Stuperflix Videos for learning

This week I learned how to use a new site to make short videos!  Its always fun to create and Stuperflix is an amazing tool to use in the classroom, and to have some fun at home. 

With this site you can put images to music and make a video to explain or explore almost anything.  For students this is a way to express themselves and their knowledge through their creativity.  Imagine the work you could get out of your students when you ask them to create a video describing the story of Romeo and Juliet, or WWI! You could have students work together collaboratively to create something or individually to show understanding.

I created a video to see how easy it was to navigate.  I did have a hard time adjusting the photos to make them appear as I wanted but other then that it was pretty simple.  You just pick the layout you want the slideshow to be in, upload your photos and order them, upload your music, and add any text you want and the duration of the slide, and your done!  I would definitely use it in the future, I think its a great way to connect with your students and engage them in the lesson.

The video I made, I feel, is a great way to introduce Stupeflix to your classroom.  And introduce yourself to your students so they realize that your a real person (trust me they do tend to think you come from another planet!).  I feel that if teachers open up to their students then students will be more willing to open up to the teachers and in a community setting like that where everyone feels comfortable then learning tends to happen more naturally.  In my video I just gave a sample of my family through out the year and I would suggest having your students create one as well.  It doesn't have to be long, just enough for everyone to get to know their classmates so they can start to build a lasting relationship through out the year.

So as always, enjoy...and create!  Change the mold of how students learn and of how teachers teach!

Be creative...Voice it!

Through out this technology I have been taking for my teaching degree I have learned a lot about implementing technology into the classroom I hope to have soon.  Children are so involved in, and drawn to, technology and the connections they can form from it. 

 One of the things that I had never heard of is a VoiceThread in which you create a page with a question for your students to answer, a thought provoking one that can get different answers from different students.  Then you have your students comment by video, microphone, or typing a response and they can see others responses.  With this type of technology it is especially helpful with ESL students who may have some reservations about speaking in front of a class.  With a VoiceThread students will be able to practice their verbal skills and get the same classroom community feel without the nerves and stress of a face to face interaction.  Although students will still have to communicate within the school setting, this could be the extra help some quieter students need to be noticed by their teachers and be accepted as a part of the class team.

Their are two Voicethreads that I have participated in that I think give a very good example of its usefulness in the classroom.   One was made by a fellow classmate of mine, Wen Guo, entitled Healthy Diet in which she gives her students a scenario.  In the scenario the man, Jon, is suffering from high cholesterol and she is asking her students to consider the effects of fast food and give some advice to Jon to become a healthier person.  This specific lesson could have a huge impact on students in our society since obesity is such an epidemic now.  It will get students to discuss and think about ways in which to become a healthier person and teaching children how to be and eat healthy is very important.  It gives kids a creative way to think and voice their opinions.

Another great voice thread is, again, by a fellow classmate names Alyssa Boron posted as a spanish review.  In this case she is posting the lesson as a way for students to practice their vocabulary and verbal skills outside of the classroom.  I think this is a great way to give students the opportunity to practice speaking at home.   Giving a student a homework assignment like this in which they are actually able to be verbal will better build vocabulary and give students a fun and entertaining way to get their homework done.

No matter how a VoiceThread is used I highly suggest you DO use it in a classroom.  Let your students get their creativity out while still being able to assess their skills and knowledge set.  Be creative and give it a voice!   

storytelling with a digital twist

TSDIGS 4 Collaborate, a photo by dreamponderCreate on Flickr.

"Digital Storytelling is the practice of using computer-based tools to tell stories." (University of Huston; the Educational Uses of Digital Storytelling).  I've been using digital storytelling software for a while now.  As you can tell from previous posts I have small children and this type of digital storytelling has been a great way for them to have some fun with their aunt who lives in California.  To keep communication alive in our family we make books using storybird; we can either do this collaboratively by making stories together (you can make them open to groups) or we share things we did in story format (going to the zoo or on a vacation).  My daughter thinks its great because we read so many books at home and with this she gets to read books that she helped make (you can even buy them and have them shipped to you in hardcover format so they can actually flip through the pages!) 

We use it at home to stay connected, but why not use it in schools to stay educated!  Digital storytelling can be a great way to keep students engaged in learning.  "Digital stories let students express themselves not only with their own words but also in their own voices, fostering a sense of individuality and of “owning” their creations. At the same time, digital stories give students an opportunity to experiment with self-representation—telling a story that highlights specific characteristics or events—a key part of establishing their identity, a process that for many is an important aspect of the college years." (7 Things you should know about Digital Storytelling).  What a great way to get kids involved right! So next time you have to teach a lesson on the Civil War (or any social studies lesson really) why not make a digital story about it.  Or better yet, teach the kids the lesson and let them make some stories of their own that way your testing their comprehension and their having fun doing it.

