Week 13

Being a designer is an essential  act of a teachers profession, you design the curriculum and learn  new experiences to meet specified purposes.Like other design professions, such as architecture, engineering, or graphic arts, designers in education  must be mindful of their audiences. Teachers have to act like designers everyday, because they have to experiment and find new ways to help their students learn. 

iStopMotion is a software that allows students to create their own animated movies and time-lapse recordings. Students can create this through a laptop, digital camera, or a direct-video input device. They are able to capture and then create animations frame by frame. This could be a fun and creative project that students can make during class. Even elementary students are able to create something like this because it has a easy-to-learn application. Students could use this in a group project or individually, and it can be used in any content area. 

Digital Storytelling allows students to show their creative sides by being able to generate ideas and put those ideas into action. Students will research, write, and organize how they plan on structuring their story. Once it is set in motion, then the camera comes into play. This type of program is more of a tool to get students ideas to begin flowing. Incorporating this kind of technology would be very beneficial to the students. Students would be able to work with visual images, text, and sound to develop their critical thinking skills. I am going to be a speech teacher, and I could definitely incorporate this type of technology in my classroom. When preparing for a speech, students have to have critical thinking skills in order know how to prepare and present a speech. The skills that they would acquire through the Digital Storytelling, would benefit them in their writing and presenting skills as well. 

Visualization is an important concept to have when dealing with mathematics. Some other methods that the textbook suggest are programs like Mathematica, MathLab, and Statistical Analysis System. These programs allow students to visualize the mathematical problem and see the effect on   problem manipulation. It is a fun and creative way for students to visualize the problem and how to makes the correct solution. 

I think that it is very possible to learn from watching TV. Most students these days are consumed by the television constantly. Since TV, is something that really reaches out to people then people would definitely learn from watching TV. A good example that can be used is how much YouTube has affected our world. You can type in just about anything and YouTube will have it. I have used YouTube a lot to learn different stuff on cooking, music, or how to operate my cell phone. It is a very beneficial thing for students, if what they are watching can allow their minds to think critically and they learn from that. 

References

Crismond, D., Howland, J., Jonassens, D., Marra, R. M. (2008).  Meaningful

learning with technology. Columbus: Pearson, Merrill Prentice Hall.

Week 12: VoicThread

 After watching the video over Voice Thread, I found it very interesting. I really like the part where it showed the old pictures of the family, and how each family member was able to talk about the mother's concern. Also, I enjoyed the little boy's dinosaur picture, and how he was able to explain what it was and everything. One of the reason's that I really thought this could be an effective tool, is because you are able to post comments through telephone, video, voice record, text, or you can upload a file. It is a good tool for having conversations around media.

I would definitely use this as part of my lesson plan, because it allows the teachers and the students to interact with one another. It is very simple to learn, and students can comment anywhere on the picture, or document. With the Voice Thread, they can capture all of the groups attention for discussion on just one page. It is really fun for the students to use, and I believe that they could learn a lot about other students from this. I as a teacher, could get their feedback on the lesson for the day as well. 

I plan on teaching speech with high school students, and the Voice Thread, could be used but not everyday. Student's wouldn't be able to give their speech on it, but they could use this as a demonstration for whatever their speech is about. It would be like having a power point to go off of, but it would be interactive for the other students. I wouldn't totally eliminate this in my classroom, because it would still allow me to get feedback on certain topics that students would like to talk about or not.

 

Reference:

What's a voicethread anyway? (2007). [Web]. Retrieved from http://voicethread.com/?#q

Week 11

The three principles that I would use are active, critical learning principle, practice principle, and identity principle. The active, critical learning principle is important, because it encourages the student and allows them to learn in a positive way. It is very critical, but it focuses ore on encouraging the student instead of bringing them down. The whole environment is revolved around encouraging active learning as well, so this brings out a positive environment for the student. The practice principle is important because this is where the students drill what they learned into their heads.  You spend a lot of time to practice what you have learned, so it is repeated many times to allow the student to really grasp what they learned. The identity principle is important because the students actually get to practice what they have learned. It allows the students to make real choices with what they have learned and take on identities with those. This really allows the students to make decisions and they learn how to respond with what they have learned in certain situations. 

You can create simulations in many ways, but how I would create a simulation in my classroom would be to do role playing. I am a speech major, and role playing would tie in so well with the identity principle. They are similar because with the identity principle, you take what you have learned and put it into practice. How I would use this simulation would be to demonstrate what to do in a role play, and give groups different scenarios and have them make the choice of how to respond with their scenarios. It allows them to use what they have learned, and then apply it so they are having to make real choices. The role playing would not only be beneficial in the classroom, but would prepare them on how to deal with different situations in the real world. 

I feel that the active, critical learning principle, the practice principle, and the identity principle are very important because it allows students to be encouraged while learning, get lots of practice, and put that practice into action. Since I want to teach speech with high school students, these three principles would be very beneficial to use in my classroom. Students will learn more easily if they have an environment that is encouraging for them to learn in. They need lots of practice, so they can apply what they have learned and put it into practice like when using role plays. 

References

Jonassens, D., Howland, J., Marra, R. M.,Grismond, D. (2008).  Meaningful

           learning with technology. Columbus: Pearson, Merrill Prentice Hall.