By Mary T McCullagh

An exciting new feature of SMART Notebook 11 collaborative learning software is Shake to Group/Shake to Ungroup. This feature allows students and teachers to group objects and text on a SMART Notebook page with fewer steps and greater excitement, interactivity and engagement.

Here’s how you can do it:

1. Open a SMART Notebook file and add some text, drag in objects from the Gallery or use one of your own. Add as many items as you wish.
2. Marquee select the objects you wish to group together and then touch the selected items with your finger and move or ‘shake’ them back-and-forth. The items you marquee selected will automatically be grouped!
3. This same feature will also allow you to ungroup items that are grouped into one object. Just repeat step 2 and the items that are grouped together will become separate objects again.

Watch me demonstrate Grouping objects on the SMART Board interactive whiteboard in this :13 second video.

This new feature streamlines the grouping steps and provides added interactivity that students will enjoy demonstrating. Teachers are also able to group items as the lesson unfolds without losing momentum or the attention of learners. This feature also allows you to seamlessly augment your Notebook page with additional content.

I use this Grouping and Ungrouping feature during the course of a lesson. During a brainstorming session, students compile a collection of notes and ideas in SMART Notebook 11 collaborative learning software. As they begin to organize the ideas into categories, the student marquee-selects the desired items and uses the Shake-to-Group feature to associate the ideas and notes. Students then move and animate the grouped items to demonstrate their thinking and understanding.

I encourage you to incorporate this feature into your lessons!

About the author

Mary T McCullagh has been teaching History and U.S. Government for 21 years. She is an Advanced Placement Exam Reader in U.S. Politics and Government and a SMART Exemplary Educator who is also a SMART Notebook collaborative learning software and SMART Response interactive response system Certified Trainer, along with a SMART Certified Interactive Teacher.

McCullagh is a member of the Executive Board of the National Council for the Social Studies www.socialstudies.org and regularly presents on SMART products at local, state, national and international professional organization conferences to share her knowledge with other teachers, and to engage teachers in sharing their SMART experiences.