Technology Based Rubrics, Clicker Assessment Tools, and Inspiration/Kidspiration Software

       I honestly do not believe I'll ever have to make up my own rubric! Wow. Looking through http://www.rubrician.com and http://school.discovery.com/schrockguide/assess.html there is a vast number of choices of different types and examples available on the internet. There were a bunch of broken links on the first link, but these aren't these only two websites for this type of thing. These will be very useful for grading projects and papers fairly using a point system as they seem to be easily modified for any situation.

       Clicker assessment tools could be extremely useful for keeping the attention of a student and their interest in a subject heightened during a lecture. I was looking through the Quizdom website and it has all sorts of different things the remotes can be used for including educational games. I'm imagining a situation where I'm doing a lecture then move on to a science game about the planets where each side of the classroom is a team, answering questions for points. The person who clicks in the answer the fastest gets the point! Now that would get them to really soak in the knowledge. In my journal critique, it was interactive software that really helped motivate students to learn more. In the end, they scored much better on knowledge tests. I see a lot of potential with a tool like this. 


       As I mentioned with the previous clicker assessment tools, using these type of interactive technologies with learning have been proven to work as per my journal critique. They keep the attention of a student and keep them motivated to continue to learn. If my school would be able to allow such a budget for Inspiration.com's programs, I would absolutely use them as continued learning for students to do at home or, if there is time and the right amount of computers, maybe use it while they are in class as a once a week type of lesson.

Sources:

http://www.rubrician.com

http://school.discovery.com/schrockguide/assess.html 

http://www.qwizdom.com/

Inspiration.com 

Visualizing With Technology

       Digital story telling as explained by Kate Kemker is a process that allows students to understand how a well told story unfolds and is created. It allows the students to work together as a team to create a storyboard through research and planning, actual videotaping, and postproduction editing via a digital video editor such as iMovie or Adobe Premiere. I think it would work well in one of my future science classrooms. I believe that students would have to do some really good research to set up an appropriate storyboard all the while building a memory of the knowledge they are gathering to present on video. Going over and over the information as they plan our their presentation would allow better retention which would be great benefit for them.

       Using computer graphics can help a student to visualize mathematical concepts and be very useful to demonstrate real life math as it applies to real world applications. Certain pieces of software are available that can help a student visually see geometry and other mathematical subjects. Graphing calculators also are another way to visualize math. Making it easier for a student to jump back and forth between the actual numbers and a graph has proven effective as a tool to help ease the learning process of math.

       According to our textbook, television can be "...a powerful learning tool when students are critical users and producers rather than consumers." So my answer would be no, students can not learn how to do something merely from watching TV instruction. They must somehow be engaged in the program. By just "consuming" what is on the TV, they are not reaching their full learning potential. To take advantage of such a thing, they need to somehow be involved it the information being set forth through an activity, such as producing their own video.

Jonassen, D., Howland, J., Marra, R., & Crismond, D. (2008). Meaningful learning With Technology(3rd Edition). Columbus, OH: Pearson/Prentice Hall.

Pod Casting - A Useful Technologly

       I learned that podcasting is another tool that can be useful for teachers and students to use to share information. It can be used in the classroom for teachers to record lectures and allow the student to listen to them later or for projects that can easily be put together with a simple microphone and computer.

        Podcasting is similar to the Web 2.0 applications we have discussed in the way it is able to share information easily without any investment in expensive technology. A trend I'm noticing is that this stuff is simplified and affordable or pretty much completely free which is great for teachers, students, and parents alike. Things like this are just recently (in the last ten years) becoming available. This is a great time to become a teacher!

        I do own an iPod. I use it in many different ways, including downloading podcasts from iTunes. In fact, on my recent trip to Europe, I downloaded podcasts that were self guided walking audio tours. They were amazing for being free! For classroom use, I think if I felt students needed to listen to me again while studying at home, I would use podcasting to share recorded lectures. That is about the extent I would use them. For projects and other similar happenings in the classroom assigned to students, I think I would go with something else with video and audio features. I honestly can't think of a disadvantage of these online communication tools unless someone becomes to reliant on them. These type of things are great learning tools. Students learn how to share information more easily and can get more in depth with their computer usage which will help them in their futures as computers aren't going anywhere anytime soon.

Jonassen, D., Howland, J., Marra, R., & Crismond, D. (2008). Meaningful learning With Technology(3rd Edition). Columbus, OH: Pearson/Prentice Hall.

Wikis, Blogging, and Social Bookmarking, Oh My!

          I feel as though I would use a wiki to provide an outline of notes for the semester,rather than any other way. It would be quick and easy to add notes each day and link other appropriate content for students to revisit during a lesson and prior to testing for review. For blogs, I'd have the students do small summaries of what they've learned for the week. I think that would be a great tool to see if they are taking appropriate notes and soaking up the appropriate knowledge and ideas I would be conveying.

