Week 11- Evaluating my Own Blogs

Beautifu Posts, Perfect in every way, Should be a Journalist! "Do I get an A?" Just Kidding while reading through the Rubics Assignment I'm beginning to think grades are not as important as skills.

I noticed I usually write about ideas and concepts but I don't always complete the idea. I don't always summarize what I've written about to give the readers closure. I could also include More Open ended questions to get the reader to think about the ideas I'm writing about more. I have noticed a change in my posts over time. My more recent posts do focus more on a complete idea rather than just random thoughts. My composition has improved. I've started to use a lot more picture references, videos, and support for my writings.

As I reflect back on my 1st post about "SimulationEducation - Hands on Approach to Learning" I'm approaching a half circle. The thought of creating a Hands on Approach to learning by facilitating is becoming an tangable Idea. I lay awake at night as my mind races though how to reach students, how to engage them and utilize there full potential. How to reach children suffering from ADHD, Social Anziety's, and Learning Disabilities. I'm develping the weapons to fight this War against illiteracy, poverty, and "this person is a lost cause" concept.

Through Webquests I've learned how to focus on creativity to challenge students. I've learned to use games to teach and strengthen skills. Someday I still hope to make them. I've learned to use co-operative documents using PBworks. I've even gotten a 1st hand glimps of one being used in an acually classroom my 6th grade son is in. They are using items I'm learning about in this class to teach. He is now in AP Reading and AP Math based on these concepts. I hope to teach him using Podcasts and Vodcasts a new concept I had never done before this class.

I've come across teacher that are working on the same ideas and through there creations and examples I hope to make my own. The Flipped Classroom is one area I'll be revisiting. The concept of using the classroom to syncronizing online learning at home. I'm currently looking over the idea of creating a Rubics. I love the idea of using a Rubics rather than grades. Rubics focus more on the skills learned, kind of a "G0 or NO GO" concept the Army uses.

I know my writings are not as creative or narrative as some in this classroom's blogs I've read. I need to work on that. I've learned a lot so far focusing on skill rather than grades. I hope to learn more even beyond this class or blogs I've written. If I use blogs I'll make them internal in my classroom and not public.

Robotic Legos Teach Elementary School Students STEM Skills

Robotic Legos Teach Elementary School Students STEM Skills

In order to motivate students you must create a learning environment they can understand and want to be a part of. What better way than using toys, especially Legos. Lego's have come a long way from just using them like blocks.

Lego's by Age
For ages Preschool to 8th I recommend using Lego Education website. It provides Legos in prepackaged sets to teach primarily robotics and a lot more.

Beginning with Robotics
LEGO® Education WeDo

Intermediate
LEGO® Education

Advanced
LEGO® MINDSTORMS® Education
Mindstorm site

Here is some Ideas about the Intermediate set used to teach Physics and gear ratios. Here is some ways to Use this set to teach renewable energy. If you click on select curriculum you can gear different aspects of the project to fit different age groups. Legos are perfect for teaching engineering.

Legos for Mathmatics
Legos are excellent for teaching math concepts like addition, subtraction, fractions, geometry, and many more. In an article called LEGO Math Activities By Teri Ann Berg Olsen she points out 22 Lesson Ideas you can use to teach math with Legos. She didn't even go into using Lego's to teach Scale Modeling, Perimeter, or Area. WierdRichard is a great site to look over for math subject ideas with Legos

Youtube like Legos are great for Learning. If there are still any doubts just sit down with a set of Lego's for 15 minutes and before you know it your creativity and creations will turn into hours of learning. The problem is you may find yourself forgetting about your other duties or goals.

Podcasts and Vodcast?

I've never tried to watch or download a podcast until today. I had a really hard time trying to figure out how to download the podcast and vodcast to my mp3 player from the NOVA site. Very Very Frustrating but I think I have finally figured it out. I went to the Nova Podcast site and was able to stream the podcasts easily to watch on my PC using my yahoo account on directly on the website. My Question was How Do I Download It!!

Downloading (Subscribing to Podcasts)

First let me point out that I do not have an Ianything - no Ipad, Ipod, ect... so to the best of my knowledge itunes will not work with my cheap mp3 players by ematic. Itunes uses a different codeing besides mp3, mp4, acc.

So I had to track down a Podcatcher. I looked them all up in wikipedia and finally decided on Doppler. Now I installed the Doppler program. Next I opened it and went to the Nova site and followed these directions. It appears you have to right click on the xml then subscribe. You do this by Right Clicking on xml and select Copy Short Cut. Then click the add in Doppler to add the Podcast subscription you want. (Whew what a Pain!) After 4 hours I'm still trying to download only what I want. It will download everything in the subscription. ugh.

