EDIM 514 - You.com

For the final project in my "Internet Tools for Teaching" course, I created a digital portfolio of my information and projects that I have completed through Wilkes University.

I chose to use visualize.me as the place to put all of my information.  This particular site allows a person to create a basic infographic about themselves - a "digital resume."  I really liked the different visual options that were available to choose from.  The link to my digital portfolio is below.

Nicole's Visualize.Me          

It was fitting that this final project is at the end of my last "Masters" class.  I included all of the links to the projects that I have completed through Wilkes University.  For my Web 2.0 tools class, I created a weebly.  I was disappointed to find out that this is no longer present.  I did take the specific projects from that course and any other online tool and added it as a link on my digital portfolio.

I can see that this digital portfolio is something that I will continue to add to now that I have started it.  I was quite surprised to see the amount of projects I have created as I went through my Masters program.  I enjoyed viewing each item again.  It brings back memories about the time it takes to complete one of these projects.

I would like to incorporate these online web 2.0 tools with students but have found that this takes time.  I think if I could get my students to use one major online tool per course, I would have to be happy.

EDIM 514 - Broadcast Yourself

This week's major assignment was one of the most challenging I think I have had in the instructional media program.  I had to "create" and "publish" an online webinar.

My first task in preparing for my webinar was to decide on a topic.  I love Twitter, so I created a script of my "Top Ten Twitter Sources."  I searched through my "retweets" of which I had 332 and made my top ten list.

I made a Power point through which I took screen captures of the ten "retweets."  I then took screen captures of each slide and saved each picture as a jpeg file.  I uploaded the powerpoint in Google Drive and shared the link  - Nicole's "Top Ten Twitter Sources"

I researched each "Twitter source" and wrote a script in Google Documents - Nicole's Top Ten Twitter Script.  The preparation of the webinar information was fairly time consuming.

The hardest part of the assignment was figuring out which tool to use to make the live broadcast.  I tried a number of different websites such as Livestream and WebEx.  They didn't seem to allow me to do what I wanted to do.  I finally settled on Ustream.tv.  I was able to create a channel for my online broadcast - "Nicole's Ed Tech Channel."  I played around with the online site and found that I could only use a web camera.  I did not want to physically appear in my webinar for the whole time.  I wanted to be able to show my powerpoint pictures and talk with minimal face time presence.  In order to accomplish this, I had to download Ustream Producer.

With Ustream Producer, I was able to upload my jpeg pictures.  I then had to figure out how to record everything.  I streamed and recorded about six different times (saved as a private file) and thought I had everything figured out.  During the second last trial, I discovered that when I clicked on my powerpoint pictures, my voice was not coming in.  To solve this, I had to go to each screen of the picture and choose the microphone array.

I sent out my webinar invitation through "Twitter" two times.  I also emailed my classmates the link twice as well.  As it got closer to the time, I experienced a higher than normal stress level, wanting everything to turn out well.  At 2:29 pm, I started broadcasting with my penguin picture.  At 2:30 pm, I started talking.  The webinar lasted 9 minutes and 17 seconds.  After my webinar ended, I added the link to my Power point in the Social media screen of my channel.  I also watched my recorded webinar.  At this time, I found out my #8 - Discovery News picture did not have sound.  I must have missed turning on the microphone array on this picture. Other than that I was happy with the broadcast outcome.

Ustream Producer is a wonderful tool.  In order to accomplish my project I used the free ustream pro trial.  It is good for thirty days.  If a person wanted to continue using this tool, it would cost at minimum $99 a month for a silver package which gives a person one channel and 50 GB of video storage.  If I had a reason to continue broadcasting I probably would continue to use this service.

Overall, "broadcasting" myself was a great learning experience!

References

Bondarchuk, N. (2015.) Nicole's top ten twitter sources. Broadcast. Retrieved from http://www.ustream.tv/channel/nicole-s-ed-tech-channel

Ustream. Retrieved from: http://www.ustream.tv/

EDIM 514 - Attend a Live Webinar

For this week's assignment, we had to participate in a "live" webinar.  I have attended a number of live webinars in the past through Discovery Education, Ef Tours, and even most recently a webinar we had at my school for learning about incorporating flex blocks into our Power school scheduling program.

One observation I can make about "live" webinars is that it always takes time for everyone to connect and get started.  Usually, there are also microphone issues in which someone has not muted their microphone and you hear feedback as a result.  I do like the "chat" portion of a webinar in which a person can ask questions as the webinar is going through. The nice thing about webinars is that they get recorded and saved so that a person can watch if they were not able to make the time zone or rewatch it if there was something they missed when they viewed it the first time.

I could not find a "live" webinar that I was interested in during the time frame of this past school week.  Instead, I watched a recording of one that was focused specifically on science.  It was through live.classroom20.com.  It was called "Connect, Create, and Collaborate with Science websites, Web Tools, and Apps.  Letia Cooper gave an extremely concise list of Science resources a person could investigate.  One of the things I learned about through this archived webinar was "InstaGrok"  I will definitely use this with my students.  When you type in a word, it gives you an interactive concept map of terms that relate to that word.  I typed in the word "solubility" and the interactive picture created is below.

The other resource I discovered in the webinar is "Blendspace"  This site allows a teacher to incorporate videos and photos and create a concept map that students would follow as they go through a series of activities.  You can organize websites, pdf's, and Youtube videos for a student to watch.  You can also add "quiz" questions incorporated into your blendspace.  Here is a sample of a the start of an "investigating cells" Blendspace

The other thing I found when watching this webinar is that Letia had included livebinder links (Tech with Tia) to everything she discussed in the webinar.  What a great resource this is.

