Google Documents and Sumo Paint

This week we explored two different applications, one office and one image editing application.  Google Documents is the office application I explored.  I have used it myself several times.  It has some wonderful features.  First of all, it is free.  It is also good for group projects or for things in which more than one person are working on it.  I have two coworkers who job share.  I have mentioned Google Documents to them because I thought it may help them while working on lesson plans.  Other positive uses for it would be that it would be useful in sharing information with students and families and the documents can be saved and then accessed from any computer as long as there is an Internet connection.  Thus, if you are working on a project in multiple locations, you would always have access to it.

The image editing application I explored was Sumo Paint.  I found it to be really cool.  The possibilities with it seem endless.   You can edit an image or create an image.  You can change the shape of the paint brush, there are also many shapes you can make.  Plus, there are different fill options.  You can change and move things around on it, change colors on pictures, and much, much more.  It seems like you could create almost anything you wanted.

Week 13 - E-learning and Instructional Design

This week we read about E-learning and Instructional Design.  We were to read the chapter to find relationships between our own experiences and what we read.  This is my first online class toward my master’s degree, so I haven’t had that much experience with e-learning, but while I was reading this passage seemed to fit with the experience I have had thus far.  “Consider further the terms online learning, Web-based instruction, and distance learning, all of which are often used interchangeably. …Learners may interact with each other, with learning management system (LMS), or both, and may do so from the same or different geographic locations.”  This fits with my experience because I am learning from a distance and our instruction is web-based.  Every week we are provided instructions for whatever task we are to complete through web-based instruction.  Plus, every week we interact with our classmates through posting.  Another experience I’ve had is “The scenario of the solitary student working alone at her computer late into the night with little or no contact with her peers still exists, but many current and future learning systems will emphasize shared experience features.”  While we do interact with our classmates through posting and blogging, I am also a solitary student working late into the night. 

There was another passage that hit home to me more in my teaching experiences rather than in my online educational experiences.  “The bottom line is to consider the learning outcomes possible (intentional and informal) along with the affordances of various technology combinations and then create an instructional design that takes advantage of these factors in an artful, flexible, and theoretically appropriate fashion.”  The important part of this passage is the “consider learning outcomes”.  This is something we, as teachers, must do when planning our lessons.  We must consider what outcome, what lesson we want our students to learn.  We must know what our purpose is for teaching that particular lesson.  

Classroom Website

Miss Kracht's Buckaroos - Classroom Webpage

I created a classroom webpage because it is very important to communicate openly with parents and this is one quick and easy way to communicate.  The homepage of my website has a brief overview of what we are doing in the different subject areas in our classroom (I send this out in a newsletter too, but having it on my webpage as well allows parents to see what is going on even if their child does not bring home their newsletter).  I also included the major upcoming events so that parents can be aware of what is coming up for their child.  Finally, the last piece of the homepage is a newsfeed gadget.  I included that because it is important to stay informed on what is going on in the nation and world as well as simply our classroom.  Thus, I can encourage my students to visit our classroom site in order to stay up to date on current events.

Linked to the homepage are three other pages; homework assignments, contact information and useful links.  The homework assignments page keeps parents updated on what is due for the week.  It also has links to the students' spelling lists and spelling options list in case a student were to leave their work at school.  The contact information page provides my school address and phone number as well as a map to help parents to find and contact me.  Lastly, my useful links page includes links to four websites that we use consistently in class.  As the year progresses, I could add to this list to motivate students to practice learned skills at home.

Week 12 Reflection - Tips for Finding a Job

This chapter contains useful information for all of us at different points in our lives.  At some point we all need to look for a job or a new job.  The author provides very useful information that can be applied to any job.

In Lesson 6 from his article, he discusses the importance of having analysis skills.  I think this is a valuable skill for people in all jobs, but I, as a teacher, assess everyday.  It is not always formally, and it is not always assessment of my students.  I am constantly assessing how I taught my lesson, if I need to re-teach some of it, and then of course I am assessing whether or not my students understood the lesson.  This is usually informal, but it is important to constantly assess yourself in order to improve and avoid staying stagnant. 

In Lesson 8, the author stresses how critical communication and listening skills are.  Again, these are skills necessary in many careers.  As a teacher, I need to be able to clearly communicate with parents, students, other teachers, administration, etc. and I need to be able to communicate verbally as well as through writing.  I also need to make sure that I am listening to the concerns or questions of my students and their parents; I need to listen to advice from other teachers or administrators; and I need to listen to my students and what is happening in their lives.

Lesson 11 is an area I need to improve on.  This lesson says that it is important to become involved in professional organizations.  This is an area I have struggled with.  As a college student, I was a member of the SMEA but I did not get as involved as I wish I had.  Since college, I have not joined any professional organizations.  During the school year, I immerse myself so much in my work, that I don’t take time for things like this.  I guess I still struggle with this because I am not sure what organization to join. 

Finally, the last lesson that I know is important is the lesson on keeping up on literature about my areas of interest.  When I was interviewing the last time around, one question that I encountered was, “what are you reading right now and how will it help you in your career?”  At that time, I didn’t have an answer for them.  Here is another area I struggle with because again, I don’t allow myself time to read literature that relates to my interests.  I need to find a good journal that I enjoy that will help keep me up to date on new techniques and ideas for education.  I can say that this class has helped me to read a bit more and to get more up to date on technology (free even) available out there to use right now in my classroom.

