Post #9

The Flipped Classroom began as a way for absent students to obtain the lectures they missed, it later expanded into “flipping” the way students and teachers spent classroom time. Instead of students having to listen to their teachers’ lectures on the content and then working with the content as homework, students listen to prerecorded video lectures for homework before going to class. During class time, students work with the content individually or in groups, alongside their teacher clarifying and deepening their understanding of the content.

http://www.teachertube.com/

Open education is about making educational experiences available to a wider audience. One example of open education is MIT’s open course work project. MIT courses are available on the internet, and open to everyone. However, attending a session online is not the same as being an actual MIT student but it does offer an opportunity. Open content is all about what teachers can and cannot do with the material available online; it is closely related to copyright. Open content consists of for “R” parts: Reuse, Revise, Remix and Redistribute.

http://www.getty.edu/about/opencontent.html

It was nice getting to use all the interesting features Power point offers. The last time I had the chance to play around with animations and transitions was in middle school. I liked creating a lesson for my future students and getting to experience the process of it all. Next time, I could improve the quality of my lesson and try to make it a little more complex.

Blog Post #8

Last week, we visited the Sports Psych Lab and had the chance to to play around with some of their equipment: The Bio Feedback instrument caught my attention the most. This piece of equipment can be used for special need kids who find themselves frustrated when presented with a difficulty. the bio feedback device can tell the teacher exactly what is frustrating the student, based on signals the device receives from the body the student. This makes it easier for the both the teacher and the student, since most times special needs kids cannot properly communicate or express their feelings.

 Microsoft PowerPoint can be very useful if used in the right manner, followed by good teaching skills. The best way to know if you are using PowerPoint effectively is if you evaluate it based on Bloom’s Taxonomy. Let’s take for example a presentation on a scene from novel The Giver. The first step would be to create the presentation. The second step would be to evaluate the information included in the presentation. You might ask yourself if all the information is relevant or would it confuse your students from the main point? After editing your presentation, the next steps happen during the presentation. When presenting the information to your class, you want to analyze, or breakdown the information for your students. Afterwards, you apply certain examples to a real-world situation or idea. In this case, you would want to relate the Utopian society in The Giver with real-world Utopian societies. Then, you stop and make sure that your students comprehend the material. This would be the time where you ask your students if they have any questions about the material. Finally, you end your presentation by summarizing key points in the presentation.

A useful website to stay updated with technology trends is CNET. This website informs you of the latest technology releases, network security, trending topics on Twitter, and reviews on certain products. The reviews can be helpful for teachers, when trying to decide what new technology to expose their students to. This website also includes articles on technology in education. This is especially beneficial to teachers who are looking for ways to incorporate technology in their classroom. 

Click here to go to CNET's website.

Blog Post #7

Assistive technologies are products designed to assist children with disabilities in completing their functional capabilities. For example, a student with dyslexia may use a spell check software to assist them when writing an essay, etc. I personally do not know someone who has used assistive technology, but I am sure that it is very helpful. However, there is one challenge I see with assistive technology: if the student and the teacher are both unfamiliar with the technology, that may affect the student’s learning and possibly put them behind.

At the start of creating my webpage, I had some difficulties understanding the process. However, once I got the hang of it, making the webpage was fun. I learned how to create different pages within your page and how to create a webpage layout. My page was quite simple but I hope for next time, I add more details to it. This assignment really gives you an insight on the many things teachers do to ensure they are doing the best that they can do to help their students.

Lastly, I think Diigo is very helpful. It makes bookmarking and annotating easier. Personally, I am using Diigo in one of my classes. I have to annotate scholarly articles, so instead of printing out a 20-page article to annotate it, I can just annotate it and save it using Diigo. It can also be very useful for teachers because they can easily bookmark websites they need to go along with their lessons, and find them easily by using tags.

Click here to go to my webpage.