscooke.explaineverything
Features
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_o26spjYmA&feature=youtu.be - Stop Motion Video
Import & Insert
Explain Everything allows you to import or insert any document, picture or video onto a slide. Documents can be in PDF, DOC, PPT or Keynote format. In addition to documents, pictures, videos, audio files and web browser windows can all be added into projects.
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Animate & Move
To put your ideas into motion, the app allows for objects (drawings, notes, text, shapes, video, pictures and web browsers etc.) to move freely around the screen. Objects can also be grouped with other elements of the slide, locked in place, and moved forward and backwards in relation to other object on a slide.
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Draw & Annotate
On the whiteboard screen user can use a pen or laser pointer, mark, highlight text and add shapes in a variety of colours and transparency. You are able to draw on top of any object, picture, video and imported document. Notes written on documents stick and move with them.
Explain everything app
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Zoom & Expand
Within each slide, users have access to expandable and endless whiteboard space that allows you to magnify and showcase everything needed.
Explain everything app
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Record & Play
One of the neatest features of Explain Everything is that the app allows you to record the happens on your screen as a / screencast . Once recorded user can navigate their recordings using a timeline, enabling users to delete and redo specific sections.
Explain everything app
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Once your project is complete, Explain Everything enables you to share your project via email or connect to cloud services such as Dropbox, Evernote, Google Drive, WebDAV, Box, SkyDrive, YouTube, Vimeo just to name a few.
Theoretical Framework
The utilization of the Explain Everything app in students learning and assessment ties nicely into / Constructivism (philosophy of education) . Reshan Richards, a co-creator of Explain Everything, considers new ideas in education, technology and self-assessment in support of a constructivist learning framework. Through the ongoing development of Explain Everything, Richards explores how emerging technologies can be used to capture and mediate discourse, in ways that data-driven approaches to assessment are not capable of measuring. Richards expanded on this ideas as a ETEDxNYED 2013 presenter.
Explain Everything & Education
Using the Explain Everything app in the classroom opens many new and exciting opportunities. It makes it easy for both kids and adults to capture what they do on screen and then share it with others. The app not only is brilliant for being able to make instructional movies anywhere anytime, but also makes such a process available for students to demonstrate what they know by similarly making such recordings and sharing with each other.
As of March 2014, over 980,000 students and educators have downloaded the Explain Everything app. With a cost of $2.99 Explain Everything is a cost-effective learning tool and can also act as an alternative to interactive white boards. A 50% discount is available for educational institutions purchasing the app in bunk.
Educators
With the app, instructors can create lessons bringing together resources from the Internet and other mobile technologies. Many teachers use this app to deliver instructional content to students. Explain Everything supports a flipped classroom style of learning in which teachers can prepare and share video lessons and interactive touch-screen activities. Projects are easily shared with students who can view information as many times as they need at home or at school. The app helps support the learning process inside and outside the classroom.
Students
With the help of Explain Everything students of all ages can create, collaborate, communicate, and consume ideas. Explain Everything offers a variety of interactive features that help engage students' interest and deepen their understanding. It provides a way for students to create and produce their own resources and share their learning.
Examples of student sharing their learning with Explain Everything
Primary
Grade One Math - Addition Word Problems http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9oujkqRi_Kc
Grade One Math with Explain Everything
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Intermediate
Journey through the solar system http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZNP8YqSQWw
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Highschool
Research project on Paul Watson, Canadian environmental activist http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fLclQmgyf1E
Stop Motion Animation
Stop Motion on Explain Everything
Karen Szu Chun Wang' Submission for ETEC510 65B Explain Everything App
Additional MorrisCooke Resources
If you enjoy using Explain Everything, here are some other useful apps created by MorrisCooke:
Stick Around : An app the allows students, teachers and parents to play and design puzzles on any topic.
PhotoPuppet : An app which enables users to create own cartoons, presentations, photo showcases, funny stories, and much more.
Explain a Website : Record your interactions with your web browser
Final Argument : An app designed for presenters which includes mind-mapped & non-linear slide
References
- Common Sense Media Inc (2014) Retrieved from: http://www.commonsensemedia.org/app-reviews/explain-everything
- Explain Everything 2.0 Retrieved from: http://vimeo.com/59845203
- MorrisCooke (2014). Retrieved from: http://www.morriscooke.com/
- PR Newswire (2014). Explain Everything™ by MorrisCooke Announces New Availability for Android Retrieved from: http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/explain-everything-by-morriscooke-announces-new-availability-for-android-249024691.html