#EDCI 505 post #4

Digital story telling encourages students to move beyond creating an ordinary power point presentation to convey information. A digital story can be created through any movie maker program, by incorporating single shot photos or short film clips and audio. Teachers can still add slides with some text to explain the material. Teachers can also voice over the video to explain the pictures or clips as they appear. The credits feature is great because it allows teachers and students to still acknowledge were they got their photos, video clips, and audio. Movie maker programs also provide features to manipulate the pictures and the way that they appear. Students are able to understand how to use movie maker programs because they use some of the same concepts as power point. Since most students are technology savy they will be able to create a movie and pot it to you tube. Once students have posted a video, students in the class can view and share the video with fellow peers.

#edci505 post#3

Goggle docs are a great tool for teachers to use to create spreadsheets that organize and record assignment grades. Goggle spreadsheets can help teachers make assessments about their students’ progress. Teacher can even visually represent the students’ progress or need for improvement through the graph and chart feature of goggle docs. Goggle docs also allow teachers to create online versions of their test or quiz through their goggle forms. Students can take the quiz online if the teacher makes the form public and gives the URL to their students. Then through google’s script function teachers can access Flubaroo to quickly grade their answers. With Flubaroo all teachers have to do is choose the set of answers to use when grading the students tests. Then they can select the amount of points for each question while Flubaroo automatically identifies the student’s name and doesn’t reward any points for it. With Flubaroo and goggle docs teachers will not have to spend hours grading numerous tests and quizzes, allowing more time to plan their instruction.

#edci505 post #2

It's great to see teachers embracing the idea of intriguing and using technology more within the class room. Most teachers have a smart board in the class and use it on a daily basis to get the students engaged in the lesson. Students are able to write their answers on the board a change from one program to another with ease. Teachers love using the smart board because is has so many different features. For math there’s a spot light feature were it highlights one area of a problem and blacks everything else out. This with students can follow along, understanding exactly what part of the problem the teacher is explaining as they work through the problem together. Some teachers use it as a way to check students’ comprehension of the material before a quiz or test. Teachers may have students connect a vocabulary word with its definition or fill in the blank. Some teachers will have students come up to the board to map out and brainstorm ideas for their writing prompt before writing. If teachers were using inspiration or kidspiration along with the smart board then it would be visual learning that is really interactive.

#edci505 post #1

Post #1

When I was going through elementary school the only time we were exposed to technology was during our scheduled computer lab time. The only other time we used computers was to type and publish our writing. When I was in middle school we were all required to take technology class were we learned how to scan photos and create power point presentations. Power point may have been difficult at first but it made presenting a project fun and interesting. From that point on almost everyone choose to present their projects in power point instead of a regular poster. Students love using new technologies or sites such as glogster because they incorporate elements they already know how to use. Teachers need to use a variety of technologies such as a web mix or other creative ways when presenting subject material. Teachers that use power point all of the time need to add graphics and videos among their lecture notes other wise they will lose the class’ attention. They should also try incorporating a new technology once in while along with their power point presentations.