Its Been Swell

Hello all!

Well it’s a sad day as this is the final class of my graduate educational technology course.  As much as I’ve enjoyed writing my thoughts and feelings in this blog, I do not think I will continue on updating this page as I still do not consider myself a “blogger”.  Once I get my own classroom, I may start to use a blog again to post assignments and/or projects, so check back for me in the near future!

I must admit that I have enjoyed this class immensely, despite numerous technical difficulties along the way with completing assignments.  I do feel as if my knowledge base about technology in the classroom has definitely broadened and I understand that technology no longer means using a computer – I realize it means so much more than that.  I feel that I am better equipped at being able to incorporate stimulating technology resources as a tool for my future students.  I think that this class has provided me with a lot of useful tools that I can provide my future students as a means of a creative outlet to complete projects.

This class has given me exposure to many things that I did not realize even existed and probably my favorite aspect of the class was learning about the cool Web 2.0 tools.  I feel that these will be the things I will probably use most when it comes to having a classroom of my own.  Many of these tools can be used to capture student’s attention (i.e., prezi, wordle, bubbl.us, glogster, etc) and provide a means for more stimulating lessons, as well.

I will not take down the blog, so please, feel free to read and take a look around at a few of the projects I completed and posted on here.  My thoughts to all educators out there, realize that technology means more than using a computer and putting up PowerPoints.  It is a means of connecting with students and finally engaging them on a level that this generation understands.  It has been a wonderful semester, hope everyone has enjoyed this.

Take care!

Wordle, Wordle, Wordle

Hello all!

Well, I feel like it's been awhile since I've posted in here.  It feels kinda nice to be back. :)
I feel like I need to explain what this post and the two below it are all about.  A few weeks back my technology professor assigned a neat little project titled Tech, Tac, Toe - cute name huh?  The point of the project was to pick 3 cool web 2.0 tools that have been presented in class and figure out how to incorporate them into classroom lessons.  Since I currently am not a classroom teacher, I took 3 tools and applied them to 3 hypothetical lessons (I want to teach grades 1-3, so I designed one lesson per grade).  The top half of the post describes the lesson, then there is an example of the tool, and below is my reflection.  I do hope that my 3 examples provide a little in sight into whether you would like to use the web tool!  Enjoy!

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Grade level: 3rd
Common Core Standard for Language Arts: Reading Standard for Literature K-5; 3 (Describe characters in a story (e.g., their traits, motivations, or feelings) and explain how their actions contribute to the sequence of events).

Lesson Idea:  Provide student's with a list of words that can be used to describe a  person/character.  Explain to the students that characters as well as people possess certain characteristics/traits and the list provided has words that can be used to tell someone about the characters/people.  Have the students practice this by having them describe you.  Have each student provide a word that would describe you (the teacher) and write it in the wordle text box.  Stress the importance that it does not matter if they see a word up on the screen, words can be used more than once.  Once all students have given a word, generate the wordle.  The words that are the largest are the words that were used the most to describe the teacher.  Continue on with letting the students know they will be using this tool to describe characters in a story that they will be reading.

See below and example of wordle:

 

Reflection:  I really enjoyed using wordle once I found a computer that was capable of generate the word wall.  My computer at home is a little bit older and does not support the java script that is needed in order to generate the wordle.  This was slightly frusterating but once I was able to find a computer that this tool would work on, it could not be easier to use!  Just type in words and/or sections of text in the word box and click generate!  Va-la!  I enjoyed that the colors themes could be changed to predetermined themes or you could create your own color palate.  I also liked the fact that you could change how the words appeared on the page and could just click "randomize" until you found a layout that worked.   It was neat to play around with different fonts and get creative.  I think wordle would be a tool that teachers could use to provide students with visualize but I also think the tool is very kid friendly.  All the students have to do is enter in words and click generate - it doesn't get much easier than that!

Let's Get Creative!

Grade Level: 2nd
Common Core Standard for Mathematics: Geometry K-5; 2G (Recognize and draw shapes having specified attributes, such as a given number of angles or a given number of equal faces.  Identify triangles, quadrilaterals, pentagons, hexagons, and cubes)

Lesson Idea:  Since the common core standard requires that second grade children be able to identify five different geometric shapes, break the class up into five groups.  Once in groups, explain to the children that each group is going to be given a shape and a little detective work is going to need to be done on their shapes.  They are going to be given a list of questions and they need to find out the correct answers based on the shape they were given (i.e., provide the students with the appropriate pages in their math textbooks so they will be able to find the answers).  Once they have the correct answers, have the groups create a glogster for their shape, putting all the important information that they found on it.  Let them know that these pages will be given out to everyone in the class as their review guides for the test they will be taking, so make sure everyone does an excellent job. 

