QR C ODES AND I - NIGMA By Margie Mutimer St Thomas The Apostle Blackburn

IP AD /IP OD A PP Search i-nigma on the Apple App Store It will turn your camera into a barcode reader

W EBSITE Google QR Stuff and choose the search that reads QR Code Generator: QR Stuff Free Online QR Code Creator. You will need to use the IPod/IPad i-nigma app in conjunction with the QR Stuff website.

H OW I BEGAN USING QR CODES AND I - NIGMA IN THE CLASSROOM. Last year as a year 5/6 teacher I created codes for the children to scan using the IPods and IPads. One example was a post assessment quiz I created at the end of an Inquiry topic. The questions were embedded into the codes.

H OW D ID THE C HILDREN BEGIN C REATING THEIR OWN C ODES ? As part of our literacy program we were writing book reviews. Each child chose a picture story book that he/she liked from the library. Next the children read the book, wrote a review and then typed the review up on the QR stuff website, creating codes.

W HAT D ID T HE C HILDREN D O W ITH T HE C ODES ? After the children had finished their codes they ed them to themselves or to the teacher. Then they were printed and cut out, ready to be attached to the book. I realise now that the codes can be downloaded and saved in a file to be printed…this is much easier! The children then contacted their reviews onto the back of the books they had reviewed in the hope that children from other classes would use the IPods and IPads to read their reviews. Before the books went back to the library we read each others reviews using the scanner.

B ENEFITS F OR O THERS This year as a year 1/2 teacher I had some of the books in the classroom with the reviews on the back of the books. I showed the class some of the codes on the books and used the i-nigma app to show them how to read the code. As a class we read some reviews. The children were excited to hear the reviews to determine which book we might choose to read.

P ROBLEMS When typing up the reviews on the QR stuff website we realised that there was a word limit for each code. We found this out when a childs code wouldnt scan. We had to then judge the maximum amount of words that could fit into a code and make the review over a couple of codes. Make sure that when you or the children are creating codes that they click on Plain text in step 1 which is entitled Data Type.