Another great idea; if your teaching ESL students and you have a large diverse class you could have everyone make a book about where they are originally from.  It doesn't have to be anything to complex since most of them may not be able to write to many words, but even if they are putting 2 or 3 words on each page they can feel like they are doing something fun while learning spelling and word recognition and then they have something to present to the class to work on oral skills as well.  They can do it collaboratively (if some of them are from the same areas) or individually.  It could also be a good idea for the teacher to put a book together in the beginning of the year on everyone being equal even though they are from different places (great way to teach cultural acceptance and awareness).  You could even collaborate with different classes in different states or countries! Talk about global learning and cultural awareness!

Downside?  "Many people find that piecing together a coherent narrative is considerably more difficult than they thought, and students not comfortable producing original work are likely to find themselves simply modeling their efforts on digital stories they have come across." 7 Things you should know about Digital Storytelling).  I know we had a hard time when we first started this in our family; you find all these pictures that you like and then think 'okay, now what?'  or you have this great story in your head but when you try and write it you think 'this makes no sense!'  Well rest assured it does get easier as you get more comfortable with the concept.  And most of the time it works to start with writing the story down first on some paper, then figure out the best places in that story to split into pages, then find the pictures to go with it.  Even if you have some great pictures you love they just might not fit well in the story your trying to get across, save them for another time maybe you can fit them in a new story later!  Its also a good idea to model a story first for your students (especially ESL students) and let them modify that for a while before you have them create on their own, although you may be surprised to find out that you have a harder time thinking up stories than most student do!  Either way, storytelling with a digital twist is definitely a great way to teach and learn!

the Rewards of Gaming

These days games play a huge role in the lives of our children whether we like it or not.  Although the kids pictured above are not my own, Ive seen images like this in my household as my husband finds a new game for my daughter to play with him and my son (6 months old) sits in his chair with his own controller watching intently.  I had been against this vary situation for a while and had finally given in to the inevitable and began to actually watch my daughter and my husband interact over a good game with Dora the Explorer and what I realized was eye opening.  Not only was it engaging for my daughter but she was actually learning something from it; counting, word and letter recognition, reading comprehension, and following directions (to name a few).  In the end I learned that education can come from anywhere, even games and TV (with STRICT limitations) as actually interaction with a parent or a teacher is still a main form of education.

For a class assignment I had to think of a rational for using games for learning and it wasn't that hard to think of why its a good reason as I have a living example in my household.  I think that games can help language learning, especially for ESL students because it helps to match pictures with words for word recognition and it helps engage learning in a fun and entertaining way with both challenge and reward.  And that's only one of many benefits of using games. As I mentioned above there are several educational purposes for games that promote language learning.

After reading 10 Gaming Genres to Adapt in Class I had looked for a fun and engaging point and click game to play to see how you could use one in a classroom.  I found the game Heart of Tota and the walkthrough, the instructions, for it.  After playing the game about 10 times (I'm not addicted I swear!) I figured that although I am not sure if it has education purpose AT ALL it still has the potential to teach children something.  For example if you let the children play the game with the walkthrough (because its almost impossible to get through without it) then they have to read the instructions in order to get to the certain areas and collect and open the appropriate items so they are using reading comprehension and they need to be able to follow directions which both have an implication in language learning.

As a teacher in this situation I would simply be there to help the children when needed, but other then that I think the challenge of such a game is what makes it engaging and fun and if you take that away from them then it is unnecessary to  to use games for learning.  I believe the best way to use these games for ESL students would be in group setting so they can work through the directions and comprehension together then not only are they reading and thinking but they are actually communicating and using oral language to learn. With any kind of education you want to make sure that the children are actually learning something and the best way to do that in these situations, with reading comprehension and following directions, would be to simply assess how and if they had completed the task by looking through the walkthroughs of them.

Not only can games play a role in education but they can play a role in almost anything now.  from points and rewards points to using it for news, all of this can be read about in the article entitled gamification.  Gamification is simply defined as applying game design thinking in non-game situations to make them more fun and engaging.  So although it is my main focus to think about what will help make education and learning more fun and engaging I feel its worth it to mention that with the technology we have now we can create anything to be fun and engaging especially with the new form of gamification.  And as surprised as I am, I have to say that there are rewards of gaming.
 

Connecting to learn and learning to connect

When I was asked to make an analogy for what a learner is like I starred at this statement for days trying to figure out what a learner is like, "The learners of today are like....."  And honestly, I have yet to come up with a good answer.  Ive heard learners compared to many things but I cant say that any analogy is good enough for the amount of knowledge a learner can obtain in a lifetime.  Now that learners are able to connect with others through social interactions or simply "google it" the amount of learning that can be done is exponential.  The era of simply sitting at a desk and learning all you can from a teacher or from your parents is now outdated and we are entering the era of endless knowledge.  "What we know today is not as important as our ability to stay current....if we are not continuously learning we are becoming obsolete in our particular field."(George Simmons in his YouTube video The Network is the Learning).   With this endless stream of knowledge it is with networking that people are able to learn continuously throughout their lifetime.  As you make connections with others that are interested in the same fields as you you can learn from each others experiences or from research done by others that can in turn create new knowledge for you.  "Learning and knowledge rests in diversity of opinions" (George Simmons in his article A Learning Theory for the Digital Age).  And with the, basically, combined knowledge through networking it is through peoples opinions, research (from books, journals, websites), and personal experiences that we as individuals can stay current with not only interests in or country or small communities but we can essentially communicate and connect with people from all over the world. 

