Blog Post #8--Educational Tools Exploration

In order to get a better idea of the educational tools that are out there, I chose two and explored them.  There are so many internet tools for teachers and knowing the advantages and disadvantages of each can go a long way in creating a more e-friendly classroom.

Bubbl.Us

The first tool that I explored was Bubbl.Us.  I ended up using this tool in my final project lesson because I found it to be very easy to use and effective for the purposes I needed.  Bubbl.Us is an internet concept mapping tool that is free to use.   Upon visiting the site, users are faced with the following screen:

(Image from homescreen of Bubbl.Us.)

When you click, "Start Brainstorming" a new concept map screen immediately opens with a cursor waiting in the center bubble for you to fill in.  It is very self-explanatory and easy to use.  When I used this tool in my lesson, the children picked it up after very little instruction from me, and even noticed options and functions that I didn't know about.  At one point, I said, "To create a new child bubble, you just click on the little bubble icon at the bottom of your parent bubble." One of my students said back, "Or, you can also click command and enter and it will do the same thing."  He was absolutely right!  I loved seeing this tool in use by children and knowing that it was intuitive enough that they very quickly could use it on their own.  In the classroom, Bubbl.Us is perfect for allowing students to show what they've learned from a lesson in a creative and unique way.  I used it in my lesson for the children to demonstrate their understanding of a video we watched on ten natural disasters.

Check out this YouTube video on the ins and outs of Bubbl.Us:

Smilebox

The second internet tool I chose to explore was Smilebox.  On their website, Smilebox claims to give users "a new way to bring your photos and videos to life".  After a very fast, free download of the software, a Smilebox application screen opened on my computer.  In it, I could easily access a catalog of designs to choose from in order to create a new slide show of my own personal photographs.  There was also a place to create my own designs.

To practice using the application, I chose to use one of their designs.  I decided to make a slideshow of a recent camping trip I went on with my boyfriend so I picked a travel template.  As I was walking through the application, I was really impressed with how easy it was to use and how well-designed it is.  Everything is attractive and appealing.  The layout makes sense, the images are lovely, and the navigation makes sense.  I picked the "Vintage Roadtrip" design for my slideshow and after that, it was only a matter of filling in information and choosing the images from my personal library.  In about 20 minutes, I had a customized, high-quality slideshow with my own pics in it.  There is the option to share the finished product via Facebook, Blogger, email, or even to burn it to a DVD.  Here is my embedded slideshow:

Customize your own digital slideshow

I found this tool to be extremely enjoyable to use.  In the classroom, children would love to use Smilebox to create their own slideshows.  If they were presenting on countries of the world or animals of the rainforest, for example, they could find web images of their topic, upload images, write their own captions, and layout their own slideshows to present their findings.  Or, after taking a class fieldtrip somewhere, students could create a memories slideshow to share with parents and other classes.  The possibilities are endless and the software is so fun and easy to use, that I would absolutely consider using this tool in the classroom.  Definitely check it out if you are interested in photo presentation software.

Blog Post #7--Two Google Tools

With the list of available Google Tools always growing, I wasn't really surprised to see how many there were to choose from.  I was surprised to learn how many of them were useful for teachers.  I explored two Google Tools closely to determine just how useful they would be in the classroom.

The first Google Tool I explored was Google Groups.  Google Groups is a tool designed to help people create, manage, and communicate among various internet groups.  From the homepage, users with a Google account can easily search new groups, click into their existing groups, and see updates on groups they are in.  Groups are searchable based on common interests of group members.  Virtually everything you can think of has a group, so whether you are into model airplanes, backpacking, or cooking, there is a Google Group (or many!) full of people who are also interested.  To find a group, you can search by subject.  Once you find one you like, you can ask permission to join by group managers.  If you don't find one you like, you can create your own.  Once in a group, you can post to an existing discussion forum, send emails both publicly and privately, or create your own new topic of discussion.  It's a great way to connect with other people who share common interests.  In the classroom, Google Groups can be used as a discussion board where the teacher can post questions and invite students to answer.  Likewise, different groups could be set up in a class to connect students with common interests.  There can be a science group, a graphic novel group, even a reading club group.  The good thing about Google Groups is that you can make groups private for only invited members.  This takes the risk out of creating a public forum that can connect children to those we'd rather not connect them to.  Though I think that there are some much better LMS programs in existence that can do all that Google Groups does and more, I think that a class that already operates through Google accounts could definitely find use for Google Groups.

