Week 6: Can you hear me now!

Though, I'm having technical difficulties between digital devices for the POD cast I am wanting to turn in I thought I better get over here and get this Blog reflections posted, before I go back to working on that issue.   K.  

Q. With all these learning communities being developed for facilitating interaction and  critical thinking what are the implications for changing the way we work, teach and learn? 

A. Wow, is the first thing that has come to mind!  Already, just one of the things that we learned about is in play with interaction of co-workers though we are just working with cleaning up an piece of research at the moment.  The critical thinking aspect, however, is a definite "think through". As I work with teaching a second language planning out how critical thinking can be integrated at the intro level requires me to critical think! I have a worksheet that I had challenged my class to work on as a collective group.  The answers were then checked and the corrections involved reporting back as to why the correct answer was the correct answer to begin with and where the lesson application page is in the text book. In other words they had to defend their new corrections. No one was exempt from the corrections unless there was a 100%and even then they had to report the elements that could of been used 'both' ways with definite and indefinite with the articles. I am planning on putting this worksheet online and assigning small groups to each work a portion of the whole paper in a program like pbworks.

 

Q. What is preventing us from such changes?

A. I believe  that time, money, a fear of looking incompetent, the"what's in it for me?" and "Is it enough of a reason for me to put up with being "put-up-on?" attitudes are holding universities back from making and embracing technological changes.  An example is my co-worker, there are just somethings she is refusing to use. It's kind of like "if it's not broke, don't fix it."   And, as for most faculty and even staff and definitely administrators, the concept is, "I will do it, if you will lead me so well that you will make me look successful at all my attempts so that i can come across with an "It's all good" front. 

 

Q.If you could wave a magic wand, what would you change and why?

A.I would change the bursting of the Internet "bubble" to have happened a lot sooner. Why? So, I could have grown up with computers from elementary on up and that all these very nice free usages would already have been even more refined by the time I got to this point. And, so I would have had modeled for me over and over again the implementation of technology and critical thinking. Also, so I wouldn't have had to learn about DVD's being made in different areas and not being synced to my player, after I had bought them!  I have a very big imagination and am a "SYFY" fan from way back. I would have medical personnel world wide would have a common accessible data base and that virtual collaborative workings on micro-nano technology could have found a way to save my mom from breast cancer and to totally eliminate my sister and I, and our daughters' chances of coming down with it at all.  I would wish that technology could find a way to block the synapses response to illegal drugs and every first offender would be required to have that nano technology inserted into their bodies. I would want ADD, Bi-polar, epileptic, and HDD students (as well as others that suffer from electrical/chemical/stress induced issues) to wear a removable wrist band that help to balance the electrical/chemical imbalances so that these very bright children would not be osctrizied or labeled and could become the highly productive citizens that they could be. And, all of this could be realities in some form or the other if people would communicate with a common goal in mind and this is where "technology's learning communities" would come in play.  I've been thinking about a department written collaborative book of good time and bad times as a student or employee with reflections on what they could have done differently. It could a way that all who participate could be published in one collective move.

Week #5 reflections.

Blog Reflection #5 - opened early

Q: After completing the MAPping information activity, what are your reactions to your findings?

A: I reached the conclusion that these websites are very in-depth and extensive and are awesome resource.

Q: What will you do differently while searching on the Internet for information now?

A. I will have to internet search more often and expand my list of favorites.

Q: How confident are you with the information you've used in the past (as part of your college career and/or in your profession)?

A>.  have been fairly comfortable as it seemed to meet my actual needs

Q. What are some implications for the future of our students if we fail to teach them these skills in school? After all, the schools may block access to sites, but students still have access at home.

A.I knew when my late 20s –early 30 yr old kids would need to be masters of technology of this sort when they were little guys and gals.  That’s why we got them a computer as soon as we could save up and purchase one.  Now, they all are awesome with it.  They tear them down and put them back together as well.  My granddaughter was the youngest child to ever be in an advance placement, 1^st grade, 4 yrs ago!  And, they were learning about the MS ppt program and she was rockin’ through it creating away, searching the web, and capturing screens, talking the jargon. It certainly reinforced my gladness at that long ago decision. She had exposure in the early years, had a computer at home and computer savvy parents. Now there’s three computers in that house hold and we have four ourselves and each of my other kids have computers and Iphones, Ipads, notebooks, etc…. we are not lack in technology exposure.  I can’t tell you how many cell phones my grands chewed the rubber antennae’s off of while teething!.  Certainly an expensive teething ring but definite an out pour of our society.