Ok Now I opened the Doppler files that it downloaded. Right clicked opened the containing folder then dragged that .mp3 player fomated file into my ematic MP3 player.

Why is it so hard to just download a MP3 file using podcasting. Podcasting is like a television program that you set your DVR to record but it will record all episodes not just the one you want. Wouldn't it just be easier to just list the mp3 files seperate and let you download them individually.

Well after all that it finally worked I was able to lisen to an MP3 from Nova about Electrical Blackouts. While Podcasting is interesting it just seems to be a complex way of giving people MP3 or MP4's(Video) they dont really need. It's a forced subscription in my opinion. I will be tracking down the MP4 and 3 I like and downloading them but as for having a subscription to a channel.... I'll try to prevent it.

After thoughts after cooling down.

Some advantage I see is that now I can download MP4's and other files to watch or lisen to on my MP3 player or my Laptop to broadcast in a Classroom.

If I could find a subscription or create a subsciption for my classroom I could send them videos each time they loaded the program using Doppler.




(Update) As I was about to run out the door I notice a file on my PC called NOVA so I put it into my removable harddrive so I could take it with me to work. I got a change to look it over on break and wow Podcasting is perfect for On-the-Go educational material. That site downloaded 15 videos that I can watch anywhere. I can see whole lessons being put on video and Podcasted or Vodcasted. I normally have to copy and past everything to a word document and print it out to look at it later when I don't have internet access but this podcasting could be the key to overcoming that.

(Update 2)
The University of North Colorado has launched a Vodcasting site. This site took me to Flipped Class Network a Vodcast Educational site. Appearently the concept of having students learn at home and apply at school has been around for a while.

Trying to Make Sense of it all (Not part of the Course for my own Understanding)

So much information to digest and I'm reaching a point of frustration. Will this ASSURE model change to something else in a few years? Frustrated with how Lessons seem to be so complex on creating.

Analyze Learners and Learning Theory
Using my Information Processing Habits(Mind Styles) of Concrete Random(trial and error) (p89) and Concrete Sequential(Hands on, Direct) I'm trying to digest everything we have learned so far. I understand that not all people learn the same way or we each have Multiple Intelligences(p89 Gradner). In order to understand how our students learn we should give them Entry Tests or assign prerequisites. We also need to know what Motivates our students. Keller's ARCS Model address Attention, Revelance, Confidence, and Satisfaction and seems to agree with Maslow's Hiarchey of Needs. Keller even mentions Maslow's Hiarchey under Revelance in Needs Matching. Learning Theory can be broken into 4 Different Theory Category's-Behaviorism(Stimulus-Response),Cognitivism(Learners process, store, and retrieve information for later use), Constructivism(Connectivism or Social Constructive)(learners construct new ideas or concepts based upon their current/past knowledge, social interactions, and motivation affect the construction).


My question is now How do we assess students and find this information out? I understand we can look over there previous classes they have taken but that does not tell use how the student learns and what works best. I've found a few sites like NC and Idpride.net . I wonder how Learning styles match up with Leadership styles?


Standards and Objectives (Working)
I understand that each State has it's own Standards for each grade level like NC State Standards at LearnNC.org . To my understanding States are still working on this NET-S or standards for technology for use by students. I'm trying to use Burner's Discovery Learning, reflection, and Conectivism which is how I assumilate new knowledge and campare it with what I have previously learned to achieve understanding. I'm still trying to get use to this Lesson Plan Concept and including Bloombergs Taxonomy and State Standards. I'm learning from the perspecitive of a soldier using Soldier's Common Tasks being like the State Standards. The difference being the Soldier's Tasks are set Lesson Plans and Standards Combined where as Teachers the Standards are set but the Lesson Plans must be created based on the Teacher.

http://iris.peabody.vanderbilt.edu/cnm/cresource.htm

Select Strategies, Technology, Media and Material (Working)

-Dramatic Play Kits for All Ages(Idea)

Utilize Technology, Media, Materials

Require Learner Participation

Evaluate and Revise (AAR After Action Review)

Voki Test


Best Educational Games-
Uncharted Waters
Scribblenots
Professor Layton
Civilization
Top Secret(RPG)
Math- Design and Build Items(Haven't found a game yet)

Databases the Evil of the Microsoft World

I hate Microsoft Access with a passion. I understand how to use it and have used it in a classroom enviroment but it system of searching is to complex and not user friendly. It is like comparing Windows to DOS. In DOS you had to type specific commands and if you miss just one letter or symbol you got the message "Error". The same with Access. If you don't know how to use it and put in just the wrong piece of information in your search.... the wrong information appears. Very Frustrating!

