Technology Tools has come to an end.......

I was not paying attention to the number of times we met for this class, and then I realized we were on our last week. This class has taught me what it is like to be a student again. I have been teaching for five years, and I think that I forgot what it is like to not be in charge of the assignments and assessments. Due to the nature of this course, it was hard for me at the beginning to know if I was having trouble with an assignment because I did not know how to do it, or because what I was trying to do was actually impossible. Did you know that it is impossible to embed a Google Docs presentation into the Ning? I did not know that, until I had already wasted an hour of time trying to figure it out!

I really liked the early classes of this course. The web browser and search engine assignments took me out of my comfort zone, and it was good to see what else was out there. I currently use delicious with my seventh graders, but I am considering switching social bookmarking sites, to better meet their needs. I also realized that I could still use a spreadsheet, even though I have not used one in many years. The database was new to me, but it also seemed quite easy to figure out. I think that the graphics programs have potential uses in my classroom, but I am still working on trying to figure out how to integrate them.

I also enjoyed getting ideas from the textbook about how to encourage creativity and explain collaboration. As an adult, I forgot that I would need to teach twelve year olds how to collaborate and communicate with each other!!

This class has definitely opened my eyes to ideas that I have heard about before, and now I feel that I am at a point in my teaching career where I can implement more of these ideas!

Using technology with my students......

I know that I use technology in my classroom, but taking the screener caused me to rethink the amount of control I give to my students. I let them pick topics, and partners. And, they can write creative assignments. But, I do not give them control over certain aspects.

I do not let them set the rubric, or the timeline for projects. They do not get to decide how much time they will need to work on the project, or how they will be graded.

Could I relinquish some of that control over to them? Can I let them think of what needs to be included in their final grade, and the deviations of the expectations?

Chapter 9 also reminded me that I need to keep parents informed with large projects. It caused me to write a letter home, explaining the current wiki project and its expectations.

InTime: European Vacation Assignment

The first two years that I taught seventh grade German, I had students make a travel brochure about sights they could see in Germany, Austria, or Switzerland. Then, I morphed my project into a report on a specific aspect of German culture. My current project is a RAFT assignment, where the students can write a journal entry as though they were a prisoner in a concentration camp, or a travel log of their visit to Berlin, or an advertisement for BMW.

I watched videos from Jerry Robinson's classroom in Michigan. He has his 9th grade World Geography students plan a two week trip for three people in different European cities. The students are given a budget of $15,000 to complete the trip, which needs to include airfare, hotels, car rental, train fares, etc. They are required to visit historic sights in different countries, and then present their trip to their classmates.

Mr. Robinson had to teach many things along the way:
1. He taught them how to take and save pictures to the correct folder.
2. Then, he showed them how to chart their mileage and expenses in Excel, creating charts.
3. The third thing he showed them was how to find pictures of tourist/historic sights on the web. The students would then need to photoshop themselves into the picture.
4. Finally, he taught them how to compile all of this information into a powerpoint presentation.

He had a website set up for them as a springboard. It included links to real flights, train information, and currency and distance conversions.

I think that if I had seen this video before drastically changing my seventh grade project, I would have tweaked, rather than changed the project. However, I think it could be a great project for my eighth graders to work on, depending on how long it takes them to complete their literature circle. (I have never done a lit circle in German class, so I am curious as to how accurate my timeframe is!)

I also enjoyed all of the little nuainces in the video. For example, a student who was getting his picture taken so that it could be photoshoped, was chomping on his gum! And, the digital cameral took a 3.5 inch disk!

Here is a link to the videos: http://www.intime.uni.edu/video/021mihs/8/

Spreadsheets.......

As a German teacher, I must admit that I do not use spreadsheets in my curriculum. I haven't used excel since college, so it was refreshing that I was able to create the recipe assignment with relative ease. And, because it was in google docs, I added a friend as a collaborator, so I did not have to email him the recipe!

I have yet to do the nettrecker assignment, but I have been brainstorming ways to use spreadsheets in my class. I think that I could take advantage of the layout, and have students conjugate verbs in columns. I could also use them as a way for students to organize new vocabulary words, and connect those new words with words they already know. I will have to do a little more thinking about other ways to incorporate spreadsheets in my curriculum.

