In the halls of any high school in our country it seems that more and more students are using technology to interact with more people then ever before. I know of students who can be writing and sending a text message from their pocket of their sweatshirt as they are looking a teacher in the eye and answering a question about history. Our students rely on technology more then I ever have. Because of their familiarity with technology and the network and equipment they already have set up and access to as educators we have a great setup to use for educational purposes. MySpace and Face Book are popular social media sites. There are also programs that can send text messages to students’ cell phones or handheld devices that update them on information about a specific topic. Twitter is very popular example of this. Students can continue class discussions out side of class and ask and answer questions either logged onto the computer or through their cell phones.

The social media that our students interact with is a great educational tool because of its ubiquitous nature; however it is very difficult to control. A colleague of mine set up Twitter in her English class but had to place many restrictions on her students. They had to come up with aliases. They could not use a picture of them that showed their face on their profile. All students had to have parent permission as well. Students did really well with Twitter and were really excited about it. My colleague said that students were making Twitter dates so they could get together after school and tweet. What a great way to get students talking about Shakespeare! However there was a problem with students getting text messages all day long in other teachers’ classes. Also, not all students have cell phones or phones with unlimited texting, so this could get rather expensive for those who do not have unlimited texting capabilities.

• It is very advantageous for educators to use a network that students are familiar with and enjoy interacting with
• Almost all students use the social web outside of school
• Classroom discussions can be continued outside of school

The concern that I have with using social media in the classroom is student safety. There are more and more online predators that put our youth at risk. School schould be a safe place where students are able to focus on learning, not protecting themselves from others. The English teacher at my school took extra precautions to make sure that her students would be safe. Another concern for student safety that I have is regarding other students. The social media that our students interact with is not immune to harassment, threats, and slander. A new term has come up called “sexting” where students send revealing pictures of them selves to one another. There has been a recent case in the news where a young girl killed herself because of pictures of her were sent around school. Once something is sent out it can not be taken back, and the original sender had no control over where it goes or who sees or reads it.

• Predation and harassment is a reality of social media
• Some students may not use social media responsibly
• Students do not have control over information sent after it is sent
  
  

Wikis

Wikis are a great way to collaborate and share information. One can open up a document as a web page, click edit, and add to the document, then save it as a web page again and post it for all to access. My government class used a wiki to share information about a debate that they had to prepare for. We had a wiki for the Pro argument and another for the Con argument. Students could add their research for whichever side they were debating. I thought the wikis were great for educational purposes because students can share information that their classmate may not have thought about. As a teacher, and administrator of our class wiki, I can see what individual students have contributed to the discussion.

• Wikis are great for brainstorming
• Wikis are convenient for students to work on their own time
• Collaboration is facilitated in one location
• Students are held accountable for what they post

However there are some draw backs to wikis. Due to the fact that many people have the ability to edit a wiki there may be information posted that is not correct or biased. I believe that if we teach students to analyze information with a critical mind and make sure there is another credible source wikis can be very successful in education. Another draw back we found is that only one person can edit a page at a time. If more then one student would like to contribute to the discussion at the same time he or she is not allowed to. We had problems initially with our wiki pages freezing because too many students were trying to edit them at once. When students realized that, they were able to wait and take turns.

• Only one person may edit a wiki at one time
• Information shared on wikis may not be accurate due to their collaborative nature
  
  

Podcasts

Podcasting is a great resource for second language classes. I am always looking for good resources of input for my students. As a teacher of Spanish I, I am constantly seeking comprehensible input for my students. There is a lot of music, literature, and podcasts out there, however if it is too advanced students will not get any meaning. As I was searching for podcasts I found many of them for beginning language students; however they were not exactly what I wanted students to focus on. I would like students to create their own podcasts for their fellow classmates.

