As part of the course, I also learned how to create a website, using Google sites, that could possibly be used for my classroom in the future. The website will probably need to be changed slightly, since some things on it are specific to the course, but it gives me a good foundation to start from. I enjoyed playing around with it and figuring out what looks acceptable and what does not. The line spacing was a problem for me at first, but I am okay with it now. Another thing I had a problem with was moving the images around. With this website tool, you cannot freely place the pictures where you would like to. I think the pictures are to close to the side, but that is how the tool places them on the page.
Next time, I will give myself more time to work on developing the website. With so much to do as the semester is finishing up, I did not have as much time to devote to it as I would have liked. So when making it better for my classroom specifically, I will spend more time making it as attractive as possible. Also, I will probably get family and friends to look at it and give me suggestions.
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Monday, November 28, 2011
Facebook Activity
Throughout the semester, we have been trying out an activity on Facebook. The instructors have been posting important questions from each of the chapters, and we as students were supposed to be answering the questions, or liking the answers we feel are correct.
I think the idea behind it is a helpful one. It is to help us as students figure out what is important to take away from each chapter, and to work together to figure out the correct answers. I do not know how well the activity went however, since many of us do not use Facebook regularly or are so overloaded with other things and other classes. I personally admit that I did not participate as much as I should have, because I do not get on Facebook much and when I do get the time to its just to quickly see if someone has sent me a message that may be important. I have been so busy and stressed with work and other schoolwork that this activity was pushed down on my priority list. Also, I try to keep school things separate from social things, so by the time I get around to getting on Facebook, I have a lot of times forgotten about the questions. I did try to answer a few questions and like a few others, but if something like this is done again I will try the participate more regularly. I will not use this type of activity with my students since they will be too young, but posing questions and practicing things that will be on the test is a useful strategy to help even young children.
I think the idea behind it is a helpful one. It is to help us as students figure out what is important to take away from each chapter, and to work together to figure out the correct answers. I do not know how well the activity went however, since many of us do not use Facebook regularly or are so overloaded with other things and other classes. I personally admit that I did not participate as much as I should have, because I do not get on Facebook much and when I do get the time to its just to quickly see if someone has sent me a message that may be important. I have been so busy and stressed with work and other schoolwork that this activity was pushed down on my priority list. Also, I try to keep school things separate from social things, so by the time I get around to getting on Facebook, I have a lot of times forgotten about the questions. I did try to answer a few questions and like a few others, but if something like this is done again I will try the participate more regularly. I will not use this type of activity with my students since they will be too young, but posing questions and practicing things that will be on the test is a useful strategy to help even young children.
Everyday use of Storybird
After learning all about Storybird, I decided to use it with my little cousins to see how young children would respond to using it. I was babysitting four of them, two in third grade and two in fourth grade, and they loved Storybird! The only boy created a story by himself, and the three girls created one together. This shows how Storybird can be enjoyable for boys and girls in various sized groups. After I showed them how to create a story by picking a set of pictures and dragging the picture they wanted to use onto the page that was there, they were able to start from the beginning and do the whole thing themselves.
The stories are really short since they were excited to play together which they rarely get a chance to, but all of my little cousins who did these stories were very proud of there work. They needed a little help with some of the formatting specifics, but they were excited to use my laptop and type in their own stories. They had fun with the stories and wanted everyone to see what they had created, so here are the links to the stories. The Rockers! and The Sweet Old Lady I hope you enjoy them as much as they enjoyed making them.
The stories are really short since they were excited to play together which they rarely get a chance to, but all of my little cousins who did these stories were very proud of there work. They needed a little help with some of the formatting specifics, but they were excited to use my laptop and type in their own stories. They had fun with the stories and wanted everyone to see what they had created, so here are the links to the stories. The Rockers! and The Sweet Old Lady I hope you enjoy them as much as they enjoyed making them.
Storybird
A web tool that I learned about and really enjoyed was Storybird (storybird.com). This is a free tool that anyone can use to create a story about anything they can imagine, and even easily publish to the web. The website provides a large amount of pictures to choose from, which are separated into different categories. You begin by choosing a set of pictures based on the sample pictures shown or choose from a theme. The creators have the idea of inspiring a story from artwork, which is why the process is done this way. Once a set of artwork is chosen, the rest is very simple, and the author can be as creative and imaginative as possible with writing the story.
