Technology standards are currently so broad and all-embracing that embedding them into a semester of Science was a natural fit. I think this reflects the fact that the tech standards define themselves as tools for a set of skills that are universal (as far as education is concerned).
For example, communication is a standard that probably exists in every content area. In the case of science, communication is one of the important parts. After all, it's been said scientific research is worth very little if it isn't communicated to others. So meeting the communication standard of technology is easy. The added bonus of blogs and similar technology is that students can communicate their experiments to others who have not witnessed their experiments. In my current classroom, communication is somewhat artificial because the students and I conduct the same experiment and all know what our results. My hope is that by communicating with a classroom of students who were not involved in the same experiment, their communication becomes more authentic. I would hope students to see what it means to explain procedures and results clearly and why it's necessary.
The standard of collaboration was also an easy fit for science experiments and one that seems applicable to many school assignments. 6th grade science is not an one-student affair. Students work with a partner to conduct experiments. Linking two classrooms with blogs allows my students to solicit feedback about hypotheses and experimental designs from other students with different perspectives. Collaboration in 6th grade science has a chance to expand outside the classroom walls.
Ultimately, embedding a technology standard into a non-technology course is as natural as embedding a standard about students using language (e.g. how to explain, persuade, etc.) into any course besides English. Technology, or language, gets used across the curriculum regularly without standards being identified, because technology or language is a tool. The technology standards are written in a way that makes them easy to identify as being used in a content area classroom.
Thursday, December 10, 2009
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Managing Technology Peripherals
Aside from the SmartBoard, my most frequently used technology peripherals (from the perspective of the Tech and Info literacy) are cameras and cell phones, which I use with my students for identical purposes--taking pictures and capturing video. It turns out students these days are likely to have cameras on their cell phones, which has been a great help, since students are not as likely to leave their cell phones at home as they might their digital cameras. Students also won't have parents worrying about them taking the family camera to school.
As with all technology devices, there are some details that I have learned to be aware of while using cameras and cell phones.
1. In general, transfering the pictures/videos to computers can be a hassle.
A. Often these devices store data on memory cards. Computers need card readers to be able to access this data. Sometimes the memory card does not fit the card reader, but students have fortunately turned up with adapters. In either case, a test is necessary because some computers cannot read the data even when they "see" the memory card. Other times students need cables to transfer the data from their camera/cell phone to computers.
B. There are similar issues with the data, but the need for a cable requires students to keep track of one more item besides their camera/cell phone. Ideally, all phones will eventually connect to the internet at which point images/videos can be posted directly online or emailed.
2. On many cell phones, image quality is an issue when a video is used on a computer. I've seen videos that looked spectacular on a cell phone turn to a jerky, accelerated, pixelated mess. We didn't make much of an effort to fix this problem, just tried transfering it a few different ways, none of which made a difference. Fortunately, there are many cell phones that work fine, and I expect they will only improve with time.
Areas where I have not focused as much time with peripherals are the typical class management areas. Typical class management that one would associate with any piece of class equipment, for example, a technology peripheral before computers had the monopoly on the word technology. A microscopes is the main one I use through science class. And every teacher knows that class management specifies all sorts of appropriate procedures for the use of such equipment: proper usage, storage, maintenance, etc. In the case of cell phones and digital cameras, my use has been casual and that has led to occasional chaos regarding who has whose memory card, cable, adapter, etc. It's time I used appropriate procedures for the use of equipment with which students are so familiar.
It's also about time I fully integrated a document camera into my teaching. It replaces the overhead projector and allows students to display their paper directly to the class without the use of plastic transparencies. ISBangkok has purchased some for the teachers and I have one at my disposal. Jonothan Steenwijk, fellow ISB teacher and COETAILer, blogges about the power of his in his math lessons. It is a low maintenance peripheral with relatively simple management since students barely touch it. I imagine that I only need to set it up, and after that there would be no further management issues. Hopefully, when I blog again, I will have already integrated it to my lessons.
As with all technology devices, there are some details that I have learned to be aware of while using cameras and cell phones.
1. In general, transfering the pictures/videos to computers can be a hassle.
A. Often these devices store data on memory cards. Computers need card readers to be able to access this data. Sometimes the memory card does not fit the card reader, but students have fortunately turned up with adapters. In either case, a test is necessary because some computers cannot read the data even when they "see" the memory card. Other times students need cables to transfer the data from their camera/cell phone to computers.
B. There are similar issues with the data, but the need for a cable requires students to keep track of one more item besides their camera/cell phone. Ideally, all phones will eventually connect to the internet at which point images/videos can be posted directly online or emailed.
2. On many cell phones, image quality is an issue when a video is used on a computer. I've seen videos that looked spectacular on a cell phone turn to a jerky, accelerated, pixelated mess. We didn't make much of an effort to fix this problem, just tried transfering it a few different ways, none of which made a difference. Fortunately, there are many cell phones that work fine, and I expect they will only improve with time.
Areas where I have not focused as much time with peripherals are the typical class management areas. Typical class management that one would associate with any piece of class equipment, for example, a technology peripheral before computers had the monopoly on the word technology. A microscopes is the main one I use through science class. And every teacher knows that class management specifies all sorts of appropriate procedures for the use of such equipment: proper usage, storage, maintenance, etc. In the case of cell phones and digital cameras, my use has been casual and that has led to occasional chaos regarding who has whose memory card, cable, adapter, etc. It's time I used appropriate procedures for the use of equipment with which students are so familiar.
It's also about time I fully integrated a document camera into my teaching. It replaces the overhead projector and allows students to display their paper directly to the class without the use of plastic transparencies. ISBangkok has purchased some for the teachers and I have one at my disposal. Jonothan Steenwijk, fellow ISB teacher and COETAILer, blogges about the power of his in his math lessons. It is a low maintenance peripheral with relatively simple management since students barely touch it. I imagine that I only need to set it up, and after that there would be no further management issues. Hopefully, when I blog again, I will have already integrated it to my lessons.
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
Classroom Laptop Use & A Best Practice to Add
Laptop carts are a classic case of an area where students might accumulate, linger and get rowdy. With each cart being accessible to realistically only two students at a time (even that many constitute a crowd), when more than two students try to get laptops from the cart, there is inevitably conflict. I should say that I'm speaking of 6th and 7th graders. To minimize crowding and potential conflict, I ask that students take turns to collect laptops, with students waiting until the group before them has collected their computers.
With my students, there are also issues of proper care, so I have assigned them a number which corresponds to a computer on a particular cart. Students know that they are accountable for their particular computer and if theirs is not properly stored or located, they will have to check the entire cart before leaving on the following day.
As we at ISBangkok are not a one-to-one school regarding computers, we share the carts between classrooms. Often computers arrive non-functional or without a charged battery. Sometimes one computer's wireless card isn't working. Sometimes one computer does not load a student's profile. Rather than solve the problem by asking students to double up, I make sure to have extra computers on hand so that a student can use a back-up computer if necessary. I'd say that the need for extra computers comes up at least once each class.
Beyond these basic practices of mine, I've gotten some new ideas from a blog post at Design 4 Learning called 23 Things about Classroom Laptops. One has been to not use labtops like textbooks. When I've done some writing activities, I've asked students to use a Word Document because I feel they spend more time and give the writing more care than if they handwrite it. But I'm missing out on the opportunity for students to include images, videos and links to various related websites. In other words, I've been using the laptop a bit like a textbook, when I should be maximizing it's usage and letting kids "go digital," which would no doubt be more engaging to them. I could imagine that a student would take more pride and more stake in the writing portion of an assignment if they were generally more motivated in the assignment because it included multimedia.
With my students, there are also issues of proper care, so I have assigned them a number which corresponds to a computer on a particular cart. Students know that they are accountable for their particular computer and if theirs is not properly stored or located, they will have to check the entire cart before leaving on the following day.
As we at ISBangkok are not a one-to-one school regarding computers, we share the carts between classrooms. Often computers arrive non-functional or without a charged battery. Sometimes one computer's wireless card isn't working. Sometimes one computer does not load a student's profile. Rather than solve the problem by asking students to double up, I make sure to have extra computers on hand so that a student can use a back-up computer if necessary. I'd say that the need for extra computers comes up at least once each class.
Beyond these basic practices of mine, I've gotten some new ideas from a blog post at Design 4 Learning called 23 Things about Classroom Laptops. One has been to not use labtops like textbooks. When I've done some writing activities, I've asked students to use a Word Document because I feel they spend more time and give the writing more care than if they handwrite it. But I'm missing out on the opportunity for students to include images, videos and links to various related websites. In other words, I've been using the laptop a bit like a textbook, when I should be maximizing it's usage and letting kids "go digital," which would no doubt be more engaging to them. I could imagine that a student would take more pride and more stake in the writing portion of an assignment if they were generally more motivated in the assignment because it included multimedia.
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
Relevance of NETs for Teachers and Admins
How relevant are the NETs for Teachers and Administrators to being a "Good Educator" today?
The NETs for Teachers is as general as the NETS for students, in that if you removed the technology piece, those standards could come from an Ed Psych textbook from a teacher prep program. Insert the word digital or technology and you have NETs for Teachers. Few people would argue with their validity.
Who could imagine being a Good Educator without facilitating learning or inspiring creativity? The same is true for authentic learning experiences; modeling the use of a tool or a skill; citizenship or responsibility; and professional growth. This list comes directly from the NETs for Teachers.
As in the NETs for Students, technology is a cross-curricular vehicle for these qualities of a good educator.
I haven't read any literature on educational administration, but once again, the list of NETs for Administrators reads like a commonly-accepted list of qualities of good administrators: vision, a culture of learning, professional learning, school improvement, and citizenship. Just insert technology and you have good DIGITAL qualities of administrators. Would anybody argue with those?
Honestly, NETs almost seem too simple to be Earth shattering. Technology has always been a tool/means for humans to meet objectives. I don't believe NETs is proposing anything new in that respect. ISTE seems to be steering clear from the fact that educational technology is an end in itself. It's just the most current means to achieve the ends that education deems appropriate. Am I missing something here?
