Over the last two months in my CEP 811 and 810 courses, I have opened up a whole new level in my technology knowledge and ability. Here are some thoughts.
Effective teaching when integrating technology
I have always believed that cooperative learning, projects and in depth study of a topic helps students to have a more effective learning experience. While studying about WebQuests and creating one, I have decided that this is a very effective way to incorporate content, meaningful study, cooperative learning and a project all while using the Internet! As teachers we are always looking for more ways to teach more in less time and WebQuests engage the students in many aspects of learning. Through this course, I have come to the conclusion that these types of learning experiences are even more enhanced because of integrating technology. When using technology, I think today's digital natives (our students) are more tuned in. They know it is important to be able to use these tools and they engage more. Another effective teaching strategy for me has always been scaffolding and feedback. In our StAIR project, we used a technology tool to teach a subject. For the slides, I incorporated scaffolding as I slowly took away support and had it only on the feedback slides. I think this helps our students move toward being more independent as well.
Web-Based Technologies
My conclusion about teaching with technology through web-based tools is that it is an environment where collaboration is essential and can thrive when students are willing to let it. Through tools like WebQuests or Google Docs, students are responsible for working together to make sure that the work is complete. Every student has a voice and every student is responsible for his or her learning as well as the learning of the group. I think this is a very important skill to be learning for tomorrow's workplace.
My Goals
My goals for this course were to learn about new ways to integrate technology into the curriculum. As teachers, we have less and less time to teach more and more. As the new technology coach at an elementary school, I wanted to find innovative products that would help teachers to make a change for their students that would really make a difference. I think I met my goal and am walking away from this course with several new tools in my toolbox so I can help teachers integrate more technology into their teaching next year.
My New Goal
My new goal as I continue to pursue my master's is to continue to find ways to bridge the gaps between digital natives and digital immigrants within the teaching staff. I also aim to continue finding new and innovative ways to make a difference for student learning through the use of technology. I believe that completing my master's degree will allow me to be a successful technology coach.
Sunday, June 20, 2010
Friday, June 18, 2010
Online Experiences
As I read about Michigan's new online experience requirements for graduation, I started thinking about ways I can start to prepare my students in elementary school for the skills they will need to complete this requirement in the upper grades.
Podcasts or Vodcasts
Podcasts or Vodcasts can be adapted to many different curriculum areas. In math, you could have students create a vodcast or video podcast where they explain how to do problems. In Language Arts, students can create a podcast as a form of reading response. For example, this year my class did a biography study. Each student created a timeline for his or her person. Then, they created a podcast where they read a sequenced summary of the person's life, added a song that fit the "theme" of that person's life and they had the option to include sound clips. One pair was particularly creative. They had Anne Frank as their person and they had very sad music. When they told about Nazis marching into Amsterdam, they had marching boots as their background noise. When the Frank family was found, you could hear doors opening and glass breaking. It was very creative and well thought out and showed that the students understood the message conveyed by her biographer. I think the adaptable nature of podcasts or vodcasts makes them a great tool to be used in my classroom.
WebQuests
When I interviewed for my first teaching job, a very experienced teacher asked me a question about technology. When I told her that I had developed WebQuests for students in my student teaching, she said to me "Those are old technology." Perhaps she misunderstood what exactly a WebQuest was for. I feel strongly that now, more than ever, students need to be engaged in searching the internet and finding relevant resources to help them accomplish a task. In my teaching, I plan to use them because I see the value in students gathering information, forming ideas and synthesizing those ideas to create a final product.
Moodle
Since our district currently uses Moodle as our virtual learning environment, I see myself continuing to advocate for its use in our classrooms. This last school year, I used Moodle as a tool for extending learning beyond the classroom. Since we only had lab every other week, I would teach a new concept and we would engage in our regular classroom activities. Then, on our lab day, we would use Moodle to explore a question or idea we were studying. For example, in science when learning about consumers, I asked students the question "Why is it important that we have carnivores, herbivores and omnivores?" Students watched a United Streaming video and then in Moodle they posted in a discussion board. Another time, we were working on descriptive writing and we were writing about a roller coaster ride. Students had to describe how they felt before, during and after their ride. I used Moodle to simulate a roller coaster ride by uploading 3 roller coaster videos from Cedar Point. Then, I gave students the link to explore other coasters. They had 15 minutes to "ride" roller coasters before they had to write about it in the Moodle online text/document.
ePortfolio
Finally, as I was reading I was thinking about ways that we could engage students in beginning an ePortfolio from an early age. The middle and high school requirement in Michigan is 20 hours before graduation. I was thinking it would be beneficial for students in elementary school to have a requirement as well. My idea was not to make a time requirement but maybe a requirement in the number of ePortfolio pieces that a student does each year in elementary. It would be beneficial for them later and it would be a great way to see how they have grown in their technology skills since Kindergarten. Just a thought and something I want to think about piloting at my school this year as the technology coach!
One technology that I struggle seeing the benefit for in elementary is the RSS reader. As an educator, there are several great resources for professional development. However, with the students I work with, I don't see a huge benefit. There may be some students or classes that track each other's blogs or podcast pages but I see those students or classes as the exception and not the rule.
