Course Reflection I have enjoyed this course. Of all of my courses that I have taken in the MAT program, this would have to be one of my favorites. The things that I liked about it were the layout of the class and learning things that were actually useful. In most of my MAT classes we have gone over material that is not relevant for me and the type of classroom that I will be running. Another thing that I liked was that this course was very "hands-on" All of the projects that we did were relevant and fun to learn how to use. Through the projects in this class I have learned things that I am able to use in my lessons. This class has been a breath of fresh air for me knowing that I could potentially use material from my courses for once.
Learning Tools
I have enjoyed learning about each of the different learning tools in this class. I will be able to incorporate these into my lessons and hopefully they will boost my lessons to the next level. Thinking back, I am very glad to have learned how to operate Weebly and learning how to use Edpuzzle and Thinglink and Quizziz. Since this upcoming year will only be my third year teaching, I feel like I can easily incorporate these technologies into my lessons since I have not necessarily established a preferred teaching method. I am still experimenting what teaching styles and strategies work best for me. One of my weaknesses in utilizing technology in my class would have to be the district in which I work. Internet is still very slow and not available in all areas. Also, not all of my students have access to the internet at home, and our school does not have enough resources to provide all students with their own laptops or tablets.
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Chapter 11, Question 2
Privacy is a controversial issue in the Digital Age. Schools have an obligation to ensure student safety, both physical and virtual. When using the Internet or the network, this requires keeping close tabs on student’ activity when they are using computers. Do you think this violates students’ privacy? Justify your opinion and consider both points of view. I do not think that this obligation to keep a close eye on a student's activity when they are using computers. Students are not fully protected by the 4th amendment of the U.S. Constitution. My school district makes it clear that all teachers must keep a close eye on students whenever they are using laptops or are in the computer lab. The policy is not just to protect students. It also there to help prevent students of violating piracy laws which would not only put the school at risk, but the teacher and student as well. Chapter 12, Question 3 Of the emerging technology trends presented in the chapter or those you discovered through your research on the Web, which emerging technology or trend do you think will have the most significant impact on education? Of all of the emerging technology trends that were presented in this chapter, the Google Glass is one that I wish would take off. Sadly, if I remember correctly, Google has since cancelled or pulled back from the Google Glass. One of the technologies that I think will be the most important moving forward is cloud computing. By storing software on a cloud-based application, we no longer have to worry about running out of storage on our school computers. My school already utilizes a few of the cloud websites such as Dropbox. It makes life so much easier being able to open documents from any device. It also great to be able to collaborate with colleagues not only in the same school, but also with others across the country. Below are the links for this week's projects. Padlet Link https://padlet.com/wthompson20/u9yt6e1xbsb9 Quizziz Link https://quizizz.com/admin/quiz/5d34f22431972e001a7635ab Rubric File Thinglink File https://www.thinglink.com/card/1209668036819156999 Scoopit Link https://www.scoop.it/topic/u-s-government-by-w-thompson Chapter Nine, Question 1
Web communication tools open broad new opportunities for interaction among students across the globe. Of the communication tools you have learned about, which do you think holds the most promise? What are its strengths and weaknesses? How might you use this types of tool in your classroom to develop and promote 21st century learning skills? I personally find that online video conferences hold the most promise of creating new opportunities for interaction among students. Websites, such as Zoom or Skype, allow people to see, hear and interact with each other instantaneously no matter the distance between them. These sites and apps allow not only the presenter (teacher) to display a Power Point, video, face cam, etc, but it also lets the viewers present content as well. One of the few problems I could see with this technology is that not everyone in rural Mississippi has access to quality internet at their homes yet. I say yet because I do not think it will be long before everyone across the world has access to high speed internet. It would be difficult for me to incorporate this into my rural Mississippi high school classroom on a large scale. However, I believe that I could use this technology. I wouldn't be able to require students to attend scheduled sessions, but I do think that I could host a voluntary session. In my mind this might be a review session the night before a quiz, or perhaps I offer students the opportunity to work on a project online and instead of presenting it orally in front of the class, they instead can present it online during a voluntary scheduled session. Regardless of how it is implemented, the video conference sites and apps still blow my mind whenever I meet for an online class in a virtual classroom where I can see my professor and all of my classmates. Chapter Ten, Question 1 There has been much discussion about whether distance education can provide students instruction that is equal in quality to traditional education. Do you think an equivalent experience is possible via distance delivery? Why or why not? I do think that distance education can provide students with quality instruction that can compare to traditional education. I believe that a lot of the success of a distance education boils down to what methods the teacher uses in his class. Also, certain methods will appeal to different students depending on their learning styles. Introverts will naturally be drawn to a distance education where extroverts would more than likely prefer being in a physical classroom or a the very least, be in a class that has a scheduled video conference where they are able to interact with other classmates and their teacher. I very much prefer a flipped classroom style of class. Similar to the style of this very class, ITD 645. I would much rather learn on my own and complete assignments by myself. I have never enjoyed group work or collaborating with others for projects. In conclusion, I do believe that a quality education can be received by a distance education that can be on par with a traditional education. However, the success of the class and quality of instruction will come down to having an appropriate teacher who is able to provide quality instruction using 21st century learning tools and having students in class who are open to learning in the styles that a long distance teacher is limited to. Attached below is the course site that I created this week. After completing the podcast and video projects, reflect your working experiences of creating multimedia materials, the challenges you encountered during your creation. You also want to focus on how you will use these technologies into your own classroom? How can authoring software help you teach and your students learn? Make sure to use Chapter 7-8 as your reference. You need to upload your movie to youtube and embed youtube video to the end of your blog. You can embed vocaroo audio to your blog as well but the link will be expired soon. So I want you to download your audio as MP3 file and upload it to your blog. You will also post the interactive Edupuzzle video class and access code to the end of your blog so that your readers will be able to access it.
I enjoyed learning how to create a podcast and doing the different video projects. It would be hard for me to implement a flipped classroom strategy at my school, but I do think that I will be able to implement these new talents in my future classes. The first way that comes to my mind is that I could easily create an audio file or voice over a ppt presentation if I knew that I was going to miss work one day. It is not too hard or complicated to create. Also, now that I know about Edupuzzle, I plan to start using this tech to create short personalized videos for my class. I am especially excited about learning about this website because I have always liked to show short clips from movies, web shows, etc, to keep my students engaged, and this will just add another dimension to that. This week was focused on creating active learners. Chapter 8 discussed different software to engage students. For our projects we had to create a podcast, a movie story and an interactive video. Each one of these will be very useful in the future. Attached below are the three projects for this week. |
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