The NETs for Teachers is as general as the NETS for students, in that if you removed the technology piece, those standards could come from an Ed Psych textbook from a teacher prep program. Insert the word digital or technology and you have NETs for Teachers. Few people would argue with their validity.
Who could imagine being a Good Educator without facilitating learning or inspiring creativity? The same is true for authentic learning experiences; modeling the use of a tool or a skill; citizenship or responsibility; and professional growth. This list comes directly from the NETs for Teachers.
As in the NETs for Students, technology is a cross-curricular vehicle for these qualities of a good educator.
I haven't read any literature on educational administration, but once again, the list of NETs for Administrators reads like a commonly-accepted list of qualities of good administrators: vision, a culture of learning, professional learning, school improvement, and citizenship. Just insert technology and you have good DIGITAL qualities of administrators. Would anybody argue with those?
Honestly, NETs almost seem too simple to be Earth shattering. Technology has always been a tool/means for humans to meet objectives. I don't believe NETs is proposing anything new in that respect. ISTE seems to be steering clear from the fact that educational technology is an end in itself. It's just the most current means to achieve the ends that education deems appropriate. Am I missing something here?
Friday, November 27, 2009
Ensuring students are learning the tech and info lit they need
How can teachers and schools ensure that their students are learning what they need when it comes to Technology and Information Literacy?
I'll start with the idea that the "What they need" about Tech and Info Lit is defined by the IETS and AASL standards, which is the use of current technology for general skills that are found in all subject areas. I'll also draw from my current experience which is at International School Bangkok.
1. Give teachers time and training to use it themselves, so their use with students will be based on their own authentic use. A good example of this is the series of ISB Certificate of Educational Technology and Information Literacy courses.
2. Embed the use of tech into the school at the teacher and admin level, for example, online learning environments like a Moodle (ISB's version is PantherNet), for teachers to post and share course work. Another example would be web-based Office products like Google Apps, which include Gmail and Google Docs.
3. Give students some room to use the tools they think are relevant. We all know students can teach themselves plenty about technology just by exploring and experimenting with their tech discoveries. An example of that comes from my colleague James Denby. He gave his students the option of making presentations on various applications, such as VuVox, Prezi or one more I can't remember.
Obviously, the particular applications will continue to change over the years, but it will likely advance and become more complex. Exposing students to or allowing them to use current technology will keep them as prepared as possible to use new technology.
I'll start with the idea that the "What they need" about Tech and Info Lit is defined by the IETS and AASL standards, which is the use of current technology for general skills that are found in all subject areas. I'll also draw from my current experience which is at International School Bangkok.
1. Give teachers time and training to use it themselves, so their use with students will be based on their own authentic use. A good example of this is the series of ISB Certificate of Educational Technology and Information Literacy courses.
2. Embed the use of tech into the school at the teacher and admin level, for example, online learning environments like a Moodle (ISB's version is PantherNet), for teachers to post and share course work. Another example would be web-based Office products like Google Apps, which include Gmail and Google Docs.
3. Give students some room to use the tools they think are relevant. We all know students can teach themselves plenty about technology just by exploring and experimenting with their tech discoveries. An example of that comes from my colleague James Denby. He gave his students the option of making presentations on various applications, such as VuVox, Prezi or one more I can't remember.
Obviously, the particular applications will continue to change over the years, but it will likely advance and become more complex. Exposing students to or allowing them to use current technology will keep them as prepared as possible to use new technology.
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
Teaching NETS and AASL Standards - Whose Job Is It?
At first glance, a question about where standards are taught has an easy answer - in the course where they belong. Take science standards, for example, about scientific inquiry or physical science concepts like Forces and Motion. Nobody would even ask where those standards should be taught. The answer is obviously science class.
But technology standards are not as clear cut as other content standards such as science. Traditionally, one thinks of tech standards as skill specific knowledge. Use Excel. Make a PowerPoint presentation. Etc. But the most recent body of technology standards doesn't sound like that at all.
Take the National Educational Technology Standards whose logo is pictured and hyperlinked below.
The standards from this document read like a general skill set that could be found in any content area.
A look at the Standards for the 21st Century Learner linked through the picture below show the same general skill set.
As a matter of fact, my first reaction was "What do these have to do with tech?"
What becomes clear as you read these standards is that they don't intend to describe technology as a content area, but perhaps more as a method or tool that applies to all content areas through a set of general skills.
As an ESL teacher, I realized this was no different than a holistic view of ESL as being the use of language across the content areas. Language is a method or tool to apply to any content area. It is used in every content area, and often specifically taught specifically as it applies to certain content areas, for example, science and the genre of lab/research reports. Few people would fail to see the applicability of language to a content area. The dream of ESL teachers is that content area teachers teach and use the language of their discipline to all their students. It is in fact the ideal context for the development of language. Pulling students out of their classes to teach them language is the same thing as removing language from its context.
I'd have to guess that it would be the dream of tech coordinators for content teachers to use and teach technology in the content areas. By analogy with ESL, I would agree that embedding technology into the content areas and teaching and using it in that context is the way to go. In other words, it's not just the job of tech teachers to teach teach, it's content teachers' job too.
But technology standards are not as clear cut as other content standards such as science. Traditionally, one thinks of tech standards as skill specific knowledge. Use Excel. Make a PowerPoint presentation. Etc. But the most recent body of technology standards doesn't sound like that at all.
Take the National Educational Technology Standards whose logo is pictured and hyperlinked below.
The standards from this document read like a general skill set that could be found in any content area.
A look at the Standards for the 21st Century Learner linked through the picture below show the same general skill set.
As a matter of fact, my first reaction was "What do these have to do with tech?"
What becomes clear as you read these standards is that they don't intend to describe technology as a content area, but perhaps more as a method or tool that applies to all content areas through a set of general skills.
As an ESL teacher, I realized this was no different than a holistic view of ESL as being the use of language across the content areas. Language is a method or tool to apply to any content area. It is used in every content area, and often specifically taught specifically as it applies to certain content areas, for example, science and the genre of lab/research reports. Few people would fail to see the applicability of language to a content area. The dream of ESL teachers is that content area teachers teach and use the language of their discipline to all their students. It is in fact the ideal context for the development of language. Pulling students out of their classes to teach them language is the same thing as removing language from its context.
I'd have to guess that it would be the dream of tech coordinators for content teachers to use and teach technology in the content areas. By analogy with ESL, I would agree that embedding technology into the content areas and teaching and using it in that context is the way to go. In other words, it's not just the job of tech teachers to teach teach, it's content teachers' job too.
Monday, October 26, 2009
Final Project Reflection
Being introduced to a new technology, namely Photo Story 3, I thought of retrying a project in EAP Math/Science (an ESL support class) that I had done last year using Movie Maker. The idea was to prepare students for a difficult text they would face in their mainstream Science class. They jigsawed the text by each making a digital story for a few sentences from the article and then watched the combined digital stories before embarking on a solo read. Using Movie Maker turned out to be overkill and more complicated than necessary. It was also too time-consuming to ask students to learn the technology and make a digital story for as much text as we gave them.
When introduced to Photo Story 3, I knew it was the simpler technology I was looking for. I also had the luxury of having more students this year and being able to divide the text into smaller segments. But I realized that the text was still too long, so I took it upon myself to make the example digital story from the first third of the article.
I also decided to try and apply my recent Zen-ization of Power Point slides to use as images in my digital story. This added an extra level of complexity, because instead of just importing images into Photo Story 3 and using the built-in text editor to add text, I made the Zen-ified slides and added text in Power Point, then exported each slide as an individual .jpeg image file. (Is there an easier way to do this?) Even though this was more complex, it meant I could design the slides to be more Zen than they might have been if I had designed them in Photo Story 3. I also used this opportunity to do two additional things. First, I was able to model giving credit to images from Flickr or anywhere else. And second, I made some screen casts to cover the various procedures involved in the technology. Here's one of those.
Making such a long digital story myself with carefully designed slides in Power Point and proper URL citations gave me a lot of perspective on what students would have to do. Over the course of two COETAIL class afternoon work sessions and one afternoon in a coffee shop, I think I logged about 6 hours of time making a nearly 4 minute digital story. The bulk of that time was actually spent making Power Point slides. Once I had the slides, importing them into Photo Story and recording my voice was a fairly quick. Photo Story was simple to figure out on my first time to use it. I ended up using almost 50 slides in the story, including some text-only slides. No kidding that making a presentation more Zen makes presenations longer. Unbelievable. But probably the most visually pleasing and helpful bunch of slides I've ever made. I'm not sure I would ever want to spend 6 hours again though. A shorter model would do the job just as well.
As for the students, the digital story making took 4 periods on average. Some students finished in 3, but others needed another period. Although the students needed one to two days to design their slides, I'd say the new-technology-learning-curve factor added an extra day or two as well. That included showing some students how to use Power Point and all students how to use Photo Story 3, and even some how to uplode their files to PantherNet, ISB's version of Moodle. Students learned or at least were exposed to a lot of technology. Most of them picked it up quickly. We had a major technology hurdle with the voice recordings and microphone settings. Even with some tech support, it was still a bit of a mystery as to when the voice would be recorded loud enough to be heard in the published digital story. About half the times it was and half the times it wasn't. Because we didn't have access to the same computers on different days, one day's settings would not carry over to the next.
When I saw the students' final stories, I was impressed by the students more Zen slides. Absent were the usual dull bullet lists of point after point after point. Images took the center stage. I was also impressed by some particularly creative students who drew their own digital images using some program like Paint to capture difficult concepts that they couldn't find photos or other images for. I'm not sure if I was blinded by the charming creativity of the young artists, but I'd be willing to bet that the students graphic interpretations of the concepts were better than using someone else's images. This is an interesting return to student art for concepts, but now in digital form. It hadn't even occurred to me that students could still make drawings on their computers.