Podcasts or Vodcasts
Podcasts or Vodcasts can be adapted to many different curriculum areas. In math, you could have students create a vodcast or video podcast where they explain how to do problems. In Language Arts, students can create a podcast as a form of reading response. For example, this year my class did a biography study. Each student created a timeline for his or her person. Then, they created a podcast where they read a sequenced summary of the person's life, added a song that fit the "theme" of that person's life and they had the option to include sound clips. One pair was particularly creative. They had Anne Frank as their person and they had very sad music. When they told about Nazis marching into Amsterdam, they had marching boots as their background noise. When the Frank family was found, you could hear doors opening and glass breaking. It was very creative and well thought out and showed that the students understood the message conveyed by her biographer. I think the adaptable nature of podcasts or vodcasts makes them a great tool to be used in my classroom.
WebQuests
When I interviewed for my first teaching job, a very experienced teacher asked me a question about technology. When I told her that I had developed WebQuests for students in my student teaching, she said to me "Those are old technology." Perhaps she misunderstood what exactly a WebQuest was for. I feel strongly that now, more than ever, students need to be engaged in searching the internet and finding relevant resources to help them accomplish a task. In my teaching, I plan to use them because I see the value in students gathering information, forming ideas and synthesizing those ideas to create a final product.
Moodle
Since our district currently uses Moodle as our virtual learning environment, I see myself continuing to advocate for its use in our classrooms. This last school year, I used Moodle as a tool for extending learning beyond the classroom. Since we only had lab every other week, I would teach a new concept and we would engage in our regular classroom activities. Then, on our lab day, we would use Moodle to explore a question or idea we were studying. For example, in science when learning about consumers, I asked students the question "Why is it important that we have carnivores, herbivores and omnivores?" Students watched a United Streaming video and then in Moodle they posted in a discussion board. Another time, we were working on descriptive writing and we were writing about a roller coaster ride. Students had to describe how they felt before, during and after their ride. I used Moodle to simulate a roller coaster ride by uploading 3 roller coaster videos from Cedar Point. Then, I gave students the link to explore other coasters. They had 15 minutes to "ride" roller coasters before they had to write about it in the Moodle online text/document.
ePortfolio
Finally, as I was reading I was thinking about ways that we could engage students in beginning an ePortfolio from an early age. The middle and high school requirement in Michigan is 20 hours before graduation. I was thinking it would be beneficial for students in elementary school to have a requirement as well. My idea was not to make a time requirement but maybe a requirement in the number of ePortfolio pieces that a student does each year in elementary. It would be beneficial for them later and it would be a great way to see how they have grown in their technology skills since Kindergarten. Just a thought and something I want to think about piloting at my school this year as the technology coach!
One technology that I struggle seeing the benefit for in elementary is the RSS reader. As an educator, there are several great resources for professional development. However, with the students I work with, I don't see a huge benefit. There may be some students or classes that track each other's blogs or podcast pages but I see those students or classes as the exception and not the rule.
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
Google Presenter
This week, I explored Google Presenter. I started with a basic presentation and selected a theme for the slides. I noticed that there were not many choices for themes. However, you can import your own images and use them as a background and choose which slides to apply them to. I felt that the interface was relatively user friendly and not too overwhelming. The functions that makes this tool most attractive is that it is in the cloud. This opens a whole new element to access and storage of the document. Also, you can import slides from PowerPoint or Keynote. This function would be very helpful for putting together a cohesive final product where multiple users and programs have been utilized.
Google Presenter in the Classroom
In order for a user to be immediately successful, he or she would have to have some background knowledge of either a word processor or other presenter tools. However, if the learner was just beginning, I think it would be a manageable tool to use because it is not as overwhelming of an interface to start with as PowerPoint might be.
Sharing with Google Presenter offers many choices. You can create a presentation and share by sending it to others as an attachment. You can also publish the document and "View Together" by sending the URL to users to view and, sometimes, even edit. The viewing takes place online and can be done from anywhere with Internet access. The disadvantage, however, is the publishing feature. If you are creating a presentation that you plan to share anyway, this feature is not bothersome. However, maybe you are presenting a new idea or research findings that you do not want anyone else taking credit for. In this case, publishing it would be a bad idea. It then becomes available for anyone to view. In addition, if the "owner" or creator deletes a presentation that you had edited or wanted, he or she has the option to delete it from everyone's account. There is an option for transferring ownership of the presentation if someone wishes to get rid of it. However, this could be a situational disadvantage. You can also download or print the presentations.
One big benefit of this tool in education to teach subject matter could be a jigsaw approach to learning. A teacher could assign particular parts of a subject to individuals and then have them collaborate with their groups to create a final product. To help students, teachers could first demonstrate through a class collaboration/sharing before sending off small groups to do the same. This is definitely a tool that would require scaffolding as it has many elements that are not necessarily designed to be used/learned all at once.
