Wow, what a full week. I've been trying to keep up with all of the end of year issues at school as well as with class and I found myself procrastinating until the last day. Oops! Unfortunately I just set up my Google Alerts today and so I will not have much to say about how they've been working for at least a few days, so check back for more on that later.
As far as the rest of the material this week, I honestly felt that we were stepping back and covering some of the same material we touched on earlier in the program when I looked at the assignments. After actually completing them, I can say that although some of the material overlaps a bit, it really isn't redundant. With each activity I learned something new or created something that I can use tomorrow in my classroom or found new lessons that correlate with items I already teach.
The piece on search engines gave me a better understanding of how the crawlers and spiders work, the differences between engines, databases, directories etc., and methods other than Boolean logic to narrow and refine my searches (ie field searches). When investigating the Wikipedia debate, I resolved my own position on the subject as I was reading the perspective of other professionals in the field of education. In addition, I was also reminded that teachers don't only have to teach students, but we have to teach one another - I think the line I liked best from the blog was something to the effect of "allowing teachers to make lemonade from the lemons". Oftentimes, teachers are the hardest to teach something new to as the paradigm shifts from teachers as the givers (and keepers) of knowledge to the facilitators to help students to develop knowledge. The evaluation of web resources and using Noodle Tools both afforded me the opportunity to create and find new lessons and activities that can be supplemented into my classroom in the next few weeks and the next school year.
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Monday, May 18, 2009
Internet Resources (CED0520 - Wk 1)
OK, so I know this blog should be about what we’re covering in class, but I have to talk about Moodle. It’s an internet tool on its own anyways. Many of my classmates were telling me how much I’d like using it in my classroom and now that I’ve finally gotten “trained” within our district I’m already in love with how flexible an application it is.
I mentioned something to the same effect in my response to internet resources in the wiki, but I think the point is a very important one. I have always struggled with how to organize and keep track of the great internet resources - favorites and bookmarking are some of the current tools to hold onto those great sites, but there is still the lack of a method of incorporating them right into the curriculum. Enter Moodle…
I think that one of the advantages of Moodle is that even though it is usually intentioned as an online course management tool, it has many other functions. One teacher is using it as her study guide as students read a novel - each chapter is broken into topics with related activities, another teaches week to week like we have been doing in MEIT, a third uses it to keep the student FACT group informed. And as far as I’m concerned, I’ve finally found a place to actually incorporate some of those great resources that are available online, instead of bookmarking them and then never remembering to go back to them later. In my classroom, I like to offer a lot of choice assignments where students have the ability to pick a topic or project from a number options and the internet is a potentially limitless source of those options. Now, I can put links to all of those options in a text piece within Moodle and let the students choose and work right on-line. Up to this point, I’ve taken those resources, cut-and-pasted them into word documents with all of the options and then printed them off, then hauled the class into the computer lab to research/work and lo and behold a student would find the site that I pulled the assignment/idea from in the first place…etc. etc. etc. What a waste of my time and energy when there is a method to pull it all together. Now I know that wikis are an option for this online organization as well, but with internet filters and limitations as to where the students can go, having a “district approved” alternative is really helpful. As far as class this week is concerned, I’m looking forward to finding and learning about new resources because I’m encouraged to think that not only will I have them, but I’ll know how to implement some of them in a very immediate and concrete way for my students.
I mentioned something to the same effect in my response to internet resources in the wiki, but I think the point is a very important one. I have always struggled with how to organize and keep track of the great internet resources - favorites and bookmarking are some of the current tools to hold onto those great sites, but there is still the lack of a method of incorporating them right into the curriculum. Enter Moodle…
I think that one of the advantages of Moodle is that even though it is usually intentioned as an online course management tool, it has many other functions. One teacher is using it as her study guide as students read a novel - each chapter is broken into topics with related activities, another teaches week to week like we have been doing in MEIT, a third uses it to keep the student FACT group informed. And as far as I’m concerned, I’ve finally found a place to actually incorporate some of those great resources that are available online, instead of bookmarking them and then never remembering to go back to them later. In my classroom, I like to offer a lot of choice assignments where students have the ability to pick a topic or project from a number options and the internet is a potentially limitless source of those options. Now, I can put links to all of those options in a text piece within Moodle and let the students choose and work right on-line. Up to this point, I’ve taken those resources, cut-and-pasted them into word documents with all of the options and then printed them off, then hauled the class into the computer lab to research/work and lo and behold a student would find the site that I pulled the assignment/idea from in the first place…etc. etc. etc. What a waste of my time and energy when there is a method to pull it all together. Now I know that wikis are an option for this online organization as well, but with internet filters and limitations as to where the students can go, having a “district approved” alternative is really helpful. As far as class this week is concerned, I’m looking forward to finding and learning about new resources because I’m encouraged to think that not only will I have them, but I’ll know how to implement some of them in a very immediate and concrete way for my students.
