...There seem to be some issues in terms of uploading... the pictures have been halved and desynchronized from the video. The audio however seems fine. If you would want to see the video in another form, contact me and I will find a way to do so.
Friday, March 16, 2012
Media Literacy
1.) Yes, we can define what it means to be information literate (although we may not have a universal definition, each person can define what it means to them). For the most part however, being information literate means being able to understand whether or not what you're reading is an established and reliable source of information that can be cited without undermining your own work in the future. For instance, citing a source that is run in an honest and professional fashion would increase your own credibility, whereas citing a source that changes its information without apologizing and cuts corners would have a negative impact on your own work in the long run.
Essentially to be able to be information literate in my perspective, you have to make sure that the information used is fully analyzed (unlike the example of the underwear-literacy connection in the article), has a credible author, is located in some sort of published journal (so that the information on it can't be changed at will without causing publication issues, so it could remain an ever-reliant source), and the information itself is full and complete in terms of the subject it is covering. To me, if a person can cover these areas, I would consider them to be information literate (as might others), and these are rules that anyone should be able to learn how to do.
2) Yes, we can teach our students the skills necessary to become information literate. One of the keys to doing this however is to not try and teach this concept in a "swing for the fences" single lesson, but instead to teach them it throughout an entire course with every research project they do. Doing this would help cause the "rules" to come naturally to them, so that they become a common-sense habit. It must become something that they are aware of every time they do it, and eventually they will monitor themselves about it. For instance, if there's someone that I'm usually around on a routine basis and they say things like "I did good" I find myself correcting them; "you mean you did well." It gets annoying of course, but eventually it gets to the point where I don't even have to say it when they messed up, because they'll start correcting themselves on it, and then next thing I know they're correcting other people before I even get the chance. As long as they are constantly made aware of it, they will learn to monitor themselves, and even others of it.
3) Yes, we can teach students to become effective users of the most powerful medium. While it is not an easy task, it is something that everybody can learn; to take the internet with a grain of salt. I believe that there are two main keys to doing this; question and evaluate. To question is to simply be aware, to learn to question everything found on the internet and sources that come from the internet and other media outlets. To evaluate is simply to learn how to accurately decide whether the source of information is credible or not. If a person reads on the internet that "All elephants have blue eyes," they might simply go "Oh! That's a cool fact!" and move on from it. If a person was learning these two steps however, they should first say "Ok, now how can I tell if this is true?" And then they need to go behind the scenes a little bit to find out if the source seems credible or not, by walking through a teacher's "information literacy" steps. In this way a person can always be sure that they can back up their findings to the best of their abilities.
Tuesday, March 6, 2012
Using Podcasts in the Classroom
I have my podcast on my computer at home, it's not entirely completed but it should be done by tonight, as long as technical items don't keep on messing with me like they have been.
Anyway when it comes to Podcasts in the classroom, I can't say that I'm quite as excited about them as I am about other means of presentation. I enjoy Podcasts if I'm in my room working on something with my hands (such as a craft) and I can turn one on from NPR or something to listen to something I find interesting, but other than that I find it difficult to become overly enthusiastic for them in more deliberate means.
After thinking about Podcasts for a short while however, I do believe there are more indirect means in which a Podcast can be effective in the classroom. A Podcast can be used as a means of a student essentially giving you a presentation, but without taking up time in the classroom. This means a student can take their time, create a fun Podcast (with different sounds, visuals, and methods of verbalization), and then simply hand it to the teacher as if it were a paper they are turning in.
A Podcast could also be used in this same manner, except in the other direction. A teacher could create a Podcast for his/her students and have them watch/listen to it at home as a replacement to something such as textbook reading, and then the next morning they could have a quiz/discussion about the material.
A Podcast is not the most exciting of presentations, and it could be a very big waste of time in class if each student makes a Podcast and they are presented in class, and if the students are grouped together there doesn't seem to enough work for everyone in larger groups to actually even have the chance to participate enough. Yet as something that can replace textbooks/papers, or create an ever-mobile and whenever-playable Powerpoint Presentation can make it effective for out-of-the-classroom time between the student and teacher.
Anyway when it comes to Podcasts in the classroom, I can't say that I'm quite as excited about them as I am about other means of presentation. I enjoy Podcasts if I'm in my room working on something with my hands (such as a craft) and I can turn one on from NPR or something to listen to something I find interesting, but other than that I find it difficult to become overly enthusiastic for them in more deliberate means.
After thinking about Podcasts for a short while however, I do believe there are more indirect means in which a Podcast can be effective in the classroom. A Podcast can be used as a means of a student essentially giving you a presentation, but without taking up time in the classroom. This means a student can take their time, create a fun Podcast (with different sounds, visuals, and methods of verbalization), and then simply hand it to the teacher as if it were a paper they are turning in.
A Podcast could also be used in this same manner, except in the other direction. A teacher could create a Podcast for his/her students and have them watch/listen to it at home as a replacement to something such as textbook reading, and then the next morning they could have a quiz/discussion about the material.
A Podcast is not the most exciting of presentations, and it could be a very big waste of time in class if each student makes a Podcast and they are presented in class, and if the students are grouped together there doesn't seem to enough work for everyone in larger groups to actually even have the chance to participate enough. Yet as something that can replace textbooks/papers, or create an ever-mobile and whenever-playable Powerpoint Presentation can make it effective for out-of-the-classroom time between the student and teacher.
Using Video in the classroom
I apologize for this blog entry being so late, it has completely fallen off of my mind over the past week until I came to class early today.
