Podcasting

Three key pieces of infomation on podcasting would include its definition, its applications, and how to start podcasting. A podcast is simply a computer application allowing users to automatically download audio (or audiosvisual) files. The files can be played whenever the downloader would like. Applications for podcasting exist in all subject areas and levels of education. Teachers can post these to help students review material before a test, or catch up when they are absent. Students can make podcasts as summative assessments to share what they have learned. To get started in podcasting, all that is need is a computer with microphone and software. A free program, Audacity, is available for new podcasters to download.

To approach a principal about podcasting in school, I would ask him/her if they would like a new way to share information about school events and students' academic progress with their parents. I would them explain how easy it is to start podcasting, and how podcasts could be linked to the Edline pages for our school. I would stress that podcasting is free, and staff could be trained in podcasting during our county's inservice days. Teachers could be shown how to use podcasts as assessments, and coachs/club sponsers/event planners could discover how to podcast about their programs.

Telecollaborative Projects

In my view, the biggest challenges to use of telecollaborative projects are simply matters of practicality. My school has only 1 computer lab in the media center that teachers can book, along with a few carts of mobile lab laptops that work when they feel like it. Each day, up to 70 teachers are competing for access to these resources. Thus, booking more than a day or two of computer time for all of your classes is difficult! Then, there is the issue of time in general. most of the telecollaborative projects that I have viewed are extensive enough that integration would be problematic. My curriculum is also expanding with the revisions due out this summer. So, if I was to use a telecollaborative project, it would need to align with my curriculum almost exactly for it to be practical. I certainly don't have the time to create a project that does mesh perfectly with my curriculum on my own, either. I'm really being blocked by a dearth of available time and computers.

The rewards of proper telecollaborative project use, though, are many. Students would be able to indulge their interests in technology. They would hopefully learn skills that can be useful in their future careers. They might become more excited about learning than they are if we are using textbooks and worksheets. Their minds could be opened by interacting with diverse students from other places-and this mind-expansion could extend to the instructors as well!

WebQuests vs. Research Modules

In a choice between research modules or WebQuests, I would choose WebQuest every time. Partly this is because I have been familiar with WebQuests for awhile, and I have designed my own, after a fashion. Another reason for my choice is that WebQuests provide more structure. I enjoy structure. It's part of being the old-school social studies teacher. Besides, I work with a lot of students who are academically below their grade level in reading. If they had the freedom research modules typically provide, they would probably find sites they cannot read, and thus they would not learn what I want them to. In addition, most of my students have not learned how to develop their own research questions. While this is obviously a valuable skill in many of a student's future careers, it is difficult, and very time-consuming, to teach. I find myself between the proverbial "rock and a hard place"-do I have to be the one to save the world and teach students how to research? And, if I do, what key content will I have to cut? In short, then, I would use the WebQuest because I would not need to devote extensive time to teaching research skills in order for my students to benefit from the WebQuest.

Both WebQuests or research modules, though, would change my role as a teacher. They push me into becoming a facilitator because, no matter how much groundwork I've laid in designing a WebQuest, at some point I HAVE to step back and let the students work. This is helpful to me because, as I've indicated before, I like to be the center of attention in the classroom. But when I am, I usually fall into the trap of expecting less of my students than they are capable of. So WebQuests (and, presumably, research modules) lead me somewhere I might not go willingly-but it's a place I need to go!

Shift Happens Reflection

In my opinion, the most important thing for teachers to be aware of as they prepare students for the 21st century is the need to prepare students to communicate. No matter what technologies arise in the 21st century, students will still be required to share ideas with others and respond to their thoughts. Of course, the rules of face-to-face conversation need not apply; students must be taught to be flexible. What is appropriate in BCR might not be suitable for a text message, or any of the other technologies Shift Happens notes have not been invented yet. In addition, Shift Happens alludes to all the developments in the capacity of computers, the usage of new vocabulary words, and the daily increase in the volume of available information. For me, this is a reminder that teachers must show students how to efficiently locate, evaluate, and synthesize information. Finally, the details provided in Shift Happens about the population growth in India and China should remind teachers of the expansion of diversity that the future will bring. Students will need to develop a comfort level not just in communication formats but also in sharing data with others from backgrounds different from their own.

Reflection-Class 1

My purpose for being in this class is twofold. Obviously, EDU 577 is a requirement for my graduate degree, and earning a graduate degree is a requirement for maintaining my certification, employment, and thus my identity as a teacher. So I would be evasive were I not to mention this. There is, however, another point to mention. I am well aware that my grasp of technology is limited, and so I will benefit by increasing my knowledge in this area. And, I have some expectation that anything I learn in this course does have the potential to improve my instruction. Four years in education is not enough to develop a vast variety of techniques to diversify my lessons. I can use all the help I can get!
I hope to learn a bit more about webpages so I could perhaps place some of my Webquests (or, to be accurate, my Webquest attempts) online in a location other than Edline. I would not mind picking up some advanced Powerpoint stragtegies, because all I do with these now is present notes or review materials. I suppose I have some curiosity about blogs and podcasts too-I'm always hearing about these but rarely encounter them.
My current frustations are numerous, however. I am 7 school days away from the end of the school year, and between the myriad eighth-grade activities I participate in, reworking my Civil War lessons to mitigate my behindness in my curriculum, completing my grading, and cleaning my (trashed) classroom, I'm swamped. So I am concerned I will not have time to devote to the requirements of this class. And, though I am in my 20s, I suffer from "Old Social Studies Teacher Syndrome." I often view technology as something that offers more possibilities for disaster than it does enrichment. Blame the constantly-crashing BAMS mobile lab laptops, or the fact that I had a dinosaur of a computer for a decade growing up. I'm a lot happy with an overhead projector. About all that can go wrong there is that the bulb can burn out.