• Students receive quality comprehensible input in Spanish
• Podcasting allows students to hear their own language production
• Podcasts can be made to emphasize specific grammar or vocabulary concepts
• Creating podcasts can be difficult if there is a lack of equipment at school

In language learning speaking is one of the last things that students are able to do. They need to receive lots of input before they can produce correct output in the forms of speaking and writing. Podcasting will provide a meaningful way for students to practice their speech as well. I learn a lot when I hear myself speak in English or Spanish. I have posted a couple of podcasts on our class Moodle site for students who miss listening exercises due to travel or illness and for students to hear Spanish when they are outside of the classroom too.

The one frustration that I have found with podcasts at school is that we do not have to equipment to record podcasts for an entire class, even if students work in groups. I have students record their podcasts on my computer and I post them, but I would like students to learn how to do it themselves so they are not dependant on me or restricted to only working during their time at school to complete their assignments or listen to their fellow students. Another obstacle that I have encountered is there is limited storage space on students’ H drives. If they save many audio or video files they run out of room quickly.

There is lots of free software to record audio files. I like working with Audacity, a free down load, and then use Prism Media Converter to convert the audio AVI file to an MP3 file.

Second Life

Second Life is interesting. The first person that I met in SL approached me in Spanish about the size of his anatomy. Other people that I approached were rather cold and did not respond. I do not think that I have the technological intuition that others have as I felt frustrated exploring SL. It was difficult to understand the layout of where I was and where I could go. I enjoyed changing my avatar and it was fun to see other people. I do agree with the discussion that was going around about how the avatars are very developed, voluptuous people. Perhaps this is because SL can function as an escape for some people.

Second Life can be a great educational tool, however I think it would not be appropriate for elementary or secondary students. SL could be a good tool for college level students who are more mature and able to filter the inappropriate material that is available through Second Life.

• SL is a great opportunity to experience things students are not able to experience in the classroom
  
• There is a lot of inappropriate material on SL that I would not want my students exposed to
  
• It is impossible to monitor students on SL

Even though there are many educational benefits to SL, I do not believe that the pros out weigh the cons. There seems to be a lot of rubbish that one must wade through to get to anything meaningful. I am very busy with my OL, (original life) and find that interacting with real people is more valuable then avatars on the computer. I do however; see the appeal and benefit to students to have a game situation where learning can take place.

Podcst Rubric

Click on the title above to see the rubric that students' podcasts will be graded on.

Spanish Podcast

Click on the title above or the link below to listen.

http://www.4shared.com/file/103480947/ac4ecc31/Ed_tech_final.html

As a foreign language teacher I am constantly seeking sources of comprehensible input for my students. There is a lot of input available however it is ineffective if students do not have the language ability to understand what they are hearing. A good philosophy for foreign language teaching is (input + 1). This is to mean that students should understand most of what they read or hear, plus a little more to challenge them and keep their brains engaged. If the material is too easy students will not progress in the language. Conversely if the material is too difficult for students to understand they will shut off and no acquire any new knowledge. We are to give them what they know plus a little more. It is like Plato’s The Allegory of the Cave. When students are in the comforting darkness of the cave they are not learning. As they move into the light their minds grow and they lean. (Input + 1) puts takes the students from the darkness towards the light as they learn.

• Comprehensible input is important to foreign language acquisition
  
• It is challenging to find quality input for students
  
• Input that is too easy is ineffective
  
• Input that is too difficult is ineffective
  
• (Input + 1)

Due to the continual challenge that I encounter I thought it would be fun for students to be a part of their Spanish experience. Students will create a podcast and a set of questions using vocabulary and grammar concepts that we have worked on in class. Other students will listen to the podcast and answer questions in Spanish. This project will be successful because students will be able to talk about what they are interested in as communicate with each other in Spanish. I have found that students teaching students is a very successful way for students learning. Students will also be encouraged and excited to hear their own voice speaking a foreign language.