Ultimately, using Photo Story 3 was better than Movie Maker. Much simpler. The ultimate product of the jigsaw activity could be compiled and viewed as a whole. A traditional jigsaw for the same length article would have been hard pressed to compile so many different parts for viewing in a whole. However, the technology element reduced the direct student interaction that characterizes traditional jigsaws. Students worked individually, although they could have worked in pairs. As a matter of fact, when a few students finished early, I put them in pairs to create a second digital story. In this case, the students interacted extensively. So the trade off doesn't necessarily justify replacing a traditional jigsaw with a digital one, but perhaps supplementing it. If students were "fluent" in the technology and didn't need to practice it independently, they could work in pairs and interact more in this manner. For the purposes of comparison, a traditional jigsaw would have taken about half the time, I'd estimate. Hopefully, the gap between the traditional and digital methods will decrease with time as the student become more and more proficient.
When introduced to Photo Story 3, I knew it was the simpler technology I was looking for. I also had the luxury of having more students this year and being able to divide the text into smaller segments. But I realized that the text was still too long, so I took it upon myself to make the example digital story from the first third of the article.
I also decided to try and apply my recent Zen-ization of Power Point slides to use as images in my digital story. This added an extra level of complexity, because instead of just importing images into Photo Story 3 and using the built-in text editor to add text, I made the Zen-ified slides and added text in Power Point, then exported each slide as an individual .jpeg image file. (Is there an easier way to do this?) Even though this was more complex, it meant I could design the slides to be more Zen than they might have been if I had designed them in Photo Story 3. I also used this opportunity to do two additional things. First, I was able to model giving credit to images from Flickr or anywhere else. And second, I made some screen casts to cover the various procedures involved in the technology. Here's one of those.
Making such a long digital story myself with carefully designed slides in Power Point and proper URL citations gave me a lot of perspective on what students would have to do. Over the course of two COETAIL class afternoon work sessions and one afternoon in a coffee shop, I think I logged about 6 hours of time making a nearly 4 minute digital story. The bulk of that time was actually spent making Power Point slides. Once I had the slides, importing them into Photo Story and recording my voice was a fairly quick. Photo Story was simple to figure out on my first time to use it. I ended up using almost 50 slides in the story, including some text-only slides. No kidding that making a presentation more Zen makes presenations longer. Unbelievable. But probably the most visually pleasing and helpful bunch of slides I've ever made. I'm not sure I would ever want to spend 6 hours again though. A shorter model would do the job just as well.
As for the students, the digital story making took 4 periods on average. Some students finished in 3, but others needed another period. Although the students needed one to two days to design their slides, I'd say the new-technology-learning-curve factor added an extra day or two as well. That included showing some students how to use Power Point and all students how to use Photo Story 3, and even some how to uplode their files to PantherNet, ISB's version of Moodle. Students learned or at least were exposed to a lot of technology. Most of them picked it up quickly. We had a major technology hurdle with the voice recordings and microphone settings. Even with some tech support, it was still a bit of a mystery as to when the voice would be recorded loud enough to be heard in the published digital story. About half the times it was and half the times it wasn't. Because we didn't have access to the same computers on different days, one day's settings would not carry over to the next.
When I saw the students' final stories, I was impressed by the students more Zen slides. Absent were the usual dull bullet lists of point after point after point. Images took the center stage. I was also impressed by some particularly creative students who drew their own digital images using some program like Paint to capture difficult concepts that they couldn't find photos or other images for. I'm not sure if I was blinded by the charming creativity of the young artists, but I'd be willing to bet that the students graphic interpretations of the concepts were better than using someone else's images. This is an interesting return to student art for concepts, but now in digital form. It hadn't even occurred to me that students could still make drawings on their computers.
Ultimately, using Photo Story 3 was better than Movie Maker. Much simpler. The ultimate product of the jigsaw activity could be compiled and viewed as a whole. A traditional jigsaw for the same length article would have been hard pressed to compile so many different parts for viewing in a whole. However, the technology element reduced the direct student interaction that characterizes traditional jigsaws. Students worked individually, although they could have worked in pairs. As a matter of fact, when a few students finished early, I put them in pairs to create a second digital story. In this case, the students interacted extensively. So the trade off doesn't necessarily justify replacing a traditional jigsaw with a digital one, but perhaps supplementing it. If students were "fluent" in the technology and didn't need to practice it independently, they could work in pairs and interact more in this manner. For the purposes of comparison, a traditional jigsaw would have taken about half the time, I'd estimate. Hopefully, the gap between the traditional and digital methods will decrease with time as the student become more and more proficient.
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
Screencasting in Education
Screencasts are a great substitute teacher for short tasks that can be explained in a couple of minutes. And not just for students, but for co-teachers as well.
In a class that Jono Steenwijk and I co-teach, we had divided up some tasks during co-planning that consisted of my preparing screencasts for the technology nuts-and-bolts of our project. We used SMART Recorder from the Notebook Software for SMART Board.
Jono and I quickly discovered some benefits of screencasts.
1. Screencasts teach teachers too. A co-teacher can learn from the screencasts if he hasn't yet explored the technology.
2. Screencasts are transferable. A co-teacher can use another teacher's screencast.
3. Screencasts differentiate. Students can watch the screencast once or multiple times.
4. Screencasts free up teacher time. While students are (re-)watching screencasts, teachers can help students in other ways that aren't as "mundane" as click here, now click here, and finally click here.
A minor word of caution: It might take a couple of "drafts" to make a screencast, but that depends on how well you narrate and perform on the spot. The investment of time on the teacher's part would be made up for if students are using and learning from screencasts outside the classroom.
Here are the screencasts we used for some PowerPoint and Photo Story 3 tasks.
In a class that Jono Steenwijk and I co-teach, we had divided up some tasks during co-planning that consisted of my preparing screencasts for the technology nuts-and-bolts of our project. We used SMART Recorder from the Notebook Software for SMART Board.
Jono and I quickly discovered some benefits of screencasts.
1. Screencasts teach teachers too. A co-teacher can learn from the screencasts if he hasn't yet explored the technology.
2. Screencasts are transferable. A co-teacher can use another teacher's screencast.
3. Screencasts differentiate. Students can watch the screencast once or multiple times.
4. Screencasts free up teacher time. While students are (re-)watching screencasts, teachers can help students in other ways that aren't as "mundane" as click here, now click here, and finally click here.
A minor word of caution: It might take a couple of "drafts" to make a screencast, but that depends on how well you narrate and perform on the spot. The investment of time on the teacher's part would be made up for if students are using and learning from screencasts outside the classroom.
Here are the screencasts we used for some PowerPoint and Photo Story 3 tasks.
Video & Video Editing in Education
Even though YouTube has been around for about 5 years now (?), even just two to three years ago, I was still using VCR tapes in the classroom. Yes, it was easy and reasonable, but now that video has become web-based it's even easier to use than before.
1. Instead of going to the International School Bangkok library to look for video, I now just search on YouTube, and show them live in class. Just in case my connection isn't working in class, I can use Zamzar or the Download Helper Plug-in in the FireFox browser to download the file ahead of time.
Here's one I used in class on Rice Cultivation that I embedded in the WetPaint Wiki I was using for class. (I am uploading a screen capture since the Wiki is private.)
2. Instead of finding the videos myself, I can ask students to search for videos themselves. In a Science class I taught about 2 years ago when I was at Rose Marie Academy, during the last few days of school, students made a Wiki page using insect videos. They wrote questions for each other from the videos, so students had to watch each other's videos and answer their questions.
Here's a screen capture example.
3. Another usage of video I've experimented with has been with videos of the students themselves. In an EAP Math/Science class (English for Academic Purposes = ESL), students previewed formal lab reports they would be learning about in their main classes through video lab reports. I was able to post these videos in our Wetpaint Wiki for students to watch and evaluate.
Ultimately, web-based video is bringing or has the potential to bring video into the classroom more than before. It is definitely becoming much more accessible to make and view videos from anywhere.
1. Instead of going to the International School Bangkok library to look for video, I now just search on YouTube, and show them live in class. Just in case my connection isn't working in class, I can use Zamzar or the Download Helper Plug-in in the FireFox browser to download the file ahead of time.
Here's one I used in class on Rice Cultivation that I embedded in the WetPaint Wiki I was using for class. (I am uploading a screen capture since the Wiki is private.)
2. Instead of finding the videos myself, I can ask students to search for videos themselves. In a Science class I taught about 2 years ago when I was at Rose Marie Academy, during the last few days of school, students made a Wiki page using insect videos. They wrote questions for each other from the videos, so students had to watch each other's videos and answer their questions.
Here's a screen capture example.
3. Another usage of video I've experimented with has been with videos of the students themselves. In an EAP Math/Science class (English for Academic Purposes = ESL), students previewed formal lab reports they would be learning about in their main classes through video lab reports. I was able to post these videos in our Wetpaint Wiki for students to watch and evaluate.
Ultimately, web-based video is bringing or has the potential to bring video into the classroom more than before. It is definitely becoming much more accessible to make and view videos from anywhere.
Monday, October 19, 2009
Digital Stories
I made this digital story to show my students what a digital story was, because I wasn't sure they were familiar with the medium/technology. It is a simple digital story which consists of only two photos, some text and a few words. Because I was familiar with the technology I was using to make it (Windows Movie Maker) and because I had a complete vision of the "story," it took a matter of minutes to create. With that said, those short few minutes were possible because I had already spent a few hours previously using Movie Maker.
My hope was that my students could make a similar length movie about an academic subject, namely part of an article about cells. Despite the expectation that the students' movie last 20-30 seconds and include 2-3 images, I was unable to transfer my knowledge of Movie Maker to the students to save them the hours that I had needed to become proficient using it.
Nevertheless, a digital story provides another option for a project or for submitting work. It could fit into the classic list of differentiated products: essay, song, game, poster, PowerPoint presentation, etc. Add to that the digital story. I now know there are numerous other technologies for creating digital stories: Photo Story 3, Voicethread, or Vuvox to name just a few. (The former is a free download from Microsoft, whereas the latter two are web-based.) As students become exposed more and more to the digital story, the time required to use the technology should decrease. Ultimately, making a digital story could be as simple for a student as checking email.
Besides modeling the use of digital stories to my students, I could use them to deliver content. My final project for this class, about which I will blog later, is an attempt to scaffold difficult language for ESL students as well as model digital story technology.
