Technology is an amazing tool and used correctly can engage every type of student. I was lucky enough to be with a master teacher this semester who was very tech savvy. It allowed for us to integrate tech into almost all of our subjects.
This class has been lovely but for someone who is very tech proficient, it was a little boring. I wish there was an advanced class and a beginner class. Many times I wanted to pound my head on the table because we couldn't move on because of a simple task that someone who is not tech savvy was struggling on. I wish it would have been a go for it, and if you need instruction you can listen, if not just finish todays assignment and get home at a decent time!
I love excel and luckily got a lot of training as a paralegal on excel, but it would have been nice to go even deeper into the codes and formulas. It would have also been nice to have a class on reliable teacher resources on the internet. I feel a lot of times websites are just thrown out there and most teachers don't hear it or completely miss the fact that it can be a great site. Even if it was just making a list with active links of great teacher websites (i.e. teacher tube, enchanted learning).
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Final Project Menu
GOLD RUSH TECHNOLOGY LESSONS
This final project is about incorporating technology into a Gold Rush unit.
This final project is about incorporating technology into a Gold Rush unit.
Technology Utilized
Students will use technology throughout this unit, in the lesson the students will be watching a YouTube Video, playing the Oregon Trail and making their own Podcasts on the Macs in the classroom and computer lab using Garageband.
Students will be able to hear their podcasts on the classroom blog (just as my master teacher posted them). They will be able to hear each others podcasts. Students are also given the opportunity to have their groups podcasts burned onto a CD, if they bring one into the class.
Technology enhances this unit because it makes the students interact, as actual Pioneers and Miners. It allows them to fully understand what had happened during that time. Students learn better if they are interested in the subject and by integrating a game and a fun podcast, students are very involved in the learning process (if they know it or not!).
Project Menu
Students will be able to hear their podcasts on the classroom blog (just as my master teacher posted them). They will be able to hear each others podcasts. Students are also given the opportunity to have their groups podcasts burned onto a CD, if they bring one into the class.
Technology enhances this unit because it makes the students interact, as actual Pioneers and Miners. It allows them to fully understand what had happened during that time. Students learn better if they are interested in the subject and by integrating a game and a fun podcast, students are very involved in the learning process (if they know it or not!).
Project Menu
Assessment of Student Performance
Students will be assessed by informal assessments during Computer Lab time. I will be watching the students to ensure they are on task and playing the game.
Miner Journals and Oregon Trail Journals
Students will get a 1, 2 or 3 for their journal entries after playing the game and for their miner entries
Grade of a 1= Very Little Effort, few sentences, not answering what was asked
Grade of a 2= Good Effort, almost all questions have been answered and Oregon Trail entries are complete
Grade of a 3= Very Good Effort, all questions answered and entries are complete
- Graded per entry
Podcasts
For the Podcasts, each group will get 5 points per Podcast, so 20 points total. Students either receive all 5 or receive a 0 depending on if they do the podcast. Students will not be allowed to upload podcast if they are not prepared. Teacher has final say on if the podcast gets uploaded or not.
The assessments will help me understand if students are understanding the hardships of the journey to California.
Project Menu
Next: Techonology Utilized
Miner Journals and Oregon Trail Journals
Students will get a 1, 2 or 3 for their journal entries after playing the game and for their miner entries
Grade of a 1= Very Little Effort, few sentences, not answering what was asked
Grade of a 2= Good Effort, almost all questions have been answered and Oregon Trail entries are complete
Grade of a 3= Very Good Effort, all questions answered and entries are complete
- Graded per entry
Podcasts
For the Podcasts, each group will get 5 points per Podcast, so 20 points total. Students either receive all 5 or receive a 0 depending on if they do the podcast. Students will not be allowed to upload podcast if they are not prepared. Teacher has final say on if the podcast gets uploaded or not.
The assessments will help me understand if students are understanding the hardships of the journey to California.
Project Menu
Next: Techonology Utilized
Lesson Structure
This lesson is one lesson of a whole Gold Rush unit. It is from the week of learning about the routes taken to get to the Gold Rush. Here is the break down of the lesson.
Students- In Class (12:50-1:00)
Prior to Computer lab students will watch a video about the overland trail and the difficulties on it. This video was a report done by a student. While watching the video, students must write down 3 terms that they heard that they want to research more about.