Anyway I am of the belief that video projects are highly useful for a classroom, and can add a lot of fun to an assignment for students. It's always been my experience that as soon as students find that a project includes making a video, their excitement and enthusiasm levels just about skyrocket. Most of these projects typically turn into something more resembling a newscast (with the news anchors and then individuals filling different roles) or a documentary type, with a host/hostess that is in different shots to show different points of her presentations. Essentially the students recreate a simple method of information delivery that allows them to be able to use easy methods of cutting from scene to scene, and be able to talk directly to the camera to present their information.
Often the project becomes more how to have fun with the video, and becomes less about the information actually being presented. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but if this starts happening, I think it would make more sense to have the students find a much more creative way to matching the video up with the actual data that they are presenting. This would have the intention of not only teaching them the subject matter, but also how video can be used to different effects and how to recreate those effects.
For instance, when presenting information about a specific topic or person, they could make a propaganda video about it. It would require a good amount of editing, but it would be a way to show not only the subject matter (which the students might be required to find creative ways to twist the truth about), but also learn how to create an overly-persuasive document for presentation.
Other examples could be advertisements or movie trailer, the "lead-in" for a show (such as Judge Judy or a series from the History Channel), a political or court room debate, or many other ideas that could be thought-up by the students (which might include a list of things they cannot do, such as advertisements & newscasts if they seem to be overused ideas), or a list could be given with different options of more complicated approaches.
Movies are a great way to find ways to present data in an alternate fashion, rather than simply repeating statistics or giving obvious examples of something. Yet even with restrictions, it seems that students should have enough enthusiasm about making a video that a teacher can take advantage of it to have the students make fantastic presentations.
Anyway I am of the belief that video projects are highly useful for a classroom, and can add a lot of fun to an assignment for students. It's always been my experience that as soon as students find that a project includes making a video, their excitement and enthusiasm levels just about skyrocket. Most of these projects typically turn into something more resembling a newscast (with the news anchors and then individuals filling different roles) or a documentary type, with a host/hostess that is in different shots to show different points of her presentations. Essentially the students recreate a simple method of information delivery that allows them to be able to use easy methods of cutting from scene to scene, and be able to talk directly to the camera to present their information.
Often the project becomes more how to have fun with the video, and becomes less about the information actually being presented. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but if this starts happening, I think it would make more sense to have the students find a much more creative way to matching the video up with the actual data that they are presenting. This would have the intention of not only teaching them the subject matter, but also how video can be used to different effects and how to recreate those effects.
For instance, when presenting information about a specific topic or person, they could make a propaganda video about it. It would require a good amount of editing, but it would be a way to show not only the subject matter (which the students might be required to find creative ways to twist the truth about), but also learn how to create an overly-persuasive document for presentation.
Other examples could be advertisements or movie trailer, the "lead-in" for a show (such as Judge Judy or a series from the History Channel), a political or court room debate, or many other ideas that could be thought-up by the students (which might include a list of things they cannot do, such as advertisements & newscasts if they seem to be overused ideas), or a list could be given with different options of more complicated approaches.
Movies are a great way to find ways to present data in an alternate fashion, rather than simply repeating statistics or giving obvious examples of something. Yet even with restrictions, it seems that students should have enough enthusiasm about making a video that a teacher can take advantage of it to have the students make fantastic presentations.
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Photo usage & editing in the classroom
When it comes to using computer programs in the class to help kids learn, I hadn't actually realized just how effective simple photo-editing might be, and there's several different reasons why I think so. Rather than simply increasing a student's ability and understanding of the usage of software or of photography, there are also other skills that photo-editing can increase that are not nearly as direct or obvious. I believe that photo-editing can boost a student's creativity, problem-solving skills, ability to understand alternate perceptions, and even how to properly critique and compare ideas.
Creativity: Photo-editing is not a streamlined process, it is something that can go in any direction a person wants, and often people have different ideas of what they can do when it comes to the actual process.
For instance, by looking at the photos in the flickr group for the education class that I am in, it seemed that each person brought their own perception of what it meant to "edit a picture. Some people took a picture and simply edited the pictures attributes, such as contrast, brightness, colors, etc. Others used effects in the pictures in order to maximize a specific idea in the picture (such as creating borders around a picture that were shaped to draw the eye to something). One person combined pairs of pictures to create an illusion between the two (for instance, a pair of pictures, both with girls reach out their arms to a railing, and combined to make it look like the same railing). And I personally just took items out of one picture, and edited those items into other pictures to make it appear as if it were actually present there.
After students are given the broad subject of simply going and "editing pictures," each brings back their own ideas of what that means. By then grouping the pictures and seeing the different things they could have done, a student could then understand just how creative they can be with a picture. They can go in almost an infinite amount of directions, and it seems up to them to decide what to do. This is a huge step in the creativity process, and photo-editing simply allows easy ways to access the creativity process in general.
Problem-solving: Surprisingly enough, photo-editing requires a certain amount of problem-solving skills. A person may have a specific goal in mind when tampering with a picture, but they don't know what specific tools or steps to take to reach that goal. They then need to fiddle around with the program to reach their goal, and sometimes they might utilize non-standard methods to reach their goal. For instance, when I was editing a picture in which I put a cat into a car, I had to figure out how to either take the window out and bring out everything behind it (as it had been dimmed down from being on the other side of the glass), or to make the car appear as if it were also behind the glass. After searching around for a solution I eventually just edited the opacity of the cat (which makes it more or less see-through), to make it appear dimmer, and therefor as if it were behind the glass.
With a program like photoshop, a person can know that just about anything is possible with a picture, it's just a matter of figuring out how to actually do something, and if a person learns to simply be patient and persistent with the program, they can problem-solve their way to any goal they wish to achieve.
