Teaching With Digital Stories

The following is a sample of what my group has done with digital stories:

For my final lesson plan, I decided to incorporate digital stories. I feel that after using Photo Story 3 with my TE401 group, we were able to easily create a 5 minute lesson. Upon observing in my field placement, I have seen students use laptops and cameras at the 3rd and 4th grade level. They are fully capable of producing products to share with the whole class. I think that digital stories are a great way for groups of students to work together to form a better understanding of one particular focus.

If you are working on a unit with a lot of content, you can divide specific areas up amongst groups and have each group focus on one particular idea. They can use photos to upload onto each slide and move them according to how they want their story to flow. They can then click on each picture and record their voices very easily. This does require a microphone, but many laptops and computers have them inside the schools. Once the students are able to play back their recording they can decide to redo it, or move on to the next slide. If they want their voice to carry over multiple slides they just have to click on each picture as they go. When they are finished recording their voices, they can chose to add music as a background. Some of the music can be distracting, but others are fun for the students to include.

After their final presentations are ready, this is a great way for students to present their hard work. By showing each digital story to the whole class, students can engage in their classmates work and take notes on what they have found. This also covers all of the material needed and allowed each group to produce something rewarding. This can also be uploaded to the internet for parents to view from their own homes. Students can share their work with their families in the click of a button.

The Technology World

CC-A-NC-SA photo by superkimbo

As this class is coming to an end, I have taken a moment to reflect on everything I have learned. From tweeting to editing pictures, I have learned a great deal of life long resources to use in my future classrooms. Not only have I begun to think of ways to incorporate what I have learned with teaching, I also use these skills in my everyday life. I feel that the most important thing I learned this semester is the idea that technology is growing at a rapid pace and can provide you with more than you could ever imagine.

First off, technology is everywhere. I have been so surprised at the amount of information I am able to access from anywhere with an Internet base. Not only that, but the use of cellphones as well. Just through simple text messaging, a connection is formed between your phone and the web.

Secondly, it blows my mind that we are able to do so much with technology. However, the vast majority of our population is not educated properly when it comes to it. All of these tools we have explored in our class have been learned through a simple how to wiki and the task of exploring it ourselves. I think that everyone should be required to learn about the technology available to us, especially teachers.

I have truly enjoyed taking this class and although there were some aspects of the class that were hard to keep up with due to my busy schedule, such as blogging, tweeting, and reading other blogs, I was still able to become familiar with what is out there. I cannot wait to incorporate these skills into my own classrooms and share what I have learned with others.

Video Clips in Classrooms

As I began exploring ideas for lesson plans with the teacher I'm working with, he showed me a subscription their school had to the discovery channel education website. When I went home that night I began exploring and thinking about the different ways videos are incorporating in the classrooms now. If we go onto YouTube we can have almost any video within the click of a button. Thousands of videos on the same search word come up with different variations and ways to send across the same message. People upload their own videos they have made, stolen, or video tapped for others to view all the time. Some of these are illegal, but other are very useful.

I was able to use a video from the discovery channel in my lesson and it was very useful. Not only did I like the one I picked but the way the website was designed, it had links to introduce my video, conclude it, and also spend time elaborating on other topics discussed. It seemed like a great teaching tool and was very resourceful. I think the students really enjoyed watching the clip and it gave them a different way to take in the material being taught. Even though I did not use it to introduce anything new, I wanted another way for them to see the material already presented.

I have spent hours on YouTube and often time find myself listening to music on there, but I think it is a great tool for teachers to use. However, some see YouTube as a negative tool and argue that it allows students to go elsewhere on the web where perhaps they are not permitted. With related links it may be easy for them to go off topic, but what if the teacher was monitoring?

Do you think it would be appropriate to have students exploring YouTube for various ways to incorporate video clips into their lessons?

Working With Wikispaces

My experience in creating my wiki was great! It is very easy and self explanatory. I think it is a great way to obtain a synthesized understanding of certain topics and come up with various view points and understanding on posted issues or topics. I used the wiki to generate a discussion on how people have actually used wikis in their classrooms. I am interested to see the different ways you can incorporate them because they seem easy and very useful!

A wiki is different from a blog because it is not something that is posted for people to read and comment on. It is to be altered be others who want to create a general understand of a topic. Yes, discussions can be mandated and used, but you do not leave comments and share your opinions. You can actually change information to form your opinions and understandings

I think you can use wikis for many different ways. Specifically with students, it may be interesting to use wikis to post a general idea of a science topic for example. Students can go in on their own time and update, change, and ultimately create an understanding that builds off of or replaces others ideas. With the teacher being the ultimate creator, they can monitor the edits. However, being able to change what other write could spark ideas they may have never noticed or thought of.  

