My favorite information was how to effectively create and use blogs and also the sheer amount of information from blogs that is out there if you just know where to look. I have talked to my wife about this and she plans on incorporating the blog idea in here class at Eastfield Community College. The students will have to summarize the weeks worth of information into blog postings and other students will be "required ( at first to get the ball rolling)" to comment on each others notes. This will reinforce the concepts, make sure students are getting the main idea out of each week, and make sure that the students are thinking through correct interpretations. I really enjoyed finding like minded (and opposing) viewpoints out there and joining a civil discussion.
The web 2.0 tools were great I especially enjoyed diigo and my igoogle looks great now. These should help me keep more productive (I can keep track on my to do list)
Several of the tools I have used before but learned to use more effectively. I had used youtube before and I have seen embedded video but I had never done it. This will make things much easier in future. I have also used podcasts before but had not found a lot of information on podcasting which I was interested in .
This program is helping me to shift into the classroom style that I have always wanted but never quite managed to get to. I am trying to develop a class well enough with enough resources and responsibilities that it is individualized similar to reading levels in the first grade. At the secondary level we often teach to the middle out of time necessities and curriculum necessities but these technologies combined with my idea of switching homework and lecture will allow me to get where I want be.
I was surprised at how much of the program I plan on incorporating into my classroom. I came into the program thinking that blogging was for people with an excessive ego and something to prove but my opinion changed the more I learned about it. This challenged all of my preconceptions about the web 2.0 technology and I was more likely to give it a chance.
I personally would change out the flickr information. It did not seem relevant to me for educational purposes. I also did not get nings, especially now that they are going to be a pay site. I would remove nings first and add the following.
I would also combine so that a subject specific week could be added for teachers to design a lesson of their own using the web 2.0 tools as the final "thing"
I would definitely take a program similar to this in the future. I can honestly tell you that this has piqued my interest and given me more ideas than any professional development that I have done. Usually P.D. is something to "get through" as it conflicts with your schedule, isn't relevant to you, etc but this was fantastic. I would recommend that you offer it again because I will tell my colleagues to take this course.
I will continue to monitor this blog for a while but I plan on starting a new blog for my coursework. I was too specific in the title of the blog and I can't change it now.
Thanks for everything Nancy.
Sunday, June 27, 2010
Thing #23
How confusing is that comic book and video? The video jumped around so much that it was frustrating although it did make its point. The comic was also very confusing (for effect)
I went through all of the links and still feel like a deer in the head lights when it comes to copyright. I tend to use the printout that came in our binders at the beginning of the year.
The way the information is presented (format) has changed. The instructions are more in depth with more video embedded. A few of the assignments have changed as well including posting about web 2.0 technologies instead of a general blog about technology. Also all of the posts are on our own blogs not on the original site. We also spent time talking about the importance of community through commenting where the original did not. Finally we focused more on widgets, productivity tools, and things we could add to an igoogle instead of googledocs (which have become fairly common place).
I went through all of the links and still feel like a deer in the head lights when it comes to copyright. I tend to use the printout that came in our binders at the beginning of the year.
The way the information is presented (format) has changed. The instructions are more in depth with more video embedded. A few of the assignments have changed as well including posting about web 2.0 technologies instead of a general blog about technology. Also all of the posts are on our own blogs not on the original site. We also spent time talking about the importance of community through commenting where the original did not. Finally we focused more on widgets, productivity tools, and things we could add to an igoogle instead of googledocs (which have become fairly common place).
Thing #22 Nings
I have never heard of ning's before today and I was intrigued by the idea of a facebook type group based around a single interest but I found ning to be cumbersome, difficult to navigate, and lacking in any real value. This is more than likely my personal bias based on my utter distaste for myspace and facebook. The conversations on the future of education ning where often a great initial post or idea but degenerated into advertisements, name-calling, and irrelevant information rather quickly. I was much more impressed with the level of conversation in various blogs that I continue to search. As nings develop further it could potentially replace the AP physics listserve which I subscribe to that is a long an cumbersome email process but it isn't there yet for me. I also checked the educator ning and although it was a little bit better and slightly more organized I still find it not nearly as useful as the blogs that I found earlier.
I guess the biggest problem that I have with the idea of nings, or facebook is that everyone is an expert even when they are unqualified.
I guess the biggest problem that I have with the idea of nings, or facebook is that everyone is an expert even when they are unqualified.
Thing #21
I have posted several different podcasts on my wiki the second semester. I plan on taping, editing and podcasting as many lectures that I can this year so that I can switch from lecturing and giving notes in class to doing things in class. I want student's "homework" to be watching the lecture that way they can rewind, pause, look up terms elsewhere, and verify using outside resources as they go. I would then use class time to "do stuff" like labs, group problem solving, PBL's, etc.