• Students will be producing original work
  
• Students teaching students Spanish
  
• Students will be producing and listening to (input + 1) Spanish
  
• Students will have ownership in the products they create

Gaming

I use gaming a lot in the classroom. My government students play a gambling game with vocabulary to earn points to buy passes, snacks, late assignments, etc. They write down their bets, I ask the question if they wrote down the correct answer they get plus their bet, if it is incorrect they subtract their bet. They love it. In Spanish we play all kinds of games mata moscas, (fly swatter), Pictionary, charades, jeopardy, bingo, and we have verb races. Games are a fun way for students to review for tests and more importantly still be learning in a more relaxed environment. My students really love the competition. We do girls v. boys, lower classmen v. upperclassmen, or one side of the room against the other. Games reaches different students that lecture, worksheets, and other types of instruction do not connect with. Besides, I have fun when we play games tooJ Games are a great way to break up our long block periods (85 min) and get kids moving.

Now I have not used computer gaming in class yet. The games we play are not on the computer; however I have yet to explore games offered on Moodle. The games I see students play on the computers are games like Tetris, Mario, and a really popular helicopter game. Students know they are not allowed to play these games at school al all, however when they have a question that does not get answered immediately before thinking it through the automatically switch to playing games while they wait. These games serve as mindless distraction or something to pass time. Students need to be always doing something; they jump from one thing to another. We did a practice quiz with i-respond where students key in their answers with remotes. They really enjoyed that because they thought it was a game. I left their scores up on the side and they could compare themselves with other students and see how well they were doing individually.

• Gaming is a great way to get students involved
• Kids love competition
• Gaming creates a more relaxed informal environment for learning
• It is very difficult to monitor students online when gaming
• The good does not out weigh the bad regarding computer gaming in education

Weeks 3 &4

Weeks 3 and 4 were quite an eye opener for me. I have found it very challenging to find time between work, school, family, church, and other to really explore all of the tools that web 2.0 offers us as educators. I just found out that my district has a full time ed technology person on staff that deals specifically with web 2.0. There is a class starting to help teachers become familiar and manage all of these tools!

In his book An Ethic of Excellence Ron Berger states that the quality of student work will increase if it is made public. Web 2.0 is a great way to publish student work. After collaborating with others, making revisions, and having the ability to post the finished product for other classes and classmates to see is very rewarding for students. I have filmed student skits before and with out fail first hour begs “let’s watch second hour’s skits”. Second hour inevitably asks “let’s watch third hour’s skits”. And so it continues throughout the day. I love it.

As far as a new perspective I gained from exploring web 2.0 I think that it is important that I make sure that the technology that I integrate is meaningful. I have found with my Spanish I students it does not matter what kind of picture sharing or micro blogging online collaboration tools there are available they are meaningless if students don’t have a basic literacy or vocabulary internalized. I have found that students end up asking me to translate their assignments for them because they don’t have vocabulary available for recalling when it is needed. Students use Google translator to do work for them and then they have no idea what they wrote when I ask them. Some of you may have heard the metaphor of a bad guitar player with an amp?

Sometime I feel that writing and collaboration with Web 2.0 is rather informal. That is okay for social networking sites, however I would not want students to continue bad habits such as “IM talk” (jk, omg, rolf, etc.) in their writing. Maybe I need to realize that the English language is evolving as these terms have encroached into student speech.

I sounded like we were all a little infowhelmed these past two weeks as we discovered what was out there to use. I made my screen cast of how to post an assignment on Moodle for students to access.

Here is the Moodle web site

• http://moodle.com/

Here is my Moodle page for my Spanish class (caution: work in progress!)

• http://moo4.kibsd.org/course/view.php?id=116

Moodle is a course management program that we are using at Kodiak High School to help students who travel for athletics, take extended vacations, or just need a place online where they can see what is going on with their classes. Instead of using four or five different programs to collaborate, we can do it all through Moodle. Moodle facilitates tools such as forums, quizzes, games, audio recordings, course calendar, and course events. I am learning how to be better organized as a teacher to us Moodle to its full potential.


