Experimenting with technologies

     Gee has come up with several pinciples that go with game design which can actually also be used in learning. The 3 I feel can help us the most are as follows: The "Practice Principle" because I do feel that along with anything, practice make perfect. The more a student goes over his work or goes to tutoring then the more familiar a student will be with the material so it will be easier. 2nd is the "Committed Learning Principle" because if a student could be as committed to a classroom assignment as they are to video games, then they would have great grades. My 3rd is "Semiotic Domains Principle" because just like in designing video games, it also takes mastering something to an extent when it comes to learning.

     I'm not really sure how i would make a simulation game for the classroom. I think there a lot of subjects that that games could be made for but im just not sure how i would create a SIMS type of video game for a math class.maybe im just not fully understanding but the only one i see that could work is the simulation for biology shown in the textbook on page 50.

     I simulation games as much as the next guy but i just dont see them being efective in a classroom setting. I do feel like other subject oriented games could be useful in class such math, science, and english games to promote participation and practice of skills.

Work Cited

Jonassen, D, Howland, J, Marra, R, & Crismond, D. (2008). Meaningful learning with technology. Upper Sadle River, New Jersy: Pearson Merrill/Prentice Hall.

Meaningful Learning

     Technolgy based rubrics are very helpful documents for educators. Rubrics make it a lot easier for teachers
to grade students work. Aside from grading, it gives a way for teachers to give students a basis to go off of for
assignments. Not only do rubrics make things easier for teachers, but they also make things easier for students.
for students who have teachers that post rubrics, this gives students a foundation for students to go and look at to
basically tell them everything that the teacher wants to be done on the assignment.
     Clickers are like little remotes that students can use in the classroom to poll in or send answers to teachers
questions. These are easy and simple devices that can keep track of when a student answers a question and
whether they got it right or wrong. This is a way to keep children in a classroom interacting with the lesson so that
the studeents do not fall asleep or get board with what the teacher is teaching. Students like to be able to see if
they answered a question correctly or how well they did on a test, and that is a reason that this a good tool
because teachers can administer tests and quizzes where students can send in answers through this device. The
cool thing about this is that after the answers are submitted, teachers can print out the students answers and show
them how they did on the test right there.
     Inspirtation and kidspiration are brainstorming tools for grades k-12. More specifically, kidspiration is
for students k-5 and inspiration is for grades 6-12. These inpiration tools are for brainstorming and mapping ideas
that are thought of. The kidspiration program is geared more toward teaching about words, numbers, and
concepts. The inspiration program is for the older students so it helps develop skills in diagramming, outlining,
mapping, and presenting. This is a good tool for all ages to help develop planning skills.
     All three of these could easily be put into a teachers lesson plan. The rubrics actually make things a lot simpler
for students because it lets them know exactly the teacher wants on an assignment. teachers should give a rubric
with every assignment so students know what to do and do not have to guess. Clickers should be used in just
about all classrooms to keep students attentive and interacting with the class and teacher. Teachers could have the
students do one assignment that requires the use of inspiration mapping.
     Works cited

Schrock, K. (1995). Discovery education. Retrieved from http://school.discovery.com/schrockguide/assess.html

Inspiration. (2010). Retrieved from http://www.inspiration.com/
Qwizdom. (2010). Retrieved from http://www.qwizdom.com

Visualizing with Technology

Digital storytelling is creating a story with the help of technology. This is telling a story using videos, paper, and then editing the video on the computer. A computer is needed to create digital storytelling because in order to do this, the student has to make a desktop movie. There are several parts to creating a digital story. The 1^st step in creating one is the preproduction. This is where the students plan out their story by researching, brainstorming, and organizing the information so that it is ready to be put together. During the preproduction stage the student will do the most work out of the whole project.  Students must not only research their subject but also but gather photos, create storyboards, and also gather any video needed for the digital story. Next the students will create a checklist with exposition, rising action, climax, and falling action. This should be used to evaluate the project and make the sure that their project is giving the viewer the correct message. In the actual production part of the story building, the student will actually begin to shoot the video. This is a good activity because it gives a student the chance to be a director, editor, videographer, and an actor all at once.