In a classroom, I could see incorporating "recorded" webinars into a student's learning. This could be done by using the Blendspaces program as well.  I don't think I would have the time in my course timeline to have students create webinars as this is quite time consuming.  The creation of a final project webinar would definitely showcase a students learning if there was the time for this to take place.

References

Blendspace. Retrieved from https://www.blendspace.com/

Instagrok. Retrieved from https://www.instagrok.com

Live.classroom20.com. Connect, create, and collaborate with science websites, web tools, and apps. Retrieved from: https://youtu.be/tJpfixnAf0w

EDIM 514 - Integrating Social Networking

This week’s major assignment is about taking an existing lesson and incorporating it into a “social networking” or web 2.0 tool.  I will take a lab that I had previously done in Science 10 and convert it to an assignment using Google Classroom for the Science 30 class I will be teaching in the fall.

According to the Science 30 Program of Study, my students will have to:

     - conduct investigations into relationships among observable variables and use a broad range of tools and techniques to gather and record data and information

     - measure resting heart rate and blood pressure and determine the effects of exercise on both factors  

I will have my students design and type of a lab on the effects of exercise on heart rate and blood pressure.  In the past, I made copies of my Scientific method outline and then shared it with groups of students.  My folders are pretty messy as a result of this.  In the fall I will use Google Classroom as my social networking site to send a copy to each student in an organized Google drive folder that is created for that class.  They will have to complete and type up the lab including creating appropriate graphs.  This is a picture of what the past assignment template looked like.

The link for this assignment is "Parts of an Investigation (Scientific Method)."

Here is a picture of “creating an assignment” in Google Classroom for my heart rate lab.

Google Classroom can also be used as a social networking site.  You can post assignments and comments.  Students can comment back to you if they have questions.  It is a closed site. 

The new part of this assignment (that ties to web 2.0) is that I will have my students create a word cloud of their lab.  I will create a single blank Google Document that each student can edit to paste their word cloud (which is created through a Google Chrome “free” app) into.  I will ask them to compare their lab word cloud to another group’s word cloud identifying similarities and differences.  The picture below is an example of a word cloud from a former Science 10’s complete lab on “Exercise and heart rate.”  I am thinking I might just have them do word clouds of their analysis, conclusion, and extension section.

Overall, I think my students will find this assignment challenging and engaging.  They are definitely going to gain technology and web 2.0 skills through this process.

I would mark the assignment the following way:

Marking Key

Question / Problem / Purpose               /1

Hypothesis / Prediction                        /2

Variables                                              /3

Materials                                              /2

Procedure                                             /4

Observations / Evidence                      /4

Analysis- Graph & Statement              /6

Conclusion                                           /3

Application                                          /1

Word Cloud Evaluation                       /4

Total                                                    /30

References

Google Classroom: Retrieved from https://classroom.google.com/h

Drive Word Cloud: Retrieved from https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/drive-word-cloud/ielgnnbehadnmkcgpgnpmelggibcogdb 

EDIM 514 - The Seven Day Social Challenge

The Seven Day Social Challenge

For the first assignment this week, we had to complete a seven day social challenge.  We had to choices to complete this task.  I could have either taken a photo a day for seven days, or participate in a “Twitter” Challenge.  Heading into the last busy weeks of class, I chose the Twitter challenge.

My Twitter handle is @nbond11.  I discovered Twitter when I started my Instructional Media Graduate program.  What an awesome professional development tool this is.  It is sometimes difficult to find “likeminded” educators to share and work with in my own school division.  With a click of a button (and without leaving your house) you can find, follow, and connect with educators who have a similar mindset to you.  I follow teachers that are interested in educational technology and also science and math educators.

In one of the tweets I found this week, I found some new blogs to read and get information from.

This "Tweet" lead me to a blog by Ross Cooper.  I found some great information from http://www.teachinglikeits2999.com/  Jennie Magiera had some information on Google Classroom that was really interesting.  A teacher can now share their classroom with another teacher.  I am thinking of using this as my social network / class site next year.  

There was also a link on Jennie’s blog to a site to teach Coding.  I have an interest in learning how to help students “learn to code.”

I follow science posts as well.  This week I found an article that talks about “changing telescopes on the International Space Station to be fitted with a laser to blow up space junk.”  All I can say to this is “wow!”  There would be a lot of issues that could arise from this.

I have done some professional development at my school division on the benefits of Twitter as a form of professional development.  I think it just takes showing fellow teachers all of the “good stuff” out there to convert more teachers to Twitter.  I don’t think there is anything wrong with having a personal account and a professional account to keep your twitter feeds separate.  

After completing this seven day challenge, I will definitely continue to use Twitter as a professional development resource and share or “Tweet” the great resources I find.

References

Cooper, R. Blogs I follow. Blog. Retrieved from http://rosscoops31.com/2015/05/31/blogs-i-follow/

Google For Education. Teaching teams: new ways to work together in classroom. Blog.  Retrieved from http://googleforeducation.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/teaching-teams-new-ways-to-work.html

Magiera, J. Teaching like its 2999.  Blog. Retrieved from http://www.teachinglikeits2999.com/  

Twitter: http://twitter.com

Venton, Danielle. (May 2015.) The mad plan to clean up space junk with a laser canon. Retrieved from http://ow.ly/NCdOg