Understanding alternate perceptions: I think that this goes beyond a person's creativity, and instead drives more towards the idea of understanding new angles. Besides simply seeing a student's work and understanding new directions of creativity for a picture, editing pictures enables students to understand much broader ideas in society. For instance, by learning how easy it can be to manipulate an image, a person can learn to second-guess many images they might see in places to understand that they might have been altered to give the viewer a specific illusion. For instance, the picture that was made by two separate pictures, each of one of two different girls, that were then combined to look like one big picture that they were both in at the same time, would give the illusion that there was a third person in the party of two girls that was actually there to hold the camera and take the picture. In reality this idea would be false, since it was set up so that one girl would pose while the other would take the picture of her, and then the other way.
Another way a new perspective could be gained is by looking at the before and after images of specific pictures. There is one picture in the group of the beach at seaside that is listed as "outside our room." The picture is largely blue with a grey border and a single illuminated building in a corner. I could see this as actually being a great picture for an advertisement. The picture illustrated the beauty and serenity of the setting, while also causing the eye to be drawn to the light-up room, where it seems as if there is a party going on. The contrast between the blue setting and the orange building, that the eye is drawn to by the border, creates a fantastic image of a perfect vacation locale that would have anyone wanting to visit there to enjoy the nightlife. Now at this point a person might be able to look at the original picture, which might not be nearly as romanticized (if this were a very-well edited picture, which it could be), and the picture might actually appear to be much more bland than a prospective customer may hope for. If a student could be walked through this process then it could lead directly into a lesson on advertisement and the psychology that goes behind it. This idea could be duplicated for photos that are edited to become much more emotion (thereby helping a student understand the psyche behind what drives human emotions or sympathy for others), propaganda, and much more. Giving the student the ability to sit down and create these effects for themselves would help them to better understand much more difficult pathways of thinking.
Critiquing & comparing ideas: Coming down from the "creativity" idea, where each student would initially bring some sort of different perspective on what it means to edit a picture, students could then learn how to properly critique a person's work from their own perspective in a positive fashion. I'm not saying that this is the only way this could be done, I'm just saying that this would be a great time for it.
For instance, when talking about the "advertisement" picture above, I wouldn't be surprised if the person who took the picture and edited it never even thought of it as being something used in an ad. When I look at it however, that's what I see, and I could then share with them my perspective on it, which then might open up an entirely new perspective on the matter. Photo-editing is something that has so many different aspects that can be brought to it, that it is outright necessary for a person to communicate with others in order to understand how to fully master all the different parts of visual-manipulation. Without positive criticism, a person is unable to move forward. A teacher could have their students do an activity like the one we did in class, and then tell their students to critique each others work in a constructive manner, outlining what that would be. And while this might be difficult for some students (as they simply might not have any great ideas for others), there's always something easy to identify, even at the most basic levels, when it comes to beginner photo-editing. And by doing this not only would a student have to learn how to critique people in a proper fashion, but they would also learn that in society, being able to take criticism and learn from it is a necessary skill as well.
I would go further into ideas on how these different ideas could be implemented in class, an I'm also certain that there are other ways that photo-editing could be used in education that I hadn't touched on, but at this point I feel that I'd rather not out-write my reader's attention span, and will leave my blog entry as-is. So with that I will point out that after thinking about it and writing on the topic, I would love to be able to use photo-editing some day in the classroom. There are far more possible-benefits for it then I could have imagined. So thanks for reading!
Creativity: Photo-editing is not a streamlined process, it is something that can go in any direction a person wants, and often people have different ideas of what they can do when it comes to the actual process.
For instance, by looking at the photos in the flickr group for the education class that I am in, it seemed that each person brought their own perception of what it meant to "edit a picture. Some people took a picture and simply edited the pictures attributes, such as contrast, brightness, colors, etc. Others used effects in the pictures in order to maximize a specific idea in the picture (such as creating borders around a picture that were shaped to draw the eye to something). One person combined pairs of pictures to create an illusion between the two (for instance, a pair of pictures, both with girls reach out their arms to a railing, and combined to make it look like the same railing). And I personally just took items out of one picture, and edited those items into other pictures to make it appear as if it were actually present there.
After students are given the broad subject of simply going and "editing pictures," each brings back their own ideas of what that means. By then grouping the pictures and seeing the different things they could have done, a student could then understand just how creative they can be with a picture. They can go in almost an infinite amount of directions, and it seems up to them to decide what to do. This is a huge step in the creativity process, and photo-editing simply allows easy ways to access the creativity process in general.
Problem-solving: Surprisingly enough, photo-editing requires a certain amount of problem-solving skills. A person may have a specific goal in mind when tampering with a picture, but they don't know what specific tools or steps to take to reach that goal. They then need to fiddle around with the program to reach their goal, and sometimes they might utilize non-standard methods to reach their goal. For instance, when I was editing a picture in which I put a cat into a car, I had to figure out how to either take the window out and bring out everything behind it (as it had been dimmed down from being on the other side of the glass), or to make the car appear as if it were also behind the glass. After searching around for a solution I eventually just edited the opacity of the cat (which makes it more or less see-through), to make it appear dimmer, and therefor as if it were behind the glass.
With a program like photoshop, a person can know that just about anything is possible with a picture, it's just a matter of figuring out how to actually do something, and if a person learns to simply be patient and persistent with the program, they can problem-solve their way to any goal they wish to achieve.
Understanding alternate perceptions: I think that this goes beyond a person's creativity, and instead drives more towards the idea of understanding new angles. Besides simply seeing a student's work and understanding new directions of creativity for a picture, editing pictures enables students to understand much broader ideas in society. For instance, by learning how easy it can be to manipulate an image, a person can learn to second-guess many images they might see in places to understand that they might have been altered to give the viewer a specific illusion. For instance, the picture that was made by two separate pictures, each of one of two different girls, that were then combined to look like one big picture that they were both in at the same time, would give the illusion that there was a third person in the party of two girls that was actually there to hold the camera and take the picture. In reality this idea would be false, since it was set up so that one girl would pose while the other would take the picture of her, and then the other way.
