All I can say is: "WOW!" all these tools have so much possibilities to make learning interesting and fun for students. It's a way to motivate them to be more creative. Of course the 3 C's (communication, collaboration, & creating) are what we want sudents to develop. When I introduced the voicethread to my students they were so scared, once I demonstrated the process and what they were to do they were more relaxed. They are preparing right now before they record what they want to say though and they will be recording one by one so that they don't have to feel self conscience about the others in the class. I have to work around their schedules though as they are now in their work placements and we have to do this in the evenings. Yet they are more than willing to learn more about how they can be a part of a learning process that will also assist them in evaluating their lives. I have also went ahead and created a wikispace to educate and provide awareness to the community as a whole. I will be making these public very soon.
Some of the tools that I have been using already and have accounts are: Delicous, Blog (2), Wikispaces (3), Twitter, Facebook, Google (most of all the components). I trust that the other tools in the Web 2.0 can be used in the classroom, this would make learning very interesting for students. Also my 2 Science groups are making a video of the projects they are doing and also taking pictures with a digital camera, I am thinking of doing a digital story of the 'Traditonal Knowledge' experiences they are recieving from our Elder who we are collaborating with and who is also our advisor. The students will tell the story and will present it at the Science Fair in Saskatoon. Isn't that exciting to use technology to share our culture! Simply Amazing!
I see these tools to be very useful. I have discussed this with my administrators and have requested that each classroom have a computer with an Internet connection. I have also been asked to create a school website which I'll probably do during the Easter Break. I am assembling all my information and storing it in my google account.
Using the tools that I have been exploring doesn't mean that we get rid of the traditional teaching but one thing is for sure it will be very hard to get the student to get up while doing something on-line! Traditional teaching and learning requires the student to sit in a desk for quite a period of time (3 hours in my school's Block sytem). I can't sit still for that long! Why should I expect my students to sit there and listen, read, and do work for that period of time! Whereas if they do a bit of work on the computer using the tools that have been introduce during this block I think that students would have a pretty hard time to stop what they are doing simply because learning is more motivating, interesting, and downright FUN!
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Yes, Loretta, your reflections sound very rewarding to you and your students as well as your school. I glad to see you progressing and I am looking forward to seeing your projects!
ReplyDeleteYou have brought up a key ingredient to education, FUN. The beauty of technology is that it can be fun and productive at the same time. I love how you have incorporated in your project plans the chance to share your culture. This will create pride in your students work. I have tries to get Elders involved but have had little success. How did you do it?
ReplyDeleteYou made an interesting comment:
ReplyDelete"it doesn't mean that we get rid of the traditional teaching..."
Do you mean traditional Aboriginal teachings or traditional classroom practices? When I think of traditional classroom practices I think of the Rip Van Winkle story where he comes back after 100 years and the only occupation that resembles what it was 100 years ago in the classroom teacher. With the incredible amount of research and increasing understanding of how learning takes places, it continues to amaze me how little change there is in education.
We have Elders in the school who assist teachers and students alike to maintain our culture and also to promote our traditons. I have also been working with elders both in the community and school to get information on our Traditional Cree Values, which resulted in a book (hasn't published yet). This has been on-going for the past 15 years. So I have an extensive collection of interviews and stories.
ReplyDeleteIn regards to traditional teaching I am talking about teaching in the classroom, by all means we will never ever get rid of a cultures traditional teachings in the class infact it should be promoted.
Why shouldn't learning be fun?? For me, I know that teaching is, so why do we wrip our students off and make it work? That's one of marnie's things is using technology properly. for me, that means that it helps me to less work. that was one of the major benefits that came from my final project for this course (pharmtech@ninehub.com) I thinhk that in terms of 21st century skills, if more learning was "fun" then life long learning wouldn't be such a bad thing. how to go!!!!!!! darcy
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