I tried both of the podcasting directories but I still prefer Itunes for its search function, easy storage, easy download to my ipod and the variety of podcasts that I found. The current podcasts that I subscribe to and would recommend to anyone are
HowStuffWorks.com: Brain Stuff
HowStuffWorks.com: Stuff you missed in history class
Freakonomics Radio
Cognition Podcast
In addition I subscribe to several other "podcasts" through Itunes U and I use this for examples and improving my lessons to make them more college appropriate. This is also great preparation for me since I will begin a masters program in the Fall. I can take the class through a university watch the lectures and do the work and then enroll in the class in the fall. Since I won't have much time I have learned the material before enrolling in the class therefore reducing the time and stress for the graduate work.
Stanford
Berkley
Yale
have the most complete podcasts for entire courses. I highly suggest that you find one you are interested in and then listen while exercising or burn it to a CD, it's better than the radio.
I also downloaded audacity and I am in the process of planning my podcasts for the first few lectures. My goal is to tape this year and go live with homework = lecture and classwork = "homework" + other stuff next year.
I tried both of the podcasting directories but I still prefer Itunes for its search function, easy storage, easy download to my ipod and the variety of podcasts that I found. The current podcasts that I subscribe to and would recommend to anyone are
HowStuffWorks.com: Brain Stuff
HowStuffWorks.com: Stuff you missed in history class
Freakonomics Radio
Cognition Podcast
In addition I subscribe to several other "podcasts" through Itunes U and I use this for examples and improving my lessons to make them more college appropriate. This is also great preparation for me since I will begin a masters program in the Fall. I can take the class through a university watch the lectures and do the work and then enroll in the class in the fall. Since I won't have much time I have learned the material before enrolling in the class therefore reducing the time and stress for the graduate work.
Stanford
Berkley
Yale
have the most complete podcasts for entire courses. I highly suggest that you find one you are interested in and then listen while exercising or burn it to a CD, it's better than the radio.
I also downloaded audacity and I am in the process of planning my podcasts for the first few lectures. My goal is to tape this year and go live with homework = lecture and classwork = "homework" + other stuff next year.
Thing #20
I enjoyed the tutorial on evaluating sites and will show it before my first research project.
I really do NOT like Vision of Today's students. I am going to sound like an old foggie here but this video reeks of self-indulgent and spoiled kids (not young adults). The mark of being an adult is that you take responsibility for your own circumstances (my opinion). The kids is this video keep saying "I grew up on video games and the internet I'm different its YOUR responsibility to reach ME" I agree that we as teachers should use best practices and the new tools that available clearly have some advantages over the traditional lecture and socratic methods BUT students share some of the responsibility of meeting us in the middle. Ultimately it is their responsibility to meet the social norms of the country until they are significant enough to change the social norms. I will always try to reach every student I can using multiple angles but after reading Daniel Willingham's book and numerous cognitive research articles learning, memory, and brain function I will only use tools that are going to be effective. I am sure that the tools in this presentation can be used effectively (I plan on using a lot of them) but I won't pander to them
The Machine is Us is a great way to get teachers on board with the idea of using this technology in the classroom. A lot of teachers see technology as this mysterious terminator that is out to destroy the safe environment that they have established. This video clearly demonstrates that the Web 2.0 tools are only what they and others put into it.
In my opinion youtube is far superior to teacher tube. Youtube moves much faster and has more server space. Yes you have to wade through a lot of stupid irrelevant videos but if you are embedding them you students won't have to. I also don't like that teacher tube is ad supported and puts 30-60 ads in front of the videos. I have a hard time getting the students to stay on task on the computers when it is immediate but give them an extra 60 seconds and they will find something else to do.
I have used a great deal of video in lecture presentation and recently began linking it in my wiki for students to review. Does embedding the video reduce the space the file takes up (I assume that it does)as opposed to downloading it converting it and reposting for the students to view? Does embedding the video increase the bandwith of the district servers (Does it slow the rest of the district down?)?
Hey look I can embed video. I never knew how to do this until this class.
I really do NOT like Vision of Today's students. I am going to sound like an old foggie here but this video reeks of self-indulgent and spoiled kids (not young adults). The mark of being an adult is that you take responsibility for your own circumstances (my opinion). The kids is this video keep saying "I grew up on video games and the internet I'm different its YOUR responsibility to reach ME" I agree that we as teachers should use best practices and the new tools that available clearly have some advantages over the traditional lecture and socratic methods BUT students share some of the responsibility of meeting us in the middle. Ultimately it is their responsibility to meet the social norms of the country until they are significant enough to change the social norms. I will always try to reach every student I can using multiple angles but after reading Daniel Willingham's book and numerous cognitive research articles learning, memory, and brain function I will only use tools that are going to be effective. I am sure that the tools in this presentation can be used effectively (I plan on using a lot of them) but I won't pander to them
The Machine is Us is a great way to get teachers on board with the idea of using this technology in the classroom. A lot of teachers see technology as this mysterious terminator that is out to destroy the safe environment that they have established. This video clearly demonstrates that the Web 2.0 tools are only what they and others put into it.
