The impact of these new technological tools on education is an ongoing process that will evolve over time. The ability to communicate and collaborate through the web for both teachers and students will improve the way we teach and learn. Our students need to be able to scan through large amounts of information and to recognize where to find the best information. By using technology our students will be doing much more than passing a written test, they will be performing and producing projects that demonstrate mastery at a much higher level.
I especially liked the comment that said that we as teachers can't pretend to know everything any more and we need to think of ourselves more as coaches who motivate students to strive for excellence. Like anything else, it can be scary to try new things in the classroom but if we try to use wikis and blogs in our own lives we will become more comfortable using them in our classrooms. I definitely think that my lessons can be enhanced with more visuals, audios and computer based projects. Right now we are still in a textbook era and it will take time to rethink the way we deliver our curriculum and content. For the moment, we can begin to gradually add technology to our lessons with the goal of adding more each year. I think this is exciting and a little scary at the same time but in the end we will become better teachers for having made the effort. The teacher in the epilogue had so much technology it was scary!
Saturday, October 15, 2011
Chapter 9
This chapter on social networking was probably the least useful so far from an educational standpoint. We all know that we will never have access to Facebook in our schools and there are so many other tools out there it's easier to stay away from Facebook. Our students love Facebook and probably use it more often than phones to make connections. The author suggests that teachers use socal networking sites to promote cooperation and collaboration among our peers. He commments that learning has traditionally taken a winner-take-all competitive form rather than a cooperative form. I think that teachers are starting to become more open to sharing and cooperating in recent years than they have in the past. Maybe technology has something to do with this?
I read the section about NING thinking that it would have less drawbacks than Facebook but it really sounds the same. There is just to much risk in creating one of these sites and the monitoring of it would be really time consuming. The comment that really scared me was when he warns against pressing the "add apps" button! I'm guessing that all sorts of inappropriate content would be accessed and that would be hard to control. I think the only real need for a social network for educational purposes was like the case of theSan Antonio school whose students wanted to share experiences but were geographically challenged. In that case I think it would be better to use Blackboard or some other protected site. The social network is too difficult to police in an educational setting even though our students love it.
I read the section about NING thinking that it would have less drawbacks than Facebook but it really sounds the same. There is just to much risk in creating one of these sites and the monitoring of it would be really time consuming. The comment that really scared me was when he warns against pressing the "add apps" button! I'm guessing that all sorts of inappropriate content would be accessed and that would be hard to control. I think the only real need for a social network for educational purposes was like the case of theSan Antonio school whose students wanted to share experiences but were geographically challenged. In that case I think it would be better to use Blackboard or some other protected site. The social network is too difficult to police in an educational setting even though our students love it.
Chapter 8
After reading about podcasting I can see that it could be useful in many ways, such as broadcasting the school's daily news or providing school tours or recording lectures or meetings. Although the author says it's easy to set up it seems overwhelming to me. The only part that I could follow was the use of Skype which I used when my daughter traveled to London for a semester. It was pretty coll to be able to see her and tour her apartment without ever going there. Having said that, I don't think I would have a use for podcastiing in my classroom.
Video publishing is something that older students are really interested in especially YouTube. Although schools block the students from YouTube I use many YouTube videos in my daily lessons and many of them are fantastic. There are mini grammar lessons as well as grammar/music videos that are really useful and entertaining. I am interested in investigating TeacherTube to see what there is to offer on that site for Spanish lessons and songs. The closest I will get to video publishing is taping the videos of students on the school's flip camera and maybe showing some on the Daily 2. I'm guessing the parental permission to put students on You-Tube or any screencast would be daunting. Until we work out the permission aspect of a lot of this technology, I plan to start small. I do feel that any small improvement to a lesson involving technology is a step in the right direction and we have to get comfortable slowly to be able to use new technologhy with confidence.