Week 11 Reflection - ID in three settings

In reading these three chapters, I found several similarities among the three different settings (business and industry, P-12, and Higher Education).  I actually found it easier to find similarities than differences among them.  For example, all three settings found the lack of time and resources to be an issue.  In addition, it is noted several places in each of the three chapters that collaboration is key.  Collaboration in the business world is key especially between veterans and newbies; collaboration among teachers and businesses in P-12; and collaboration among professors in the same faculty and outside their college or university in higher education.  

However, the assignment was to find different themes or differences among the three, so this is what I have come up with.  I see the three settings working together.  I see businesses creating products and evaluations.  I then see higher education taking those products, researching, assessing and sharing uses for the products in different settings.  P-12 then takes the products and uses them in order to meet state and national standards and objectives, especially those mandated by NCLB. 

All three areas face constraints.  In the business world they listed several constraints, but one large constraint was lack of time and resources.  As for higher education, while they have a similar constraint of lack of time, they also face the constraint of faculty being trained more in content and not in pedagogy.  Therefore, they may not use best practices when sharing the great products they research and evaluate, and thus, may not express their true value (this is simply an opinion based on my reading).  Finally, along with lack of time and resources, P-12 faces the constraint of teacher resistance and availability and access.  Many teachers feel that things are thrown at them without proper discussions and then are less motivated to see the positive in the technology.  Being given an order versus a choice doesn’t always sit well with everyone.  Plus, in many cases schools do not have the money or means to make technology completely accessible to all students. 

Here is where I see a difference between P-12 and both higher education and business ID.  P-12 is mandated to use technology while the others are choices.  People choose to go into ID in business and higher education.  Another difference between P-12 and both higher education and business is in the make-up of the system.  It seems as if both higher education and business ID have teams of people that work together to make and end result.  In addition, they both have opportunities for advancement in their field.  In the P-12 world, yes, there are other teachers to talk to and work with but it seems a little different than the teams of business and higher education.  Plus, teachers do not have opportunities for advancement in their field.  Yes, they can advance in pay through more degrees, and yes, they can advance in the sense of moving to administration, but administration is not for everyone and that is a very different career than a teacher.  Whereas, advancement in higher education and business ID does not seem like such a drastic change.  However, I am not in the business or higher education field, so maybe my perception is off. 

Until now, I never realized how broad ID is.  It has so many different pieces and is involved in so many different places.  

Concept Mapping

This is a concept map that I would have my students create using our social studies curriculum.  In third grade we teach about Michigan and part of that is teaching students about government.  It can be difficult for them to grasp all of the different levels of government, who leads them, and what they do.  Therefore, creating a concept map like the one above would hopefully help them to organize all of the different information.  It might also help them to visualize the different levels and responsibilities.  We have a chapter in our social studies textbook that covers all of this information.  I used it to create this map, so I know this is something my students could create as well.

Screencast

This is a screencast to teach students how to create a PowerPoint presentation.  Recently, my third grade students created Biography PowerPoints.  I found myself running around to every student in order to show them how to create links from one slide to the next.  I know that links are not necessary, however, I thought my students would benefit from learning about the capabilities of PowerPoint.  They really enjoyed this project and LOVED their end result! 

Week 10 Reflection - ID and P12 Technology Integration

In reading the chapter for this week about Instructional Design and P-12 Technology Integration, I learned that there are three types of ID development – System ID, Product ID and Classroom Development. I always thought these fell under the umbrella term of instructional design/technology. These three terms are still a bit foggy as to how they are distinguished, but it makes sense to have several branches of ID. There are so many different parts to ID; of course it would need to be divided in order to accomplish the many goals of ID.

In addition to the three types of ID, I learned more about two integration models. The ASSURE model seems to be set up very much like other lessons. The NTeQ model gave me some questions. NTeQ is a model that likes to use authentic, real-world data, not simply simulation data. The goal of NTeQ is for students to learn the necessary objectives and as a tool for solving problems. It involves a 10 step lesson plan which has some great parts but when is there time to complete a lesson plan that extensive? Going along with that, and maybe I should have asked this first, are these lessons already prepared for the teacher?

The chapter went on to discuss Michigan’s Freedom to Learn initiative, which provided 20,000 laptops to middle school students and teachers. The short paragraph about this initiative left me with many more questions. Where in Michigan was this initiative implemented? When the district hired new teachers, were they given the same training as the previous teachers? Were they trained in how to effectively implement the use of these laptops?

Even with all of the initiatives to help teachers integrate technology into the classroom, researchers noticed that gains on state tests were inconsistent. One possible reason given for this was the use of low-level and high-level tasks on the computers. What do those high-level tasks look like? Am I using the lab effectively?

It was very interesting to read about the different types of ID and the different models used to try to help integrate technology into the classroom. However, even with all of this work, I was not surprised to read, “Education is ranked as the least technology-intensive enterprise among fifty-five U.S. industry sectors.” One reason given for this fact is the availability and access to computers and resources. That would have been the first reason I would have come up with. I don’t want this to sound like I am complaining because I know it could be worse, but I have 17 students and two computers. We go to the lab one day a week. We do have a laptop cart and are able to sign up for more lab time when it is available, but even there we have several computers that are not working properly. Plus, our software is outdated. Thus, availability is quite an issue. Furthermore, in thinking about the other technology available to us, I discovered that most of the technology available in my district is provided for teachers. Teachers are provided laptops, a document camera, projector, iPad2, DVD and VHS players. All of these are useful tools for the teacher to use when presenting information, however, it is not providing students an opportunity to USE the technology. They see us use it, but they don’t get the physical practice of using the tools.