In my opinion youtube is far superior to teacher tube. Youtube moves much faster and has more server space. Yes you have to wade through a lot of stupid irrelevant videos but if you are embedding them you students won't have to. I also don't like that teacher tube is ad supported and puts 30-60 ads in front of the videos. I have a hard time getting the students to stay on task on the computers when it is immediate but give them an extra 60 seconds and they will find something else to do.
I have used a great deal of video in lecture presentation and recently began linking it in my wiki for students to review. Does embedding the video reduce the space the file takes up (I assume that it does)as opposed to downloading it converting it and reposting for the students to view? Does embedding the video increase the bandwith of the district servers (Does it slow the rest of the district down?)?
Hey look I can embed video. I never knew how to do this until this class.
Thing #19 Library Thing
What a great tool. This could easily be used to find recommendations for students that liked a particular novel or idea in history on science class. I always struggles when a students asks me for recommendations on string theory or quantum mechanics. I can really only recommend books that I have read but this will allow me to input the books that I have read and come up with a more relevant recommendation for them at their level.
The books that I put in were fairly popular with about 20,000 of the 90,000 subscribers having read the books. Of course some of the books that I input barely had a a 100 readers (I have strange tastes in reading). I input a lot of the books that I preview for my older son. He is nine and gets bored with nine year old "picture books" so I read older books to make sure that they are not traumatizing before he does. I also signed up to be a previewer of new books. Apparently each month library thing receives numerous books before they are published and you can request that they be sent to you. All the ask you to do is post a review about the book for others. Usually about 600 people request the 50 books so the odds aren't great but you may get a book before it is published
Here is a link to my books. I will add more later as I am interested in what it has recommended for me.
http://www.librarything.com/catalog/jeffc65am
The books that I put in were fairly popular with about 20,000 of the 90,000 subscribers having read the books. Of course some of the books that I input barely had a a 100 readers (I have strange tastes in reading). I input a lot of the books that I preview for my older son. He is nine and gets bored with nine year old "picture books" so I read older books to make sure that they are not traumatizing before he does. I also signed up to be a previewer of new books. Apparently each month library thing receives numerous books before they are published and you can request that they be sent to you. All the ask you to do is post a review about the book for others. Usually about 600 people request the 50 books so the odds aren't great but you may get a book before it is published
Here is a link to my books. I will add more later as I am interested in what it has recommended for me.
http://www.librarything.com/catalog/jeffc65am
Thing #18 Wiki's
Are we supposed to do the sandbox?
I never really understood what the purpose of wiki's was until watching this video. I am somewhat confused by the districts decision to incorporate wikis as our class websites. The key to a wiki is that many different users can edit the material in a best practice form. I have a huge disconnect in my brain that says that allowing students access to the course website to edit it as they see fit would be counter-productive. I want to believe that they would take the opportunity to add things responsibly but since I am ultimately responsible for the material I think that our websites need to be filtered by the teacher. I encourage students to send me reviews, articles and other interesting links but I'm not ready for them to post them without being seen first. I found the idea of using this for note-taking or as a review activity intriguing and I may pilot it in a class this year. I also stumbled across an article saying that wikipedia is just as accurate and more up to date than most online encyclopedias. Although it should not be used as a citation I am interested in what others think about using it as a jumping of point for research. The article referencing the above is http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4530930.stm
I never really understood what the purpose of wiki's was until watching this video. I am somewhat confused by the districts decision to incorporate wikis as our class websites. The key to a wiki is that many different users can edit the material in a best practice form. I have a huge disconnect in my brain that says that allowing students access to the course website to edit it as they see fit would be counter-productive. I want to believe that they would take the opportunity to add things responsibly but since I am ultimately responsible for the material I think that our websites need to be filtered by the teacher. I encourage students to send me reviews, articles and other interesting links but I'm not ready for them to post them without being seen first. I found the idea of using this for note-taking or as a review activity intriguing and I may pilot it in a class this year. I also stumbled across an article saying that wikipedia is just as accurate and more up to date than most online encyclopedias. Although it should not be used as a citation I am interested in what others think about using it as a jumping of point for research. The article referencing the above is http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4530930.stm
Wednesday, June 23, 2010
Thing #17 Is google making us dumb?
The articles were both well articulated but I tend to agree with the fact that the way that technology is being used right now is not increasing intelligence. I suggest that you read the articles by Daniel Willingham at http://www.danielwillingham.com/ read the articles on cognition and critical thinking. I was in the middle of his book when Ian Jukes gave his presentation at the performing art center and I couldn't help but think of how dangerous his ideas were. The thing that sticks out the most is the idea of "disposable knowledge." Jukes presented this idea as the wave of the future and that students need to able to interpret information and think critically think about information that is easily obtained ( I highly suggest that you watch the presentation on the rockwallisd homepage). The problem is that this idea directly conflicts with theories of cognition that are currently supported by research. In order to think critically about a topic you must have information stored in your brain and the ability to "think critically" comes from making new new connections about basic information in essence you can't think critically until you learn the material. The 21st century model of don't teach facts teach them how to think is killing our kids because we are asking the impossible.