          I like the Social bookmarking. I've been using it for a couple years, so I'm familiar with it. I don't see me using it with my future students, but maybe I'm not understanding how this could be useful. Now the VoiceThread on the other hand looks absolutely great! I've never heard of it, so I found it very intriguing. I could see myself having the students use it as a collaborative tool for projects or homework assignments.  The fact you don't need any extra software to use it makes it PRICELESS for students. No need to have them buy anything, which I'm sure is a hard thing to have everyone do in a public school. Being able to make extravagant presentations by adding multimedia such as audio, video,and pictures would allow a whole new dimension of integrated technology learning. Not only would they be more immersed in the subject being covered, but they would also be learning about computers and how useful they can be.

          Tapped in was yet another resource that I have not had any experience with. All I can say it WOW! I'm not sure how teachers handled such things way back when the internet was just an idea. Tapped In looks like it would be very useful not only for myself, but my students to have some interaction with other students, in and out of the country. As a new teacher, I'm sure it will be absolutely invaluable being able to ask teachers across the United States and the world how to deal with certain issues or suggestions for better learning activities.

Sources

Johnson, D., Howland, J., Marra, R., & Crismond, D. (2007). Meaningful Learning With Technology. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.

Voicethread. (2007). VoiceThread Features. In VoiceThread. Retrieved March 1st, 2011, from http://voicethread.com/about/features/.

Chapter 10 : Assessments and Clickers.

          Assessment activities are used as part of a an assessment system to improve performance and learning. We execute this assessment system by observing the learners' performance through performance assessments. Performance assessments are tasks that allow a student to exercise the learned skills. We use these methods because they are tried and proven to be successful at helping students.

          E-Portfolios exist to showcase a students efforts, progress of knowledge, and abilities achieved through previous activities stored as samples of writing, videos, pictures, or similar items. It is the electronic version of what use to be an actual binder that falls into three different classifications: working , standards-based, and external evaluation portfolios. For teachers, they are useful for assessing different learning outcomes and actually encourage useful learning outcomes. Computer based tests are tests taken on the computer that are used to simplify the process of grading by giving an instant score to teachers. Unfortunately, this has not be the best way to go about testing unless it is a test that can adapts to each learner. If this is the case, being that it can adapt and it is constructed appropriately without rushing due to simplicity of its creation, the validity and reliability of the test will remain in good standing.

         The use of technology to create such things as e-portfolios and carefully crafted computer based tests will continue to be as useful as they are now and more so as we learn how to tweak them to be their best. Throughout my future career as a teacher, I see assessment activities evolving, becoming better and better, for teachers and students alike. Looking back on this chapter, all I can saw is wow. Being new to all of this, I had never heard of portfolios like this before. Same goes for clicker technology. I can only think back and imagine how much fun it would have been to use such a tool back in elementary, middle, or even high school. I would have been fully engaged for the single fact of thinking the class was a game show! I only hope that I work at a school that has such things when it comes time for me to find a job. 

Works Used:


Johnson, D., Howland, J., Marra, R., & Crismond, D. (2007). Meaningful Learning With Technology. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.

Copyright: It Must Be Respected and Online Safety: Safeguarding Our Children.

           We need to respect copy rights and fair use rules to have a just society. Using someone else's work without paying for it or proper citation is akin to stealing. If we let people continue to "steal", authors, artists, composers, and any other person benefiting from the material would not be able to sustain themselves as they would not make any money. To teach students how to go about using copyright material, I will lead by example, first showing how to cite properly and demonstrating proper usage of materials. If teachers do not introduce this concept to students early on, it is just going to cause trouble later on in life when they figure out the hard way.


            When someone mentions online safety, they are more speaking about keeping safe and sound from predators that are lurking on the internet. Online safety is a way to keep a child safe from the child predators by teaching them to not divulge too much information and to never agree to meet anyone off the internet. Cyber bullying is bullying done via instant messaging, social sites, and texting. The same principles that apply to online safety can be used for cyber bullying. Do not divuldge too much information, if a student finds that he is being cyber bullied or is having problems with a stranger online, they need to be reminded to speak directly to a parent or adult. For us adults, we need to go directly to the ISP or cell phone provider to report such issues with the saved texts, emails, or webpages. 

           I learn a lot with this activity. I did a terrible job on the copyright quiz, so I made sure to read the suggested webpages over thoroughly. I think it is imperative that we teach children about using the internet properly and how to safeguard themselves from predators and cyberbullying so that this extremely useful tool can be used to its fullest extent. As for copyright issues, as I mentioned before, it is hard to introduce everything that copyright covers to a student all at once. This is why we must introduce this train of thought early and build upon it as the student is expected to use it. By slowly introducing copyright rules and training them by example, we can really nail it home what it means to be respectful of other peoples creations and not to steal ideas or works for our own benefit.

Sources used:

Netsmartz Workshop. (2007, October 04). Retrieved February 16, 2011.
Copyright. (2011, February 02). Retried February 16, 2011.