Since math is such a abstract subject, there a programs built just for this to help make it seem more real to students. Some of the programs include Mathematica, Math Lab, Statistical Analysis system, Statistical Package and several other programs are out to help students. In addition to these programs, there have been devices created such as graphing calculators to help students understand the relationships between linear equations and other numbering or graphing problems they may have. These calculators allow students to go from numeric representations, symbolic, and graphical functions. There have been studies that show that students who use graphing calculators are more persistent when they meet a new problem.

It is possible for students to learn just from watching TV alone depending on what type of learner the student is. If a student is a visual learner than it is easier for them to watch something instructional on a show or video then be able to imitate it. People who are less visual and need more hands on learners may actually need more instruction than just watching something on television.

Works Cited

            Jonassen, D, Howland, J, Marra, R, & Crismond, D. (2008). Meaningful learning with technology. Upper Sadle River, New Jersey: Pearson Merrill/Prentice Hall.

Podcasting

This was a very interesting section of this class for the simple fact that I’ve had an iPod since they came out and I have never known what a podcast was. I always scrolled through iTunes and saw them but I never actually downloaded 1 because I guess all I was really interested in was music and the games. From the reading and from the video, I just learned how useful they are a lot of different situations such as listening to a class lecture that you may have missed or just want to listen too on your own to study. Not only are they very useful but they are also very simple and cheap to make to make. There are several ways that podcasting could be used in the classroom from study resources to projects for students. Podcasting could be a very useful tool for teachers especially if they record their lectures or even just important classes such as a test review day or something like that. It may be a little more work for the teacher to do this and upload the podcast, but in the end I think it would be beneficial to the students. This is a helpful tool for students because if a student does miss a class period then they can catch up on the work or see whatever homework they might have missed, but this is in no way trying to promote missing classes. This could also be a resourceful tool for students who came to class because some may want to study at home or somewhere on their own time but not want to read or may not even have the book. Podcasting can also be used by the student if a teacher wants to make a project for the student to make a podcast over a certain subject.

The podcasting to me is a big difference from the web 2.0 applications that we have already studied. The only thing that is similar to the podcasting is the voice thread because there is voice, but the podcasting is that plus a lot more. The podcasting has voice thread along with visuals that the creator can add anything to that they want to show the person that is watching. The podcasting to me is a big difference from the web 2.0 applications that we have already studied. The only thing that is similar to the podcasting is the voice thread because there is voice, but the podcasting is that plus a lot more. The podcasting has voice thread along with visuals that the creator can add anything to that they want to show the person that is watching. Podcasting is different because it is like a television show, so a teacher is able to show and tell the student what is expected of them.

I actually do have and iPod touch and have had it for about 3 years now and I use it primarily for music and game purposes. I never thought to use it for anything else, and actually when I got it I did not even use it for games. Now that I am starting to learn more about these podcasts and what they really are, I could actually see myself using them in a classroom setting. Just as an example, right now I am taking chemistry and I am not picking it up too well, so now knowing about podcasts I could go and get a podcast of a chemistry lecture or tutor. I think there are nothing but advantages to online communication as long as you know who you are talking to such as facebook, twitter, or just emails. The times that you run into trouble is when you are on there trying to meet new people. That’s when you run into predators other problems like that. If you stick to the people you know and only use it to keep into touch or to talk about something then I think there is nothing but advantages. The only disadvantage I could think of with this would be for a person who doesn’t have internet access.
Work cited

Jonassen, D, Howland, J, Marra, R, & Crismond, D. (2008). Meaningful learning with technology. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Merrill/ Prentice Hall.

Web 2.0

I think that wikis are a very fun and interesting way for students for students to do projects. Wikis seem like an assignment that I would turn into a once a semester project that a student could enjoy doing over an entire semester. They seem like they would be too much work for a student to do as a regular homework assignment so I would stretch it over several months so that it could be packed with all of the information throughout the class. By the end of the semester I would have them turn in a wiki going over 3 or 4 subjects that we went over throughout the course of the class.

            Socialbookmarking seems like a really good idea for students who work in groups. It is useful for teachers and students because if a teacher needs to check a student’s resources or work that they used for their projects or papers. I have never used a VoiceThread before but it seems like a way to easier explain a picture or media slide. If a student is trying to show a media slide with a picture that isn’t easily explained, a student can add a voice snippet to help explain what is going on in the visual.