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Guilty of non-Zen
Shame, shame everybody knows my name. And everybody who saw the following presentation knows I took a 10 year backstep on the design.Does this look like 1998? Mountain landscapes, silhouettes, wow. How many bullets is that? How many words? Don't bother counting, it's just a rhetorical question.
I normally don't present in this way if I can help it. So what happened? Uh. . .well. . .I got lazy? Is that a valid excuse for non-Zen presenting? Probably not. But non-Zen presentation making is a lot less time consuming than Zen presentation making.
With that said, I chose the above presentation, which I used on Open House for Parents because I know it is a presentation I will give many more times in my career.
Since this was my first slide, I thought that in a more Zen-like presenation, my personal history could fit in nicely with a map. How would this look instead?
Instead of reading bullet points, I could refer to particular stars on the map of the world and say whatever I need to say about it. I first saw a slide such as this in a Zen-nified presentation for parents, but I couldn't resist the temptation to play with prezi.com to for my presentation.
Just now, I realized that this part of my presentation could just was well be done with Google Earth and be much more engaging than a two dimensional map.
Regardless of what form the final presentation takes and what technologies are involved, there's no doubt that any of the new approaches beats out the old one for my
Friday, September 18, 2009
Ferris Wheels & Multiples: Monday's Math Lesson Intro
I've already used Creative Commons Image Search for Still Images, but what's the Blip.tv tab I see there next to the Flickr tab? Videos. Well, why not use it this Monday to start a lesson on Multiples that is titled Riding Ferris Wheels.
The teacher's guide to the math book opens with a few questions such as "How many of you have ever been on a Ferris wheel?" and "Did you ever wonder about the number of trips around that you would get?" and "How does the size of the Ferris wheel affect your ride?" The guide also suggests using (cardboard?) circles (with a seat drawn on them) on a screwdriver to illustrate ferris wheels.
Why not show a quick video first? The students actually see the ferris wheel revolve, and to add a bit of a "problem" element into the quick intro, I could ask students to figure out how long it takes for one full revolution. This is slightly challenging for 6th graders because the video only shows the upper half of the ferris wheel.
In terms of visual literacy, this video adds the visual element, particularly movement, to the senses being integrated in this lesson intro. So theoretically students' attention and memory encoding will be better (if what I read about Sensory Integration on the Brain Rules website is accurate). However, I don't believe this video will deliver too much when it comes to emotional impact. So in that sense, there is still room for a better video although, can Ferris wheels be very emotional ever?
Here's the video, courtesy of Matt Black's Video Sketchbook on Blip.tv
The teacher's guide to the math book opens with a few questions such as "How many of you have ever been on a Ferris wheel?" and "Did you ever wonder about the number of trips around that you would get?" and "How does the size of the Ferris wheel affect your ride?" The guide also suggests using (cardboard?) circles (with a seat drawn on them) on a screwdriver to illustrate ferris wheels.
Why not show a quick video first? The students actually see the ferris wheel revolve, and to add a bit of a "problem" element into the quick intro, I could ask students to figure out how long it takes for one full revolution. This is slightly challenging for 6th graders because the video only shows the upper half of the ferris wheel.
In terms of visual literacy, this video adds the visual element, particularly movement, to the senses being integrated in this lesson intro. So theoretically students' attention and memory encoding will be better (if what I read about Sensory Integration on the Brain Rules website is accurate). However, I don't believe this video will deliver too much when it comes to emotional impact. So in that sense, there is still room for a better video although, can Ferris wheels be very emotional ever?
Here's the video, courtesy of Matt Black's Video Sketchbook on Blip.tv
Frustrated and Atechnological!
There is no doubt that the COETAIL classes have introduced me to a Web 2.0 way of doing things in my classroom that I wouldn't have used otherwise. The two best examples are a blog to communicate with parents and the use of Creative Commons Search for images that I use with permission.
When more developed, the blog will serve as a site for parents to receive news, download files and see pictures of their children and children's work. I even envision posting pictures and videos from JV volleyball practices for students to see their form and ability in various skills.
The Creative Commons Search pages that I've used so far actually provide more attractive images than my previous Google Searches which seemed to rarely pull up images from amateur photographers. For example, a search for Milkweek Bugs (Grade 7 EAP Math/Science) on Google pulls up images of a more scientific nature whereas a Creative Commons Flickr Search pulls up more artistic (vs. scientific) images. When practicing scientific description language with pictures of milkweek bugs, I showed the students various images and let them choose one as a class for drawing and describing. The students nearly unanimously chose the most stunning photo of a milkweed bug which came from CC Flickr Search.
Otherwise, the embedding of technology into my teaching has been painfully lacking. With the adoption of a FOSS Science Kit and the CMP (Math) Curriculum--both of which come with cookbook-like instructions--I've found myself spending so much time reading, understanding, and following the directions, that I stop thinking about technology.
One idea I've had after seeing some blogs of Robin Bulsza's 5th grade students, has been to ask students to write math reflections on their blogs rather than notebooks, even though I still don't know how they could easily and quickly incorporate drawings/models into their blog posts.
Even without continuing to take COETAIL classes, my challenge this year will be to keep technology on my mind while juggling the instructions of Science Kits and the New Math Curriculum.
When more developed, the blog will serve as a site for parents to receive news, download files and see pictures of their children and children's work. I even envision posting pictures and videos from JV volleyball practices for students to see their form and ability in various skills.
The Creative Commons Search pages that I've used so far actually provide more attractive images than my previous Google Searches which seemed to rarely pull up images from amateur photographers. For example, a search for Milkweek Bugs (Grade 7 EAP Math/Science) on Google pulls up images of a more scientific nature whereas a Creative Commons Flickr Search pulls up more artistic (vs. scientific) images. When practicing scientific description language with pictures of milkweek bugs, I showed the students various images and let them choose one as a class for drawing and describing. The students nearly unanimously chose the most stunning photo of a milkweed bug which came from CC Flickr Search.
Otherwise, the embedding of technology into my teaching has been painfully lacking. With the adoption of a FOSS Science Kit and the CMP (Math) Curriculum--both of which come with cookbook-like instructions--I've found myself spending so much time reading, understanding, and following the directions, that I stop thinking about technology.
One idea I've had after seeing some blogs of Robin Bulsza's 5th grade students, has been to ask students to write math reflections on their blogs rather than notebooks, even though I still don't know how they could easily and quickly incorporate drawings/models into their blog posts.
Even without continuing to take COETAIL classes, my challenge this year will be to keep technology on my mind while juggling the instructions of Science Kits and the New Math Curriculum.
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Mass Collaboration
Are we preparing students for a world of mass collaboration?
If the discussions on the Wikinomics blog of mass collaboration going on in the work place, e.g. Best Buy, and the (somewhat cheesy) video entitled Microsoft's Vision of 2010
are any indication of what mass collaboration will look like, I'd say we're still behind in preparing students for this kind of a world.
How and how often do we ask students to collaborate? Is it collaboration to accomplish a common goal or is it online sharing and commenting? Yes, that's a bit of a rhetorical question, and I'm suggesting it's more often the latter.
But to be fair, when I was in school, the criticism was that school didn't teach any collaboration. I'd say we collaborated naturally to get some homework done, although the collaboration was often asymmetric and involved one student carrying the others. Nowadays, group-work with defined roles seems to be a standard part of Elementary and Middle School classrooms. (I haven't seen enough HS classrooms to comment about them.)
However, I'd say the collaboration in schools nowadays is still not as virtual as it should be if we are preparing students for future mass collaboration. That may still be related to technology limitations, but I'd say there is another limiting factor: teachers.
And that brings me to the next question: How do we prepare students for a world of mass collaboration.
I'll venture an alternative answer to this question: Start mass collaborating ourselves. I think teaching mass collaboration will be artificial if we aren't doing it ourselves, not as models for the students, but to meet our own needs. I'm guilty of and have seen other teachers sticking to old paper-and-pencil or Web 1.o habits when working together. How often do we say: Everybody send me your thoughts in an email and I'll compile them. Wouldn't this be a perfect opportunity for a Wiki? Yes, but at what cost? Time, of course. So we remain in our old ways.
I may not be answering the question about how to prepare students, but I'm not addressing it specifically to make the point that we can't understand how to prepare students if we are not preparing ourselves for mass collaboration.
If the discussions on the Wikinomics blog of mass collaboration going on in the work place, e.g. Best Buy, and the (somewhat cheesy) video entitled Microsoft's Vision of 2010
are any indication of what mass collaboration will look like, I'd say we're still behind in preparing students for this kind of a world.
How and how often do we ask students to collaborate? Is it collaboration to accomplish a common goal or is it online sharing and commenting? Yes, that's a bit of a rhetorical question, and I'm suggesting it's more often the latter.
But to be fair, when I was in school, the criticism was that school didn't teach any collaboration. I'd say we collaborated naturally to get some homework done, although the collaboration was often asymmetric and involved one student carrying the others. Nowadays, group-work with defined roles seems to be a standard part of Elementary and Middle School classrooms. (I haven't seen enough HS classrooms to comment about them.)
However, I'd say the collaboration in schools nowadays is still not as virtual as it should be if we are preparing students for future mass collaboration. That may still be related to technology limitations, but I'd say there is another limiting factor: teachers.
And that brings me to the next question: How do we prepare students for a world of mass collaboration.
I'll venture an alternative answer to this question: Start mass collaborating ourselves. I think teaching mass collaboration will be artificial if we aren't doing it ourselves, not as models for the students, but to meet our own needs. I'm guilty of and have seen other teachers sticking to old paper-and-pencil or Web 1.o habits when working together. How often do we say: Everybody send me your thoughts in an email and I'll compile them. Wouldn't this be a perfect opportunity for a Wiki? Yes, but at what cost? Time, of course. So we remain in our old ways.
I may not be answering the question about how to prepare students, but I'm not addressing it specifically to make the point that we can't understand how to prepare students if we are not preparing ourselves for mass collaboration.
Monday, April 27, 2009
The Power of the Web
What makes the web so powerful?