Another way a new perspective could be gained is by looking at the before and after images of specific pictures. There is one picture in the group of the beach at seaside that is listed as "outside our room." The picture is largely blue with a grey border and a single illuminated building in a corner. I could see this as actually being a great picture for an advertisement. The picture illustrated the beauty and serenity of the setting, while also causing the eye to be drawn to the light-up room, where it seems as if there is a party going on. The contrast between the blue setting and the orange building, that the eye is drawn to by the border, creates a fantastic image of a perfect vacation locale that would have anyone wanting to visit there to enjoy the nightlife. Now at this point a person might be able to look at the original picture, which might not be nearly as romanticized (if this were a very-well edited picture, which it could be), and the picture might actually appear to be much more bland than a prospective customer may hope for. If a student could be walked through this process then it could lead directly into a lesson on advertisement and the psychology that goes behind it. This idea could be duplicated for photos that are edited to become much more emotion (thereby helping a student understand the psyche behind what drives human emotions or sympathy for others), propaganda, and much more. Giving the student the ability to sit down and create these effects for themselves would help them to better understand much more difficult pathways of thinking.
Critiquing & comparing ideas: Coming down from the "creativity" idea, where each student would initially bring some sort of different perspective on what it means to edit a picture, students could then learn how to properly critique a person's work from their own perspective in a positive fashion. I'm not saying that this is the only way this could be done, I'm just saying that this would be a great time for it.
For instance, when talking about the "advertisement" picture above, I wouldn't be surprised if the person who took the picture and edited it never even thought of it as being something used in an ad. When I look at it however, that's what I see, and I could then share with them my perspective on it, which then might open up an entirely new perspective on the matter. Photo-editing is something that has so many different aspects that can be brought to it, that it is outright necessary for a person to communicate with others in order to understand how to fully master all the different parts of visual-manipulation. Without positive criticism, a person is unable to move forward. A teacher could have their students do an activity like the one we did in class, and then tell their students to critique each others work in a constructive manner, outlining what that would be. And while this might be difficult for some students (as they simply might not have any great ideas for others), there's always something easy to identify, even at the most basic levels, when it comes to beginner photo-editing. And by doing this not only would a student have to learn how to critique people in a proper fashion, but they would also learn that in society, being able to take criticism and learn from it is a necessary skill as well.
I would go further into ideas on how these different ideas could be implemented in class, an I'm also certain that there are other ways that photo-editing could be used in education that I hadn't touched on, but at this point I feel that I'd rather not out-write my reader's attention span, and will leave my blog entry as-is. So with that I will point out that after thinking about it and writing on the topic, I would love to be able to use photo-editing some day in the classroom. There are far more possible-benefits for it then I could have imagined. So thanks for reading!
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Technology in the classroom - Utility vs Useless
In many ways technology is nothing but a filler in the classroom, as I remember days when teachers would take us down to the computer lab almost just as a way to kill time (or at least that's how it felt), or the computers in my elementary classes were really only used on days when it was raining for playing the Oregon Trail on. It can be difficult to make a correlation for students between computers and tools, rather than computers and toys, since largely at such a young age, that's really all that they are. But as difficult as it is, it's certainly not impossible.
The first step would be to teach students the usefulness of computers or the internet, and this can be done in a couple of ways. What I was thinking, would be to assign a list of different tasks that needed to be done, and then let the students find out which program or site would be used to solve that task (such as find a web database of a specific kind, edit an image file, even how to create a word document (if they are a young enough age), and many more, in order for them to find out how wide a range of tools that a computer can possess and how easy those tools can be to access.
The second step (in my opinion) would be to closely monitor their computer use for the first few weeks at school, making guidelines for them to follow and ensuring that they stay away from specific sites (possibly like Facebook or browsing YouTube, which can become an instant distraction). By making sure that they get into an established routine of knowing that they are there for WORK, and not for play, they can start seeing computer use in a new manner.
This, to me, was the big problem many teachers had throughout my K-12 experience on computers. Often as students were working on computers, even with teachers in the class, they would find something they liked while following directions, and then stick with it the rest of class, getting deviated off the original path. For instance one time a friend and I were told to go to a site similar to "AskJeeves," but when we got there we found out we could look up other things that people were searching for, and essentially spent the rest of class time looking at those (still to this day we both remember seeing someone searching up how to buy a machine gun for a submarine, and that was over 10 years ago).
A third step to take would be to keep things new with technology, to keep things fresh. According to the standards with technology, there is a lot of comparison between technology and creativity/versatility. If, as a teacher, you get stuck too much on one part of technology (such as falling in love with Prezi and not using anything else), then you are entirely failing in that aspect. Technology is about constant fluctuation, there are newer and betters apps/processes being thrown out into the world every day, and to be a part of it you need to be able to keep an open mind. And if you are constantly changing the way you use things in the classroom, or assign constantly-changing assignments/problems to students when it comes to the internet, they will understand this concept and be more willing to be accepting of what technology has to offer. It's not easy (as I've already found myself falling behind), but it's certainly doable, at least if teachers band together to help each other out.
To me, these are the most important parts of what a teacher needs to do to keep technology useful in the classroom. Make sure students understand the tools that are given to them, make sure they understand that when using technology, it is a time for work, not for fun, and lastly to make sure they understand that technology is constantly in shift and being "redefined," so that they can join in with this shift and even benefit from the creativity it offers. I firmly believe that technology can be a major resource for future classrooms, and not just simply a filler for students on a rainy day.
