Educational Technology: Week One

It has been a long time since my last post, and I am excited to be back at it! I was recently accepted into Graduate School at The University of the Cumberlands to work towards my Master's of Arts Degree in Teaching. I am so excited to finally be one step closer to becoming an English teacher!

For my Educational Technology class, I am going to be posting reviews and comments about our weekly lessons. Hopefully this will help me to keep track of all of the different types of technology we learn about. I know that there will be lots of valuable information learned that I can implement in my future classroom.

This week,  we focused primarily on general beginnings of technology in the classroom. The reading that we studied explained that technology began in the classroom very early on- even chalkboards counted as a rustic form of technology, since they were being used to help students learn. Obviously, in the last few years, technology has taken off. Students now have iPhones and iPads and become computer and technology literate very early on. I think one of the most important lessons to draw from this is that it is important, as a teacher, to be ever-evolving and current when it comes to technology. This is important for a few reasons, including but not limited to:

(1) It is imporant to be able to relate to your students and teach them using methods they are familiar with and enjoy.
(2) It is imporant to be able to help prepare students for the "real world," where they will need to be able to work with all different types of technology, and you can't teach it if you don't know it yourself.

This week, we learned about three different types of classroom technology in particular. They are PBworks, Tumblebooks, and PodCasts.

Though I do not yet have my own classroom, I can definitely say at this point that I would love to implement PBworks or something similar to it into my work. I feel that though it probably takes a little while to learn how to use it completely, it would be worth it. Its positive aspects of assistance with organization of files, worksheets, and links, as well as the endless opportunities it gives students, makes PBworks very appealing to me. I think the main challenge with this type of technology is the fee associated with it and the time one would need to commit to learning it properly.

In regards to Tumblebooks, I don't believe I will use this technology much in my classroom. This is not because I do not like it, as you'll see below, but rather because I will be teaching secondary age students, and the Tumblebooks are geared mainly towards younger students. I do think, however, that this is a valuable and really neat resource, especially for elementary teachers and students.

I believe that PodCasts will come in handy for my classroom. I don't see myself using them too often becuase of the challenges associated with finding PodCasts of high quality that relate entirely to the lesson that I'm teaching at the time. I do think, however, that they could be useful if they were made by students for various lessons, similar to the one I mention below. To use these in my classroom, I would be sure and have a decent microphone and computer in order to record my lessons or allow sutdents to record themselves for a work assignment.

Below, please find my exploration of this week's technology assignments.

PB Works

1.

I think Pbworks is such an interesting and exciting potential classroom tool. The only similar experience I have had is with Blackboard when I was in college. Blackboard was a portal similar to iLearn, where students could access class grades and assignments and communicate with classmates and professors.   From reading the school testimonials, I hope that the school I teach in uses PBworks or something like it!   I think it is interesting that PBworks allows students to access other students’ work. This could be a very beneficial tool. I think a great way to engage students is to have peer review sessions, and this could really be simplified with this software. In one of the testimonials, it mentions an activity where students were made to create a PodCast commercial as a whole class. The class was able to upload and gather resources, ideas, and information, and it was all stored on PBworks. I think this is great for many reasons. First, it allows students to access what other students are doing to contribute to the group project, thus dividing up the work fairly and holding each student accountable. Secondly, it is great for a student to be able to log on to PBworks while at home and access the information to work on assignments. This emphasizes individual work but also group projects, which are both important.   I also think PBworks would be convenient for organization as the teacher. It mentions in the description of PBworks that it helps “provide access to information sources, book lists, and links to good articles” as well as “have the resources stored for future use.” Though I do not have firsthand experience with this yet, I can imagine it would be difficult to store and organize links for certain lessons that you might use for the same lesson in the coming years. It would be place to store worksheets, links, and even lesson plans as a whole.

2.

This resource could be used in many ways in a school setting.   First, it could be used by school districts and schools for organization and staff development. In the testimonials, one teacher mentioned enjoying that she could complete staff development on her own time through PBworks instead of having to attend staff development after a long workday. This seems practical to me, as well. I am sure on a school-wide level, it would help the principal and administrators since they could post announcements. It also would be nice for teachers to be able to post and share resources with other teachers of the same subject. PBworks would be beneficial for a teacher individually for various reasons. Obviously the program would be beneficial for organization and bookkeeping purposes. As a teacher, I could use this program to keep track of student profiles and grades, days that were missed, makeup work, and more. I could also use it to organize lesson plans, worksheets and documents, links, and various resources for each lesson. It would be wonderful to have this information stored for future years or for students who missed that particular lesson.   Finally, PBworks would be beneficial to students. Ease of use would probably not be an issue for students, as most of them are technologically literate in this day and age. I think it would be a great way to get them more accustomed to using technology, even starting at a young age. It is a good learning experience to learn how to upload documents and videos. It would prepare them for college and the “real world” in this way. It would also be a great way for students to connect to other students. The group assignment options are endless with this software, and as I mentioned above, the fact that you can see what others upload and contribute is a great way to hold students accountable. It would definitely be a great organization tool for students and a way to access current grades and assignments.

3.

