Final Blog Post

Placements-20%

• I spent more time on this project than any of the other projects. The difficulty level of what was required for me was not high. However, the tasks were very time consuming and the project was slow moving.

• The biggest challenge was helping the teachers figure out want they wanted and solidifying the what was required of us. The expectations for us kept changing and we had to keep editing our work. The most challenging part of this project was finding the resources for the mac P.E page. the video tutorials were very specific and somewhere very difficult to find.  

Project 2- 10%

• I am much more comfortable with giving presentation and talking to people than I am with written projects. Though I didn't end up presenting for me that doesn't seem like the challenging part of that project. That is why I feel like this project was that same amount of work as my project 3 presentation.

•  The hardest part for me was finding information that was specific about the effectiveness of MOOC's. There was a lot of information about how low completion rates are but not much was available about the effectiveness of MOOC's for people who do complete the courses. 

 Project 3- 10% 

• This project required less research than project 2 because I was talking about material that I was already very comfortable with. The preparation involved was less about trying to understand what I was going to talk about and more about trying to find away to get the grade nines to not only understand but see that value of our presentation. 

• Actually presenting to the grade nines required a lot more effort than I anticipated but the preparation was a lot easier than any of the other assignments.This is why I gave this project the same rating as project 2.  

Project 4- 15%

• I actually think that though the amount I was able to accomplish with this project wasn't as much as I would have like to, I still learned the most from this project. I spent a lot of time learning how to use wordpress and figuring out which plugins I needed. I actually think that I am going  benefit more from this project than any other one because it gave me the motivation to start working on an idea I have had for a long time and taught me a knew skill.  

• I still am continuing to work on my website in my free time. # cognitivesurplus 

Give Back Project- 3%

• I have to admit I didn't do as much as I should have for this project. Part of the reason I didn't work hard on this project was because I didn't understand exactly what was expected of me but I really think that I just didn't feel like I had to go above and beyond. 

• I knew that I didn't try my hardest with this project but I was still surprised with how poorly I did on this because at the time I thought what I had done was decent. Looking at other peoples projects I know that I should have done more. 

Additional task. - 5%

• I haven't done much work on this part of the course yet but I am going to update the wordpress walk through for the mac guidance page this weekend and I don't think it will take very long.   

Greatest hits- 10%

• The amount of preparation involved for this presentation wasn't too much. I just had to figure out exactly what I want to talk about. As I mentioned before I am quite comfortable talking in front of people so doing presentations like aren't to stressful.

• What I am working the most on for this project is to make sure that I have a clear understanding of what I am going to talk about and how I can make it go smoothly. 

THE BLOG - 27%

• This blog was the most taxing part of my semester. I spent more time at my computer staring at the screen trying to motivate myself to finish a post than I did studying math. ( and I like studying math) I could not believe what a struggle it was for me to do every post. Every time I planned out what I wanted to say and found impossible to type out. Every post seemed more and more manageable but turned out to be equally impossible.

• I am scared of blogging. I don't understand why people blog for fun. I tried very hard to write passionately because I genuinely cared about some of the topics I discussed but the amount of effort it took made this section of the course ONE OF THE MOST FRUSTRATING EXPERIENCES OF MY LIFE.      

  

Blog Prompt #8

Why cognitive surplus will change the world.

Summary:

In his ted talk Jay Shirkly explains how what people are doing online with their free time is changing the world. Our “cognitive surplus” is the spare time we have when our brains are still active. If people use this time to create, share and contribute to development of ideas then they are actively changing the world by making it a more co-operative place, no matter how small their contribution may be.  Through co-operation one person’s idea can grow into something that will change the world.

Things like Ushahidi and Wikipedia are great examples of how cognitive surplus is changing the world. People today have more creative power than ever before.  Anyone with a connection to the internet and a basic computer can create and share their ideas online faster than ever.  One programmer has the power to change the world in a matter of hours. This power grows exponentially when people decide to work together to achieve similar goals.  Imagine you’ve created software used for merging the physical and digital world using some sort of augmented reality. Making this software open source allows for anyone with a passion or idea for your software the ability contribute to the growth and development of your vision. Limiting peoples’ ability to create is a waste of the human potential.

  Not everyone has the power to create such high level programs or do any form of programing for that matter. However, that does mean these people have no value. Everyone has the power to create and share, whether it is the commenters on Ushahidi or the people who posting LOLcats. Everyone who contributes to the potluck that is the internet is taking part in something huge. They are taking the first step to contributing something of real value. People are working together without even realizing it. For example website Sick Weather uses what people on twitter to track the areas on the map where the most number of people are.  The people posting on twitter aren’t consciously conbributing to this project but are actually ensuring its success   

The ideas of one person can change the world especially today when voice can be heard globally and instantly. However, as Carson McCullers said “the most fatal thing a man can do is try and stand alone”.  People need to work cooperatively in order to unlock our full potential.     