Students- Computer Lab time (Tuesdays 1-1:45)
All students computers have 5th Edition Oregon Trail Game downloaded (Oregon Trail 5th Edition- Amazon).
Students will be given rules before they start to play. They must create a whole family and save after each day. They will have 3 Computer time classes to complete their journey. They are not allowed to reload if something happens to their characters.
After Computer lab, students will write at least on paragraph of what happened to their wagon train, how far they got and what they are expecting for the rest of the journey (they should note their supplies and how they will be replenishing their supplies).
In Class (1:45-2:30)
Students begin their Miner Diary project and podcast. In this project students will be grouped in groups of 4-5 students and are to be considered a wagon. They will have 15 minutes to discuss their first journal entry. Students are to make up their Pioneer name and write it on their journal. The students will be writing answers to the following questions:
Journal Entry 1- Leaving for California
1) Which Route did you choose to go to California
2) Where did you start from?
3) When did you start your journey?
4) Did you leave your family or has your family travelled with you?
5) What hardships are you worried about before you begin your journey?
Writing will be for 20 minutes, students will then prepare for their podcasts. Students will have 4 journal entries total over a 3 week process ( to hear the most recent classes podcasts you can hear them here: Ms. Taylor's 4th Grade Podcasts)
Rules for a Podcast:
1. Each student will say their miner name and one part of the Journal Entry
2. Students must practice what they are going to say
3. Students should also practice fluency in the group and have nice transitions.
Project Menu
Next: Assessment of Student Performance
Students- In Class (12:50-1:00)
Prior to Computer lab students will watch a video about the overland trail and the difficulties on it. This video was a report done by a student. While watching the video, students must write down 3 terms that they heard that they want to research more about.
Students- Computer Lab time (Tuesdays 1-1:45)
All students computers have 5th Edition Oregon Trail Game downloaded (Oregon Trail 5th Edition- Amazon).
Students will be given rules before they start to play. They must create a whole family and save after each day. They will have 3 Computer time classes to complete their journey. They are not allowed to reload if something happens to their characters.
After Computer lab, students will write at least on paragraph of what happened to their wagon train, how far they got and what they are expecting for the rest of the journey (they should note their supplies and how they will be replenishing their supplies).
In Class (1:45-2:30)
Students begin their Miner Diary project and podcast. In this project students will be grouped in groups of 4-5 students and are to be considered a wagon. They will have 15 minutes to discuss their first journal entry. Students are to make up their Pioneer name and write it on their journal. The students will be writing answers to the following questions:
Journal Entry 1- Leaving for California
1) Which Route did you choose to go to California
2) Where did you start from?
3) When did you start your journey?
4) Did you leave your family or has your family travelled with you?
5) What hardships are you worried about before you begin your journey?
Writing will be for 20 minutes, students will then prepare for their podcasts. Students will have 4 journal entries total over a 3 week process ( to hear the most recent classes podcasts you can hear them here: Ms. Taylor's 4th Grade Podcasts)
Rules for a Podcast:
1. Each student will say their miner name and one part of the Journal Entry
2. Students must practice what they are going to say
3. Students should also practice fluency in the group and have nice transitions.
Project Menu
Next: Assessment of Student Performance
Content Instruction
Project Goal: Students will understand the events of the California Gold Rush along with understanding the economic and social interactions during the Gold Rush. This project will have students interacting with technology and each other to have a further understanding of what happened during the years of the Gold Rush. Students will be able to understand how 49ers travelled to California and the difficulties that they faced along their journey. Students will also be able to understand the complexity of gold mining and the social interactions of a mining town. Technology will be implemented in all aspects of the unit to help further facilitate learning.
Project Menu
Next: Lesson Structure
Project Menu
Next: Lesson Structure
Content Standards
4.3 Students explain the economic, social, and political life in California from the establishment of the Bear Flag Republic through the Mexican-American War, the Gold Rush, and the granting of statehood.
2. Compare how and why people traveled to California and the routes they traveled (e.g., James Beckwourth, John Bidwell, John C. Fremont, Pio Pico).
3. Analyze the effects of the Gold Rush on settlements, daily life, politics, and the physical environment (e.g., using biographies of John Sutter, Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo, Louise Clapp).