I found chapter 5 to be interesting. I know that we want to encourage creativity in our students, but sometimes that creativity is stifled in my classroom. There is always so much material to cover, and sometimes, I feel that such open-ended assignments can hinder our progression in course material. So, I will need to take a step back and think of how I can encourage more creativity in my classroom.

My seventh graders will be starting a large culture project in the next month, and I decided to have them collaborate on the project with someone in a different hour. It will be very interesting to see if they are able to collaborate, and if they can do that all online, through the wiki!

Online Word Processors.

I was not sold on the idea of Google Docs, or other online word processors, until this past week. As the secretary of my parish council, it is my responsibility to take minutes for the monthly church meetings. (Note to self: being secretary is not all that much fun. You don't get to really participate in discussion, because you are so busy writing, or typing.)

But, after this meeting, I was envisioning a time when I could simply write the minutes, and then share them with the other members of the council. It seemed so much easier than sending them out as attachments the night before the next month's meeting. If we had Google Docs, or some other way to share information, people could read them as soon as the meeting was over, and they could add their own notes, or questions.

I thought a lot about how I could use online word processors in class, and I was not completely convinced that they were a necessary tool. But, then, I realized how much my students could use them to collaborate on projects. My seventh graders will be using wikispaces to collaborate next month, but I will have to try using an online word processor for this project in the future.

I was also thinking about the graphics we made last week. My eighth grade students are currently making "Wanted" posters. They need to write a paragraph in English as to why a particular person is "wanted" for a crime, and then describe that person in German. I will have to do a little more investigative work into the graphics programs, but if anyone has any ideas, I would love to hear them!

I also thought that the history of the internet assignment was interesting. Having been born in 1979, it is hard for me to remember a time when we did not have a computer in our home. So, it was eye-opening to read some of the history behind the creation of the internet, chat, etc.

Side note: Is anyone happy with their ISP? I have been on the phone with Charter multiple times this week, and they offered a temporary fix, but then they failed me yet again. Hence, the late post. If you have an internet service provider that you would recommend, I would love to hear it!

ToonDoo

I was playing around with ToonDoo, and I created a little scene of a grandma and grandpa telling us which articles of clothing they are wearing. I think it would be a great for my students to create their own comic strips, with German text!

Rethinking current practice......

The school librarian stopped me this morning to ask me about how I wanted to change my seventh grade culture project for this coming semester. I was caught a little off guard, it seemed like a daunting task to discuss at 7:50 on a Friday morning.

My current project involves students posting a creative, informative written piece, as well as photos to a wiki. However, I am not convinced that the wiki is the best method of delivery, as I feel that we are doing it a disservice. My students do not use it as a way to collaborate, they only use it as an easy way to post information on the web. The second major concern I have about the project is the number of staff members who are willing to aid me in the project, and making sure that no one is stepping on anyone's toes.

I think that Google Apps would be a better program to use for the project, because then students can collaborate simultaneously. However, that raises the question of how well seventh graders can collaborate on month long project. And, then there is the issue of accessibility. The district wants to get all of our students google accounts, but they are dragging their feet. And, I was asked not to have my students create separate google accounts. My school district has many resources, and the fact that I cannot work around this issue is slightly frustrating. Until they create the accounts, my hands are tied.

I don't want to continue using wikispaces, unless I am going to use it in the manner it was intended. I don't want to keep using technology just to use it. There must be something better out there......

The second issue that is happening is that Kevin, the library media specialist, does not want to step on Velvet's, the technology resource person, toes. Velvet set up the wikispaces account last sememster, and invited all of my 131 students. This sememster, Kevin would really like to create short videos that the students could watch. The students could save Velvet from having to do the prepration that she did last semester.

I think it would be great if the kids could set up their own accounts, and then I could just verify their membership to the wiki. However, I know how many glitches we had last semester, and I would like to minimize them as much as possible. And, even though Kevin has offered to create the videos, I think that it is going to be quite the project for him. I realize that part of his job is to help teachers, but I also wish that I did not need to rely on him.

Since I have been thinking about this all day, the reading was especially interesting. The lesson plan, and critique, made me rethink my current project, and then what I could do to improve on it this semester. The beginning of chapter 2, which discussed the variety of roles that play out in learning and technology, started to make me feel better about the google hangup.

I still don't know how I am going to morph the project this semester. And, I think that I am more confused than I was yesterday. But, I know that sometimes we need to try things, and if they don't work, then we try something else!