Blog Prompt #7

Though the presentations we gave for the grade nine classes may not have seemed ideal, I was actually quite surprised at how well they went. This past summer I worked at magic camp with kids of the same age group so I understand firsthand how difficult and uncooperative they can be. There were still many students who didn’t see the value or care about what we had to offer but I was surprised by the number of students who were actually interested and asked questions. The biggest challenge to overcome was making sure all the material was covered and still leaving for questions within such a small time frame. This was because each group and a different dynamic and therefore presentation had a different flow. Furthermore the rotation time between groups seemed to change making it more difficult to manage. Another challenge was that students sometimes asked questions about things other groups were talking about so when it was that groups turn to talk to them they’re material had already been covered.

I did enjoy telling students about some of the available resources that I find helpful because though the majority of them were not interested many of them did actually seem like they were excited about it. Teaching has been an interest of mine for a long time and I found this experience to the very valuable. It actually didn’t change how I see teach, rather it reinforced my opinion of how difficult it is to teach. I think grade nines are one of the hardest age groups to teach because not only is it difficult to explain things so that they understand them but many of them are uninterested and unwilling to try and learn. 

If I could do this project again I try and make sure that people had a clear idea of what they need to talk about as well as what the other groups are talking about. This would be to prevent overlap of topics. I would also try and find a way to make the presentation more engaging and interactive. Over all I found the presentation to be a success and a more enjoyable experience than I anticipated.     

Blog Prompt #6

I think that interactive white boards, Ipads and game based learning are three Educational tools that would work well together in the high school environment if used properly. I think one of the biggest issues I see with ICT being used in the classroom is that teachers are trying to use unconventional tools to teach conventionally. Interactive white boards do not function well when being used for long lectures with a lot of writing involved because they are slower and more complicated than a chalk board. However, interactive white boards are much more powerful than a chalkboard when being used for short well designed presentations. I don’t think that students today need hours of instruction anymore because of the amount of information that is available online. Students need taught how to access what is available to them and how to teach themselves. This is because learning this way is much more engaging than just copying notes but more importantly it is a much more valuable life skill to have.

I think these three tools would most effective if used together. For example if in a math class the teacher could give a short presentation about what exactly they will be covering that day on the interactive white board, then students could answer questions in groups using there Ipads to help them. After the work is complete students could display their answers and resources on the interactive white boards. To get the work more exciting for students it could be presented as a game or competition. This method could apply to many subject areas. One subject area I think would benefit from something like this would be the social sciences. For example history, students in a history class could all be given a section of an historical event to research. Questions could be posted on the interactive white board and as each student posts there answers more and more of the story could be filled in. students could then all save a digital copy of the entire presentation into their notes as well as having the a list of the resources used to make the presentation. 

Students to need use technology in a way that allows them to work independently but keeps them connected with each other. Making learning more independent and interactive will better prepare students for the way they will have to learn in the real world. The possibilities for self-teaching and long learning are endless and students need to be taught how to learn and problem solve rather than memorize content.             

Blog Prompt #5

I strongly agree with many of the opinions discussed in the Changing Education Paradigms video. One thing I have both witnessed and experienced is the belief that school is unimportant. Being someone who likes to ask questions and think about why things are the way they are I have always found it challenging to just accept the structure of our education system. Another reason I may have found this so challenging is because like everyone else I have a unique learning style. If we are all unique learners, then why do I struggle more than most students in the conventional class room? Well I guess (and pardon my serious grammatical error here) my learning style is very unique.  I have never being able to really accept the conventional way of teaching as the most effective way to learn because …. Well… it doesn’t work for me. When I sit down and listen to scripted information being read off an overhead, while failing to get the notes down, I lose interest. I lose interest because if the information seems like it is coming from the text book and not the teacher, it loses its meaning. I think I actually learn best when I am doing work in a group interacting with people and learning from each other or from well put together interesting videos like ones shown my economics is class. ;)

I also think that the idea of chunking is something that has always worked well for me. Chunking is what has lead me to being somewhat successful in math. I was always a good math student in elementary school because math way something that came naturally to me. Unfortunately as soon as letters became involved, everything fell apart. My math marks stayed frightening low until grade 11 when I got my first 90 in course that was P.E.  What really allowed me to make the change was just doing to homework in class and at lunch, instead of going home first. This was effective because I was able to practice what I learned in class instead of re-teaching it to myself. This allowed to understand what I was had learned instead of remembering it. Another example in my life where chunking was effective is grade 8 French. Everyday after school my teacher would make me stay after class to practice what we had learned that day. Not only was the practice work “chunked” but my testing was as well. Instead of writing a test every month or so like the rest of my class, my teacher would test me every three days on what we had gone over. This system took extreme dedication on both our parts (mainly hers) and made French one of my most successful courses that year. I really think that school needs to feel possible and that is one of the reason why chunking is so effective, because it allows you understand materials in pieces and get small rewards as you learn.                