As the Skype video from a 5th grade classroom shows, the web allows communication to take place where it wouldn't if the web were not available. Our own Ed Tech classes have been a textbook (or should I say wikibook) example of the power of the web. I, among many, "attended" one of our classes from my home by watching a live streaming video (Ustream) and joining a web-based chat room (tinychat.com) that was visible to all course participants. Thanks, Web! We also benefited from guest speaker experts who lectured via Skype. Thanks again, Web! On our blogs, remote experts on certain topics were able to comment on our ideas and give us feedback that others in our immediate class would not have been able to give. And thanks yet again, Web!
All of this communication is available mostly free and is almost instantaneous.
Is free instant communication with theoretically anyone not evidence that the web is powerful?
As the Skype video from a 5th grade classroom shows, the web allows communication to take place where it wouldn't if the web were not available. Our own Ed Tech classes have been a textbook (or should I say wikibook) example of the power of the web. I, among many, "attended" one of our classes from my home by watching a live streaming video (Ustream) and joining a web-based chat room (tinychat.com) that was visible to all course participants. Thanks, Web! We also benefited from guest speaker experts who lectured via Skype. Thanks again, Web! On our blogs, remote experts on certain topics were able to comment on our ideas and give us feedback that others in our immediate class would not have been able to give. And thanks yet again, Web!
All of this communication is available mostly free and is almost instantaneous.
Is free instant communication with theoretically anyone not evidence that the web is powerful?
Student Online Safety Responsibility
Whose responsibility is it to teach students to be safe online?
Is that question really any different from the question: Whose responsibility is it to teach students to be safe? Some will probably say the answer is the healthy, happy family. Others will say it takes a village to educate a child. Families will differ in how able they are to teach their children about online safety. So will teachers for that matter, unless they are specialists or at least frequent users of the internet. Technology teachers should by definition be internet specialists, but safety should be the responsibility of the user or teacher who asks students to use the internet. Victims and former, repentant online bullies/criminals could serve as traveling lecturers, much the same way that former addicts or convicts are used to teach students about drugs and crime. Perhaps consultants will pop up to meet this need in schools. To some extent, the media teaches about online safety when it publishes or reports a story. Ultimately, many parties do or could take responsibility, but by no means should the opportunity be missedto teach about it in school.
Does ISBs AUP take this issue into account?
Online safety is covered directly in a section on social networking. Interestingly, the AUP states that social networking online safety is a personal responsibility. The AUP makes references to university applications, job searches, and overall reputation. All of these are valid, but perhaps still a bit abstract for 6-8th graders.
Online safety is also covered throughout the AUP in sections on internet use, school computer use, school network use, etc. The most basic reference to safety is regarding the privacy of passwords. There are discussions of viruses and improper web pages. In short, online safety is covered through numerous channels in ISBs AUP.
Is that question really any different from the question: Whose responsibility is it to teach students to be safe? Some will probably say the answer is the healthy, happy family. Others will say it takes a village to educate a child. Families will differ in how able they are to teach their children about online safety. So will teachers for that matter, unless they are specialists or at least frequent users of the internet. Technology teachers should by definition be internet specialists, but safety should be the responsibility of the user or teacher who asks students to use the internet. Victims and former, repentant online bullies/criminals could serve as traveling lecturers, much the same way that former addicts or convicts are used to teach students about drugs and crime. Perhaps consultants will pop up to meet this need in schools. To some extent, the media teaches about online safety when it publishes or reports a story. Ultimately, many parties do or could take responsibility, but by no means should the opportunity be missedto teach about it in school.
Does ISBs AUP take this issue into account?
Online safety is covered directly in a section on social networking. Interestingly, the AUP states that social networking online safety is a personal responsibility. The AUP makes references to university applications, job searches, and overall reputation. All of these are valid, but perhaps still a bit abstract for 6-8th graders.
Online safety is also covered throughout the AUP in sections on internet use, school computer use, school network use, etc. The most basic reference to safety is regarding the privacy of passwords. There are discussions of viruses and improper web pages. In short, online safety is covered through numerous channels in ISBs AUP.
Sunday, April 26, 2009
Copyright Usage and Plagiarism
Do we as a global society need to rethink copyright laws?
Given the traffic on the internet and amount of copying and borrowing, policing copyright infringement might be so unmanageable that we will need to rethink copyright. If not, we will have to come up with a tracking mechanism or monitoring body to alert us to infringements.
According to our course instructors, Youtube is pulling videos that are even questionable in their use of copyrighted material, and playing it safe even though fair use may be applicable. There must be some way to track material and verify if the original source is copyrighted or not.
Unfortunately, the fair use clause appears to be grey enough to make the use of some algorithm for monitoring materials impractical.
If society continues to develop toward instant publication, viewing, and borrowing of digital text, photos and videos via the web, will the issue of copyright essentially become moot even before society has a chance to rethink it? I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if this did in fact happen.
What's our role as educators in copyright usage in schools?
Model and teach appropriate use of copyrighted materials for sure. Try to give could scenarios that students can appreciate rather than just the rules. Since students these days have grown up with the ability to copy practically anything from the web, merely knowing the rules won't likely change behaviors.
I envision using case studies where students discuss appropriate use and consequences for inappropriate use. Some good examples seem to be very popular these days, such as the photonapping cases of Allison Stokke or Alison Chang that we read about in the article Understanding and Respecting Copyright a Problem for Many.
Does ISBs AUP take this issue into account?
Sure enough, under internet policy there is a comment about following copyright law for anything graphics or text that are taken from the internet. Does the AUP, however, need to address copyright in technology projects that do not involve graphics or text from the internet? I'm imagining non-internet acquired things, such as music, digitized graphics, photos, etc.
Or is this covered under our schools standard, non-technology academic dishonesty policy. From what I can tell this general policy covers ideas, words, or statement, but not music, photos, etc. Perhaps this belongs in both the technology AUP as well as the Academic Dishonesty Policy.
Given the traffic on the internet and amount of copying and borrowing, policing copyright infringement might be so unmanageable that we will need to rethink copyright. If not, we will have to come up with a tracking mechanism or monitoring body to alert us to infringements.
According to our course instructors, Youtube is pulling videos that are even questionable in their use of copyrighted material, and playing it safe even though fair use may be applicable. There must be some way to track material and verify if the original source is copyrighted or not.
Unfortunately, the fair use clause appears to be grey enough to make the use of some algorithm for monitoring materials impractical.
If society continues to develop toward instant publication, viewing, and borrowing of digital text, photos and videos via the web, will the issue of copyright essentially become moot even before society has a chance to rethink it? I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if this did in fact happen.
What's our role as educators in copyright usage in schools?
Model and teach appropriate use of copyrighted materials for sure. Try to give could scenarios that students can appreciate rather than just the rules. Since students these days have grown up with the ability to copy practically anything from the web, merely knowing the rules won't likely change behaviors.
I envision using case studies where students discuss appropriate use and consequences for inappropriate use. Some good examples seem to be very popular these days, such as the photonapping cases of Allison Stokke or Alison Chang that we read about in the article Understanding and Respecting Copyright a Problem for Many.
Does ISBs AUP take this issue into account?
Sure enough, under internet policy there is a comment about following copyright law for anything graphics or text that are taken from the internet. Does the AUP, however, need to address copyright in technology projects that do not involve graphics or text from the internet? I'm imagining non-internet acquired things, such as music, digitized graphics, photos, etc.
Or is this covered under our schools standard, non-technology academic dishonesty policy. From what I can tell this general policy covers ideas, words, or statement, but not music, photos, etc. Perhaps this belongs in both the technology AUP as well as the Academic Dishonesty Policy.
Wednesday, April 8, 2009
EARCOS Conference 2009 Reflection
It was my first time to attend an EARCOS conference for teachers, and wow, was it overwhelming. Four days of presentations on every topic you can imagine related to education. If it hadn't been for the pre-conference workshop, my head would be spinning. Because the preconference workshop I attended was focused on one theme, it gave me a focus for the entire conference.
I finally had a chance to attend a workshop by Virginia Rojas, who I had heard was an ESL guru. I don't actually know much about her, but at least here in SE Asia, she is credited with bringing the "Inclusion Model" of ESL pedagogy to international schools.
The workshop was called "Scaffolding Success for English Language Learners: A Toolkit for Teachers" and focused mainly on vocabulary development. As an ESL teacher, I was familiar with most of the jargon and many of the strategies, but one thing I liked that I hadn't heard before was a framework which Gini described with the catchy phrase: Input, Intake, Output. She went on to reword this as Exposure, Practice, Mastery (among other rewordings specific to different content areas). I found it appealing, because in ESL pedagogy I seem to hear the phrase Comprehensible Input more commonly than any other. I enjoyed being reminded that language learning is not just about Input, Input, and more Input. Interestingly, Gini gave percentages about how much time should be devoted to the three parts of her framework: 20-60-20. That too gave me something to think about, as I planned my own lessons.
I also learned that the IB started addressing the ESL phenomenon. I had searched the website before, but I couldn't find much. Gini says that the IB has consulted with her about a section for the website. Apparently, there will soon be information online, as far as I understand, regarding some classic ESL strategies, among other things.
As I write the phrase "ESL strategies," it makes me think about the fact that the most common title for an ESL workshop seems to be just that, ESL strategies, especially when the workshop is for mainstream teachers. As an ESL teacher, I've seen the textbooks that list vocabulary strategies, reading comprehension strategies, listening strategies, etc, etc, etc. It starts to make me wonder if ESL is giving the world the impression that ESL is just a bunch of strategies. That makes it sound like ESL is a methodology rather than a discipline. Is that really the case? Or is that missing the point? I'm worried ESL might get misinterpreted, because I think it's more about language acquisition. And language acquisition is not just accessible through ESL strategies.
Anyway, for the rest of the conference, I attended as many presentations of Gini's as possible, and although there was some overlap with the preconference workshop, I enjoyed them all. Gini is a spunky presenter who models what she presents, and that lets you experience what you're learning about.
Her handouts are all online at the EARCOS conference website, but I'll link to them here as well since between EARCOS's conference website and EARCOS conference wiki, I had some trouble finding just where handouts were posted.
They aren't 100% stand-alone documents, but they give a good overview of the presentations. She did say she would respond to emails, so ask her any questions these handouts generate.
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
When and where should we be teaching students about their digital footprint?
Does ISBs AUP take this issue into account?
