When beginning my search on digital storytelling I was not sure what it was or what it entailed. Through searching I found, in short, that it is a way to engage and combine the art of storytelling with any of a variety of available multimedia tools.
I watched an example of digital storytelling and it was called “The Look” and I have to say I found it to be boring. The guy that was talking in the background was very monotone sounding to me and made me very disinterested. On a better note I did think the way that the video was put together was very nice. The flow of the pictures along with the relevance of the pictures was very well executed.
I think it would be a really cool aspect to have in school to where kids could make their own digital story in the classroom. This would make it so they would be able to use and learn different media’s and bring them all together in one project. The only fear I would have with this in the classroom is that it could get boring for the students to have to listen to if a teacher was to implement this into a classroom. I would also fear that if the students were to make their own story that it would just take to much time out of the day. All in all I think this is a good idea to use in the classroom, I believe that new things are always good to use and liven up the classroom setting if executed effectively.
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Monday, April 21, 2008
Gaming in Education
After reading the few articles on gaming and education I can really see the benefits of incorporating this learning method into a curriculum. The way that schools use the “skill and drill” method in the school system just doesn’t make sense with all of the technologies that are available. Yes, gaming is looked at as a leisure activity, but it is obviously something that kids find fun to do, so why not make use of it as an educational tool.
I played a video game on our super Nintendo called super Mario world. I have played this game several times, but I can see how it is a way of learning. It isn’t teaching kids math skill, but it is helping them learn problem- solving skills. They would have to know what would be the best way to go about defeating a level and how to get the most points possible when doing so. It has a lot of strategy behind it. I also played a game online called Math Baseball. This game showed that there were much more fun ways at going about learning math along with it being fun. The game would make it so that the gamer would have to solve any kind of math problem to swing the bat and then if they got the problem right, depending the difficulty, they would either get a single, double, or a triple. This game, to me was just a fun way to learn math skills. If a student was having trouble with basic math skills this game would be a great way to practice those skills.
In the High score education web article I like when it said that learning isn’t about memorizing isolated facts rather it is about connecting and manipulating them. I think that video games promote this type of thinking. There are strategies in gaming that have to be used to solve problems. I believe overall that gaming is a good way to learn. Kids will not feel like they are learning because they will be having fun while doing it.
I played a video game on our super Nintendo called super Mario world. I have played this game several times, but I can see how it is a way of learning. It isn’t teaching kids math skill, but it is helping them learn problem- solving skills. They would have to know what would be the best way to go about defeating a level and how to get the most points possible when doing so. It has a lot of strategy behind it. I also played a game online called Math Baseball. This game showed that there were much more fun ways at going about learning math along with it being fun. The game would make it so that the gamer would have to solve any kind of math problem to swing the bat and then if they got the problem right, depending the difficulty, they would either get a single, double, or a triple. This game, to me was just a fun way to learn math skills. If a student was having trouble with basic math skills this game would be a great way to practice those skills.
In the High score education web article I like when it said that learning isn’t about memorizing isolated facts rather it is about connecting and manipulating them. I think that video games promote this type of thinking. There are strategies in gaming that have to be used to solve problems. I believe overall that gaming is a good way to learn. Kids will not feel like they are learning because they will be having fun while doing it.
Sunday, April 13, 2008
Information Literacy
Like most I believe that literacy now more than ever is very important. It seems that this is always a topic that is being talked about, how technology is prohibiting students from traditional learning of literacy. I believe that technology is just another tool that should be implemented into the classroom to help develop then student learning.
When reading the article PowerPoint is Evil I was disagreeing with it quite a bit. I believe that the use of PowerPoint as a tool for giving presentations is a great idea. I believe that it is a more beneficial way to get information across to an audience rather than standing up in front of a class with a poster full of information that most times they cannot even read. I really disagreed when it was said that power point turns everything into a sales pitch with an attitude of commercialism. In the classroom I do not think this is the case at all. I just simply believe it is a more advanced way to get information across, in students prospective, rather than having the poster board up behind you as you present something. I liked how the article Scoring Power Points talked about the different ways in making a power point the most beneficial and effective as it can be. This is where the teaching of using this technological tool comes in hand. It is the teacher’s responsibility to thoroughly explain to a class how they want them to use the power point in a project or whatever it is they are doing. It is important for the teacher to explain the rubric to the students on how the information provided is what is most important rather than the “cool” special effects that they can put onto their slide show. To go back to the PowerPoint is Evil article when it was said that “rather than supplementing a presentation it has become a substitute for it” I do not agree with this statement that much. To explain, I do think that a presentation could end up as said, but it is up to the teacher to make sure that it doesn’t.