            I’m not sure that I have used a tapped in type of community with any school work but if I am not mistaken, I think I used one at work online to find my schedule. From the figure shown in the book, it looks pretty much like the same thing. This is a creative way to keep people connected and informed with different things that a certain group of people may need. The 1 that I used had different communities broken down into different parts like a park, a subdivision, restaurants and they would all represent something like our schedules, corporate contacts, or different rules and so on. Since it was the first time I saw it I thought it was pretty cool. I think this tool could be very useful as a teacher because you could do the same thing and set them up as class time/dates, class notes, and syllabus just to name a few as examples.

Works Cited

Jonassen, D, Howland, J, Marra, R, & Crismond, D. (2008). Meaningful learning with technology. Upper Sadle River, New Jersey: Pearson Merrill/Prentice Hall.

Assessments and e-portfolios

We use assessment activities to authentically evaluate learning. Since they have created the authentic assessments, educators have begun to get rid of older evaluation methods that just sort students by the assessment system. Assessments are a way that educators gather information and analyze data to see if students have learned what they intended for them to learn. Educators are beginning to move towards the technology based assessments because it easier to keep track of students grades instead of shuffling through papers and trying to keep everything in a file. Using electronic assessments makes it easier for not only educators but also for students. It seems like this would be more trouble because there is more data to collect and builds anxiety for students but researchers say to consider it a easy to use technology based to quickly gather the data and see if the learner is understanding.

E-portfolios are a collection of a student’s bio, work, and overview of the course. These electronic portfolios are helpful for both students and teachers. A couple ways that the portfolios simplify things is that they reduce physical storage requirements, easier to edit, and it can be updated. Computer based tests are tests, quizzes, or any assessment that is given by an educator using a computer. The fact that the assessments are computer based does not take away from the validity or reliability of the results. The educators that give the tests can actually download results, provide feedback, and send scores to respondents.

Giving assessments in schools are necessary to for teachers so that they know whether or not their students are understanding the material. The government has set up stated mandated tests such as the TAKS test but then teachers began doing what professionals call "teaching to the test" and they feel that the students are not learning what they need to when teachers do this. Even with all of this said assessments are still necessary and will remain in the schools.

Works cited

Jonassen, D, Howland, J, Marra, R, & Crismond, D. (2008). Meaningful learning with technology. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Merrill/ Prentice Hall.

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Can You Use That Info?

There are a lot of rules about copyrighting that many people do not know about. These are rules that people actually do need to be aware of to keep them out of what could be a lot of trouble. A copyright is someone’s right to a property such as original work of art, music, or literature. People that are unaware of these laws could actually be illegally be using information from many different sources for a number of different reasons. There are rules and laws stating that you must give credit from wherever or whoever it is that you got your information from. On top of giving credit to whom you got the information from, a lot of things must be payed for to use it legally to accommodate the fair use law. These laws are very important to follow because all of this information that is being used belongs to someone else who put in a lot of work to gather the info. Anytime that you use this information without giving credit or without paying, you could actually be sued for illegally using their works. I would teach my students about this very important subject by finding a video or article showing either people that have been caught using copyrighted material and their consequences or just explaining the seriousness of this crime.

There are two similar internet offenses that people commit. They are called cyber safety and cyberbullying in which is there is not too much of a difference. Even though they are different, they both have to do with improper behavior over the internet through social networks or whatever it may be. Cyber safety is a term that has to do with children using online resources and potentially running into a predator. Cyberbullying is a term referring to bullying online. Cyberbullying is just another form of bullying. Just because it is online, people can still be hurt from things people do or say over the web. We must protect our children and ourselves from this by knowing and trusting the site that we are surfing on. Another way to protect ourselves is to know the people that we are communicating with over social networks and not talk to random people that may request you as a friend.

I feel like the activities this week were very helpful especially to people that are unaware of these laws and regulations. I felt like before reviewing some of this material I was pretty much educated on this subject because my teachers always explained to us the importance of plagiarism and making sure to cite our work. After taking the copyright quiz I saw that I did not know as much as I thought I did. I found out that there are a lot more rules to learn about this whole subject that we think we know so i encourage everybody to take a closer look at the rules so that you do not become an offender of this crime.

Works Cited

Newsome, C. (1997, November 17). A teacher's guide to fair use and copyright. Retrieved from http://home.earthlink.net/~cnew/research.htm#References