This lesson is concentrated on the gold rush, students will be learning how the 49ers travelled to California through exploring the links on a website about the overland trail and watching a video along with reading and interacting in their own classroom mining town.
1. Facilitate and Inspire Student Learning and Creativity: Teachers use their knowledge of subject matter, teaching and learning, and technology to facilitate experiences that advance student learning, creativity, and innovation in both face-to-face and virtual environments. Teachers:
Next: Content Instruction
2. Compare how and why people traveled to California and the routes they traveled (e.g., James Beckwourth, John Bidwell, John C. Fremont, Pio Pico).
3. Analyze the effects of the Gold Rush on settlements, daily life, politics, and the physical environment (e.g., using biographies of John Sutter, Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo, Louise Clapp).
This lesson is concentrated on the gold rush, students will be learning how the 49ers travelled to California through exploring the links on a website about the overland trail and watching a video along with reading and interacting in their own classroom mining town.
1. Facilitate and Inspire Student Learning and Creativity: Teachers use their knowledge of subject matter, teaching and learning, and technology to facilitate experiences that advance student learning, creativity, and innovation in both face-to-face and virtual environments. Teachers:
Project Menu
a. promote, support, and model creative and innovative thinking and inventiveness. b. engage students in exploring real-world issues and solving authentic problems using digital tools and resources. c. promote student reflection using collaborative tools to reveal and clarify students' conceptual understanding and thinking, planning, and creative processes. d. model collaborative knowledge construction by engaging in learning with students, colleagues, and others in face-to-face and virtual environments.
Next: Content Instruction
Wednesday, June 1, 2011
Techonology- Homework
aggregation- function where values of multiple rows or columns are grouped together to get a measurement
avatar- online persona, can be an image associated with email, instant messenger
blog- online diary
cache-stores the data of what you do on the internet (can screw up websites if not cleared)
captcha- a computing response to figure out if it is actually a person typing
cloud computing- use of programs or documents through a network that can be worked on by multiple people
Digg-embedded buttons for sharing
hash tag- the beginning of code
HTML-HyperText Markup Language
podcast, webcast- online production of a either voice or video diaries
tags- shortcuts to blog or website items, usually
tweet- a short message posted by someone who can be retweeted, replied to, followed, you can also tweet images and websites- jpegs, gifs, pngs, used on websites, websites are a mixture of text and images with an address
Web 2.0- user centered collaboration on the internet today, not just website to viewer, but website and viewer interracting together (social networking)
wiki-allows creation and editing of any number of interlinked web pages via a web browser
source code- text written in a computer programming language, designed to do a specific thing for a web page/website
avatar- online persona, can be an image associated with email, instant messenger
blog- online diary
cache-stores the data of what you do on the internet (can screw up websites if not cleared)
captcha- a computing response to figure out if it is actually a person typing
cloud computing- use of programs or documents through a network that can be worked on by multiple people
Digg-embedded buttons for sharing
hash tag- the beginning of code
HTML-HyperText Markup Language
podcast, webcast- online production of a either voice or video diaries
tags- shortcuts to blog or website items, usually
tweet- a short message posted by someone who can be retweeted, replied to, followed, you can also tweet images and websites- jpegs, gifs, pngs, used on websites, websites are a mixture of text and images with an address
Web 2.0- user centered collaboration on the internet today, not just website to viewer, but website and viewer interracting together (social networking)
wiki-allows creation and editing of any number of interlinked web pages via a web browser
source code- text written in a computer programming language, designed to do a specific thing for a web page/website
Excel Gradebook
This could be incredibly useful to have parents view their students grades. If I was to do it, I would hide the columns with the students names and just show ID numbers. Parents can then view all of their students grades on assignments, see what is incomplete and what is missing. Hopefully parents would be proactive and ask their students why the scores aren't there. If a grade book is shared between teachers who all have to collaborate on a report card, such as PE, Computer, Science, etc. This could be very useful.