Please see below link for example handout for project made on glogster:
http://boykstac.edu.glogster.com/mathdetectives/
(if you are unable to see the glogster by clicking that link, please check out my website (click link of tech-tac-toe) as there is an example of it on there: http://snboykin.weebly.com)

Comments:  I enjoyed working with glogster.  I used the education version and found that there were a lot of pre-made templates that were great for the school setting.  I found it easy to use, however; I'm not sure if it would be a suitable tool to use with the younger students as it does take some mouse control to adjust pictures, text, etc.  I thought there were great preloaded pictures to use and enjoyed scrolling through them.  Overall, I think it would be a nice tool to use for teachers to make interesting hand-outs and for older students to use once fine and gross motor skills were more refined.

So Many Ways to Organize

Grade Level: 1st
Common Core Standard for Language Arts: Language Standards K-5; 5a (Sort words into categories (e.g., colors, clothing) to gain a sense of concepts the categories represent)

Lesson Idea:  Categorize various animals (i.e., farm animals, house animals, wild animals).  Provide children with a list of animals and as a class, using bubbl.us, put into distinctive categories.  Students and teacher could further discuss that these are broad categories and could anyone provide examples of instances where certain animals could cross over into other categories. 

Please see below for an example of how this concept map could look.

Reflection:  I LOVED bubbl.us!!!  I found it extremely easy to use and very user friendly.  I just typed in the URL and was good to go.  I had no trouble figuring out how to use the site; it was very basic and everything that was needed was on one page.  I also enjoyed that the concept bubbles could change colors as well as their text color.  I liked that if a "parent bubble" had offspring, the offspring were colors that were very similiar/in the same hue to parent.  I thought this would allow for a good visual to show the relationship. 
I did do a little more playing around and liked that you could connect various offpring bubbles using the "link" button that pops up when you scroll over the bubbles.  I also liked the fact that the lines connecting each of the bubbles could be labeled, if that was something you wished to do.  Overall, I found it easy to use and would highly recommend if someone is interested in creating concept maps.

Who Knew Twitter Wasn't Just for Tweeting

     A few weeks back, my professor assigned a project to develop our own personal learning network (PLN).  She suggested that we create a twitter account and follow prominent educational sources/people in the twitter world.  Lets just say, I was less than enthused to develop a twitter account.  I am not overly fond of this sort of social networking and up until this point, refused to sign up for an account.  My displeasure quickly changed when I discovered that twitter is more than just “tweeting” about random nothings and can offer teachers great educational resources!

     Richard Byrne, is someone I have been following on Twitter.  I am convinced this man does nothing but search the Internet for useful educational resources and then posts them to the twitter world.  While I was perusing my account one day, I noticed that he had tweeted about a neat source that allows children to create their own books.  It seemed simple enough so I clicked on the link he provided.  This is what I discovered:

1)      Upon entering this website, I found it to be a little confusing.  I did not realize that I had to look at the upper right hand corner for the “book” link.  This link will actually take you to a different screen where you are able to create these books.

2)      Once I finally figured out where to go, I found this section of the site to be extremely user friendly.

3)      I liked that there were four pre-saved animals that the creator of the story could choose from (i.e., there was a penguin, gorilla, giraffe, and a creature I’m assuming is a pig)

4)      Each of these animals had different “view” and/or “action” which I thought helped make the stories come to life.

5)      I also liked the pre-saved backgrounds, however; I felt that the author of the story was very limited in what they were able to choose from.  The main reason I liked the backgrounds was for the mere fact I thought it could help guide/push children into what they should write about.  I sometimes feel like if a child is “stuck” sometimes the flow of a story line will emerge if the illustrations can be produced first.

6)      I was not fond of the fact that only 2 lines of text would show on each page.  The text box allows for more writing, however; only two lines would show up once you clicked off the box (i.e., also, you could not change the size of the font or the font box to allow for more room)

7)      I liked the concept that children could create their own covers and that the stories could be printed out, e-mailed, or saved to the computer.

