Miranda Russnow

ECED 372

4/21/19

QR Code Reflection

For my practicum placement, I am placed in a pre-kindergarten class at South River

Elementary School. My teacher doesn’t keep a pacing guide, but rather she themes the
months to talk about different subjects. One of the subjects that the students are learning
about in April is measurement, so that is what I decided to focus my QR codes on. My ques-
tions were asking about mass and length of different items we used in the classroom daily such
as toys and writing utensils. My goal with the assignment was to make the actual questions as
interactive as possible. Rather than students trying to answer a question in their head or on a
piece of paper I wanted them to test what they thought the answer would be. Therefore I had
each of the items that were used in the questions, a balance scale, and a set of foot prints that
each represented a foot length.

I tested this assignment with 5 different students during center time. I chose the stu-
dents based on their academic level in other areas of class, making sure to have at least one
student who was at the average level, one who was more advanced and one who was below
the average level. I did this to get a full understanding on how a variety of students would react
to the use of a QR code. They used the materials given to them to find their answers and my
phone to scan the QR codes. If I were to do a QR code assignment in my own classroom, I
would not use my own phone to scan the codes, rather I would try to locate some school iPads
to use. Overall the students did fairly well with the questions but had some trouble working
with the phone to scan the codes. I don’t think the kids understood that the code on the paper
was able to make the phone do something and not just the paper in general. Since they didn’t
understand, they struggled lining the camera up with the square code.

When deciding on the idea of using QR codes in my own classroom I would say it de-
pends on the class I have. I would not do an assignment using QR codes with the younger
grades such as pre-k through 1st, however I would contemplate using them with kids in 2nd
grade and up. I don’t think the younger kids can understand the codes enough for them to be
effective. If I am in a classroom with older students, I would have to decide if the QR codes
would work with my specific students. If I feel that they are able to handle the assignment
based on their understanding of the technology and the students behavior then I would at-
tempt to do an assignment using QR codes.