Collaboration- Checklist Assignment
For collaboration, Google docs is the most amazing tool. I have used it many times in my classes in NDNU when group work is involved. All parties are able to contribute, save and work on the same file. I believe that this should be used in a classroom when working with your students on assignments, giving feedback, or working with a colleague. You can collaboration on a wide range of documents and with real time updating, you can be making changes and your partner can be seeing it. When I worked at a law office, this was a tool we used for briefs before we saved it to the mainframe. It allowed the associates to work on it together before the higher ups made changes and re-saved it in a new version.
The document I have posted was an assignment for one of our classes last semester. All three of us imputed and changed parts of the document and then one of us printed the final project. This saved us a ton of time when it came to meeting because we could collaborate through the chat function on the document. It also allows you to see who updates it and when. It is an amazing tool that I love!
The document I have posted was an assignment for one of our classes last semester. All three of us imputed and changed parts of the document and then one of us printed the final project. This saved us a ton of time when it came to meeting because we could collaborate through the chat function on the document. It also allows you to see who updates it and when. It is an amazing tool that I love!
RSS Feeds- Checklist Assignment
RSS Feeds are incredibly useful. I use them all the time for my invitation business. I follow wedding blogs, paper blogs, other designer blogs, all on RSS Feeds. I find that it is easier to read multiple blogs at once without having to deal with all the ads, colors, images on their blogs. It is more a time efficiency thing for me than anything. For teaching I feel that if my students had their own blogs, then I would definitely follow their RSS feeds. If I had a classroom blog, I would have the students follow the feed for updated information. I think it is a great tool that can be used efficiently for getting information to parents/students the fastest.
I follow education news feeds in my RSS feeds along with instruction and other feeds. A great resource is http://www.edweek.org/ew/section/feeds/index.html that my master teacher alerted me to. She has a classroom website that the students write reviews on the classroom blog. She recommends students to follow the RSS feed from the classroom website.
I follow education news feeds in my RSS feeds along with instruction and other feeds. A great resource is http://www.edweek.org/ew/section/feeds/index.html that my master teacher alerted me to. She has a classroom website that the students write reviews on the classroom blog. She recommends students to follow the RSS feed from the classroom website.
Powerpoint- Checklist Assignment
I think that PowerPoint is very useful if done properly. There shouldn't be a lot of words on the PowerPoint or students get bored quick. There should be pictures and links if possible to use other tech possibilities. Especially with smartboards, PowerPoint is a useful tool. Students can present their projects on the smartboards with PowerPoint. All students should be able to use PowerPoint starting in 4th grade. Our students learned this year how to make their own presentation and used it to present their Ohlone projects. The presentation that I added was one that I made for my multi-cultural class. There is also a YouTube link on the last slide. I had problems with it working embedded so I just left it as a link that I clicked and had prepared before I started my presentation.
YouTube- Checklist Assignment
Grade Level: 4th Grade
Subject: Science
Standard: 3. Living Organisms depend on one another and on their environment for survival. a. Students know ecosystems can be characterized by their living and non-living components
Teaching: This video would be used to front load our biome lesson. This would give them ample visuals to see and understand the difference between the biomes. We would then go on to read about the biomes, reinforcing information that was learned in the video.
Reflection #2- Social Networking
Social Networking is a tool that needs to be used carefully. I believe that social networking is a great tool but it also blurs the lines between student and teacher. Privacy needs to still be upheld between teacher and student. With Facebook groups I find that they can be effective to reach out to your students but at the same time it should be used carefully. Students are on Facebook all the time, so it would be the most effective way of communicating with them, but at the same time there is a question of ethics, should your students see your profile? Should parents be friending a teacher?
Strengths would be communication. It would be an easy way to get the information to your students in the fast form possible. But I feel that there are more weaknesses than strengths. It would allow your students to check in on you. If parents are part of the group, it would be another tech tool that is making teaching a 24 hour job. Right now parents believe that if they email you, as a teacher you need to respond within a certain amount of time. If it is an email that is heated, teachers need the time to have the best response possible before they respond. I feel that with Facebook, parents will be hounding teachers and would use it more of a sound off board than a useful tool.
Since I am in an elementary classroom, I would not use Facebook as a tool. The students are too young to be on it, and I would just use email to communicate with the parents. The classroom I am in now has a big parent bullying problem and using Facebook would just allow for another place for these moms to duke it out.
I believe in a high school setting it can possibly be a highly effective tool, if it is used correctly. Unfortunately for elementary, I would say no.
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