Blog Prompt #4 

Both of my placements were with gym teachers and though they had their own unique challenges, both of them did also pose some similar problems.  One of the most challenging [arts of working with these teachers was simply finding the resources they wanted for their websites. Unlike courses like math and science, there are not a lot of online resources for P.E. Also, I had personally never attempted to create a website before this, so the entire process was quite new to me. Learning how to take the resources and add them to the our sites in a way the look clean as was logical was the most challenging part of this project for me.  It was also the part of the project I found most beneficial. Another thing I found challenging was that even though our placements new what they wanted from us  in terms of functionality, they didn’t necessarily know what type of tech was availed to preform that function. We had to teach them how to use what we had created, which was difficult because the line of communication between us wasn’t very strong.  I was hard to figured what we needed to update and change when we spent days just trying to get in touch with them. However, I do consider our placements to be successes because our teachers seemed happy with the work we did and even though it was a lot more stressful than I anticipated, the work we produced was not only satisfactory but actually useful. I actually did enjoy working on this project and making something that other people can use. One thing I think would make this project better would to have teachers who really want to be a part of the process and who understand the amount of time that is required to make a good website. This isn’t because working with my teachers was tremendously difficult but because the benefits and quality of the work that would be produced from having both involved students and involved teachers would be much greater than when all the development is left to the students.  I actually think the challenges of working closely with a teacher would be much more stressful but the learning experience would be much more meaningful.     

Blog Promt #3

Interdisciplinary and ICT Knowledge

In working my two placements I have learned a lot about the role ICT plays in 21^st century education. The biggest difference I see in today’s education system is that more accommodations are being made for students with different learning needs. For example, the main focus of one of my placements was to use ICT to communicate the same information taught in the in class to ESL students who struggle with just verbal/non-verbal information and need to learn visually.

            In working with my placements I have learned a lot about the available ICT tools that I have never used before. This was my first time working with Google Sites, Google Calendar, Google Forms and though I used Google Docs/Drive before, I have learned a lot about how to use them effectively, making them a much more powerful tool.

Thinking and Inquiry

            Organizing and planning projects is something I have always struggled a great deal with. During this project I have had to not only plan around my schedule but also the schedules of my partner Danielle but most importantly both of my placement teachers. Before meeting with our teachers Danielle and I had to plan exactly what to ask the teachers to make sure we know what they want from us. Once we understood their needs we made to make sure we knew what we required from our teachers to accomplish our goals. Now that we have a plan and clear idea of how our finished product should look and function, we are able now able to make adjustments to our work and fix technical problems that we are facing.

            Some examples of ICT analysis we have done are looking at teacher’s old websites to see what the problems are and what tools/information are worth using in their new websites. Also, we have had to find and sort through many educational resources for health/fitness and pick and choose which ones will be the most beneficial for teachers and students.

            My teachers challenge me creatively because often they do not know exactly what they want from us but have a more general idea for the site. For example one of my teachers wanted away to digitally submit an assignment that students have to do every year. He wasn’t sure if he wanted to create a dropbox type system or if there would be a more efficient way to do this. Because the project required students to fill out a daily log we created a form he cite for students to submit their answers. This ensures that students fill out log everyday and not all at once at the end of the project.

           

After we had everything on the cite that are teachers wanted from us, we had to make sure that everything was functional and laid out logically. This is because the website was actually going to be used by students. Every time we added a new feature it seemed like we had to change of the layout of the website to make sure it was organized and easy to use.

Communication

            We didn’t develop any written instructions on for teaching ICT skills. We verbally explained how to use what we built for our teachers because most of it was self-explanatory. What we offered to one of our teachers was for him to contact use via email, so that we could make him video tutorials answering any further question he might have.

            One of our placements was entirely dedicated to finding resources for ESL students. We found videos which teach the content taught in class. Also, for some of the topics we posted multiple videos which the same content if different ways.

            The only oral communication we really did for this project was between our teachers and us. Though there wasn’t a lot of oral communication, I think that the oral communication that did occur was clear and effective. This is because our teachers were satisfied with our work, which means that we communicated effective we was required and was going to be done.

            All the materials on our sites are spelt properly and because most of what our teachers wanted were links to online resources, so, most the formatting and spelling was already done for us. The only thing we had to do was make sure that the link were organized properly.

Application

            What we used was things like Youtube, Google docs, Weebly, Google sites, Google forms and websites specific to course curriculum. We combined these tools into websites for students to use in order to get extra help, contact teachers and submit work.

            We didn’t get too advanced with our work mainly because making these webpages was a learning curve for both of us. We used the web tools in the way they were intended to be used and didn’t change much about how they could be applied.  

            I discovered or rather enforced my belief that digital files are better for my leaning style because they are easier to send to people, keep track of, edit, and most importantly reorganize. In terms of being an educational tool, I think the best way to describe the internet is as a giant sharable notebook. Hopefully our website will be help to students who use it but I am really hopeful for is to allow teachers to get a better idea of how ICT can be used in the classroom and maybe inspire them to try new methods of teaching.