When reading the article PowerPoint is Evil I was disagreeing with it quite a bit. I believe that the use of PowerPoint as a tool for giving presentations is a great idea. I believe that it is a more beneficial way to get information across to an audience rather than standing up in front of a class with a poster full of information that most times they cannot even read. I really disagreed when it was said that power point turns everything into a sales pitch with an attitude of commercialism. In the classroom I do not think this is the case at all. I just simply believe it is a more advanced way to get information across, in students prospective, rather than having the poster board up behind you as you present something. I liked how the article Scoring Power Points talked about the different ways in making a power point the most beneficial and effective as it can be. This is where the teaching of using this technological tool comes in hand. It is the teacher’s responsibility to thoroughly explain to a class how they want them to use the power point in a project or whatever it is they are doing. It is important for the teacher to explain the rubric to the students on how the information provided is what is most important rather than the “cool” special effects that they can put onto their slide show. To go back to the PowerPoint is Evil article when it was said that “rather than supplementing a presentation it has become a substitute for it” I do not agree with this statement that much. To explain, I do think that a presentation could end up as said, but it is up to the teacher to make sure that it doesn’t.
Monday, April 7, 2008
Blogging as a Pedagogical Tool
When I first think of a person blogging I think of it being a tool to write down crazy ideas and a way for people to express themselves. I have honestly never looked at blogging as a pedagogical tool. I have to say that after looking through a few websites on the internet about incorporating the blog into the classroom, it seems like a very positive thing to me. With that everything that has positives also has negative sides to it as well.
From the few websites that I looked through about blogging they showed me that blogging can have its advantages in the classroom. From looking at the web page called “Blogs in School” it showed that blogging can bring a sense of community to the class as a whole. Everyone in the class would be able to share their own thoughts about a subject and even the kids that are shy in class are able to get their voice out on a blog. The kids are also able to give each other feedback on each other along with the teacher. This promotes learning from each other and not just the adult in the classroom. I believe that this type of learning if implemented the right way, being that the feedback from other classmates would not always be negative, would over all make the children more excited about learning. From the site about blogging in elementary classrooms I found a very valid point which stated that a blogging site for the children would help the students become better writers. This thought is because the kids do not want their classmates to think that they are bad writers, so in turn the students try harder and do a better more complete job when writing these blogs because they know that everyone is going to have access to them.
The only negative thoughts I have about using blogging as a teaching tool is where and how the sites are used in the classroom. When I say where, I mean what sites the teachers are using to do this blogging activity in class. It is the teacher’s responsibility that these students are not accessible to the entire world through this blogging. I think that it should be some sort of private site that the teacher would set up so that it was just their particular class that had access to the blogging site. If the sites were not private in some sort of way I could see blogging as a negative tool in the classroom. Furthermore, how the sites are used is very important as well. A teacher could turn this into a very negative learning tool by using it too often, I believe. The student teacher interaction in the classroom is still very important in my eyes. Bottom line is I don’t think that a teacher should become too lazy and do all of their work through blogging, some subjects are still meant to be taught is a traditional type learning way.
From the few websites that I looked through about blogging they showed me that blogging can have its advantages in the classroom. From looking at the web page called “Blogs in School” it showed that blogging can bring a sense of community to the class as a whole. Everyone in the class would be able to share their own thoughts about a subject and even the kids that are shy in class are able to get their voice out on a blog. The kids are also able to give each other feedback on each other along with the teacher. This promotes learning from each other and not just the adult in the classroom. I believe that this type of learning if implemented the right way, being that the feedback from other classmates would not always be negative, would over all make the children more excited about learning. From the site about blogging in elementary classrooms I found a very valid point which stated that a blogging site for the children would help the students become better writers. This thought is because the kids do not want their classmates to think that they are bad writers, so in turn the students try harder and do a better more complete job when writing these blogs because they know that everyone is going to have access to them.
The only negative thoughts I have about using blogging as a teaching tool is where and how the sites are used in the classroom. When I say where, I mean what sites the teachers are using to do this blogging activity in class. It is the teacher’s responsibility that these students are not accessible to the entire world through this blogging. I think that it should be some sort of private site that the teacher would set up so that it was just their particular class that had access to the blogging site. If the sites were not private in some sort of way I could see blogging as a negative tool in the classroom. Furthermore, how the sites are used is very important as well. A teacher could turn this into a very negative learning tool by using it too often, I believe. The student teacher interaction in the classroom is still very important in my eyes. Bottom line is I don’t think that a teacher should become too lazy and do all of their work through blogging, some subjects are still meant to be taught is a traditional type learning way.
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