Lamar - Web Conference

One of the assignments in my graduate course this week was to participate in a web conference. This is a great idea for technology education leadership students as we need to have some experience in how these web conferences work. We have had these conferences in our previous courses as well, but this week was an example in what not to do. We use Adobe Acrobat Connect to access these web conferences and normally ask questions to clarify our assignments, and learn of any upcoming events that will affect our program of studies. This week was not a successful web conference because the software appeared to be overloaded. First the few people with video on froze and then the entire video portion was lost and we resorted to just a typed chat conference.
Normally I participate in these conferences using my Macbook computer. I can normally speak, but have yet to learn why my working internal camera can not be turned on for the web conference. In some conferences there has been a button for me to allow access and in others there has not, but it has yet to actually show a picture.
This week's conference was not very successful probably because there were too many people trying to get online at the same time to ask their questions. It appears that after about 20 people the system slows down to a crawl or freezes entirely. The one good aspect is the chat. In the Adobe program, there is a chat to accompany the video. The chat allows us to comment to the entire group or privately to any of the participants. During the conference this week my partner and I were able to chat privately about our collaboration on an assignment and identify two others we would like to invite to participate in our group for our upcoming project.
While we were making those arrangements we were also able to have our questions answered by the professor and follow the questions of other students.
As we participate in more and more web conferences, I feel that each of us is becoming more relaxed using the conferencing program. We have learned some basics such as keeping our mics turned off when not speaking, ensuring adequate lighting for our cameras, and how to follow both the video and chat portions of the conferences.
I am not quite sure how I will use this process as a teacher, but I certainly see how useful it is to know how these conferences work. As the business world moves more and more into online conferencing to save on costs, it will become imperative for our students to understand the process in order to compete in the job market.

Thing 11.5

Thanks for another great summer of discovering tools on the Internet. For my colleagues who are not in Spring Branch ISD, check it out when you have the time. The first course is Library2Play, and the current one I just finished is Library2Play2. Both as well as the newest version Library2Play 3 can be found on the Spring Branch ISD Library Resources web page.

As for my favorite (or most likely to use) aspects of this round, I would have to go with the simple vocabulary tools from Thing 2 such as Wordle, Wordsift, and Voki as one of my favorites. Each of these tools could really help my ESL students master a confusing language. I will also be using the Screencast-o-Matic screen capture video tool very early on in the coming year to establish a collection of how to video clips for my students as they try to master several new programs. The last of my favorites surprised me, but is Second Life. I knew Second Life was out there and basically what it was, but I had no idea of the corporate and educational aspects already in use. I was surprised to find universities, NASA, NOAA, ISTE and many other organizations with sites that could benefit students. While I expect it will be the last one I incorporate (due to my needing some learning curve time), I think in the long run it will be the one with the most impact on students. This is the one "thing" that should probably turn into its own course with guidance through all the steps of getting started and locating the resources that would be beneficial to individual teachers.

I will take away new resources and a reminder that every time I think I'm "advanced" in using technology and resources with my students, there is always a lot more out there to learn and explore. I like the Library2Play format in that I am able to work on each item in my own time frame and from my own home or wherever I happen to be. This is definitely an experience where you will get as much from it as you put into it.

As I am currently pursuing a Master's degree in Educational Technology Leadership, this program has provided me with abundant resources I need to be familiar with and be able to share with teachers on my campus. It will be included as one of the activities I use to address each of the ISTE Technology Facilitator Standards.

The unexpected take-aways from this experience are the exposure to some programs I had not encountered before, and a level of comfort that my experimentation with technology for my students is not as novel as I had believed and in fact needs to push much further.

Thanks for the interesting ride.

Thing 11

I have been encouraging good digital citizenship with my students for years and while many of them can tell me the "right" answers to online safety questions, most admit they do not necessarily follow them. If I have to pick 5 things to share with them I think they would be:

1. THINK - Just as you might say things online to make yourself sound better, so does the person you are chatting with. Use your head before responding to anyone online.

2. GUARD YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION - Try a Google search of your own name and see just how much information is out there for anyone to see about you. Never post your real name, address or phone number.

3. STAY SAFE - Never agree to meet someone you met online. If your friend tells you they are a good friend of that person, ask them if they have met in person or just online. Most of the people you meet online are looking for friends and conversation, but you do not want to be the person to find the dangerous people out there who follow chat rooms looking for victims.

4. CHECK THE SOURCE - So many teens believe that if something is on the Internet, it must be true. I have my students evaluate the Save the Rennets website and then discuss it in class. Many of them never look at the About Us tab. Look for the nonsense in what you read and see if you can support that information from any other source.