The first step would be to teach students the usefulness of computers or the internet, and this can be done in a couple of ways. What I was thinking, would be to assign a list of different tasks that needed to be done, and then let the students find out which program or site would be used to solve that task (such as find a web database of a specific kind, edit an image file, even how to create a word document (if they are a young enough age), and many more, in order for them to find out how wide a range of tools that a computer can possess and how easy those tools can be to access.
The second step (in my opinion) would be to closely monitor their computer use for the first few weeks at school, making guidelines for them to follow and ensuring that they stay away from specific sites (possibly like Facebook or browsing YouTube, which can become an instant distraction). By making sure that they get into an established routine of knowing that they are there for WORK, and not for play, they can start seeing computer use in a new manner.
This, to me, was the big problem many teachers had throughout my K-12 experience on computers. Often as students were working on computers, even with teachers in the class, they would find something they liked while following directions, and then stick with it the rest of class, getting deviated off the original path. For instance one time a friend and I were told to go to a site similar to "AskJeeves," but when we got there we found out we could look up other things that people were searching for, and essentially spent the rest of class time looking at those (still to this day we both remember seeing someone searching up how to buy a machine gun for a submarine, and that was over 10 years ago).
A third step to take would be to keep things new with technology, to keep things fresh. According to the standards with technology, there is a lot of comparison between technology and creativity/versatility. If, as a teacher, you get stuck too much on one part of technology (such as falling in love with Prezi and not using anything else), then you are entirely failing in that aspect. Technology is about constant fluctuation, there are newer and betters apps/processes being thrown out into the world every day, and to be a part of it you need to be able to keep an open mind. And if you are constantly changing the way you use things in the classroom, or assign constantly-changing assignments/problems to students when it comes to the internet, they will understand this concept and be more willing to be accepting of what technology has to offer. It's not easy (as I've already found myself falling behind), but it's certainly doable, at least if teachers band together to help each other out.
To me, these are the most important parts of what a teacher needs to do to keep technology useful in the classroom. Make sure students understand the tools that are given to them, make sure they understand that when using technology, it is a time for work, not for fun, and lastly to make sure they understand that technology is constantly in shift and being "redefined," so that they can join in with this shift and even benefit from the creativity it offers. I firmly believe that technology can be a major resource for future classrooms, and not just simply a filler for students on a rainy day.
My Classroom Website (sample)
I doubt this will be the actual website I use when I actually do have a classroom of my own, as I would prefer to use a website with more options and put more time behind it, but this is instead simply a sample of what I think would be a few good ideas to use in a website designated to your class.
My website
At this point it leans more towards the side of being silly than serious, but in the long run I think that's a healthy thing.
My website
At this point it leans more towards the side of being silly than serious, but in the long run I think that's a healthy thing.
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Weekly Question #2 - Chapter review
Reading the chapter on presentation design I found it to be pretty interesting. Many of the thing I've already learned, such as the ideas that when giving presentations you want them to be visually stimulating, to make something that will stick in the mind of the viewer, rather than just slide after slide of boring text and bullet points (which is fairly humorous because I have seen a few teachers and even professors do this, seemingly unaware of the boring effect it has on viewers). It's still nice to read and review however, and there are smaller points that it makes - such as to avoid 3D images and other distracting visualizations - that make you go "Mmhmm, makes sense..." while you read.
One of the more interesting parts was towards the end where it goes over "The Big Four." While these are more things that many people (although obviously not all) are typically aware of in the back of their minds, it's still very useful to have actually spelled out for you, especially the relationship between contrast and repetition, which if used together correctly I can imagine could yield some fantastic results.
Overall I wouldn't say that there was anything in the chapter that was a real mind-blower, but it is very nice having something like this actually written out, with main points and everything. It helps to understand EXACTLY what sort of effect you might be looking for with something and allows to to create a sort of check-off list or a sort of "presentation palette" for when you do create a presentation of your own.
One of the more interesting parts was towards the end where it goes over "The Big Four." While these are more things that many people (although obviously not all) are typically aware of in the back of their minds, it's still very useful to have actually spelled out for you, especially the relationship between contrast and repetition, which if used together correctly I can imagine could yield some fantastic results.
Overall I wouldn't say that there was anything in the chapter that was a real mind-blower, but it is very nice having something like this actually written out, with main points and everything. It helps to understand EXACTLY what sort of effect you might be looking for with something and allows to to create a sort of check-off list or a sort of "presentation palette" for when you do create a presentation of your own.
Weekly Question - Why will it be important for future teachers to cite their sources and seek permission to use copyrighted work?
To me this is a fairly simple question, although there are multiple answers.
The first answer is simple; EVERYONE should do this, at least legally. I'm not saying that teachers are wrong in not doing so (as it is a difficult thing to have enough content for your students and yet be able to keep up with copyright laws), but it's something that everyone should at least TRY to do. If a person gets in the habit of simply using copyrighted work or not citing their sources on a regular basis then not only is it dishonest to the people who see his or her work (thinking that the work is original to that person), but it may jeopardize another person's claim to something (such as monetary factors if someone were to photocopy their textbooks) as well as even put the violator at an increasing risk of being tried on copyright infringement. And that's something that nobody wants.
Every person should try to make it second-nature to follow copyright rules, for not only others' sake but also for their own.
This brings me to my second point. Every person should have copyright awareness on their minds at all times while working with intellectual or commercial property (especially in this day and age), and the best way to do this is to learn at a young age and do it through your whole life. And what's one of the best ways to learn about this at a young age?
By example.
If teacher's in the classrooms are constantly citing their sources when they bring something to class, or make sure that the students know that he or she got permission to show a movie a reprint a book, then the students will become more aware of it themselves. I personally have little awareness of this in the classroom, as teachers have always shown movies or said facts without citing the source or acknowledging that it was OK for them to show the copyrighted material. And now that I have only really become aware of this now, I am going to have to be extra cautious not to step on any toes in the future, because who knows what I might do by habit!