Digital footprints are most likely not the domain of any one course and time. Given that this is essentially an issue of privacy, it should definitely be stressed to parents that this is something for them to discuss with their children. However, anyone who is not aware of the ways in which a digital footprint is even made could have trouble with this. Nevertheless, even in general terms it can be discussed.
Of course a technology class is an obvious place to discuss this issue. Many students learn to make and post videos in technology classes. Their videos are all associated with their user names for the video hosting sites, such as on YouTube.
I have a possible answer to the question that Mary B. posted on her blog about this topic: "How do we get students to understand that what they do today will impact tomorrow?"
Given that students themselves might best know how and where to find information online about themselves and others, I could envision a project for use in perhaps a Humanities course where students are asked to play detective and track down information about themselves or a classmate. We could ask students to take the role of a potential employer who needs to check the character of a student (themselves), as was mentioned in Kim Komando's article "Your online reputation can hurt your job search." Their findings might give them perspective on what they want to be making part of their digital footprint.
Such a project or similar activity, could also take place in any class during the first week of school as part of a Get-To-Know-You activity.
The obvious time to approach this topic would be as soon as students begin using the internet. As the internet is changing so rapidly, digital footprints will probably look different as time passes and technology and applications change. Repeat visits to the topic would be relevant in each new context.
Finally, teachers could give reminders any time technology is used in the classroom. Much like classroom management reminders are given before activities with potential for off-task behavior, digital footprint reminders could be given before students log on to their laptops for any work requiring the internet.
Does ISBs AUP take this issue into account?
After skeptically reading deeper in the MS AUP, I did in fact find the following:
Social Networking:
Online safety is a personal responsibility. It is important that students are aware of the implications of their actions online, both to themselves and to others. The actions students take in social networking areas like MySpace, Facebook, or others, can impact their university applications, job searches, and overall reputation. It can also provide sensitive information to online predators.
Students should keep themselves and the people they know safe by carefully screening who their online “friends” are and what information they share.
I'd say that's a definite attempt to address the digital footprint issue. Now it's just a matter of disseminating this information to staff, students and parents.
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Post Final-Project Course Reflection
Many experiences I had while working on my final course project with Jono serve as great examples of the value this course has had.
First while planning this project, Jono and I realized that a jigsaw project involving student photo movies needed a platform for the students to put all their pieces together. Last semester, I would have asked students to put their pieces into a common folder on our school server and then assembled them myself or perhaps asked one or two students to be the final assemblers. A few days ago, Jono and I hunted for and discovered an online video editor where students could upload video clips and combine them into a final movie. This is essentially like a wiki for movies. Now the students can be part of their collaboration until the completion of the final product.
Next, in the short time between when Jono and I published our project sketches on our blogs, we received feedback from a Technology-Based Project expert from the US. Obviously, such feedback was only accessible to us once we made our sketches publicly available. Last semester, we would have had to rely on each other for ideas and a first experience to see what improvements we could make.
Finally, while simplifying the text that we were asking the students to work with, we both began working on the same computer. One of us read the original text, we discussed modifications, and the other typed. We thought we could save time by each modifying half of the text and then putting our two halves together. We set to work on our individual computers. But the breakthrough for us came when we realized we could share a text document through Google Docs and work simultaneously on the document. Now we didn't need to look over each other's shoulder if we had a question; we could both see it on the screen. We jointly finished simplifying the text and can now both access it for final edits. No multiple versions. No emailing files. All convenient and efficient.
In short, today's experience captures some of my learnings from this course. Collaboration is getting easier and easier for students and teachers alike given the developments in technology. Technology also gives us access to remote feedback from others who we don't even have to know.
During this course, I had a few experiences where I realized that some of the collaborative applications could save real time and paper. For example, using a spreadsheet in Google Docs for students to share data made it easy for them to see each other's work and draw conclusions from a larger set of data than just their own.
To me, this course has been as much about exploiting technology for my own professional practice as for collaboration for the students. Hopefully, I can continue these new practices now that the course is finished.
First while planning this project, Jono and I realized that a jigsaw project involving student photo movies needed a platform for the students to put all their pieces together. Last semester, I would have asked students to put their pieces into a common folder on our school server and then assembled them myself or perhaps asked one or two students to be the final assemblers. A few days ago, Jono and I hunted for and discovered an online video editor where students could upload video clips and combine them into a final movie. This is essentially like a wiki for movies. Now the students can be part of their collaboration until the completion of the final product.
Next, in the short time between when Jono and I published our project sketches on our blogs, we received feedback from a Technology-Based Project expert from the US. Obviously, such feedback was only accessible to us once we made our sketches publicly available. Last semester, we would have had to rely on each other for ideas and a first experience to see what improvements we could make.
Finally, while simplifying the text that we were asking the students to work with, we both began working on the same computer. One of us read the original text, we discussed modifications, and the other typed. We thought we could save time by each modifying half of the text and then putting our two halves together. We set to work on our individual computers. But the breakthrough for us came when we realized we could share a text document through Google Docs and work simultaneously on the document. Now we didn't need to look over each other's shoulder if we had a question; we could both see it on the screen. We jointly finished simplifying the text and can now both access it for final edits. No multiple versions. No emailing files. All convenient and efficient.
In short, today's experience captures some of my learnings from this course. Collaboration is getting easier and easier for students and teachers alike given the developments in technology. Technology also gives us access to remote feedback from others who we don't even have to know.
During this course, I had a few experiences where I realized that some of the collaborative applications could save real time and paper. For example, using a spreadsheet in Google Docs for students to share data made it easy for them to see each other's work and draw conclusions from a larger set of data than just their own.
To me, this course has been as much about exploiting technology for my own professional practice as for collaboration for the students. Hopefully, I can continue these new practices now that the course is finished.
Horizon Report
Reading the NMC's Horizon Report was the first report of its kind that I had seen. Something that surprised me was that the time frame given for many of the trends were stated to be in the future, although if asked, I would have said these some of these trends were already here: cell phones, cloud computing, geotags, etc.
One thing that was interesting was the prediction that by the year 2020, most people will use their cell phones to connect to the internet. This development would be an interesting twist to the concern that computer technology is accentuating the gap between the haves and have-nots in the world. While it maybe true that access to the internet via personal computers may be limited to the wealthy, internet access via cell phone might not be. It appears that cell phones are much more accessible financially than personal computers, and as with everything, as the price comes down, cell phones that act as personal computers might eventually end up in the hands of less wealthly people who currently do not have access to actual computers. This all means that the internet and all the connectivity that goes along with it might become part of more and more people's lives.
As for the cloud and the idea that computers will no longer be the physical repositories for computing power, storage space, applications, etc, I experienced this at a company in the US where work could be done from home with a remote access client. The client logged into a work station or network of computers in a company building, and allowed me to use the computer network to run the applications that I ran at work. Essentially, all the activity was happening on the workstation at the office, but the graphic interface was being broadcast over the internet onto my screen. What I could do was a function of the power of the computer I was logged into. If the internet connection was fast, I could see everything at home as it came up on the workstation I was logged into. It's essentially what Remote Assistance is on the Windows platform. Perhaps the difference between now and the future is that this style of computing will pervade all applications and tasks.
While I will be interested now to follow the development of these technologies and the future horizon reports, I'm more interested in seeing the Horizon Report for K-12 education, whenever it is finally released.
One thing that was interesting was the prediction that by the year 2020, most people will use their cell phones to connect to the internet. This development would be an interesting twist to the concern that computer technology is accentuating the gap between the haves and have-nots in the world. While it maybe true that access to the internet via personal computers may be limited to the wealthy, internet access via cell phone might not be. It appears that cell phones are much more accessible financially than personal computers, and as with everything, as the price comes down, cell phones that act as personal computers might eventually end up in the hands of less wealthly people who currently do not have access to actual computers. This all means that the internet and all the connectivity that goes along with it might become part of more and more people's lives.
As for the cloud and the idea that computers will no longer be the physical repositories for computing power, storage space, applications, etc, I experienced this at a company in the US where work could be done from home with a remote access client. The client logged into a work station or network of computers in a company building, and allowed me to use the computer network to run the applications that I ran at work. Essentially, all the activity was happening on the workstation at the office, but the graphic interface was being broadcast over the internet onto my screen. What I could do was a function of the power of the computer I was logged into. If the internet connection was fast, I could see everything at home as it came up on the workstation I was logged into. It's essentially what Remote Assistance is on the Windows platform. Perhaps the difference between now and the future is that this style of computing will pervade all applications and tasks.
While I will be interested now to follow the development of these technologies and the future horizon reports, I'm more interested in seeing the Horizon Report for K-12 education, whenever it is finally released.
Friday, February 27, 2009
Project Sketch
In 6th grade Science, the students study cells through various activities, one of which is a 4 page reading from their resource book. In EAP Math/Science, Jono and I preview and review content with an emphasis on our ELL's language development.
We are thinking about doing a jigsaw-collaborative-technology project to tackle the 4 page reading, which will likely be extremely challenging for the students. Instead of having them each read the assignment, we would like to involve them in making a photo movie as a vehicle for the reading.
More specifically, we can divide the reading among 12 students and 2 teachers, and each work on our part. For their parts, students slowly read their parts and use whatever resources they need to make sense of them (internet, dictionary, classmates, teachers). Perhaps we will rewrite the text to make it a little simpler for them, or provide them with a text with explanatory annotations.
Anyway, their first task will be to use flickr or Google Images to find images that help explain the various sentences in their part of the text. They will then use Windows Movie Maker or PhotoStory to record the text, assemble the images, and maybe write out the text on each photo.
After they have created a multi-image movie for their part of the reading, the students will use JayCut (an online video editing tool) to collaboratively assemble a class video of the entire reading. They will be able to insert their section and save it for classmates to edit, i.e. insert their parts.
After the video is published, the students will watch it as a class. Ideally, the graphic images as well as seeing and hearing the text will help the students understand the content as well as appreciate their group effort using technology. We could even post the movie to YouTube with a tag which identifies as the reading from the particular resource book for other students around the world to view.
A question I still have is if there is a way to make the first part of the assignment something that students could do as partners so that there is student-student interaction rather than just individual student-text-web interaction.
