Technology Reflection

My opinions on technology in classrooms has greatly changed from the beginning of the term because I knew next to nothing about how I would go about integrating technology into my lesson plans. The less I know about something, the less likely I am to use it or teach it. Now that I have experience in some of the web tools, and have seen successful applications for the classroom, I would be comfortable in using some technology in my classroom.
I had never heard about Project Based Learning before, but I think it is a really cool, all encompassing, idea that would greatly benefit students. It gets them to work together and makes them think long term and crosses subject lines. Print Page in IE

Myths and Realities Wordle

Words that describe what changes must take place in k-12 schools for technology to succeed in schools.

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Integrating Websites into the Classroom

The Site:
Scholarpedia is a great website, it takes the positive attributes from Wikipedia and makes the articles more reliable. Scholarpedia is an online encyclopdia just like Wikipedia, but has assigned  "curators" to each topic who are responsible for the information that is on their topic's page. Anyone is able to suggest changes to an article, but unlike wikipedia, the information is first review by the curator, then approved or denied for posting. Scholarpedia is completely free and open for everyone made possible with funding from the National Science Foundations and amazon.com. It lets everyone collaborate on topics, ideas and subjects but there is a filter and fact checkers that guarantee the information provided is true. However, I don't think that there is enough information on the site to use it exclusively. It is a good site if the topic you are looking for is available.
Two ways for this site to be used in the classroom:
1. This is reliable site funded by the NSF and I would allow students to use this a a resource for projects and research.
2. Scholarpedia says they are kept current and up to date, so I would feel comfortable using it myself to review a subject area that may not be my strongest teaching area.
How could the site be used to extend learning opportunities beyond the classroom:
As long as the students have access to the Internet, they are able to use scholarpedia anywhere! Parents can allow their child to explore scholarpedia knowing that the articles are factual.  Print Page in IE

Project Based Learning

The PBL project I liked the best was "Hiking the Appalachian Trail" because I think it had the most interesteding topic, the guildlines were straightforward and had an end result that required critical thinking. As someone who has actually hiked part of the Appalachian Trail before, I know how important it is to prepare correctly and how large of a project it turns out to be. It askes students to come up with what problems they think they will face on the AT and create a product/presentation (How far help of a telephone is on any give point of the trail was the exampled used) for the class. I think that this PBL project is the best because it sparks the most interest and encourages students to acutally hike the Appalachian Trail some time in the future. And since it is an interesting project I think/hope the students would really get into it and get the most out of this PBL. Print Page in IE

Telecollaboration

As Bloom states in "Bloom's Taxonomy of the Cognitive Domain," to get to the highest skill level, one must learn and master the prior skill before moving on to the more complex skill. In order for students to complete a telecollaborative project successfully, they must be able to construct and combine their ideas with other students and produce a piece of work that not only satisfies the assignment's requirements, but shows critical thinking and evaluation.
If the student is able to produce work that showcases' their critical thinking skills, then according to Bloom, they have mastered all previous skills.

 I think that one of the best writing exercises for high school students in an English class is to use peer editing; it helps both the editor and the writer improve their skills. In a telecollaborative assignment for high school English, students could use technology in a project using "Common Space" and could peer edit each other's work via internet.

 As mentioned by the Penn State article, emails and progress reports to and from students for the duration of the project are good ways to individually grade a student on a group project. I think it is important to grade students as a group as well as on an individual level. If good communication and adequate observation on the teacher's part is applied, then the individual grading and group grading should be accurate. Print Page in IE

My Past, Present & Future of Technology

My Past:
One of my earliest memories of using a computer in school was right before Halloween in what must have been kindergarten or first grade. Our teacher had printed out pictures of a large pumpkin; it had thick black lines and a very basic design. He taped the pumpkin picture onto each of our computer screens and had us practice tracing the outline of the pumpkin in Microsoft Paint. It wasn't high-tech and it was a little laborious because after every few marks of the mouse, we had to lift up the paper to check our progress and readjust as needed. But at the end of class, everyone was allowed to print out their rendition of the pumpkin and take it home. I thought that was pretty cool and really liked going to computer class once a week.
Throughout my years in school, I've had basic technology lessons for programs like Word, Paint and Excel, various typing classes to improve my speed, and have been expected to manipulate Power Point for class presentations. A few teachers have made lectures on Power Point, a science teacher I had in middle school had the "Astrology Picture of the Day" projected on the wall and one English teacher even gave an assignment out in which we had to make a video and edit it. My K-12 education gave me just enough knowledge to be familiar with the current technological norm of programs.

My Present:
I waffle between teaching third grade (or somewhere between kindergarten and fourth grade) and teaching high school English. I would assume it's almost impossible to make a lesson plan on technology that could work for both an eight year old and a seventeen year old, so for the purposes of this class, I will focus my entries on an elementary school classroom. I think that my third grade class could be old enough to start using Word to write papers and Clip Art for other assignments. I would integrate technology into group History projects and have the students write up short biographies, have them make a few Power Point slides and use internet search engines.

My Future:
I think the most challenging thing that I will face as a teacher is keeping current and up to date with technology and being able to integrate computers into group lessons. Not all children will have access to computers at home and teaching a full classroom of students with different levels of experience will be difficult. Especially if there is only one or two teachers able to help the group of students. Print Page in IE

Avatars in Education

Avatars could be used to familiarized students with using different computer tasks. Different forms of education reach children differently and avatars might reach some students who otherwise wouldn't be interested. Print Page in IE