Overall, I truly enjoyed creating a book.  I thought this would a perfect activity to use with the primary children (i.e, K-2) who were just learning how to write and create stories due to the fact that there was such a limited amount of room for text. 

My twitter account!

Website:  www.culturestreet.com à books link à picture book maker

 

What stage are you?

The lecture on Stages of Technology Integration was a topic that really got me thinking.   Change is difficult for anyone; for the most part, human beings like consistency and enjoy routines.  For most people up to this point (i.e., not including the generation that is being born into the technology generation) accepting and using technology effectively has been a huge change/challenge – whether it be integrating into the classroom or for personal use.   As I was looking over the slides, I found myself flashing back to various teachers I’ve had in my educational experience.  I have had teachers at all points of accepting technology and I used these references in helping pinpoint where I stood on the topic.

I currently am not a teacher, therefore; I had to put myself in a hypothetical situation to figure out how I felt about technology in the classroom.  I used my past experiences as a guide but I also found myself writing little notes as I was trying to figure out where I fell.  My notes were based on how I felt about a particular stage and whether or not I felt I was at a particular stage or past it. After all my reflecting, I concluded that I am at stage five; the innovation stage. 

I feel that I am at this stage for a variety of reasons.  I believe that incorporating technology is something that cannot be fought.  It is the way of the world and unavoidable, however; I do not believe that every single lesson taught needs to have some aspect of technology attached to it.  It is important to keep children engaged but it is also important to realize that there are many different avenues that can be utilized to do so.  To effectively teach, technology needs to be weaved into the curriculum in a meaningful manner which means, not all lessons will lend themselves to having technology attached.  I feel that I am savvy enough with technology to be able to realize when using technology would be a benefit and when it would be a hindrance to the learning process.

I think that knowing these stages is important and something that pre-services teachers should keep in mind.  As we start to go out and enter the wonderful world of teaching, it may help us figure out where colleagues are on their views of technology.  The goal would be to realize accepting technology comes in stages and knowing this, a support system could be put in place as the push would be getting all teachers into stage five (i.e., the one I feel is the most beneficial to students). 

Beloit Mindset - A list into understanding present students

All of the research presented in class Tuesday night was extremely interesting.  I felt all of the research shown provided important information to today’s teacher; both teaching in the field and those working towards becoming teachers.  I chose however to take a closer look at the research presented by the professor’s of Beloit College. 

Each year, since 1998, the professors of this college have compiled a list of what life has been like for the incoming freshman class. I find this an absolute fabulous idea.  From year to year, the world has changed so much; with each class experiencing life in a slightly different manner.  I think for professor’s to effectively teach their classes, they need to know and understand what the students have experienced and how they have viewed the world.    

I thoroughly enjoyed reading the list for the 2016 class.  The main, over riding theme of the list I found, was that these students have always lived in a world of instant communication; a world of technology.  I found it sad that these students have probably never seen a bound set of encyclopedias or a real plane ticket and yet when I thought about it, the question of “why would they?” popped through my mind.  They have grown up in a world where everything can be found searching the internet and in an age where everyone is going “paperless”.  I then thought, is this generation and future generations missing out on something?  To answer this question, yes I do feel that they are missing out on things.  I feel that life is becoming so fast paced, that the little moments are meaning less.  Things that people should know and have once known this generation and present generations never will.  

I feel that in order to be an effective teacher and to really be able to reach your students, an educator needs to keep up with what is the norm for their students.  No matter what grade level you teach, whether it be kindergarteners or college students, teachers need to know what their classes are being exposed to.  They need to do the research to see what is normal for their students; what technology are these students using and what cultural norms are they being exposed to.  Teachers then need to take this information and use it to effectively reach their students.  Life is ever changing and teachers need to be able to change along with it to reach their students the most effective way possible.

From this research, I agreed with most on the list, although some points I did not.  There were a few things on the list that I felt freshman students would know (i.e., biblical terms - people still use these terms so I feel at some point they would have heard them and had someone explain to them what it meant), so I feel that this list is a great guideline but should not be taken as sole fact.  I also felt that this list did not portray students in one way or another; positive or negative.  I felt the list was just stating what these students have experienced in life up to this point and in order to better understand them, professors need to understand this information.

The midset list. (2012).  Retrieved September 3, 2012, from, http://www.beloit.edu/mindset/2016/