Q).Do you see any advantages for organizing your information via Delicious?

A.) Boy did I ever! I can’t wait to have my classes create a webliography for me and then later I will use it as a resource for the whole class.

Q.) What else did you find when exploring the other bookmarking applications? 

A). I found some variations of layout and search functions and thematic focused

Q.What are some ways you think you could use tools like these in the future?

A) I will certainly use it in my classes and diffidently for the lit-review

Impressions of  Social Bookmarkings:

I found Blinklist.com to be formatted similar to Del.icio.us after you got into the actual search engine for the site.  I did like seeing the three sections of Most recent, Most frequent and Most popular listing on the main page before you went into the site search.  I will consider this one as possible for my own personal usage.

Diigo the spinoff of Del.icio.us had annotation and archieves and was more focused on education and it did seem more likely to bring up things like lesson plans and teaching resources.

Del.icio.us, the model for Diigo in infrastructure but focuses on the non-academic more readily.

Stumble upon was an okay site, I did like the intro pics at the beginning appearing that is an application that I wish was on the other sites as well.

Toobla was under construction however I could tell what was going on from the main page displays. I will need to return to this page and exam it more in-depth, I’m curious about the screenshots app how well will it compare to my Camtasia studios app..

Week 4 reflections...Portfolio wk

Which tenent did you most relate to and why?  I think prehaps the Focusing on how students learn.  I had a really good instructor that used a very different approach to assessment, It fell into the drill and re drill area sort of, but it played off the aspect that students learn best from their mistakes.  I've tried to do that in my class, the students who don't make my 80% mark appreciate the opportunity to correct the errors on the failed assessment even if they have to explain why the correct answer is the correct answer and cite the lesson page number to raise their grade. I'm envolved with a research project even now that started out to look at student class selections based off of learning syles, but we certainly found out very few sign-up for a class from that premise.  Because I teach an open class I will have all levels, ages, and skill levels in my class. It can be difficult to find how the middle road for their learning as a class unit.

 

What potential if, if any, do you see for portfolio assessment? This question was my easy one.  I'm a linguist and the availablity of using the portfolio for advanced language composition classe and now that I know about speaking availability for the blogger sites, speaking samples as well!

 

What do you think the creation and development of your portfolio will do for your learning?  It seems like to me that portfolios have been scary for me.  I don't like having my stuff open for just anyone's criticism and I just as well prefer not to have any record of where my work had progressed from.  What's behind is history. What is here is now and of more worth.  If my portfolio truely contained the best of the best instead of a complilation over the process then ift could be very benifical, but very few people care how you got there, only that you are there.

 

Reflection #3: WIKIs, one for the road....

I no more saw the demo than I bailed out to look at the feasibility of the site. Because, the purpose I had in mind when I developed my wiki was not having to drive every Tuesday up to Durant just to work on that research project of which the first 3/4 of my time up there is my co-worker wanting to visit. We could be more on task with the WIKI.  Don't get me wrong, I dearly love to visit with her, when I can get a word in edgewise :) But, I'm smack in the middle of my residency and pushed to my edges as it is.  Our lack of progress is frustrating.  The wiki will take care of that. Oh BTW, I made it before I even went to our class one!! :)

What advantages do you see in utilizing wikis? I think that the advantages are only limited by your imagination.  As the article "Digital Natives" spoke about, this mets the needs of engaging them at least to a point on a project.

What disadvantages did I see? I was trying to log into the "Edit" and my classmate was on it at the same time .  I wouldn't allow me to join in with her but locked me out. I had to "Steal the Lock" to be able to enter my comments.  So apparently the PB site will only allow one at a time contact with the project. This could be a time frustration.  I did not see where they could chat while waiting on the other one.  Remember, they process so much faster!

Because of this I would like to look deeper into the DIMDIM site.  

 

Provide examples:  When they are given a culture project where they have to prepare a presentation about the attributes of a country for their company/school to move into.

 

For the writing of a chemistry composition

 

For the composition of a sistina poem or critical thinking group response to a Lit reading.

 

For a video compilation of a certain theme in History/economics/music etc...