Video publishing is something that older students are really interested in especially YouTube. Although schools block the students from YouTube I use many YouTube videos in my daily lessons and many of them are fantastic. There are mini grammar lessons as well as grammar/music videos that are really useful and entertaining. I am interested in investigating TeacherTube to see what there is to offer on that site for Spanish lessons and songs. The closest I will get to video publishing is taping the videos of students on the school's flip camera and maybe showing some on the Daily 2. I'm guessing the parental permission to put students on You-Tube or any screencast would be daunting. Until we work out the permission aspect of a lot of this technology, I plan to start small. I do feel that any small improvement to a lesson involving technology is a step in the right direction and we have to get comfortable slowly to be able to use new technologhy with confidence.
chapter 7
Flickr could be a good way to share presentations and projects with parents and other educators. The author mentions that you need an e-mail address to set up an account or you can create one login for all students to share. The advantage of being able to restrict acces to friends and family is a good feature allowing you and your students to work in your own private space. The annotation feature could be used as an assessment tool, for example students might have to label the parts of the house (la casa) and all it's features or any other vocabulary unit. I thought this would be a really exciting alternative to the standard quiz!Students coulsd also connect globally with people of other cultures but I think this would be a bit risky. One thing that I will probably try is projecting a photo on my LCD projectoe and have the students play "Filktion" by writing a short story in Spanish about the photo or simply listing Spanish words that come to mind, depending on ability. This would be a great 5 minute opening activity.
Another idea that I liked was the teacher who used images from Flickr to create an imaged version of a poem. This could also be done in the foreign language classroom with a short story or poetry. From a cultural standpoint, students could "visit" Spain and other Spanish speaking countries through a photo field trip. One thing that I found funny was the author's comment that "if you find sailors from halfway around the world, you can always contact them to see if they might have some experiences to share with your students" Yikes!! I don't think so!
Another idea that I liked was the teacher who used images from Flickr to create an imaged version of a poem. This could also be done in the foreign language classroom with a short story or poetry. From a cultural standpoint, students could "visit" Spain and other Spanish speaking countries through a photo field trip. One thing that I found funny was the author's comment that "if you find sailors from halfway around the world, you can always contact them to see if they might have some experiences to share with your students" Yikes!! I don't think so!
Chapter 6
I had always thought of twitter as something used by famous stars and athletes like Paris Hilton and Charlie Sheen, not something that regular people would use in their everyday lives. As I read about twitter, it seemed like a great way to stay in touch with family and friends, especially people who have family overseas and across the country. I did not really get the educational use for twitter at all. Once I read the sentence about twitter being a bit too "Wild West" for most school situations, I realized that we most likely will not be allowed to use it. One intriguing paragraph for me was the Baltimore Foreign language teacher who uses twitter as a way of having students connect snippets of information, keep an assessment of what they know and build vocabulary and grammmar skills. My big question is how??? I'm guessing that this is an AP teacher whose students analyze advanced text?
After reading the social bookmarking services section I was completely overwhelmed with trying to follow the implications and uses of Diigo and had a huge headache. I can see that it could be useful to teachers who need to comment on student work and that the student will be able to see how their writing is evolving. To me, Delicious sounded so much easier to use because the tag is everything. The fact that you don't need an e-mail address is also appealing from a teching standpoint although you still have to monitor that the comments are appropriate. Diigo is more content based whereas Delicious is about sharing links which makes it a good sharing tool for teachers of the same subject area.
After reading the social bookmarking services section I was completely overwhelmed with trying to follow the implications and uses of Diigo and had a huge headache. I can see that it could be useful to teachers who need to comment on student work and that the student will be able to see how their writing is evolving. To me, Delicious sounded so much easier to use because the tag is everything. The fact that you don't need an e-mail address is also appealing from a teching standpoint although you still have to monitor that the comments are appropriate. Diigo is more content based whereas Delicious is about sharing links which makes it a good sharing tool for teachers of the same subject area.
chapter 5
I definitely agree with the author that the amount of information on the internet is completely overwhelming and RSS seems like a useful tool for teachers whose students do research. The convenience of going to the aggregator to find the information for your research would be a huge timesaver as opposed to reading multiple blogs and sifting through the information. I can see that it there could be an overwhelming amount of information sent to a subscriber of RSS feeds at first and that it could be viewed as a time waster as opposed to a time saver at first. I think that RSS feeds would be a great tool for history or English teachers and students to help them to sift through and find the most meaningful information for their work.