The second Google Tool I took a look at was Picnik.  Picnik is a photo editing program that allows users to add creative effects, crop and resize, and organize their personal photographs in one easy-to-use program.  I've never used Picnik before and, being that it is one of the newest members of the Google Tools family, I thought I would dive right in and create my own account.  Like all of the Google Tools, Picnik is free to use, though it does have a premium upgrade that you must pay for.  Using the free application, I quickly set up a free account (no gmail address necessary) and within 2 minutes uploaded my first photos from my own computer.  You can also grab photos from various web locations, including Facebook, Picasa, and   I was able to upload only 5 photos at a time (premium membership allows up to 100) and it took about a minute for them to be fully uploaded.  Once there, I clicked "manage uploads" and was able to see my five pictures to edit.  I chose one and it opened in a new frame.  This allowed me the basic editing functions--crop, red eye, level adjustments, etc.  After this, I went to the "Create" tab.  This is where the fun stuff is.  Here you can add stickers, themes, textures, backgrounds, and even perform airbrush touch-ups.  Many of the best functions are only available on the premium--a rather annoying fact that I encountered quite often--but in the end of my playing I was able to create this lovely sepia-toned, framed image of my boyfriend and I on our latest outdoor hike:

All in all, Picnik is easy to use and fun.  In the classroom, I could see it being used for creating class photo albums, for students to edit photos for homemade books or for presentations, or even for organizing a collection of images after a class field trip to be posted on a class blog or website.  Photo editing is something that children are inherently interested in and many of them are able to pick it up relatively quickly.  Picnik, though full of reminders to upgrade to a better version, is a program that many kids would find fun and simple. If you're interested, you should check out this video tutorial from YouTube:

Blog Post #6--LMS Comparison of CollaborizeClassroom and CourseSites

Comparison of CollaborizeClassroom and CourseSites

There are countless Learning Management Systems available on the internet for educators to enhance their classes and provide an atmosphere for learning on the internet.  In order to get a better feel for the types of LMSs that exist, I compared two of them.

Collaborize Classroom

Collaborize Classroom is a free LMS that allows educators to create a user profile, setup different course pages and establish an interactive learning space for their students.  At Collaborize Classroom, teachers can upload assignments, open discussion boards, embed Microsoft Office documents, videos, pictures, and PDFs.  Users can determine how many classes to setup and how many discussions (or, I would imagine, topics in the class) they would like to host.  Other possible functions are mass mailings, video tutorials, posing debates or questions for a class vote, and widget adding. 

I really like the vote option on Collaborize Classroom.  I can think of many times when this could be useful in gathering opinions or even starting debates among students.  Overall, this site is easy to use and intuitive.  I don’t think that it is set up as convenient as a site like UB’s Blackboard, nor does it have as many functions, but, certainly, this site would work well for a middle school or high school classroom.  One thing that was definitely lacking in this LMS was a digital dropbox or file transfer area.  There is no place for students to be able to turn in work, no assignment upload section, and no grading function.  This is one of the most convenient features of many LMSs and the fact that this aspect is missing from Collaborize Classroom would definitely keep me from using it in a real life classroom.

 (Image from: CollaborizeClassroom)

CourseSites

CourseSites is another free LMS that makes use of the Blackboard interface to provide educators with a free and fully functioning classroom management system.  I was able to set up a customized profile and site that had just about all of the features of UB’s Blackboard system.  I am teaching an Introduction to Education course this fall at UB and so I used CourseSites to design my own template for the course that included a grade center, discussion boards, course tools, and even a place to upload my syllabus.  Being very familiar with Blackboard, using CourseSites was like second nature to me.  It appears just as Blackboard, with the “My Announcements” and “To Do” on the homepage.  I was able to easily update the course objectives, course description, instructor information, and textbook requirements section with very little effort.  After these basic informational areas were filled in, I moved on to setting up the course discussions.  I easily created an introduction forum and posted a sample of what I expected the students to post.  I explained how to make a post and what to write.  All of this was very easy and familiar to me.

Especially interesting to me at CourseSites was the “Live Classroom” tab on the left navigation.  When I clicked it, I was led to a page explaining that I could use the interface to create a live, real-time classroom through CourseSites in which I could chat, provide Voice over IP, application share, and open a whiteboard between myself and the students.  Using Java, CourseSites allows instructors to collaborate in real-time with up to 50 students in a live session.  Being that I am teaching a course of mostly freshmen and sophomores this fall, I thought that this tool could prove to be invaluable.  How convenient it will be to be able to offer out-of-class, live help for students who need it!  Beyond the Live Classroom, CourseSites provides many helpful and enhancing features, such as links to class blogs, a course calendar, an area to IM with students, a podcating area, and access to online journals for private communication with students.  With so many options, I felt a bit overwhelmed and very motivated to start building my online course presence. 

I am definitely interested in making use of CourseSites, and possibly even for use in this fall class.  I hope to explore CourseSites a bit more and, once I am given my instructor access to UB’s Blackboard, make comparisons between the two interfaces from the instructor’s perspective.