I read through the article "introductions for third and fourth grade to databases"
just to see how a teacher could introduce Access to younger students. I have to disagree with her. I don't see how student caught on to Access in under 10 minutes unless the program was made so that students couldn't type anything wrong. After doing Access for a month in one of my computer classes I still cannot always get the information I want. I will use Databases in my classroom but it will be more like Delicious or some other form of user friendly specifically designed databases not Access.

Spreadsheets making Data into something Tangable

Integration of using Spreadsheets in the classroom is a must. I remember life before speadsheets and having to collect data, calculate data, and then trying to show others research using graphs, charts, and accounting using ledgers and books. Spreadsheets make data manipulation and calculation much easier. It may take some work initially learning to use tools like Microsoft Excel but in the end it's worth it. I understand students get frustrated at just making spreadsheets on information they only use once. I've had to create spreadsheets using tons of information that took hours just to post the document and then start all over again for the next project. My statistics class was the worst! A simple page of 5 questions you had to answer could take days to finish. Looking back I don't think this was the best way to be introduced to how to use Spreadsheets.

Spreadsheets should be an on going assignment using the same spreadsheet but adding to it. I loved my Physics class were we used speadsheets to collect data then manipulated the data into multiple graphs representing different senarios and probabilities. Spreadsheets should be taught more in school since in the business world they are used daily. At work we use a spreadsheet template everyday then compile the data on those templates into a montly report showing productivity. In my classroom I will ensure students learn to create spreadsheet templates and compile data and utilize that data all through the year. Spreadsheets can be a great teaching tool since they can be used to compile vasts amount of data and turn it into something everyone can understand.

Word Processing as a Teaching Tool

How I would integrate Word Processing into the classroom. The Greatest thing about Word Processing is that it is a canvas for the painting of ideas. It's realitively free and open for creation for any student. All you have to do is inspire them to create.

Word Processing now can be used not for just creating essays but can be a tool to create a masterpiece of information and artistic design. One plan of mine is small project can be started at the beginning of the year, lets say a journal, on a subject. Students can add to it daily, weekly, monthly, during directed working periods or during free time if they are creating something they enjoy. One Paragraph per day can add up to be 180 paragraphs over a school year or at 4 paragraphs a page that turns into a 45 page paper single spaced.

The coolest thing about word processing now it that you can add pictures, graphs, equations, color, design, codes, and much more. No longer are students restricted to just writing on paper and pasting things together... now they can copy and paste them using a word processing program to create an idea or thought into something tangable. This is also the downfall of word processing.

With word processing being so easy to copy and paste students must be taught not abuse the power of word processing. Word processing can be an instument of good teaching the NET-S of Creativity and Innovation, Communication and Collaboration, and Research and Information Fluency but most importantly we must emphasis - Digital Citizenship. Most importantly "advocate and practice safe, legal, and responsible use of information and technology"(NET-S) must be empasized. It makes me sick of hearing students and professionals deliberatly plagerizing and having others do there work using the power of word processing. Giving references or Give credit where credit is do is easy and helpful on explaining yourself and ideas to others. Delibertly having someone do your work is just wrong. Without teaching Digital Citizenship and respecting others work students can learn the evils of technology instead of the good.

Class Blog Assignment- MS Word (Mana from Heaven)

Microsoft Word (Stop Changing Your Layout!)

I remember when our High School got its first computer lab. That was in 1988. The internet for practical purposes did not exist outside of colleges, the military, and they were still talking about Telenet and CompuServe. I started to learn to type on a type writer and worked with some of the first IBM computers used in our classrooms. Our Computer Lab teacher had a terrible time keeping us kids from smuggling in games and playing them on the servers when she wasn't looking. In the 1987 we had a small lab where we learned to write programs using DOS. It took hours just to make a picture on the screen using command lines like "go to" and "run". Now I can't keep up with the changes on MS Word because the format changes every 3 years it seems like.

I laughed when Mrs. Keesee wrote "think of one instance of a time when you wanted to do something in Microsoft Office and could not figure out how to accomplish it?" Just when I can figure out how to do anything without MS word they changing the format and where all the buttons are placed! I really enjoy the new things like charts, pictures, equations, and spell/grammar check (Greatest Invention Since Sliced Bread!). Without MS word and word processing my teachers would still be telling me, "Butch what is this.... It looks like Chicken Scratch!" My handwriting is terrible an archeologist put it in a museum next to a mummy. I still print everything because my cursive has been known to cause temporary blindness. Luckily MS word came up with this wonderful Invention and even created a help button that has always looked like a question mark or said Help.

PS- Want to talk about frustration...posting from MS Word with hyperlinks to here seems impossible.