I believe this project meets the NET standard below:
2. Communication and Collaboration
Students use digital media and environments to communicate and work collaboratively, including at a distance, to support individual learning and contribute to the learning of others.
We are thinking about doing a jigsaw-collaborative-technology project to tackle the 4 page reading, which will likely be extremely challenging for the students. Instead of having them each read the assignment, we would like to involve them in making a photo movie as a vehicle for the reading.
More specifically, we can divide the reading among 12 students and 2 teachers, and each work on our part. For their parts, students slowly read their parts and use whatever resources they need to make sense of them (internet, dictionary, classmates, teachers). Perhaps we will rewrite the text to make it a little simpler for them, or provide them with a text with explanatory annotations.
Anyway, their first task will be to use flickr or Google Images to find images that help explain the various sentences in their part of the text. They will then use Windows Movie Maker or PhotoStory to record the text, assemble the images, and maybe write out the text on each photo.
After they have created a multi-image movie for their part of the reading, the students will use JayCut (an online video editing tool) to collaboratively assemble a class video of the entire reading. They will be able to insert their section and save it for classmates to edit, i.e. insert their parts.
After the video is published, the students will watch it as a class. Ideally, the graphic images as well as seeing and hearing the text will help the students understand the content as well as appreciate their group effort using technology. We could even post the movie to YouTube with a tag which identifies as the reading from the particular resource book for other students around the world to view.
A question I still have is if there is a way to make the first part of the assignment something that students could do as partners so that there is student-student interaction rather than just individual student-text-web interaction.
I believe this project meets the NET standard below:
2. Communication and Collaboration
Students use digital media and environments to communicate and work collaboratively, including at a distance, to support individual learning and contribute to the learning of others.
Students:
a. interact, collaborate, and publish with peers, experts, or others employing a variety of digital environments and media.
b. communicate information and ideas effectively to multiple audiences using a variety of media and formats.
Sunday, February 22, 2009
New things in new ways?
While reading Prensky's Adopt and Adapt article, I understood and followed his model of technology adoption. It made sense that dabbling was followed by doing old things in old ways, which was followed by doing old things in new ways. How many times have I thought that using computers for tasks that could been done by hand, such as illustrating or designing, often made something prettier but required more time--a perfect example of an old thing in a new way. Anyway, I read on.
In the final stage of adoption, I found these two sentences of doing new things in new ways:
"For the digital age, we need new curricula, new organization, new architecture, new teaching, new student assessments, new parental connections, new administration procedures, and many other elements."
Motivational, yes, but not very informational. Just what specifically is Prensky advocating for? I read on and found this:
"If we really offered our children some great future-oriented content (such as, for example, that they could learn about nanotechnology, bioethics, genetic medicine, and neuroscience in neat interactive ways from real experts), and they could develop their skills in programming, knowledge filtering, using their connectivity, and maximizing their hardware, and that they could do so with cutting-edge, powerful, miniaturized, customizable, and one-to-one technology, I bet they would complete the "standard" curriculum in half the time it now takes, with high test scores all around."
Is this what he means by new things in new ways? Make the knowledge more future oriented and make skills more technology based? At first glance, that doesn't strike me as a new thing in a new way. Aren't there places in education already that address these topics? Aren't there courses already that teach programming skills? Does shifting the curriculum to these areas constitute the "invention" of which he speaks? Is this the "experimentation" in lesson plans, classes, etc of which he speaks?
I feel just as in-the-dark about the New-things-in-new-ways stage of technology adoption as it applies to education as I did at the beginning of the article. What should technology integration look like?
In the final stage of adoption, I found these two sentences of doing new things in new ways:
"For the digital age, we need new curricula, new organization, new architecture, new teaching, new student assessments, new parental connections, new administration procedures, and many other elements."
Motivational, yes, but not very informational. Just what specifically is Prensky advocating for? I read on and found this:
"If we really offered our children some great future-oriented content (such as, for example, that they could learn about nanotechnology, bioethics, genetic medicine, and neuroscience in neat interactive ways from real experts), and they could develop their skills in programming, knowledge filtering, using their connectivity, and maximizing their hardware, and that they could do so with cutting-edge, powerful, miniaturized, customizable, and one-to-one technology, I bet they would complete the "standard" curriculum in half the time it now takes, with high test scores all around."
Is this what he means by new things in new ways? Make the knowledge more future oriented and make skills more technology based? At first glance, that doesn't strike me as a new thing in a new way. Aren't there places in education already that address these topics? Aren't there courses already that teach programming skills? Does shifting the curriculum to these areas constitute the "invention" of which he speaks? Is this the "experimentation" in lesson plans, classes, etc of which he speaks?
I feel just as in-the-dark about the New-things-in-new-ways stage of technology adoption as it applies to education as I did at the beginning of the article. What should technology integration look like?
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Peer Based Learning (From Dig.Youth.Proj. Conclusions/Implications)
What teacher wouldn't want to the respect from a student normally given to an experienced peer rather than the "respect" students give to their authority-figure school teachers? I can't imagine that many people would argue against peer-based learning given the benefits that it has. There will probably be more discussion about how it can be used effectively in schools. Here's some quick thoughts on that.
If the report found that the experienced-peer adults who formed part of the interest-driven online groups were themselves avid hobbyists and creators, then teachers might benefit from sharing the work they do within their subject so that students could see this hobby/creative element in their teachers. Students perspective might change if they saw their teachers doing the work that teachers asked students to do. A book I'm currently reading on writing instruction suggests that students benefit by seeing their teachers write. Can this perspective be extended to all subject areas?
Unfortunately, the analogy between the report's peer-based learning groups and school breaks down becaus school mostly lacks the interest-driven element that interest-driven groups have. For the analogy to be complete, we would have to learn to interest students to the point that they see school subjects as something worth devoting their interest to. That seems like an enormous challenge given the prescriptive nature of our school curricula, but it is nonetheless an implication of the findings of peer-based learning in interest-driven groups.
Another option would be to let students study what they are interested in--an individualized curriculum. This is likely to be unmanageable in a school setting where learning is typically measured and reported in an standardized way. It would also be beyond the means of the teachers to be experienced peers in every field the students chose to study. This doesn't have to be a problem as long as schools can find some way to measure student's learning. Perhaps, students could be given the non-content-specific learning goals we have for them and asked to explain how they were met in their investigations.
Or, in an effort to steer learning towards peer-based learning in the absence of student-interest we can allow for students to work together. Of course, there we run the risk of students not actually learning, but letting their partners do the learning for them. This would work best in the case of two motivated students. I don't believe this attempt to promote peer-based learning would be as ideal as either of the first two.
If the report found that the experienced-peer adults who formed part of the interest-driven online groups were themselves avid hobbyists and creators, then teachers might benefit from sharing the work they do within their subject so that students could see this hobby/creative element in their teachers. Students perspective might change if they saw their teachers doing the work that teachers asked students to do. A book I'm currently reading on writing instruction suggests that students benefit by seeing their teachers write. Can this perspective be extended to all subject areas?
Unfortunately, the analogy between the report's peer-based learning groups and school breaks down becaus school mostly lacks the interest-driven element that interest-driven groups have. For the analogy to be complete, we would have to learn to interest students to the point that they see school subjects as something worth devoting their interest to. That seems like an enormous challenge given the prescriptive nature of our school curricula, but it is nonetheless an implication of the findings of peer-based learning in interest-driven groups.
Another option would be to let students study what they are interested in--an individualized curriculum. This is likely to be unmanageable in a school setting where learning is typically measured and reported in an standardized way. It would also be beyond the means of the teachers to be experienced peers in every field the students chose to study. This doesn't have to be a problem as long as schools can find some way to measure student's learning. Perhaps, students could be given the non-content-specific learning goals we have for them and asked to explain how they were met in their investigations.
Or, in an effort to steer learning towards peer-based learning in the absence of student-interest we can allow for students to work together. Of course, there we run the risk of students not actually learning, but letting their partners do the learning for them. This would work best in the case of two motivated students. I don't believe this attempt to promote peer-based learning would be as ideal as either of the first two.
Geeking Out. . .Can we learn through hobbies?
The section of the MacArthur report on Geeking Out reminded me of the fact that hobbies have been the source of some of my most personally rewarding learning. When I was young, it was making plastic model airplanes or model rockets. In college, it was salsa dancing and psychology/mythology. Once I got a job, it was finances and economics. Most of the time, I shared my hobbies with only one or two other individuals at a time, but in college I was able to share my passion in salsa dancing with an entire club. I don't think anybody would doubt that we were salsa geeks. We explored, learned, and taught each other. We gave each other feedback. We felt a sense of pride when others copied our "moves" or picked something up we had shown or explained to them. The same applied to salsa music and sharing it with the other dancers. We even shared with each other which peer-to-peer file-sharing networks (which were just taking off about 10 years ago) to use to find music online. In short, I closely identify with the experiences on geeking out which were described in the report, such as video making or rap music in MySpace.
Again, I don't find the experiences to be new to humans, but I expect and appreciate that the authors of the study are attempting to validate the geeking out that occurs online nowadays. Is it hard for me to appreciate that many people need for technology to even be validated because our school embraces technology? Am I lucky to have (been) immigrated to Digi-land at a young enough age to appreciate what natives are doing with technology? Regardless of the reason, I appreciate that technology, online special knowledge networks and online interest-based communities and organizations can provide a fantastic opportunity for learning, just as non-virtual hobbies and interest groups have too.
Again, I don't find the experiences to be new to humans, but I expect and appreciate that the authors of the study are attempting to validate the geeking out that occurs online nowadays. Is it hard for me to appreciate that many people need for technology to even be validated because our school embraces technology? Am I lucky to have (been) immigrated to Digi-land at a young enough age to appreciate what natives are doing with technology? Regardless of the reason, I appreciate that technology, online special knowledge networks and online interest-based communities and organizations can provide a fantastic opportunity for learning, just as non-virtual hobbies and interest groups have too.
Saturday, February 7, 2009
A little rain for the 2.0 parade
Did anyone else read the articles on Connectivism and Messing Around and wonder "What's the big deal?" I don't see much novel about those discussions, just technology-specific applications of pre-existing ideas.