I also suggest that you watch the youtube video on multi-tasking which gives a good overview of multi-tasking an its detriments. Multitasking just means that you aren't doing anything well you are just constantly changing your focus and not doing any one thing well.
If technology is incorporated in the right way it can be a tremendously powerful tool to teach the information, let students explore the critical thinking aspect, make connections to the real world, and expanding what a traditional classroom can do but it must be incorporated the right way.
It may be cultural to multitask but culture can change
I also suggest that you watch the youtube video on multi-tasking which gives a good overview of multi-tasking an its detriments. Multitasking just means that you aren't doing anything well you are just constantly changing your focus and not doing any one thing well.
If technology is incorporated in the right way it can be a tremendously powerful tool to teach the information, let students explore the critical thinking aspect, make connections to the real world, and expanding what a traditional classroom can do but it must be incorporated the right way.
It may be cultural to multitask but culture can change
Thing #17
I completed the technorati search with zero results for School Learning 2.0 in blogs and only 3 results in posts (and one of those was about new video games at E3 that just happened to have all three words). I have not gotten very good results each time that I try the technorati search but I do like technorati just as long as you use their pre-determined categories.
Using GoogleBlogSearch I had over 500,000 results of which most of the first 5 pages were relevant results.
A general search using google gave 12,600,000 results a lot of the results are news articles about web 2.0 or information on conferences but not blogs.
The key tags that I saw were pretty standard obama, all of the sports, key figures. I thought it was interesting that Mark Zuckerberg the CEO of facebook was a popular tag and I began to wonder if he going to be the new wonder CEO similar to Steve Jobs at Apple. There was a lot of tags for John Wooden with his recent passing. The oddest thing that I saw was stand up paddling which there are apparently numerous races for around the country. There were also a large number of tags about the World Cup which does not surprise me considering the wide spread appeal outside of the U.S.
The obvious disadvantage of this technology is the fact that not all students have access to this technology at home and some of it is blocked at school for students. I am not likely to assign something to students in which 10% of the students have a severe disadvantage. There is also the disadvantage of time. The amount of time at the beginning to become proficient in these tools is significant. I believe in the end that these could save time over the course of the year but the initial investment of time to bring students up to speed (many of them probably have some of these skills but not all of them) would require changing the schedule quite a bit.
The advantages are that you can use the most recent, relevant information. The ease of use and multitude of resources. I think that the best advantage would be that the student could take responsibility for their own learning by individualizing what they need to learn or what they had difficulty with. They could also add to the existing blog and feel a sense of ownership in the class.
Using GoogleBlogSearch I had over 500,000 results of which most of the first 5 pages were relevant results.
A general search using google gave 12,600,000 results a lot of the results are news articles about web 2.0 or information on conferences but not blogs.
The key tags that I saw were pretty standard obama, all of the sports, key figures. I thought it was interesting that Mark Zuckerberg the CEO of facebook was a popular tag and I began to wonder if he going to be the new wonder CEO similar to Steve Jobs at Apple. There was a lot of tags for John Wooden with his recent passing. The oddest thing that I saw was stand up paddling which there are apparently numerous races for around the country. There were also a large number of tags about the World Cup which does not surprise me considering the wide spread appeal outside of the U.S.
The obvious disadvantage of this technology is the fact that not all students have access to this technology at home and some of it is blocked at school for students. I am not likely to assign something to students in which 10% of the students have a severe disadvantage. There is also the disadvantage of time. The amount of time at the beginning to become proficient in these tools is significant. I believe in the end that these could save time over the course of the year but the initial investment of time to bring students up to speed (many of them probably have some of these skills but not all of them) would require changing the schedule quite a bit.
The advantages are that you can use the most recent, relevant information. The ease of use and multitude of resources. I think that the best advantage would be that the student could take responsibility for their own learning by individualizing what they need to learn or what they had difficulty with. They could also add to the existing blog and feel a sense of ownership in the class.
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Thing #16
I went with igoogle and I added widgets to the homegpage as described in a previous post. I created a to do list using Tada and added it to my igoogle page. I also explored mindomo and empressr. Mindomo is a better mind map then what I saw available in the previous posts. It allows for emoticons, emphasis, bold, italics, relationships, topics, subtopics, you can attach videos and pictures and it is FREE. I also looked at empressr. Empressr is a online presentation tool that is similar to powerpoint. It does have some functionality that power point does not and allows for multiple users to work at once. You can also import jpeg to work on. Powerpoints be imported edited and then exported as jpeg. Unfortunately the website does NOT work for .pptx which is the version of powerpoint that is installed on our macbooks.