 

(Image from: CourseSites)

Blog Post #5--Virtual Field Trips

This week I created my first Virtual Field Trip.  A VFT is a digital tour of a location complete with images, information, and explanation for why you are visiting.  For my VFT, I decided to use a geology theme.  I created a tour of five different naturally occurring land formations in the United States.  Using Google Earth, I recorded a virtual trip from the New York State Finger Lakes, to the barrier island Fire Island off of the coast of Long Island, NY, to Great Sand Dunes National Park in Colorado, to the Mississippi River Delta, and finally, to the natural mass movement landslide of La Conchita on the coast of California.

I really loved using Google Earth and was amazed at the precision with which one can zoom in and really focus in on a location.  Being that I was making such a specific VFT about really specific formations of land, I was worried that Google Earth would not be able to locate my landmarks or wouldn't be able to zoom into the level I needed in order to demonstrate my points.  Was I ever wrong!  Not only was each of my land formations recalled by name, but I could easily zoom right down to street level for each and every one of them.  For the landslide at La Conchita, this was especially useful.  Here's what the street view of the landslide looks like.  What great detail!

I love how Google Earth makes use of the 3-D imaging as well as the ever-familiar Google Maps real-world imaging.  In fact, many of the functions and applications in Google Earth are very similar or the same as their Google Maps counterparts.  I found this program to be intuitive and pretty remarkable.  My only gripe is that I recorded audio of my voice talking my viewers through the tour but, for some reason, this audio failed to save on top of the recorded tour.  I'm sure I did it wrong but I got too frustrated with it to monkey around any further.  Any tips on how to make this work are greatly appreciated!

Here is a link to my VFT (without audio, sadly...).  Check it out and let me know what you think!




Here's a link to the script that I read and which should have been heard throughout the tour.

I really enjoyed the chance to make a virtual field trip.  I learned that it takes a lot of hard work, research, and plenty of patience to play with the technologies necessary to create a VFT.  I also learned that there are some pretty incredible resources out there to make something like a VFT possible.  With enough time and energy, teachers could literally bring the world into their classroom, an exciting and motivating lesson learned for me!  I can't wait to put this knowledge into practice.

Blog Post #4--UB on iTunes U

I am happy to see that UB in fact has an iTunesU site, however, the state of it leaves much to be desired.  The page is bland and is really simply a listing of the current podcast offerings.  There is nothing selling the site and nothing that would attract users to the UB iTunesU page.  The podcasts all share the same plain blue image and there are only 8 sections of UB with active podcasting pages.  I was happy to notice that many of the schools and "Discover UB" podcasts have relatively recent updates, meaning that they are in fact being used.  The most active podcast by far is the WBFO page, which plays the public radio content for all of Buffalo. 

To better serve its students, the UB iTunes page should have better organization and more attractive aesthetics.  The Columbia Teachers College site on iTunesU features a unique and attractive background.  There is a "What's New" section as well as a "Top Downloads" section, both of which draw in the eye and make for an appealing experience.  The Columbia page is designed much like an iTunes music page would be, with popularity ratings, Top Collections, and Available Tags links.  The site is very user-friendly and actually makes one want to explore.  Each of the courses, lectures, events, and podcasts has its own attractive image and a preview link that allows you to listen first to be sure you are subscribing to the right thing. 

Image from: http://itunes.apple.com/institution/teachers-college-columbia/id395702836#ls=1

UB could definitely benefit from some of the design work at the Columbia site.  There are no helpful links or recommended podcasts at UB's site just as there is little explanation of each podcast.  Columbia's iTunesU site seems like one that users would come to browse and find interesting podcasts to listen to for fun.  UB's iTunesU site seems like one that students in courses are directed to without any outside interest flowing in.  It would be wonderful to see UB develop its iTunesU site even more.

Blog Post #3--Subscribing to a Podcast

Using iTunes, I searched for podcasts that I thought would be interesting.  I am always looking for new music and enjoy listening to NPR on my way to work each morning.  I decided to go with NPR's All Songs Considered, a weekly podcast about the latest music releases from new breakouts to old favorites.  I enjoy this podcast because it allows me to find out about new music from all genres and contains sound clips, interviews, discussions, and sometimes even free downloads.  I also like to support public broadcast and, though this podcast is free, I feel good knowing that it comes from public radio.

Image from: http://www.npr.org/


The educational podcast I chose to follow is produced by the University of South Florida and is called Technology in K-12 Lesson Plans (Grades 3-5). The podcast provides ideas for innovative technology practices that can be used in lessons plans in a variety of subject areas. The podcast topics range from poetry movies, to caring for your iBooks, to dinosaurs.