Connectivism is a catchy name which highlights part of the philosophy of Web 2.0, but is not exclusive to the digital world. It seems to be the current incarnation of what used to be the oral tradition, written texts, printed material, etc. These phenomena all entailed wisdom being shared and made collective. Weren't they examples of externalized learning too? Aren't libraries and fellow humans the physical equivalents of digital personal learning networks. Hasn't connectivism been around as long as humans have lived in groups? In that sense, I don't see it at as a replacement of the previous learning theories (behaviorism, cognitivism, connectivism), just a description of a different scale of learning.
The discussion of Messing Around is also not exclusive to the computer realm. Isn't that part of being human, tinkering with things, fiddling, figuring out, making something, whatever. It seems hard to own and use any tool (including a computer or a web application) without messing around with it. Wouldn't people rather mess around with an object than read the instruction manual to figure out how to use it?
Let me know if I'm missing out on the Earth-shattering ideas here, but to me there wasn't much ground breaking about these discussions.
Connectivism is a catchy name which highlights part of the philosophy of Web 2.0, but is not exclusive to the digital world. It seems to be the current incarnation of what used to be the oral tradition, written texts, printed material, etc. These phenomena all entailed wisdom being shared and made collective. Weren't they examples of externalized learning too? Aren't libraries and fellow humans the physical equivalents of digital personal learning networks. Hasn't connectivism been around as long as humans have lived in groups? In that sense, I don't see it at as a replacement of the previous learning theories (behaviorism, cognitivism, connectivism), just a description of a different scale of learning.
The discussion of Messing Around is also not exclusive to the computer realm. Isn't that part of being human, tinkering with things, fiddling, figuring out, making something, whatever. It seems hard to own and use any tool (including a computer or a web application) without messing around with it. Wouldn't people rather mess around with an object than read the instruction manual to figure out how to use it?
Let me know if I'm missing out on the Earth-shattering ideas here, but to me there wasn't much ground breaking about these discussions.
Changing Thoughts - Bloom, Connectivism, Messing Around
The speed with which a large amount of up-to-date information is becoming available makes me wonder if learning anything besides how to access and use this information will even be relevant in the future, whenever that may be. Given that so much learning nowadays is spent internalizing the learning of others before us (in a sense "re-creating the wheel") learning is still mostly internal. The article on connectivism refers to a situation of learning being external. Could it be that eventually, internalized learning of content will be mainly replaced with externalized learning?
For example, presently to extract oil from the earth requires a team of geologists, engineers, accountants, lawyers, etc, each of which is an educated/experienced expert in their field. They have all internally learned some specialized content. With this content, generally speaking, they work on projects throughout their careers. What would happen if this knowledge and information were to become externally learned? Could anyone begin to step in and apply that knowledge and information to a new project? Already in 2001 at the oil company where I worked previous to teaching, databases and how-to guides of best practices were being created to shorten the learning curve of employees beginning new projects and to ensure that knowledge did not disappear with retiring individuals who had internalized it.
If this is in fact a possible trend in learning, individuals may only internalize the learning surrounding how to use externalized learning for a particular need, i.e. project. Maybe this means that part of teaching will become educating students to complete projects/tasks with the knowledge and information of others rather than their own self-constructed knowledge--quite a reversal from the current model of "doing your own work" and not plagiarizing.
Compared to my parents' generation, my generation is known for working for many different companies and even in many different careers. Compare that to the baby-boomer model of one career, one company (or, at least, very few). Will the next generation even identify themselves with a specific career at any point in their lives? Or will they just jump from project to project as consultants who use a common base of externalized learning?
For example, presently to extract oil from the earth requires a team of geologists, engineers, accountants, lawyers, etc, each of which is an educated/experienced expert in their field. They have all internally learned some specialized content. With this content, generally speaking, they work on projects throughout their careers. What would happen if this knowledge and information were to become externally learned? Could anyone begin to step in and apply that knowledge and information to a new project? Already in 2001 at the oil company where I worked previous to teaching, databases and how-to guides of best practices were being created to shorten the learning curve of employees beginning new projects and to ensure that knowledge did not disappear with retiring individuals who had internalized it.
If this is in fact a possible trend in learning, individuals may only internalize the learning surrounding how to use externalized learning for a particular need, i.e. project. Maybe this means that part of teaching will become educating students to complete projects/tasks with the knowledge and information of others rather than their own self-constructed knowledge--quite a reversal from the current model of "doing your own work" and not plagiarizing.
Compared to my parents' generation, my generation is known for working for many different companies and even in many different careers. Compare that to the baby-boomer model of one career, one company (or, at least, very few). Will the next generation even identify themselves with a specific career at any point in their lives? Or will they just jump from project to project as consultants who use a common base of externalized learning?
Friday, February 6, 2009
What I hope to get out of this course
I know I am going to get a lot of information about Web 2.0 tools, and I'm really looking forward to that. But what I'd like just as much to get out of this course is the way to use these tools in a class such that it doesn't become the curriculum, but rather helps learn the curriculum. In my case the "curriculum" is ESL, but in reality it is whatever content I support and choose to teach to help students develop their English.
Regarding specific tools I saw on the Wiki-
I would like to learn the basics about:
Twitter
Voicethread
Google for Educators
Facilitating global collaboration (connecting students to others around the world)
I know something about and would like to learn some more about:
Delicious
SmartBoards
Effective search techniques
Flickr
RSS & iGoogle
Word/Tag Clouds (Wordle)
I know a good deal about and would like to learn to maximize the potential of:
Linking
Moodle (PantherNet)
YouTube
Wikis
As I mentioned above, the emphasis is on using it with students and for the class objectives.
Regarding specific tools I saw on the Wiki-
I would like to learn the basics about:
Voicethread
Google for Educators
Facilitating global collaboration (connecting students to others around the world)
I know something about and would like to learn some more about:
Delicious
SmartBoards
Effective search techniques
Flickr
RSS & iGoogle
Word/Tag Clouds (Wordle)
I know a good deal about and would like to learn to maximize the potential of:
Linking
Moodle (PantherNet)
YouTube
Wikis
As I mentioned above, the emphasis is on using it with students and for the class objectives.
Saturday, January 31, 2009
What the heck is a Personal Learning Network?
When in doubt, ask the internet: "personal learning network -- a group of people who can guide your learning, point you to learning opportunities, answer your questions, and give you the benefit of their own knowledge and experience." That's according to Daniel R. Tobin, Ph.D. from http://www.tobincls.com/learningnetwork.htm. Not sure if this website is authentic or if it's a consultant trying to sell things, but it's a definition that fits with what we've learned in class.
So what it boils down to is that all of you classmates are my personal learning network. How do I feel about it? Glad to have you as teachers. I expect to learn more from all of you guys than I could by myself. My main question for this course, is how do I use this stuff in class? It's one thing to be Clarence Fisher and have kids read about a Global Voices blog for a Social Studies class. That seems logical. But how about EAP Math/Science?
So what it boils down to is that all of you classmates are my personal learning network. How do I feel about it? Glad to have you as teachers. I expect to learn more from all of you guys than I could by myself. My main question for this course, is how do I use this stuff in class? It's one thing to be Clarence Fisher and have kids read about a Global Voices blog for a Social Studies class. That seems logical. But how about EAP Math/Science?
Friday, January 30, 2009
CureMySoreBack.com
While listening to Chris Betcher's presentation about evaluating the authenticity of websites, I realized how much of my own evaluation is based on my intuition and experience. Chris gave an example of two hypothetical websites: curemysoreback.com and backpain.org. Those examples were supposed to be obvious, but it occurred to me that a young student might not have the necessary experience to be suspicious of a certain domain name. I'm not sure I could even explain why one is more suspicious than the other, and that helps me realize why it's good to explicitly teach Chris' website evaluation criteria to students.
I have seen this done at ISB, specifically while tutoring some of Margherite's 7th grade students. I don't remember the details, but I (and others) can get a pre-made worksheet for website evaluation at ISB already. It would be interesting to know what websites students naturally find and use and to know how authentic the websites are. How big are the risks of students using bogus websites? How good are the students are recognizing bogus websites before being taught how to evaluate them? And how good are they using explicit criteria. All questions worth looking into.
I have seen this done at ISB, specifically while tutoring some of Margherite's 7th grade students. I don't remember the details, but I (and others) can get a pre-made worksheet for website evaluation at ISB already. It would be interesting to know what websites students naturally find and use and to know how authentic the websites are. How big are the risks of students using bogus websites? How good are the students are recognizing bogus websites before being taught how to evaluate them? And how good are they using explicit criteria. All questions worth looking into.
Dead Writing - post-Clarence Reflection
The example of Clarence's student's blog that received 23000 hits gave me hope that students will be inspired to write (on a blog) because of a real audience rather than just performing for the teacher. I have found that only the motivated students are good at writing to perform for the teacher, while others usually point out the redundancy or pointlessness of the performance: for example, "But you know we're talking about seed germination--why do I need an introductory sentence to tell you that?" I've wondered how to make writing more real and meaninful, but so many of my ideas seem contrived. The best one I had was to give each student a different assignment, so there would be a real information gap that required the students to communicate to fill that gap, but I got scared by coming up with and keeping track of all the individual assignments--a differentiation nightmare. Maybe the world audience on blogs gives the writing a legitimate purpose.
Matt McG shared a similar example of this in his Middle School Technology course. He has students create how-to videos for tasks (for example, how to make a table in Word) and post them on YouTube. (FYI, Notebook Software has Smart Recorder to capture a video of what you see on the computer screen.) His students have been able see how frequently their videos are viewed and what ratings they get by viewers. No "dead" performing for the teacher there! Good example, Mr. McGovernor.
Matt McG shared a similar example of this in his Middle School Technology course. He has students create how-to videos for tasks (for example, how to make a table in Word) and post them on YouTube. (FYI, Notebook Software has Smart Recorder to capture a video of what you see on the computer screen.) His students have been able see how frequently their videos are viewed and what ratings they get by viewers. No "dead" performing for the teacher there! Good example, Mr. McGovernor.
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