Google appealed to me because of the options and ease of incorporation of widgets. Also the majority of tools that I use our google based so it makes it easy to use. An online calendar is useful because it is not tied directly to one desktop I can add and edit at home and then be reminded at school or vice-versa. I am more likely to use the online to do list because I usually have 3-4 lists that I lose during the course of the week so having an online list is a definite plus.
I would definitely recommend mindomo as a conceptual mapping tool.
I already use google docs, gmail, To do, and google reader all of which I recommend as well.
Google appealed to me because of the options and ease of incorporation of widgets. Also the majority of tools that I use our google based so it makes it easy to use. An online calendar is useful because it is not tied directly to one desktop I can add and edit at home and then be reminded at school or vice-versa. I am more likely to use the online to do list because I usually have 3-4 lists that I lose during the course of the week so having an online list is a definite plus.
I would definitely recommend mindomo as a conceptual mapping tool.
I already use google docs, gmail, To do, and google reader all of which I recommend as well.
Thing #15 Going with the Flow
I have been looking for a tool to do this for quite a while. I have been using Microsoft Word and have been disappointed with the limitations of it in creating a flow chart. It takes too much time and too much work to create decent template.
I did not like Giffy, although they offered multiple templates the templates where rigid and difficult to change around. The one thing that I did like from this site was the inclusion of a Venn Diagram. This will make my diigo list solely for that purpose. I would NOT use it for creating anything other than a Venn Diagram and even then I continue to look for an easier tool
Bubbl.us was better than giffy in that you could create different looking maps or organizational charts but it had a limitation in that it was unidirectional. You could not link one of the later points to a earlier point. I saw this to be extremely linear and somewhat defeating for a mind map. It was nice to move the boxes around and change the shape but for anything other than a top down item like an organizational chart I would look elsewhere.
I am still waiting on my invitation from flowchart and I have high hopes for it.
Mindmeister is my favorite so far. The biggest draw for me is the ability to connect ideas from different sides of the concept map and therefore show relationships between seemingly very different ideas. Mindmeister does not allow some changing of the shape ( I wish it did) and is therefore limited in what it can do space wise. It also lacks some of the colors and bells and whistles that some of the other functions has but I still found it to be the most suited for my class.
All in all I am somewhat disappointed in that none of the webapps had all of the features that I am looking for. I hope that flowchart works out. I know that some of these are still in beta or testing new versions. If just a few modifications are made this could be a very powerful tool for linking learning throughout the year to one or two core concepts
I did not like Giffy, although they offered multiple templates the templates where rigid and difficult to change around. The one thing that I did like from this site was the inclusion of a Venn Diagram. This will make my diigo list solely for that purpose. I would NOT use it for creating anything other than a Venn Diagram and even then I continue to look for an easier tool
Bubbl.us was better than giffy in that you could create different looking maps or organizational charts but it had a limitation in that it was unidirectional. You could not link one of the later points to a earlier point. I saw this to be extremely linear and somewhat defeating for a mind map. It was nice to move the boxes around and change the shape but for anything other than a top down item like an organizational chart I would look elsewhere.
I am still waiting on my invitation from flowchart and I have high hopes for it.
Mindmeister is my favorite so far. The biggest draw for me is the ability to connect ideas from different sides of the concept map and therefore show relationships between seemingly very different ideas. Mindmeister does not allow some changing of the shape ( I wish it did) and is therefore limited in what it can do space wise. It also lacks some of the colors and bells and whistles that some of the other functions has but I still found it to be the most suited for my class.
All in all I am somewhat disappointed in that none of the webapps had all of the features that I am looking for. I hope that flowchart works out. I know that some of these are still in beta or testing new versions. If just a few modifications are made this could be a very powerful tool for linking learning throughout the year to one or two core concepts
Thing #15 Google
The two things that I selected are
igoogle and google wave.
I set up an igoogle page that has the following gadgets
Google Reader
Gmail
Google Book Search
Google Driving Directions
Weather
Calculator
Calendar
To do list
This allows me to check m email, blog posts, to do list and calendar all fromt he same page and also do the most common tasks from my home page. I have had igoogle for years but all it had was the weather and famous quotes. I explored what was out there and suddenly igoogle became very useful
Google Wave is relatively new. I invited Nancy and Dave to it and would be happy to invite anyone else out there that would like to join. It is a realtime collaboration between people who are in different places. People work on the same document, they can talk, edit, and communicate in real time to produce a finished product. I thought that this would be ideal in communicating with our curriculum director and Rockwall HS. We could easily meet during the day on the computer to put together the district benchmarks. We could change the language, edit questions, import questions from our laptops and have a finished product to copy all without ever meeting, emailing, etc. I encourage everyone to join google wave so that we can "brainstorm" a way to incorporate some of these new ideas into our classroom.
igoogle and google wave.