So let's not raise the chances of our future students "shafting" some company or person by failing to follow copyright laws, by making sure that we all do it properly.
The first answer is simple; EVERYONE should do this, at least legally. I'm not saying that teachers are wrong in not doing so (as it is a difficult thing to have enough content for your students and yet be able to keep up with copyright laws), but it's something that everyone should at least TRY to do. If a person gets in the habit of simply using copyrighted work or not citing their sources on a regular basis then not only is it dishonest to the people who see his or her work (thinking that the work is original to that person), but it may jeopardize another person's claim to something (such as monetary factors if someone were to photocopy their textbooks) as well as even put the violator at an increasing risk of being tried on copyright infringement. And that's something that nobody wants.
Every person should try to make it second-nature to follow copyright rules, for not only others' sake but also for their own.
This brings me to my second point. Every person should have copyright awareness on their minds at all times while working with intellectual or commercial property (especially in this day and age), and the best way to do this is to learn at a young age and do it through your whole life. And what's one of the best ways to learn about this at a young age?
By example.
If teacher's in the classrooms are constantly citing their sources when they bring something to class, or make sure that the students know that he or she got permission to show a movie a reprint a book, then the students will become more aware of it themselves. I personally have little awareness of this in the classroom, as teachers have always shown movies or said facts without citing the source or acknowledging that it was OK for them to show the copyrighted material. And now that I have only really become aware of this now, I am going to have to be extra cautious not to step on any toes in the future, because who knows what I might do by habit!
So let's not raise the chances of our future students "shafting" some company or person by failing to follow copyright laws, by making sure that we all do it properly.
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Experiencing Web 2.0
Using the website GO2WEB20 I tested 3 different "online applications" in three different areas that I could see as being useful in some way or another. I chose one website for reading/writing, another for music creation, and a third for video creation. Here's my brief review on each:
BookRix - The reading/writing site that I tested out. It is a site made for independent writers and readers to reach out to one another to have their stories read. You are able to read almost all of the books for free, with some exceptions, and if you sign up you can download the stories, comment on them, favorite them, etc. While reading a story, you could also read people's comments about the story, which would mostly include reader feedback. This seems like an incredibly useful site for younger adults who wish to start dabbling in the arts of literature creation.
At first I was unsure about the site, compared to my expectations. The stories seemed over-simplified and incredibly short. Yet after thinking on it I realized that was the good thing about the website. If the writers were putting their heart and soul into a work, then why would they put it up on the internet for free, rather than attempt to get it published? And if every story was a long read, then it'd be difficult for every person to have their story read as there simply wouldn't be enough "reader" time to go around. The site was made so that people could post a story they made, out of pure leisure, onto the internet to be enjoyed and/or critiqued. The stories are either just for fun, such as a hobby, or as a means of gaining experience for bigger -and better- things down the road. This means that the website could be for young writers/readers, still in elementary school even, to the most experienced of literature enthusiasts, who wish to become critics themselves.
The largest complaint that I have with the site is the flash book-reader thing, as it simply complicates reading the materiel and adds in an unnecessary complication that makes it difficult to read at times.
I could use this website (after looking through it more to verify that it would be age-appropriate) in what I hope to be my fifth-grade class.* Each students would sign up for the website and submit a story of their own to be read by the world. This would be a great way to reach the creative side of the students (with them working harder due to the image of having a world-wide audience), as well as possibly jump-start any students who have a natural talent for writing literature.
*My views on this website would work for not just younger grades (such as fifth grade), but I believe could be expressed for all grades in K-12 schools, even high school kids,
JamStudio - The music website that I investigated. The website allows users to create their own songs from scratch my using easy-to-use instrument sounds that can be matched up with any chord or key as they desire. The instruments to choose from are acoustic guitar, bass, drums, electric guitar(x3), piano, and electric piano. The tool for making the music is very simplified, yet there's still plenty to it in order to allow a person the ability to make a good, original song.
The site delivered very well in what I expecting, although I was a little disappointed that you were unable to actually create the rhythms/sounds for the instruments themselves, yet I know this is in order to keep the program simple and to allow any person to be able to make what sounds like good music no matter their musical background. And either way there's still plenty of sounds to choose from that a person will be able to stay occupied on the website for a long time before exhausting all of the "resources" given to them.
I think this wold be a very fun thing to do in a classroom (mostly just for younger kids, however), and could introduce two things that most would never even have the ability to combine into one activity in their entire lives; music and creativity. It would be fun for students to be taken down to the computer lab, have a set of headphones, and be given time to make their own songs. And due to the ease of making music, I doubt many kids would find themselves in over their heads immediately, as a student could just fool around with a single instrument for maybe even 30 minutes without getting bored. This would be an fun and exciting new way for students to interact with music, and after a day or two in the lab, if a student desired, he or she could go home and start using the program there to make what they want. It could be a great new experience.
ANIMOTO - The video website that I looked into. Reluctant to sign up for things right now if I don't know that I'm going to try and use them (if I start signing up for everything right now I'd lose track of my accounts everywhere immediately and would probably get bombarded with emails from every website) it was difficult for me to truly see everything in this site. Yet I took a small tour and was able to find out enough to make a decent assumption about the site, I believe. The website is made as a new method of giving presentations, it combines the feel of a video with the pictures/movies of a slideshow or power-point presentation, while adding a song to go over everything. It has the quality of a full-blown marketing video to attract buying customers but is made for a family sending out a video to friends and other relatives about a trip they had recently gone on. Yet it does all of this without the need for a trained visual effects person (can't remember what they're officially called at the moment), by setting up what seems to be something similar to the JamStudio (see above) website, where everything is made for you and you just move the pieces in places where you want them.