Monday, May 4, 2009
Computers & How They Work - A Review
How does this course, and its content connect to you? Is it useful information that will help you in the future? If so how? If not how might it be improved?
I found this class to be very connected to my professional and personal life. As an individual in a technological society I use computers all of the time. Knowing how they work and the components that are used as well as the history of their becoming what they are today gives greater understanding and meaning to that use. The knowledge also has given me greater resolve to not be afraid of what I don’t know about computers, but to experiment with them like I did when we opened up the box and when we tested different operating systems by creating live CDs. I would never have guessed that I would have come away with greater ability to care about the “how and why” computers work instead of just the “if and when”. When programs or applications don’t work or don’t work well, I think I’ll be able to troubleshoot many things on my own before having to seek assistance and when I do, I can give an accurate and (hopefully) helpful explanation of the issue or problem.
As far as the usefulness of the information…while I don’t plan on ever becoming an IT in the future, knowing how to talk like one and understand the lingo is very important. In addition, seeing where computing may be headed down the road (cloud computing, netbooks, etc) is not only exciting but has given me an edge in the classroom. I was very interested in working towards writing a grant that would put a laptop in each student’s possession while in my classroom. Originally I was thinking traditional laptops but just as we were discussing netbooks in class, our Technology Director was asking me if I knew about these little laptops that were a fraction of the cost of traditional laptops - go figure. (I of course told him that I knew of them and their abilities and that if he would simply outfit my classroom with them, I would volunteer to be the model classroom for their use! - I haven’t heard back from him yet…) I also think that the class has been useful to me as I look to the future of education in our district. Our principal is moving on to a superintendent position in Medford next year and our district isn’t hiring a person to replace him - we’re restructuring our current staff. This tells me that the more hats a person can wear in the building, the better chance of either moving up (if that’s the intention) or more importantly sticking around! I think it increases my value to the district.
The only area in class that I would seek improvement would be the commenting on others work. When submitting assignments, I was so focused on finishing that I really didn’t spend the time looking at other student work - I found myself giving many of them a quick look over and then making my comments. I think that if you give one or two days after the assignment is due for the comments, there may be a better chance of getting some discussion going through the comments. (For example, if the assignment/blog is due on the Tuesday, give until Wednesday or Thursday to post comments.) We actually did extend this time for the last week’s materials and although I had already commented, I really liked the idea of having more of a chance to respond.
I found this class to be very connected to my professional and personal life. As an individual in a technological society I use computers all of the time. Knowing how they work and the components that are used as well as the history of their becoming what they are today gives greater understanding and meaning to that use. The knowledge also has given me greater resolve to not be afraid of what I don’t know about computers, but to experiment with them like I did when we opened up the box and when we tested different operating systems by creating live CDs. I would never have guessed that I would have come away with greater ability to care about the “how and why” computers work instead of just the “if and when”. When programs or applications don’t work or don’t work well, I think I’ll be able to troubleshoot many things on my own before having to seek assistance and when I do, I can give an accurate and (hopefully) helpful explanation of the issue or problem.
As far as the usefulness of the information…while I don’t plan on ever becoming an IT in the future, knowing how to talk like one and understand the lingo is very important. In addition, seeing where computing may be headed down the road (cloud computing, netbooks, etc) is not only exciting but has given me an edge in the classroom. I was very interested in working towards writing a grant that would put a laptop in each student’s possession while in my classroom. Originally I was thinking traditional laptops but just as we were discussing netbooks in class, our Technology Director was asking me if I knew about these little laptops that were a fraction of the cost of traditional laptops - go figure. (I of course told him that I knew of them and their abilities and that if he would simply outfit my classroom with them, I would volunteer to be the model classroom for their use! - I haven’t heard back from him yet…) I also think that the class has been useful to me as I look to the future of education in our district. Our principal is moving on to a superintendent position in Medford next year and our district isn’t hiring a person to replace him - we’re restructuring our current staff. This tells me that the more hats a person can wear in the building, the better chance of either moving up (if that’s the intention) or more importantly sticking around! I think it increases my value to the district.
The only area in class that I would seek improvement would be the commenting on others work. When submitting assignments, I was so focused on finishing that I really didn’t spend the time looking at other student work - I found myself giving many of them a quick look over and then making my comments. I think that if you give one or two days after the assignment is due for the comments, there may be a better chance of getting some discussion going through the comments. (For example, if the assignment/blog is due on the Tuesday, give until Wednesday or Thursday to post comments.) We actually did extend this time for the last week’s materials and although I had already commented, I really liked the idea of having more of a chance to respond.
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