A teacher who needs to monitor student weblogs would greatly benefit from RSS feeds because it allows teachers to find all the class information in one spot, comment and check for appropriateness. As I read the chapter, I was trying to envision how or if I would use RSS feeds as a foreign language teacher. I really don't see it happening in my teaching life but it could be fun to use personally if you were passionate about a certain topic. The only possible use for me as a teacher would be cultural references and readings in English for my students. I think teachers that use RSS feeds will definitely help their students scanning skills and make them betterand more efficient readers.
A teacher who needs to monitor student weblogs would greatly benefit from RSS feeds because it allows teachers to find all the class information in one spot, comment and check for appropriateness. As I read the chapter, I was trying to envision how or if I would use RSS feeds as a foreign language teacher. I really don't see it happening in my teaching life but it could be fun to use personally if you were passionate about a certain topic. The only possible use for me as a teacher would be cultural references and readings in English for my students. I think teachers that use RSS feeds will definitely help their students scanning skills and make them betterand more efficient readers.
Wednesday, October 12, 2011
Chapter 4
One of the most intersting facts I learned fromthis book and from this class is that anyone can edit Wikipedia. I had always relied on Wikipedia as my Encyclopedia Brittanica from way back in the 70's when we had to use actual books for research. I guess that's what makes the wiki such an interesting tool . There's always the risk that something will be edited incorrectly, but we have to hope that there are more editors who want to publish right information as opposed to wrong. The amount of people that contribute to Wikipedia is amazing and the content that is produced could never be achieved without collaboration.
Using the Wiki in the classroom would definitely be a challenge without using a password and login system. I don't foresee using the Wiki in a Spanish class as a forum for debate on literature because our students simply are not at that level. The Wiki could possibly be used as a tool for teaching a grammar concept, simply by viewing the teacher's Wiki about subject pronouns and answering a question or series of questions. Assignments could be posted as well as links to you tube videos and websitesto help with current topics. Students could also search the web and post additional helpful sites and videos for the grammar concept. I would start out by using a Wiki for a simple grammar concept with the main goal being to provide the students with a visual for a grammar concept. This could then evolve into students creating their own Wiki's to "teach" each other different concepts.
Using the Wiki in the classroom would definitely be a challenge without using a password and login system. I don't foresee using the Wiki in a Spanish class as a forum for debate on literature because our students simply are not at that level. The Wiki could possibly be used as a tool for teaching a grammar concept, simply by viewing the teacher's Wiki about subject pronouns and answering a question or series of questions. Assignments could be posted as well as links to you tube videos and websitesto help with current topics. Students could also search the web and post additional helpful sites and videos for the grammar concept. I would start out by using a Wiki for a simple grammar concept with the main goal being to provide the students with a visual for a grammar concept. This could then evolve into students creating their own Wiki's to "teach" each other different concepts.
Chapter 3
Getting started on Weblogs requires a commitment on the part of the teacher to dedicate his/herspare time creatively blogging for her own writing and creativity. If we don't don't know how to use it ourselves, we can't expect our students to embrace it. Most of our students are using blogs as a social network and not for critical thinking and reflection. If we use the blog as an educational tool it will make our students better readers and thinkers.
Starting small by posting assignments and links would be a good starting point. Next, I would encourage students to respond to the posts on the class blog based on a simple question of the day in Spanish. I went to a foreign language seminar with a great presenter who actually called his students on his celll phone and spoke to them about a brief topic for a homework assignment! The blog would be a good way to get writing feedback, but would not be as effective as this for speaking evaluation. However, many basic grammatical concepts could be posed as questoins with each student answering as a homework assignment. I'm still unsure about giving each student his or her own blog until the administration gives us some clear guidelines. Until then, I plan to start small and work my way up. I think as we try each new small thing, we'll see what works best for our subject matter.