Originally I thought that the website was going to be something similar to Prezi (which is another site that is made to show presentations in a new light), but it is much more a video, rather than a visual show to go with an actual oral presentation.
This tool (if it could be accessed by students without having to make them all pay) would be a great way for students to have a fun way to summarize something that happened to them up. Perhaps groups give presentations after a group science project, or friends have fun at the end of the year (if this is done it couldn't be assigned to the whole class, as certain individuals may be singled out), or maybe their dreams for the future. In any case it would be a fun way to introduce kids to different types of presentations they could give, as well as the preparation that would be required of them.
I can't be certain of what the best ways to use this website would be (as I haven't been able to do much inside of it myself yet), but after further probing I'm sure that I could find a way for students, of all ages, to be able to use this site for themselves.
BookRix - The reading/writing site that I tested out. It is a site made for independent writers and readers to reach out to one another to have their stories read. You are able to read almost all of the books for free, with some exceptions, and if you sign up you can download the stories, comment on them, favorite them, etc. While reading a story, you could also read people's comments about the story, which would mostly include reader feedback. This seems like an incredibly useful site for younger adults who wish to start dabbling in the arts of literature creation.
At first I was unsure about the site, compared to my expectations. The stories seemed over-simplified and incredibly short. Yet after thinking on it I realized that was the good thing about the website. If the writers were putting their heart and soul into a work, then why would they put it up on the internet for free, rather than attempt to get it published? And if every story was a long read, then it'd be difficult for every person to have their story read as there simply wouldn't be enough "reader" time to go around. The site was made so that people could post a story they made, out of pure leisure, onto the internet to be enjoyed and/or critiqued. The stories are either just for fun, such as a hobby, or as a means of gaining experience for bigger -and better- things down the road. This means that the website could be for young writers/readers, still in elementary school even, to the most experienced of literature enthusiasts, who wish to become critics themselves.
The largest complaint that I have with the site is the flash book-reader thing, as it simply complicates reading the materiel and adds in an unnecessary complication that makes it difficult to read at times.
I could use this website (after looking through it more to verify that it would be age-appropriate) in what I hope to be my fifth-grade class.* Each students would sign up for the website and submit a story of their own to be read by the world. This would be a great way to reach the creative side of the students (with them working harder due to the image of having a world-wide audience), as well as possibly jump-start any students who have a natural talent for writing literature.
*My views on this website would work for not just younger grades (such as fifth grade), but I believe could be expressed for all grades in K-12 schools, even high school kids,
JamStudio - The music website that I investigated. The website allows users to create their own songs from scratch my using easy-to-use instrument sounds that can be matched up with any chord or key as they desire. The instruments to choose from are acoustic guitar, bass, drums, electric guitar(x3), piano, and electric piano. The tool for making the music is very simplified, yet there's still plenty to it in order to allow a person the ability to make a good, original song.
The site delivered very well in what I expecting, although I was a little disappointed that you were unable to actually create the rhythms/sounds for the instruments themselves, yet I know this is in order to keep the program simple and to allow any person to be able to make what sounds like good music no matter their musical background. And either way there's still plenty of sounds to choose from that a person will be able to stay occupied on the website for a long time before exhausting all of the "resources" given to them.
I think this wold be a very fun thing to do in a classroom (mostly just for younger kids, however), and could introduce two things that most would never even have the ability to combine into one activity in their entire lives; music and creativity. It would be fun for students to be taken down to the computer lab, have a set of headphones, and be given time to make their own songs. And due to the ease of making music, I doubt many kids would find themselves in over their heads immediately, as a student could just fool around with a single instrument for maybe even 30 minutes without getting bored. This would be an fun and exciting new way for students to interact with music, and after a day or two in the lab, if a student desired, he or she could go home and start using the program there to make what they want. It could be a great new experience.
ANIMOTO - The video website that I looked into. Reluctant to sign up for things right now if I don't know that I'm going to try and use them (if I start signing up for everything right now I'd lose track of my accounts everywhere immediately and would probably get bombarded with emails from every website) it was difficult for me to truly see everything in this site. Yet I took a small tour and was able to find out enough to make a decent assumption about the site, I believe. The website is made as a new method of giving presentations, it combines the feel of a video with the pictures/movies of a slideshow or power-point presentation, while adding a song to go over everything. It has the quality of a full-blown marketing video to attract buying customers but is made for a family sending out a video to friends and other relatives about a trip they had recently gone on. Yet it does all of this without the need for a trained visual effects person (can't remember what they're officially called at the moment), by setting up what seems to be something similar to the JamStudio (see above) website, where everything is made for you and you just move the pieces in places where you want them.
Originally I thought that the website was going to be something similar to Prezi (which is another site that is made to show presentations in a new light), but it is much more a video, rather than a visual show to go with an actual oral presentation.
This tool (if it could be accessed by students without having to make them all pay) would be a great way for students to have a fun way to summarize something that happened to them up. Perhaps groups give presentations after a group science project, or friends have fun at the end of the year (if this is done it couldn't be assigned to the whole class, as certain individuals may be singled out), or maybe their dreams for the future. In any case it would be a fun way to introduce kids to different types of presentations they could give, as well as the preparation that would be required of them.
I can't be certain of what the best ways to use this website would be (as I haven't been able to do much inside of it myself yet), but after further probing I'm sure that I could find a way for students, of all ages, to be able to use this site for themselves.