One major managerial consideration for the teacher to take into account is the monitoring and creating of Google accounts. As I teach in the elementary setting, I can see where there would be a lot of concern with students having their own accounts. A solution to this might be creating "James Bond" type group accounts where users are given "alias" usernames and passwords by the teacher. This way, the teacher could view the accounts, if necessary, and monitor activity. One of the benefits of Google Presenter (and Google Docs) is the autosave feature. At the top of each new editing session, there is a save button (in case you need that extra reassurance) and next to it a time stamp that indicates when the last autosave took place. This is a tremendous help to the teacher because it helps the avoidance of "I lost it all!" situations.
Finally, the last thing to consider about Google Presenter is the continuous update of the software. Google is known for its continuous "renovation" of current applications. This would require that the teacher/school stays on top of browser updates and settings changes. Currently, Google Docs is being reworked to include more collaborative features and to allow for the uploading of larger files. At this time, while it is accessible for current Google users, the new version does not have all the features of the current version. Google cautions users to preview the features before changing their settings. Again, this would be an organizational and managerial task for the teacher to consider and stay on top of.
Overall, Google Presenter presents itself as a useful tool that compares to PowerPoint. The benefit of this tool, however, is that work can be done on the Internet allowing for easier access, storage and electronic sharing of files. Also, Google Gears has been developed to allow users access to their documents when there is not Internet access. There are also many more collaborative capabilities than PowerPoint. On the downside, it poses some security and management challenges for the teacher when students have their own accounts (especially for younger children). Also, when an Internet connection is unavailable, all collaborative features become ineffective. Finally, this application also requires the teacher or school (or family for home access) to stay on top of updates in browsers and settings so that all tools can be utilized (which we hope is done anyway, but let's face it- it is not always the case!). So we have to wonder: do the benefits outweigh the challenges? As with most innovations, I say "Let's give it a try!".
Google Presenter in the Classroom
In order for a user to be immediately successful, he or she would have to have some background knowledge of either a word processor or other presenter tools. However, if the learner was just beginning, I think it would be a manageable tool to use because it is not as overwhelming of an interface to start with as PowerPoint might be.
Sharing with Google Presenter offers many choices. You can create a presentation and share by sending it to others as an attachment. You can also publish the document and "View Together" by sending the URL to users to view and, sometimes, even edit. The viewing takes place online and can be done from anywhere with Internet access. The disadvantage, however, is the publishing feature. If you are creating a presentation that you plan to share anyway, this feature is not bothersome. However, maybe you are presenting a new idea or research findings that you do not want anyone else taking credit for. In this case, publishing it would be a bad idea. It then becomes available for anyone to view. In addition, if the "owner" or creator deletes a presentation that you had edited or wanted, he or she has the option to delete it from everyone's account. There is an option for transferring ownership of the presentation if someone wishes to get rid of it. However, this could be a situational disadvantage. You can also download or print the presentations.
One big benefit of this tool in education to teach subject matter could be a jigsaw approach to learning. A teacher could assign particular parts of a subject to individuals and then have them collaborate with their groups to create a final product. To help students, teachers could first demonstrate through a class collaboration/sharing before sending off small groups to do the same. This is definitely a tool that would require scaffolding as it has many elements that are not necessarily designed to be used/learned all at once.
One major managerial consideration for the teacher to take into account is the monitoring and creating of Google accounts. As I teach in the elementary setting, I can see where there would be a lot of concern with students having their own accounts. A solution to this might be creating "James Bond" type group accounts where users are given "alias" usernames and passwords by the teacher. This way, the teacher could view the accounts, if necessary, and monitor activity. One of the benefits of Google Presenter (and Google Docs) is the autosave feature. At the top of each new editing session, there is a save button (in case you need that extra reassurance) and next to it a time stamp that indicates when the last autosave took place. This is a tremendous help to the teacher because it helps the avoidance of "I lost it all!" situations.
Finally, the last thing to consider about Google Presenter is the continuous update of the software. Google is known for its continuous "renovation" of current applications. This would require that the teacher/school stays on top of browser updates and settings changes. Currently, Google Docs is being reworked to include more collaborative features and to allow for the uploading of larger files. At this time, while it is accessible for current Google users, the new version does not have all the features of the current version. Google cautions users to preview the features before changing their settings. Again, this would be an organizational and managerial task for the teacher to consider and stay on top of.
Overall, Google Presenter presents itself as a useful tool that compares to PowerPoint. The benefit of this tool, however, is that work can be done on the Internet allowing for easier access, storage and electronic sharing of files. Also, Google Gears has been developed to allow users access to their documents when there is not Internet access. There are also many more collaborative capabilities than PowerPoint. On the downside, it poses some security and management challenges for the teacher when students have their own accounts (especially for younger children). Also, when an Internet connection is unavailable, all collaborative features become ineffective. Finally, this application also requires the teacher or school (or family for home access) to stay on top of updates in browsers and settings so that all tools can be utilized (which we hope is done anyway, but let's face it- it is not always the case!). So we have to wonder: do the benefits outweigh the challenges? As with most innovations, I say "Let's give it a try!".
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