5. EXPLORE - Try to locate different sources for information. Use them to back up what you know or think you know, prove statements from various web sites true or false, find new information or a better way to say/show something. It is easy to get into a rut on the Internet and just look at the same old places. With so much to choose from, expand your horizons and see what is out there. Remeber to cite your sources when you do find information you can use.

Thing 10

I spent way more time on exploring Second Life than I really had, but I kept wanting to find more. I did not really interact with anyone while there, but I did jump around to several different islands. The first one I chose totally at random, decided I did not appreciate the language and moved on. I found the ISTE island and spent a while exploring that and then moved on to some of the museums just to see what it was like. After I explored and fumbled around a bit on my own, I viewed the SciLands Classroom and found it very helpful. Watching the video clip of all the educational sites already available got me to thinking of the possible uses for my students. I'm a little bit cautious due to the number of inappropriate sites available as well, but I think many of the sites listed in the SciLands video would be great motivators for the students. I saw a virtual Alamo, health sites, architecture sites, space sites, and many more. If a teacher has the time to locate specific worlds and can guide students through there, I think it could be a very powerful motivator to get students to have interaction with their course material in a manner they are familiar with and enjoy. Having students "build" a set for a book they are reading, or using the visualize math tools to create their word problems in the virtual world could really help improve comprehension. It could also be fun to use the projector on the teacher computer and let the class decide which of several preselected islands to visit, or where to go once you arrived. That would provide more control for the teacher. This "Thing" will definitely warrant more investigation.

Thing 9

I think Slideshare and the other sites listed for sharing PowerPoint presentations are excellent for students (as well as teachers.) I had stumbled onto Slideshare a couple of months ago when I desperately needed to post a PowerPoint slide show to my blog for a class I was taking. After repeated failures, I discovered Slideshare, uploaded my presentation and was ready to share within minutes. I think this is a valuable tool for students. As time is more and more occupied with responsibilities and activities, there is little time to sit at a computer and create a slide show and then plan to share it with a class. This technology allows us the freedom to work on a presentation/project when and where it is convenient and then upload it for sharing, whether that be for a grade if a student, for explanation and coaching by a teacher, or just for easy access if making a presentation. Not only would the creator get practice using newer generation computing without having to store everything on their personal computer or flash drive, they would also have the advantage of needing only an Internet connection to retrieve their information.

Thing 8

I've been looking for a good screencasting application. There are lots of things I would prefer my students be able to view at the computer and then immediately try. This is especially true for my Journalism/Desktop Publishing classes. By the time I walk them through a complicated program like PhotoShop Elements and they get to a computer to try it, they forget where to go. Using a screencast in short increments would allow them to have 2 open windows, view the instructions and immediately try them out. My sample screencast was made on Screen-O-Matic and I created a short video on how to open Photoshop and convert a photo from color to black and white.

Thing 7

I was glad to find so many sources for educational video clips listed as this is one of the projects I have set for myself this year, to identify good clips that relate directly to the curriculum. One of the clips I thought would particularly interest students was from PBS, Moment of Impact: Jungle. This would be a great introduction to ecosystems in the rain forest and the spectacular photography would keep students fascinated. I also liked Blinkx. The tags used on their videos made it fairly simple to locate different clips. I watched one I might use for my ESL students about Jamestown. It gives a simple explanation of the founding of the colony and also gives related clips such as Queen Elizabeth's visit to Jamestown on the 400th anniversary. I think these clips and others like them will be very useful for my ESL students who need some extra support to grasp the concepts and vocabulary as they attempt to learn content in a language they are not completely comfortable using.

Thing 6

I absolutely love my iPod Touch. We received a cart of the devices over the past year as part of the Power2Learn grant from the school district. I kept begging to get my hands on them, but they were confiscated by the math and science classes. This year, I have a few of my own to use with my students who were begging to use them all last year. I have downloaded a number of apps on the ones I will use in my classroom. The list of my favorites may seem a bit odd as I teach several very different subjects. I have Flashcards Deluxe, Adobe Photoshop CS4 Learn by Video, Key Whiz, American Dreams - Speeches and Documents in American History, the Kindle and Kobo readers, the Hubble app, the Louvre, Vocabulistic, a news reader (Newsie), and some games that I feel my students would enjoy and might actually stimulate their brains.
One thing I will be doing this year is adding video clips from National Geographic, History Channel, and Discovery Channel for my ESL students to get background information for their Social Studies and Science classes. The plan is to switch these short video clips out each week as the curriculum changes focus topics. This could easily be done in a library to give students some back up for their studies just by accessing the 6 or 9 week plans for the subject areas. I would love to see our libraries and teachers using these devices to support the curriculum and not just for games or one time uses in the classroom. Our students are very fluent with these devices and we need to lead them into the educational aspects available.