Tuesday, January 17, 2012
Internet Resources
-Technorati - A blog/site evaluator for legitimacy/validity
-tinyurl - A website to shorten a web address to give to others
-Top 20 Teacher Blogs - a source of different blogs for teachers
-wikispaces - a website for creating and managing wiki pages
-Prezi - An imaginative website for a different style of presentations
-Google Reader - A Google search engine that allows you to subscribe to any topic you wish
-Wall Wisher - A site for creating an online "bulletin board"
-Survey Monkey - A website allowing you to create surveys
-tinyurl - A website to shorten a web address to give to others
-Top 20 Teacher Blogs - a source of different blogs for teachers
-wikispaces - a website for creating and managing wiki pages
-Prezi - An imaginative website for a different style of presentations
-Google Reader - A Google search engine that allows you to subscribe to any topic you wish
-Wall Wisher - A site for creating an online "bulletin board"
-Survey Monkey - A website allowing you to create surveys
Monday, January 16, 2012
Blogging with Students - week 1
1. To be honest I've never really thought of using a blog for students. To do so seems to me to be much more of a conversational method of conducting lessons, in a sense. Maybe I just need a better understanding of how a blog could be used in a classroom. To me a blog is a way for someone to be a sort of journalist from their own home or office. Students, on the other hand, aren't exactly playing the journalist role. Instead, I see students more as official "authors." The work that they make are edited to a final version ready to be turned in, or "published," into a well-thought-out paper. This paper could be a research paper or a story, not an ongoing report of something taking place.
Yet perhaps that is why a blog would be used. Rather than make students out to be working on paper after paper at home assignments, they can have an assignment that is done from their house on a continuing basis. A blog could be used to show a student's progress in a science project, or -even better- could be a way for a student to every night reflect on what they had learned at school.
What the blog could be used for would vary depending on whether other students could see each others' blogs as well. If they could see each others' blogs then it would be better suited for them to use them for specific projects or for a class-wide assignment. If not, it would be a terrific way for a teacher to keep in touch with students about the lessons, as a way for the teachers or students to ask questions without the students feeling vulnerable in front of everyone else.
Considering these ideas, I would make sure the first and foremost, students were not to put any information that is private about themselves. This means where they live, their phone numbers, try to avoid listing after-school activities, or personal matters that they wouldn't want others to see. I would also make sure that each student had access to the internet, either at a public place like a library close by (which would also mean a means to access said library), or at home. Then I would make sure that each students is aware of how to use a computer and the internet, if it were OK with their parents. Then I would make sure that each student understood the risks of using the internet and safety precautions to take with it.
2. While using blogs doesn't cover many of the national and state standards for technology, there are several different ones that it does help out with. An example of this is number 3 of the Standards: Research and Information Fluency. A teacher can have students conduct research on a topic and post their research results, as well as their opinion, online on a blog. This would cover the various requirements of using digital tools. Another standard is number 2: Communication and Collaboration. By using a blog students could communicate with one another via digital posts, and stay in contact for an ongoing project, or could use a blog to share an assignment with an audience.
3. For my Google apps lesson plan I chose Historical Novel from Carol LaRow. The lesson objective is to have the entire class read a historical novel about an era in history, and to have the students understand the meaning and main ideas of the book, and reflect it on the time period. The lesson plan utilizes several different tools in Google, such as Google blogger (as a means of creating a class discussion online), Google Earth (to show students specific places described in the book), Google Docs (to set up a presentation in order to summarize a part of the book for other students), and other tools. These tools would be used not only by the teacher, but also by the students in order to create presentations and points about the book on their own. This would mean that students would be using digital technology as a resource for information as well as a means of creativity towards understanding the historical time period.
I actually think it is a well thought-out lesson and I would have never thought to have used the tools the way that this teacher outlined the lesson to. I could possibly see myself using a lesson like this one in the future.
Yet perhaps that is why a blog would be used. Rather than make students out to be working on paper after paper at home assignments, they can have an assignment that is done from their house on a continuing basis. A blog could be used to show a student's progress in a science project, or -even better- could be a way for a student to every night reflect on what they had learned at school.
What the blog could be used for would vary depending on whether other students could see each others' blogs as well. If they could see each others' blogs then it would be better suited for them to use them for specific projects or for a class-wide assignment. If not, it would be a terrific way for a teacher to keep in touch with students about the lessons, as a way for the teachers or students to ask questions without the students feeling vulnerable in front of everyone else.
Considering these ideas, I would make sure the first and foremost, students were not to put any information that is private about themselves. This means where they live, their phone numbers, try to avoid listing after-school activities, or personal matters that they wouldn't want others to see. I would also make sure that each student had access to the internet, either at a public place like a library close by (which would also mean a means to access said library), or at home. Then I would make sure that each students is aware of how to use a computer and the internet, if it were OK with their parents. Then I would make sure that each student understood the risks of using the internet and safety precautions to take with it.
2. While using blogs doesn't cover many of the national and state standards for technology, there are several different ones that it does help out with. An example of this is number 3 of the Standards: Research and Information Fluency. A teacher can have students conduct research on a topic and post their research results, as well as their opinion, online on a blog. This would cover the various requirements of using digital tools. Another standard is number 2: Communication and Collaboration. By using a blog students could communicate with one another via digital posts, and stay in contact for an ongoing project, or could use a blog to share an assignment with an audience.
3. For my Google apps lesson plan I chose Historical Novel from Carol LaRow. The lesson objective is to have the entire class read a historical novel about an era in history, and to have the students understand the meaning and main ideas of the book, and reflect it on the time period. The lesson plan utilizes several different tools in Google, such as Google blogger (as a means of creating a class discussion online), Google Earth (to show students specific places described in the book), Google Docs (to set up a presentation in order to summarize a part of the book for other students), and other tools. These tools would be used not only by the teacher, but also by the students in order to create presentations and points about the book on their own. This would mean that students would be using digital technology as a resource for information as well as a means of creativity towards understanding the historical time period.
I actually think it is a well thought-out lesson and I would have never thought to have used the tools the way that this teacher outlined the lesson to. I could possibly see myself using a lesson like this one in the future.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)