Since this tool is so simple to use, I am very excited about using it with my future students. It is a great tool to not only excite children about literacy, but to help them practice and learn more about reading and writing. If older children or more adults are not available to help, I may have to use Storybird mostly for creating a story as a whole class, but I could also use it in small groups. However, the children can pick whatever pictures they want and dictate the story. If children are able to spell and have a little more typing skills, Storybird is simple enough for them to use themselves.
When I created my first story using Storybird, it took no time at all to figure out how to use which is why it would be a good idea for classroom use. I was able to quickly pick a set of pictures and begin the creative process. One thing that was difficult was keeping track of the picture you want to use if there are a lot of pictures in the set. I lost one that I wanted to use, but there are so many that a found another that I liked as well. The only thing I would do differently next time is make sure that I move the picture to the page before I keep looking through the rest of the pictures. I enjoyed creating the story and I am sure others of all ages will enjoy it as well.
Since this tool is so simple to use, I am very excited about using it with my future students. It is a great tool to not only excite children about literacy, but to help them practice and learn more about reading and writing. If older children or more adults are not available to help, I may have to use Storybird mostly for creating a story as a whole class, but I could also use it in small groups. However, the children can pick whatever pictures they want and dictate the story. If children are able to spell and have a little more typing skills, Storybird is simple enough for them to use themselves.
When I created my first story using Storybird, it took no time at all to figure out how to use which is why it would be a good idea for classroom use. I was able to quickly pick a set of pictures and begin the creative process. One thing that was difficult was keeping track of the picture you want to use if there are a lot of pictures in the set. I lost one that I wanted to use, but there are so many that a found another that I liked as well. The only thing I would do differently next time is make sure that I move the picture to the page before I keep looking through the rest of the pictures. I enjoyed creating the story and I am sure others of all ages will enjoy it as well.
Friday, November 18, 2011
iMovie Landform video
This is a video I created using Apple iMovie software. I had to decide on a topic, collect pictures and music that complimented the topic I chose, and storyboard the video all before even beginning to put it together. This was a long process, but once I got to putting the video together it was very fun and students will enjoy watching videos such as this one. Older students will also benefit from making them if possible.
The process of making this video was very difficult. The most difficult part was collecting good pictures and music while adhering to copyright laws. This would have been easier if I was just using this video for classroom purposes, since I could use fair use policies, but since I had to put it on the internet the laws are more strict. Also, using pictures that are originally an appropriate size and resolution is very important to creating a visually crisp video quality. I also had difficulty deciding what type of music supported the topic of landforms. I think I finally found something that works well together.
Actually making the video was the most fun part. iMovie is a very simple tool to use once you know what all the buttons do. I enjoyed adjusting the motion of the pictures and deciding what transitions to add between some of the pictures. I would probably use this type of software to create simple concept videos for my young students, or to document a field trip that we may go on. Next time I make a video like this I hope to have the software on my home computer, or more time and access to the software to play around with it more. Also, I will either not put the video on the internet, find media that is no longer copyrighted from the beginning, or use my own pictures now that I understand how strict the laws are. I had to find two completely different sets of pictures for this project because I did not understand the laws when putting things like this on the internet, and that was very difficult.
The process of making this video was very difficult. The most difficult part was collecting good pictures and music while adhering to copyright laws. This would have been easier if I was just using this video for classroom purposes, since I could use fair use policies, but since I had to put it on the internet the laws are more strict. Also, using pictures that are originally an appropriate size and resolution is very important to creating a visually crisp video quality. I also had difficulty deciding what type of music supported the topic of landforms. I think I finally found something that works well together.