I set up an igoogle page that has the following gadgets
Google Reader
Gmail
Google Book Search
Google Driving Directions
Weather
Calculator
Calendar
To do list
This allows me to check m email, blog posts, to do list and calendar all fromt he same page and also do the most common tasks from my home page. I have had igoogle for years but all it had was the weather and famous quotes. I explored what was out there and suddenly igoogle became very useful
Google Wave is relatively new. I invited Nancy and Dave to it and would be happy to invite anyone else out there that would like to join. It is a realtime collaboration between people who are in different places. People work on the same document, they can talk, edit, and communicate in real time to produce a finished product. I thought that this would be ideal in communicating with our curriculum director and Rockwall HS. We could easily meet during the day on the computer to put together the district benchmarks. We could change the language, edit questions, import questions from our laptops and have a finished product to copy all without ever meeting, emailing, etc. I encourage everyone to join google wave so that we can "brainstorm" a way to incorporate some of these new ideas into our classroom.
Thing #14
Technorati appears to have its search function down for now. I will check back later. The nice thing about Web 2.0 web-based applications is that they are easily accessible from anywhere encourage sharing, etc. but we can't control when it goes down. I believe that this is a fundamental change that we as teachers need to get use to. Dave was talking about letting go in the classroom, but it appears that we may also need to let go of our tools as well. Teachers in the past have been the ultimate control freaks. This has been easier for me than some people but I still have a hard time letting go of control when I see so many students make the "wrong" decision.
I will fill in this section when technorati gets back up.
I find tagging to be tremendously useful. I now see the value of pulling the information and labeling it from its context instead of an index based keyword search such as google. I am in the process of converting all of my bookmarks to diigo and modifying my current online assignments. I will also be sharing access to my bookmarks in the physics department and hopefully we can create an excellent section of tutorials, demonstrations, and reviews for our students correctly tagged so they can get the help they need .
I will fill in this section when technorati gets back up.
I find tagging to be tremendously useful. I now see the value of pulling the information and labeling it from its context instead of an index based keyword search such as google. I am in the process of converting all of my bookmarks to diigo and modifying my current online assignments. I will also be sharing access to my bookmarks in the physics department and hopefully we can create an excellent section of tutorials, demonstrations, and reviews for our students correctly tagged so they can get the help they need .
Monday, June 21, 2010
Thing #13 Tagging
I am using this instead of bookmarks now. My bookmarks are a mess and folders just make it more complicated. I spent the last two hours moving my bookmarks into diigo which I thought was the easiest to use. I also really enjoy the highlight and post it notes function. My idea was to use these as a guided reading activity for the students. Have the students read an assignment online but highlight important aspects and post questions using the comments for them to think about certain parts. I also thought that this would make a tremendous review activity. There are so many good animations, videos, tutorials, notes, etc. out there to help our students but they always rely on questionable sources. I thought about giving a traditional review (questions) with keyword tags to students with access to my diigo where they could review tutorials if they didn't get a question right. This way students could focus their study time on what they didn't get right and spend less time on what they have already mastered.
Thing #12
I really enjoyed this and find it to be incredibly useful. I have a hard time checking all of the sources that my students use when they do projects and they know this. I would love to use this for their research projects and restrict them to reputable sites. I wish there was a way to make all .gov or .edu sites available in the search instead of putting in specific sites. The only concerns that I would have would be in the time that it would take to create a rollyo. I plan on building a search for my energy project (October-Nov) and evaluating how it goes. Excellent tool.
Thing #11
I enjoyed posting on the blogs, I have frequented forums and blogs for several years but I ahve always done so as a lurker. Posting made me feel like I am participating and having a conversation instead of listening to a lecture. I thought that the two most important things that I read about commenting are linking to articles that you reference (sharing knowledge directly from the source) and treating other bloggers like they are in the room with you. The only other time I tried to post on a forum other people immediately attacked as a new person who didn't know what I was talking about. I haven't returned to that blog and I likely won't. In order to develop a sense of community you have to be open to all views but you must be civil.
for the love of learning - This blog has to do with reforming the education system to abolishing grades, homework, etc. and students will respond by doing what they need to do instead of what they are forced to do. Although I agree in principle I believe that it is a false utopia similar to the communist view in the 1920's
I agree with you and I believe that psychological research generally supports that idea that intrinsic motivation is far superior and long lasting in terms of effect. What do you do with the students that don't have intrinsic motivation. If done properly a reward system can be used to help develop that motivation as long as it is phased out and is not the only reason why students have a certain behavior.
free technology for teachers. - This site picks out different tools for teachers. I commented on the one that is a time map which displays what cultures around the world are doing at different times.