Teaching With Smartboards

CC-NC-SA photo by BES Photos

I have seen the use of Smartboards in many of the classrooms I have observed in. It has seemed like a very beneficial tool for all ages. I have heard of many different uses ranging from PreSchool to middle school. The school I used to work at had a Smartboard in each classroom. Many of the lessons were based around the use of their Smartboard. They even used it for attendance. After looking over a few different websites, I was able to learn more about what Smartboards have to offer.

According to Smarttech.com, Smartboards are a combined use of a whiteboard with a computer. The surface of the board is touch sensitive and allows lessons to come alive. Students are able to physically interact with the lessons by moving objects around and clicking on pictures and words. A major benefit to using a Smartboard is that it targets both visual and kinesthetic learners. Students in this era of technology need more than one text book way of learning material. By being able to get up and interact, not only stimulates their brain but gives them a hands on experience to be involved with the material. With Smartboards you are able to write with your hand or a pen and erase with your hand. The touch recognition allows you to use these tools without changing any settings or delaying your lesson. When you pick up the pen tool you can begin writing on the board or erasing different text. The digital ink will appear on the board when you choose to write.

The Smart notebook allows you to organize and manage your lessons. You can save any notes you add during the lesson and use that with your students later on. A screenshot can be taken also.

Along with the Smartboards there are Smart response devices that allow students to submit answers, work, or ideas from their own seats. These target many different needs for all kinds of students such as those with special needs, advanced placement, and early education.

When searching for teacher reviews on SMART boards, I found many positive ways to use them. There are many teachers who post their lessons and share with others what they have come up with to actively engage their class in lessons. There were little disadvantages but the main ones were that it is a large object and can be hard to fit into a small classroom. Another big limitation is that they are expensive.

According to a website I found, SMART boards can range anywhere from $3,450 - $10,050.

Overall, I think SMART boards seems like a great tool to have in your classroom. I would be very interested in gaining money if the school does not provide me with one for my own room use. I think today's students need interaction like this and seeing students use it first hand has really opened my eyes to all of the opportunities SMART boards can provide.

Teaching For The Future

CC-NC-SA video by mwesh

I was shown this video in my one of my Teacher Education courses on technology. I was so blown away by this that I shared it with my family. I got in a discussion with my Dad about technology and what it is doing to our students today. It has definitely changed the way children are living their lives, but what isn't constantly changing? My Dad was anti-technology in the classroom when we had this discussion, but I brought up the fact that how he was raised and how I was raised is very different and I didn't have much technology compared to students now. I see that students these days are looking for fast ways to obtain information. They are used to the fast paced lifestyle many of us have grown accustomed to. But that is the reality of life today. We have to keep things constantly changing and updating because so much of our future depends on it. With the way technology is advancing, these students we will be teaching will be working with technology that is not even out yet. We must prepare them for jobs that do not exist today, because our world is moving at a quick pace. So I ask you this question, is using as much technology as possible in our classrooms a bad thing when many of these students are guaranteed to be working with some aspect of it in their future? Why not prepare them now so that they are the best they can be in the following years?

Laptops in Classrooms: Helpful or Distracting?

CC-NC-SA photo by Kathy Cassidy

I came across a debate on Helium about the use of laptops in the classroom. When I was still in high school over 4 years ago, we had classroom sets of laptops that could be checked out from the library. We mainly used these for research projects or typing up papers for English. I found the laptops very useful because my home computer was slow and I enjoyed being able to work on my assignments during class. Although there were a few students who had trouble keeping on task, the majority of the class was busy at work using that time to their advantage. When I came across this debate, I found it very interesting to see what people had to say about the advantages and disadvantages.

65% of the voters said that laptops in the classroom were beneficial.

One post on the debate stated that she felt students potential to learn was taken away by the use of laptops in the classroom. She felt that the Internet is just too fun for students to handle all of that freedom on their own personal computer. Having that freedom causes too much distractions and they are taken to sites that leave the learning goal previously set. Although her argument focused on the Internet another post focused on the idea of being able to take notes in class. Now this was never an option when I was in high school, but in today's world it makes sense. Our brains are having to process to much these days with the fast pace of our world that it is very easy to get lost by other distractions when taking notes by pen and paper. If you have your laptop you are able to type quickly and jot down the notes while maintaining focus on the class material being taught. I find it much easy to take notes on a computer now and wish we could have had that option in class. If the Internet is such a distraction maybe the schools should disable those options and have certain laptops strictly for taking notes.

Among the many advantages of having laptops in the classroom, one post described the ability to have fast access and immediate feedback. Like many of the technologies and useful ways to integrate webpages in our own classrooms the idea of having that all in the click of a button is fascinating and efficient. I feel as though this course has already taught us about many of the advantages in having Internet access and the use of Internet sites in our classroom is very helpful.

How would you prevent distractions if you had laptops in your classrooms and would you find this useful?