Actually making the video was the most fun part. iMovie is a very simple tool to use once you know what all the buttons do. I enjoyed adjusting the motion of the pictures and deciding what transitions to add between some of the pictures. I would probably use this type of software to create simple concept videos for my young students, or to document a field trip that we may go on. Next time I make a video like this I hope to have the software on my home computer, or more time and access to the software to play around with it more. Also, I will either not put the video on the internet, find media that is no longer copyrighted from the beginning, or use my own pictures now that I understand how strict the laws are. I had to find two completely different sets of pictures for this project because I did not understand the laws when putting things like this on the internet, and that was very difficult.
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
Animoto Tool
This is a video slideshow I created about my family and friends using Animoto!
Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.
I enjoyed creating this video, however there were a few drawbacks. One drawback is that the free version of Animoto only allows you to make 30 second videos. Also, you cannot choose which part of the music you want to use for the video. I would have liked to make it a little bit longer and possibly be able to choose which part of the song to use in the video instead of just from the beginning. It turned out that the majority of my video is only the talking part of the song I picked from the site which I did not realize would happen. Next time I use Animoto, I will make sure to either use a song from my computer, or choose one that has music from the very beginning. I could create a video for my future students to see pictures of my family, or just some pictures I find interesting for them to see. It was easy to use this tool to upload the pictures, and it created the video for you so that is good for people who are not as talented at making videos as others are.
Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.
I enjoyed creating this video, however there were a few drawbacks. One drawback is that the free version of Animoto only allows you to make 30 second videos. Also, you cannot choose which part of the music you want to use for the video. I would have liked to make it a little bit longer and possibly be able to choose which part of the song to use in the video instead of just from the beginning. It turned out that the majority of my video is only the talking part of the song I picked from the site which I did not realize would happen. Next time I use Animoto, I will make sure to either use a song from my computer, or choose one that has music from the very beginning. I could create a video for my future students to see pictures of my family, or just some pictures I find interesting for them to see. It was easy to use this tool to upload the pictures, and it created the video for you so that is good for people who are not as talented at making videos as others are.
Monday, November 7, 2011
Final Interactive Spreadsheet
Another project we were assigned to create was an interactive worksheet. I chose to use second grade math as the subject area. I went through and decided that I wanted to use the "Algebra" standard and create a worksheet using sequences. An example of it can be seen below.
I enjoyed creating this interactive worksheet. It was very interesting to put in the equations to make everything work. I got the equations in pretty easily without much problem, but even if something ended up wrong, it was interesting to go through and find what caused the problem. I thought it was fun to see how these type of worksheets work, and I think that my future students will enjoy it as well. I could use this in the future for many different subjects in my classroom. This will give my young students a fun way to practice concepts, and use the computer for things besides playing games.
Being the first time I had created a worksheet using Microsoft Excel, this was a very long and tedious process. There are so many small things that seem minor, but can cause problems with the worksheet. One thing I had a problem with was making sure that the worksheet would be on just one page when printed. I don't think that would be a problem if I just use it in digital form because I do not have to much information on the worksheet. As a result of trying to fit it all on one printed page, the spacing is small between the rule and the sequence, which can be confusing. However, on the computer it all fits on the screen at one time with adequate spacing. So for future uses, to make the process easier, I will not have the interactive worksheet printed off. Other than that, I would not change anything else about the process.
I enjoyed creating this interactive worksheet. It was very interesting to put in the equations to make everything work. I got the equations in pretty easily without much problem, but even if something ended up wrong, it was interesting to go through and find what caused the problem. I thought it was fun to see how these type of worksheets work, and I think that my future students will enjoy it as well. I could use this in the future for many different subjects in my classroom. This will give my young students a fun way to practice concepts, and use the computer for things besides playing games.
Being the first time I had created a worksheet using Microsoft Excel, this was a very long and tedious process. There are so many small things that seem minor, but can cause problems with the worksheet. One thing I had a problem with was making sure that the worksheet would be on just one page when printed. I don't think that would be a problem if I just use it in digital form because I do not have to much information on the worksheet. As a result of trying to fit it all on one printed page, the spacing is small between the rule and the sequence, which can be confusing. However, on the computer it all fits on the screen at one time with adequate spacing. So for future uses, to make the process easier, I will not have the interactive worksheet printed off. Other than that, I would not change anything else about the process.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)