That is a great tool. I know that it isn't free but the game civilization does a similar thing to the time map but it also tells you when various events occur. Copies of the game can be picked up for around 3 dollars at half price books or some other resale shop. If you can get more than one copy you can play as a class. I know that my 3rd grader knows more about diplomacy, government, history, and technology because of this game.
for the love of learning - This blog has to do with reforming the education system to abolishing grades, homework, etc. and students will respond by doing what they need to do instead of what they are forced to do. Although I agree in principle I believe that it is a false utopia similar to the communist view in the 1920's
I agree with you and I believe that psychological research generally supports that idea that intrinsic motivation is far superior and long lasting in terms of effect. What do you do with the students that don't have intrinsic motivation. If done properly a reward system can be used to help develop that motivation as long as it is phased out and is not the only reason why students have a certain behavior.
free technology for teachers. - This site picks out different tools for teachers. I commented on the one that is a time map which displays what cultures around the world are doing at different times.
That is a great tool. I know that it isn't free but the game civilization does a similar thing to the time map but it also tells you when various events occur. Copies of the game can be picked up for around 3 dollars at half price books or some other resale shop. If you can get more than one copy you can play as a class. I know that my 3rd grader knows more about diplomacy, government, history, and technology because of this game.
Thing #10
This was a lot of fun, it has a lot of potential to spice up more traditional lectures and can be easily incorporated into reviews.
These websites were easy to use
http://www.imagechef.com/ - is the new one that I found using a google search. It allows you to illustrate main points by having the text move and it can easily be transferred into a power point
http://www.comicstripgenerator.com/
http://www.imagechef.com/
I did not like
http://www.customsigngenerator.com/
as it was confusing and some what difficult to use, but it did offer the most options
Examples of my work:
Sunday, June 20, 2010
Thing #9
Google is the easiest to use but comes up with a billion results most of which are not relevant.
Topix was easy to narrow down geographically significant posts. There are lots of local parents that think that we are lazy, overpaid, slovenly teachers in Rockwall but there are even more parents that think we do a good job and don't get paid enough.
Feedster was down on 6/20/10 but I will try it again tomorrow.
Syndic8 was especially confusing to use but it did seem to come up with some relevant results. It is by far my least favorite to use.
Technorati was very interesting and easy to navigate. It is by far the easiest for me. It allows you to search by category or to search similar to google. It came up with interesting and relevant results.
I found several interesting physics feeds including a blog put on by a physics teacher in Egypt. It had interesting video and pictures. Technorati had great articles about the LHC. Syndic8 just wanted to send me to MTV Deutchseland and Archer New England.
I have always seen that CNN and FoxNews have the RSS buttons on their stories that if they update them can be used and now I know what that is for.
Topix was easy to narrow down geographically significant posts. There are lots of local parents that think that we are lazy, overpaid, slovenly teachers in Rockwall but there are even more parents that think we do a good job and don't get paid enough.
Feedster was down on 6/20/10 but I will try it again tomorrow.
Syndic8 was especially confusing to use but it did seem to come up with some relevant results. It is by far my least favorite to use.
Technorati was very interesting and easy to navigate. It is by far the easiest for me. It allows you to search by category or to search similar to google. It came up with interesting and relevant results.
I found several interesting physics feeds including a blog put on by a physics teacher in Egypt. It had interesting video and pictures. Technorati had great articles about the LHC. Syndic8 just wanted to send me to MTV Deutchseland and Archer New England.
I have always seen that CNN and FoxNews have the RSS buttons on their stories that if they update them can be used and now I know what that is for.
Thing #8
This has been the most useful tool that I have found so far. I monitor several different pages forums and I find myself constantly going to look for updates and not finding anything. This will be a great time saver and will allow me to "catch up" when I have time and not have to search all over the place for updates.
This will help me keep up to date with the latest research on education and ideas and will also allow me to use the most recent news examples to illustrate physical principles.
The reader is a great opportunity to monitor students who participate in a blog situation. The teacher can monitor the discussion and does not have to check the wiki unless it has been updated. Additionally it allows you to record the posts and read them later when you are offline. This is a great tool for classes that require a discussion board or wiki participation.
Here is an interesting link for those of us who have had helicopter parents
http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/helicopterparentshaveneurotickidsstudysuggests
Here is a link to my public reader
http://www.google.com/reader/shared/user%2F11410242443935184797%2Fstate%2Fcom.google%2Fstarred
This will help me keep up to date with the latest research on education and ideas and will also allow me to use the most recent news examples to illustrate physical principles.
The reader is a great opportunity to monitor students who participate in a blog situation. The teacher can monitor the discussion and does not have to check the wiki unless it has been updated. Additionally it allows you to record the posts and read them later when you are offline. This is a great tool for classes that require a discussion board or wiki participation.
Here is an interesting link for those of us who have had helicopter parents
http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/helicopterparentshaveneurotickidsstudysuggests
Here is a link to my public reader
http://www.google.com/reader/shared/user%2F11410242443935184797%2Fstate%2Fcom.google%2Fstarred
Saturday, June 19, 2010
Thing #7
The thing that I learned about the list of Web 2.0 tools is that I already use a lot of them.