Starting small by posting assignments and links would be a good starting point. Next, I would encourage students to respond to the posts on the class blog based on a simple question of the day in Spanish. I went to a foreign language seminar with a great presenter who actually called his students on his celll phone and spoke to them about a brief topic for a homework assignment! The blog would be a good way to get writing feedback, but would not be as effective as this for speaking evaluation. However, many basic grammatical concepts could be posed as questoins with each student answering as a homework assignment. I'm still unsure about giving each student his or her own blog until the administration gives us some clear guidelines. Until then, I plan to start small and work my way up. I think as we try each new small thing, we'll see what works best for our subject matter.
chapter 2
Chapter 2 focuses mainly on the advantages of blogging in the educational world. As always, this tool is more user friendly and advantageous to the teachers of history, ELA , science and math. I really read the chapter searching for answers to how foreign language students could benefit from blogging. Again I ended up with more questions than answers due to the fact that 8th grade Spanish students do not posess the skills to write critically in the target language. The positive reasons for possibly using a blog for Spanish are as a "filing cabinet" for writing samples, the willingness of shy students to participate, the possibility ofcreating conversations with native speakers, surveys and literature circles.
The challenges we face as foreign language teachers is that we lack a common meaningful reading text for our students. The idea of somehow engaging with Spanish speaking pen pals through a blog would be fantastic once the logistics are settled. This would take away all the "paper" involved in the pen pal system making the process easier for students and teachers. Journal entries on basic writing promts as well as survey questions using basic grammar topics covered in class. I agree with the author that the excuses would decline with the lack of paper. Lastly, creating a site to publish examples of good writing, regardless of how complex could be very motivating.
The challenges we face as foreign language teachers is that we lack a common meaningful reading text for our students. The idea of somehow engaging with Spanish speaking pen pals through a blog would be fantastic once the logistics are settled. This would take away all the "paper" involved in the pen pal system making the process easier for students and teachers. Journal entries on basic writing promts as well as survey questions using basic grammar topics covered in class. I agree with the author that the excuses would decline with the lack of paper. Lastly, creating a site to publish examples of good writing, regardless of how complex could be very motivating.
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
Chapter 1
Chapter 1 was not the most informative or interesting chapter, but it did show how important technology is becoming in society and as a teaching tool. We all know how much our students rely on technology for school work and for social media. We, as teachers will need to start using technology in our daily lives in order to keep up with current teaching techniques and to keep pace with our students. I am always amazed at how technologically advanced many of our students are as compared to myself. I have had many a student solve an audio-visual/computer problem or glitch that I was unable to resolve. The section about learners as teachers was eye opening because it says that we as teachers need to be passionate about and embrace technology in our daily lives before we can really appreciate it's uses for our students. The fact that education has been slow to embrace much of this new technology is definitely something that needs to be addressed as we move toward the future.
The other important information in chapter 1 was about how to keep our students safe while using these tools. If we can teach students how to safely blog and us wikis in the school environment, then they will be better trained to use safe practices at home. We discussed the various obstacles to using blogs and wikis in class last week and there were many. First the administration has to be on board then the parents will need to give permission and lastly the teacher needs to set up safety practices for students by practicing in the school setting. Although it may seem like a lot of work, I think that there are lots of lessons and projects that could be better presented with the use of technology. I also think there is a certain amount of fear that goes with trying new technology as a teacher. Hopefully, when we finish this class we'll feel much more comfortable and able to embrace this new technology to interract with our students.
The other important information in chapter 1 was about how to keep our students safe while using these tools. If we can teach students how to safely blog and us wikis in the school environment, then they will be better trained to use safe practices at home. We discussed the various obstacles to using blogs and wikis in class last week and there were many. First the administration has to be on board then the parents will need to give permission and lastly the teacher needs to set up safety practices for students by practicing in the school setting. Although it may seem like a lot of work, I think that there are lots of lessons and projects that could be better presented with the use of technology. I also think there is a certain amount of fear that goes with trying new technology as a teacher. Hopefully, when we finish this class we'll feel much more comfortable and able to embrace this new technology to interract with our students.
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