I would definitely recommend this resource to other educators. Though I haven’t used it in an actual classroom, what I read about it makes me confident that this is a valuable resource. I am sure that like any new technological tool, there would be a learning curve for new users. However, it seems that the time spent learning the tool would be worth it. Some people at this point (especially college-aged students) have experience with working with programs similar to this, but this would be a valuable resource for those that do not. Though there is a fee associated with it, in some of the testimonials listed, districts paid the fee for the whole school or school district. However, if I were not able to receive it from my district, I believe I would still purchase it for my individual classroom needs.

Tumblebooks

1.

From exploring Tumblebooks, I learned that this is a great way to get students involved in reading. As one of the teachers in the testimonial mentioned, I believe that it is rare that children are read to these days, which is so important in my opinion. My parents read to me every night before bed, and I believe that this is where my love of books began. I think if more students were read to, more of them would look at reading as fun instead of as a chore or item of busywork. I also think being read to expands vocabulary and imagination at a young age, which is invaluable. I think it would be fun to use this in a classroom with the interactive worksheets as well. One teacher mentioned that they projected the book so that all students could follow along and locate certain weekly vocabulary words. This seems like a much more interesting and fun way to review vocabulary instead of simply calling words out to the class or having them memorize definitions. This might be a fun Friday afternoon activity to use when students are restless before the weekend.   I also love that the Tumblebooks resource has Spanish books for ESL students. What a wonderful (and probably rare) thing for a student who does not speak English to be able to follow along with the rest of the class and experience the book in the same way. I think the games and puzzles that are listed along with the books would be a fun and interactive segment to go along with the books. Again, the fact that they are offered in both Spanish and English is helpful.

2.

Though I am not yet a teacher, I feel that Tumblebooks could most definitely be used successfully in a classroom setting. I think that Tumblebooks would be mostly beneficial for younger grades, but for those classes, they could be invaluable. I did have an Algebra teacher in high school, though, who read us a children’s book out loud every Friday at the beginning of class. They usually contained a “life lesson” or something that could be drawn from them about character or kindness, etc. Though many students groaned about it, I think it was refreshing to be read to, and it was also a nice break from classwork.   Tumblebooks could be used in various ways in a classroom such as assigning them to students to read on individual tablets or computers or projecting them on the overhead projector so that the class can follow along as a whole. These could be a great resource for ESL students, as well, in that these students would have the opportunity to easily read both the Spanish and English versions of the same book. This could assist with learning the English language, as they could compare and contrast words. They could use the worksheets to assist in learning English, as well.

3.

I feel that I would recommend Tumblebooks to other educators. Though I have not used them personally in my own classroom, I can definitely see that they would be beneficial in many ways. They are definitely easy to locate online and the website that I used (Gwinnett Public Library) had a nice selection of both Tumblebooks and learning activities like games and puzzles that accompany the books.   I think that they are easy to use, and even younger students could figure out how to use them. Since the books are read aloud, all you have to do really is watch the book. They are also simple to locate online.

PodCasts

1.

Though I have heard of PodCasts before, I have never really used them. The only other time that I knew someone personally who made them was the Minister at my former church who recorded each sermon he preached. It made the sermons readily available to people who may have missed church that particular Sunday. I thought this was a neat idea then, and I think it’s also a great idea for education.   I learned that creating PodCasts is much easier than I believed it to be. On Mr. Langhorst’s website, he mentioned that to make a PodCast, one only needs a computer and a microphone. The reading excerpted from “The Educator’s Podcast Guide” by Bard Williams and the samples on Mr. Langhorst’s blog showed me that using PodCasts can be really useful in classrooms for instruction. I think that it is a really interesting idea to do what Mr. Langhorst does, which is to record review sessions, which he called “Studycasts,” that are made to help students review for upcoming exams. This is much more exciting and relatable to a technologically-savvy student than simply reviewing from a worksheet.

2.

Podcasts could be used for so many reasons in a school setting. Like Mr. Langhorst, I think it could be extremely useful and helpful for students to record review sessions on PodCasts that they can listen to and use for a study guide before tests. If most lectures from the teachers are recorded and posted, this could also be useful and helpful for students who may have missed class. They could simply log on to the class website and listen to the lessons that they missed. At the very least, it would be helpful for them to hear the review of the lesson that they missed.   Podcasts could also be useful for various lessons. When I was in high school, we had to create pretend advertisements in order to study persuasive writing and arguments. I think that PodCasts could be implemented in this particular lesson, because you could have students work together to create “radio commercials” of themselves speaking about a certain subject. The teacher could play them to the rest of the class for a fun segment.   As Mr. William’s article spoke of, PodCasts could also be very useful to simply assist in a normal lesson. A teacher could research on the internet and find certain PodCasts that apply to their lesson and offer a meaningful contribution to the lesson at hand.

3.

I would recommend PodCasts to other educators. Though I think they would be useful in an everyday lesson, I think most of their value would come from recording review sessions for students before an upcoming exam as well as having students use them for certain assignments, as I mentioned above.   I think that since all that is required to make a PodCast is a microphone and a computer, the ease of use is also a positive aspect. Most students have access to this at home, and if not, they probably do at school. I do think that PodCasts used for instruction need to be chosen carefully, as Mr. Williams’ article explained, because PodCasts can often be dull and ill-quality. I would look out for those factors and before using the PodCast in my lesson.

See you next week!