I, being a mother, have made a connection through networking on a site with mothers in the Buffalo, NY area.  With these connections I have been able to stay up to date on all topics pertaining to child rearing that includes anything from new developmental research to good tips on how to get toddlers to potty train to the best pediatric doctors in the area.  So in essence with these connections I have made I am actually able to learn a huge amount of knowledge and stay current without having to sit in a seminar or read a large amount of books that would probably take me a lifetime to get through.  I simply have to create a topic in a forum and ask a question and sit back and wait for the information to come to me through my connections with others.

With this all being said I think its fair to assume that an analogy for a learner is almost impossible to apply because there is nothing in nature neither an object or a living thing that is able to change and adapt to the amount of knowledge that is being created every day.  Not even a learner can learn everything there is to know in this day and age, there is simply to much knowledge being created.  I guess if I had to create an analogy though it would be that of a spider weaving its web, each silk strand standing for a new connection the human mind (spider) has made to a new form of education.

Blogging for the Future

"In any given day, 68% of children under two will use a screen media, for an average of just over two hours (2:05)"-Pay Attention.  As I was watching this video shocked at the statistics popping up on my screen I realized my two and a half year old daughter was not only playing a video on my nook(that she turned on and started herself), she was also flipping through pictures on my iPhone(that she again, started herself.)  If that's not an "ah ha" moment I'm not sure what is!  As if this video and the video A Vision of K-12 Students Today didn't make me realize enough that we need to incorporate technology into our classrooms to help promote learning then watching my tech savvy two year old certainly did. 
I know there are many arguments out there that state that children are too involved in the technological world today and sometimes they need to power down, and I have to agree having a child sit in front of the Television all day watching movies or playing video games with no educational content makes me want to throw any such device out the window.  And I know in my example above my daughter was watching a video and flipping aimlessly through the phone looking at pictures of herself or my husband making an innumerable amount of ridiculous faces and laughing at each other , neither one having anything to do with education, but they definitely have their benefits as well.  The nook for example, has a number of educational games ranging from matching skills (auditory reception skills) to basic skills in letters and numbers al of which have had a huge impact on my daughters learning capability, and the fact that she can turn on the games and play them by herself gives her a major confidence boost.  And although she is definitely one of those children who has a limited amount of time to watch the T.V. she can still learn from the time she has, just the other day she was counting backwards from ten at TWO YEARS OLD! I asked her if she had been practicing that with daddy and she said no..."okay so where did you learn that?" her response "Oh mommy Dora just taught me."  Yes that would be the Dora the Explorer, with the talking monkey whose parents let her walk aimlessly in the woods alone and talk to wild animals...yup thats who taught her how to count backwards.  If that doesn't show you that technology can be helpful in education that you probably shouldn't be an educator.
So if our children at the age of two can do all this stuff and teach our older generations how to use these devices (which my daughter has done with my mother on numerous occasions,) then why are teachers so against using some of this to benefit childrens educations?  Well most of the time the answer is because its scary!  How are we supposed to teach using technology that we haven't even heard of?  We barely had computers and cellphones when we were growing up and now were expected to teach using them?  Well to that I say...how did WE get through our schooling years...its not like we walked into school knowing everything..just because now were the teachers it doesn't mean that we are no longer able to ask for help.  And speaking of asking for help, what better way to teach our students respect, responsibility, and communication skills then asking them to help set up a class Wiki or class Blog.  Its not teaching them how to to solve for X when 5X+12Y=14X(I don't even think that's a real equation), but it is teaching them three very important techniques that you actually need to learn in REAL LIFE!
If this doesnt make you think maybe we should pull some technology into our classrooms then here are a few more statistics that have made me think:

• Children will have approximately 14 jobs before age 38, half of those jobs don't yet exist today.  So how does making a child write the same word ten times help them prepare?
• Students have learned to "play school" studying the right facts the night before a test to pass and thus become a successful student.  How does this help them in the work place?
• On average students in class only get to ask a question once every ten hours.  How do we expect them to learn when they're not even engaged in the classroom?

So next time your students are falling asleep in your class because they got bored watching your back as you write notes on the board and talk endlessly about something they don't care about.  Think about how you could use a blog or a wiki or anything that can engage your students and make them want to learn something.  Were teachers and its time to make learning fun again!