Final Project

{ December 12, 2009 @ 5:28 am } · { Uncategorized }
{ Tags: project }

My Final Project

Global Socialization

In today’s society, many of America’s youth walk down the school hallways or pass people along the streets while talking on their cell phones, and listening to their iPod players. Often times, there is always an individual within sight who is tediously typing away on a keyboard or glaring into the screen of their laptop. With this knowledge in mind, educators need to apply this way of living to the learning environment.
The focal point of this project is ePals, http://www.epals.com (ePals, 2009). The Visual Blooms (Fisher, M., 2009) Technology Tree will also be used to help enforce technology in the classroom and further expand its acceptance and reassure the comfort level of technology use in the school environment. The Visual Blooms website, http://visualblooms.wikispaces.com/, provides a number of alternative links that further expand on the Technology Tree.

I chose to introduce an educator and past coworker, Mrs. P., to different aspects of technology and how to apply those aspects to distance education. A short discussion about what was needed to complete the final expectations was discussed, followed by a string of emails. The emails set up what we would discuss in our official meeting and when this meeting would take place. After bulleting a couple of topics of discussion, an appointed time was set for December 09, 2009 after school. Mrs. P. feels very strongly about wanting to learn what is available and how to best utilize those tools. With spring 2011 classes, I will be able to further design and implement a more structure-like use of the tools; hence, this paper is being written as a project summary, the development will continue into future Education Technology courses. I will personally be assisting Mrs. P. with any activities she should need a collaborative aide for.

Firstly, Mrs. P. established her interest in digital storytelling. EPals also happens to have a classroom connect link on the home page for this very same idea. The page lists subtopics in which every educator must address:
• Essential questions (4)
• Objectives (5)
• Culminating activity
• Standards (2 Language Arts, 6 Technology)
Project Elements:
• Overview
• Objectives
• Essential questions
• Supporting questions
• Academic vocabulary
• Culminating activity
• Materials / Handouts
• Reflection / Assessments
• Related resources
• Extended learning

A Project Calendar is also included where the instructor is to know when everything needs to be completed. Since all participating educators will be operating on this calendar, there should be little room for confusion or miscommunication. EPals makes digital storytelling a very fun and an educational learning event.

There are many other projects that stem from ePals that enforce the importance of distance education and how it has become not only a natural way of learning, but is fundamental for success. The global awareness is now a key feature in our society and one way we can best solve the need to form a global perspective is through long-distance web based communications. Of course there are many other alternative ways of communication, but the focus of this project is computer based.

Moving on, Visual Blooms (Fisher, M., 2009) is a nicely laid out tree of technology tools. Mrs. P. has informed me that she has heard of Ning, a type of forum/chat, in which she was interested in making a classroom for her kids in. Ning takes up several positions in the tree and would be a valuable resource to look into for the future. At this point, I provided a printout of the Tech. Tree to Mrs. P. to further evaluate.

As a guide, Laurence Peters book, Global Education, Using Technology to Bring the World to Your Students, has been a phenomenal resource. Peter mentions that Web 2.0 and the Learning Theory is an opportunity to globalize classrooms and breakdown barriers. The book is extremely well laid out, and is a joy to read. It would make a wonderful addition to any Education Technology course or for any educator who is ready to take that next step into the web arena. Peters provides an exciting outlook for the 21st century student and the educator. His book spans topics from wikis, iEARN, to ePals. In fact, Peter includes projects with the sites he mentions. I intend to introduce and hopefully carry out many of these projects with Mrs. Powers after digital storytelling. What is most phenomenal has to be the APPENDIX. A collection of links to mega sites offering lesson plans and other resources.

This project has been very constructive in the many places it has lead me in my mind and in person. In reality, it only has begun, so I look forward to a whole new chapter when the semester starts up again. Mrs. P.’s enthusiasm and motivation, I believe, will be a spark not only for the students, but for other faculty. With any luck, other educators will join in on the process of social globalization before the 2010 school year is out.

References
ePals. (2009). Retrieved December 9, 2009, from http://www.epals.com/
Fisher, M. (2009). Visual Blooms. Retrieved December 9, 2009, from http://visualblooms.wikispaces.com/
Peters, L. (2009). Global education Using technology to bring the world to your students. Washington D. C.: International Society for Technology in Education.

APPENDIX
1 Technology Tree from Visual Blooms (Fisher, M., 2009)

2 Full Digital Storytelling Calendar is not pasted (ePals, 2009)

3 25 Tools Descriptive Chart (Fisher, M., 2009)
Category TOP TOOLS SMIL
TUTORIALS LEARNING TOOLS
DIRECTORY LISTINGS
1 Web browser Firefox | Google Chrome
Firefox
Browsers, Extensions, Toolbars & Players

2 Social bookmarking tool Delicious | diigo
Delicious
Social Bookmarking tools

3 Blogging tool Wordpress | Blogger
Wordpress
Blogging tools

4 RSS/Feed reader Google Reader | Bloglines
Google Reader
RSS/Feed readers & Alerts

5 Micro- blogging tool Twitter | Tweetdeck
Twitter
Micro-blogging tools
Twitter apps

6 Email gMail/Google Mail | Outlook£
gMail
Email, SMS, Voice & Video Messaging tools

7 Instant Messaging Skype
Skype
Instant Messaging & Voice call tools

8 Personal productivity tool Evernote | Google Calendar
Google Calendar
Note Taking & Sharing tools
Calendars, Event & Meeting Scheduling

9 Mind mapping Freemind | Bubbl.us
– Mind mapping & brainstorming tools

10 Presentation tool PowerPoint£ | Prezi
– Presentation tools

11 Presentation sharing tool Slideshare | VoiceThread
Slideshare
Presentation hosting & sharing tools

12 Online office suite Google Docs | Zoho
Google Docs
Document, spreadsheet & database tools

13 Web conferencing Dimdim | Adobe Connect£
Dimdim
Web conferencing (& screen sharing) tools

14 Course authoring tool Articulate£ | Lectora£
– Course authoring tools
Interactivity tools
Quizzing and testing tools

15 Screen capture SnagIt£ | Jing
Jing
Screen capture, screencasting and software demo tools
Learning games and simulation tools

16 Demo/Screencasting tool Camtasia | Adobe Captivate£ | Jing

17 Web authoring Dreamweaver£ | Google Sites
Google Sites
Web authoring tools (& HTML editors)

18 Wiki tool PBworks | Wikispaces
Wiki tools

19 Image/photo tools flickr | Adobe Photoshop£
flickr
File hosting/sharing tools
Media creation and editing tools

20 Audio/podcasting tools Audacity | iTunes
Audacity | iTunes
Podcasting tools

21 Video tools YouTube | Flip£
YouTube
Video tools, hosting and sharing sites

22 Personal dashboard iGoogle | Netvibes
iGoogle
Start Pages

23 Course management system Moodle
Moodle
Course & Learning (Content) Management System

24 Social networking Ning | LinkedIn | Facebook
Join a Ning | Set up a Ning
Social networking (& community) tools
Social Networks
Facebook apps

25 Integrated social media platform Elgg
Elgg
Social learning systems
Team, Group & Enterprise Collaboration tools