Most of the podcasts are short so I checked out a few of them.  The first one I watched was a sample piece of work made by children, a poetry movie.  The podcast was photographs of teachers in practice set to background music.  There was a child's voice reading an inspirational poem. The clip was about a minute long but was very well done. It was clear that the children had rehearsed and planned out how they would read. I really enjoyed this piece and it seemed very doable for a 3-5 classroom.  Another podcast was from a third grade teacher describing how her students produced their own podcasts on friendship.  It was inspiring to hear another educator talk about how she uses technology in her classroom and how capable her students were after only a short time at using the technologies.

Image from: http://itunes.apple.com/itunes-u/technology-in-k-12-lesson/id384509123

Blog Post #2--Following eClassroom News on Twitter

For my Twitter follow, I chose eClassroom News.  They are a free web resource for educators who want information on technology to help provide a digital learning environment for their students.  Over the past week, they have posted many wonderful links to web-resources that support a variety of technological trends.  Among them was a link to their website eClassroomNews.com, where they provide many free materials that can be used by educators to enhance their teaching. In the time since I've been following eClassroom News, they have provided links to stories found on eSchoolNews such as the best Learning Management Systems for K-12, teaching the physics behind the game "Angry Birds," and recent grant funding opportunities for early childhood centers.  All of their Tweets direct users back to their main website that is home to many useful articles and links related to education and technology. Here is a screen cap of the eClassroom News website that users are directed to:

Image is from http://www.eclassroomnews.com/ homepage. 

I think that there is definitely an educational use for Twitter.  See my last blog post for an overview of Twitter and how it could be used in an educational setting.  Twitter can be an exciting way for teachers and students to communicate as well as for a classroom to stay current on relevant information.  For a class studying about world current events, maintaining a Twitter feed to TimeOut Kids is a great way to get immediate information on what is happening in the world.  I think it would be fun to assign a Twitter Monitor job to one child in the class every week whose job it is to check out the current events streaming in on the Twitter feed and to synthesize a report for the class at the end of each day.  This could be a wonderful way for a class to stay in touch with what's happening in the community and the world around them, and to introduce children to the notion of global affairs and current events.

Blog Post #1--Web Resources Explored

The first internet resource I chose to explore is Wikispaces.  I am using Wikispaces currently in another technology course I am taking and have found that it is extremely user-friendly, intuitive, and makes collaboration with others easy.  Using Wikispaces is simple, you go to the homepage, create a user account, and click create a new wiki.  It's all free and setup takes less than five minutes.  Once in, you are presented with a user dashboard when you can manage and organize your wikis.  You can follow others, set up email alerts when changes to a wiki you monitor occur, and check your wiki mail.  Once in your wiki, you can invite users by email and you can create your own wiki that can be altered, saved, and followed by you and all of your friends.  Here is a link to my Wikispace page that I had to create for another assignment.  You can see that with minimal effort, I was able to create a wiki that my classmates and anyone who finds it can join in on.  Each wiki also has a discussion board attached that allows friends to make comments and ask questions.  The whole site is free to use and customizable to fit your needs.  This is a great place to host your class website and my first wiki post is about 3 class sites that I reviewed.  In the classroom, Wikispaces allows educators a safe place online that can be sued for exchanges of communication between students, parents, and other educators.  Each student can have his or her own wiki page inside of the class wiki and teachers can post relevant information to the wiki that can be accessed anywhere there is an internet connection.  Wikispaces is a great way to bring children into the world of writing on the computer and allows them to share, collaborate, edit each others work, and feel a sense of pride in having an internet presence.

Image is from www.Twitter.com under their resources for free use link.

The second resource I reviewed was Twitter.  Twitter has taken the internet world by storm and has become one of the top sources of information for people the world over.  To use Twitter, you simply go to the homepage, create a user account with ID and password, find people to follow, and start posting.  When you post on Twitter--or "Tweet"--you are allowed only 140 characters to say what you'd like.  This forces users to condense information and often means leaving a link to a website with a full story.  The benefit of Twitter is that it provides real-time, immediate information to anyone who is monitoring the website via computer or, more popularly, via a smart phone or other mobile device.  It is not unusual for breaking news to appear on Twitter before any other news source as it does not have to pass through editing or press releasing.  In the classroom, Twitter can be a great way for teachers to stay connected to their students.  Teachers can Tweet relevant information about upcoming exams, homework assignments, recreational activities, and announcements.  Likewise, they can follow students and learn quickly about questions and concerns they may have.  Also, there are many wonderful educational resources on Twitter that would be beneficial for a class to follow.  Perhaps in connection with a class website, a class could have a Twitter feed that is constantly being monitored (perhaps as a class job) for new and interesting information.  One example of a great resource for children on Twitter is PBS Kids.  Designed and published by PBS, there are many great programs, links, and announcements from the kid-friendly broadcast network.  This is just one example of the types of Twitter user that children could follow.