I use Biblio to search for 1st edition psychology books for her personal library. I purchased a first edition copy of Walden 2 for her a few years ago.
I also use Craiglist, google maps, pandora, zillow, igoogle, googledocs quite a bit.
The web 2.0 tool that I explored was redit. It is an online forum that allows people to choose topics to follow and post/read articles on those topics. I set up a page with the following topics that I am following: | One of the most difficult things to do is narrow down what you want to appear on your main page. After that it is keeping up with all of the subjects that you want to follow as nearly all of the boards are updated with new information several times a day. For school the best one that I have found is edpsych it posts great articles about the needed overlap of psychological research with teaching practices to be effective teachers. One of the great things about the redit community that I have seen so far is that the articles are almost always research articles, sometimes news articles (depending on the forum), but are always valid. This would be a great jumping off point for students to do research on certain topics. The topic groups vary a great deal from fun and games to academic topics. I also set a redit up for my wife on her computer so that she can stay up to date with the latest information in her field. This is a great website to keep in the loop on new information in your field.
I use Biblio to search for 1st edition psychology books for her personal library. I purchased a first edition copy of Walden 2 for her a few years ago.
I also use Craiglist, google maps, pandora, zillow, igoogle, googledocs quite a bit.
The web 2.0 tool that I explored was redit. It is an online forum that allows people to choose topics to follow and post/read articles on those topics. I set up a page with the following topics that I am following: | One of the most difficult things to do is narrow down what you want to appear on your main page. After that it is keeping up with all of the subjects that you want to follow as nearly all of the boards are updated with new information several times a day. For school the best one that I have found is edpsych it posts great articles about the needed overlap of psychological research with teaching practices to be effective teachers. One of the great things about the redit community that I have seen so far is that the articles are almost always research articles, sometimes news articles (depending on the forum), but are always valid. This would be a great jumping off point for students to do research on certain topics. The topic groups vary a great deal from fun and games to academic topics. I also set a redit up for my wife on her computer so that she can stay up to date with the latest information in her field. This is a great website to keep in the loop on new information in your field.
Thing # 6
One of the flickr mashups that I played with was called alpha learner. It was originally designed to tteach the English alphabet to pre-school kids but I thought it would be nice to modify it to show various physics principles (e.g. Newton's 1st Law and pictures various collisions, table cloth tricks, etc. pop up). Flickr color picker would be useful in the light unit of physics when I need images of different colors to illustrate various points. Also while looking at flickr chiat pet which has no educational value but was fun to play with. You can take any flickr photo and add chia pet seeds to turn that object into a chia pet. I also liked the trading card tool for teaching famous scientific figures
Thing #5: Flickr
I found that the vast majority of science pictures came from the life sciences instead of the physical science. I do a project with the Mac Books where students have to take pictures of themselves matching the motion of various force diagrams. They could easily use flickr instead of power point to attach their photos and submit them electronically. Flickr would also more easily allow them to use their cell phones to take the picture instead of transferring it via an expensive data plan. The image above was from an old science textbook and was free for anyone to use and does not require any attribution.
Monday, June 7, 2010
Thing #3: Set up a Blog and an Avatar
I had a number of problems setting my blog up the first time. I was unable to get blogger to work for the majority of the day. The process itself is fairly easy once the technical difficulties were fixed. Blogger gives a great deal of options, the options allow for a great deal of control but are confusing for a first time blogger. Familiarity breeds comfort so I'm sure that I will be better at setting up the next blog
The avatar was fun but it was time consuming to look through the various options. I did enjoy the process overall
The avatar was fun but it was time consuming to look through the various options. I did enjoy the process overall
Thing #2 Pointers for Life Long Learners
The easiest habit for me is that I view problems as challenges. Whenever I have a problem I work through until I get a solution. I will research and try out new ideas until I come up with the a myriad or the best solution.
The hardest habit for me to use is the "begin with the end in mind." I have numerous ideas that I come up with that I think will be very beneficial to my class but I don't always see how it will effect my students until afterward. The learning contract was very beneficial for me in helping me think through some of my ideas before getting to far into the idea.
I did want to disagree with their definition of learning. It is not just acquiring a new skill or knowledge but being able to manipulate that information/skill and use it out of the context in which it was taught. Student's can regurgitate information without ever learning anything.
The hardest habit for me to use is the "begin with the end in mind." I have numerous ideas that I come up with that I think will be very beneficial to my class but I don't always see how it will effect my students until afterward. The learning contract was very beneficial for me in helping me think through some of my ideas before getting to far into the idea.
I did want to disagree with their definition of learning. It is not just acquiring a new skill or knowledge but being able to manipulate that information/skill and use it out of the context in which it was taught. Student's can regurgitate information without ever learning anything.
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