So in a nut shell here is what I think

• Technology does not solve all of our problems as educators
• Students are usually more comfortable with technology then many teachers
• Communication with Web 2.0 tends to be casual and informal
• Technology should not replace instruction rather enhance instruction
• Web 2.0 is a great resource for collaboration all around the world
• Web 2.0 is a great place to publish student work

JING

I think Jing is a very useful program. Many times I have had questions about how to do something with technology and have been lost. If only there was something out there to help a visual learner like me? Ah! But now there is! I found out as I was making my screen cast that the microphone does not pick up when the mouse is moving so sorry it is a little rough. It was fun to try and is going to be very helpful as far as tech support goes. I can send step by step pictures with highlights and notes, or make a short example video. It will be useful also to show students how to use some of the technology that I am learning about and trying in class.

My screen cast is about Moodle a course management software that we are encouraged to use at Kodiak High School. We live on an island and a lot of students miss school occasionally whether it is because of extended vacations or that we happen to have amazing athletes that travel to compete off island. Moodle provides a way for students to catch up on assignments and see what they missed when they are off island. I demonstrate how to post a work sheet for student practice.

C:\Documents and Settings\lglenn01\Desktop\2009-02-06_2225.swf

(I am in the process of converting this movie to post it on Youtube)

Moodle (in a couple of bullets)

• Class calendar to inform students of course events
• Provides a topical guide of the course
• Allows students to access information when they are not in class
• Facilitates forums, wikis, quizzes, chats, hot potato games, and more!

I am still getting to know Moodle and its capabilities. I have started a forum that students are going to add to about vocabulary that we are working on about what they like to do in their leisure time. I created groups with all of my classes and next week we are going to see how they do. Moodle is a great tool for students to access when they are not able to be in class. They can look up the objectives and see what they are missing. My next goal with Moodle is to record a short narrative and have students listen and translate!

Tech Tool Box (its growing!)

The web has so much free software available to us. It is amazing to see how many programs one can use to share photos, or store music! I remember when I was in school technology and computers were only used for doing research and typing essays. Word did not even capitalize “i” automatically, if I remember correctly. Teachers could not require typed essays from every student because not everyone had access to a computer and printer at home. If you did not have access to computers at home the option was to write your essays neatly in black or blue ink, but that was always a white-out nightmare for me.

Sometimes if there was lab time we could play a math or spelling game on the computers at school, but I never really did well with these games because I did not get what the little worm on the screen wanted me to do. Now students, our technology natives, pick up games and software instinctually.

• I was experimenting with a program called i- respond. Students have remotes in their hands and as a quiz or game is projected on the screen, students can key in their answer and send it to my laptop which stores it automatically. There is an option to have the scores displayed on a side bar so students can see how they are doing compared to other students. As I was figuring out how to get all of the remotes synced and getting the test set up one student said, “Hey Ms. Glenn, why don’t you let me figure it out?” Sure enough we got it going within minuets after I turned control over to my students.

Despite the fact that they were taking a quiz, my students really enjoyed taking their quizzes through i-respond. There are also games that we can play with this program. So this is the new software I am learning, however it is not free, so on to the free software that I have used and enjoy.

• Moodle
  This is a course management software that our principal is encouraging us to use. We can post homework and lesson plans, set up class calendars, teachers have electronic drop boxes where assignments can be turned in and graded electronically, and we can put copies of worksheets online that students can access when they are traveling for activities or on extended vacations.
  My Spanish students are going to create a visitors guide of Kodiak. We are going to go around town and take picture of some of the cool places of our city and make a blogg. The problem we have is that students do not have access to site such as blogger.com; however we can make bloggs through Moodle.
  
• Babylon.com
  As a Spanish teacher I struggle with allowing students to use online translators to do work. It is just do easy for them to type in something and have the computer do the work for them. Very often the translation is done too literal and is incorrect. However, online translators are good tools to check grammar and vocabulary.
  
• Audacity.com
  This is a fun program that I have been playing with that records and mixes audio tracks. I used it with Microsoft moviemaker when I made a digital story last semester and am going to use it to record students talking in Spanish. I think it is important for students to hear themselves speaking. I know that when I have heard my voice after I have recorded it I can critique myself better listen for pronunciation and accent correctness.
  
• Youtube.com
  This has been helpful to show movies that other Spanish students have made. Also with my government class we watched a lot of the inauguration and public service announcements that President Obama has made.
  
• LomasTV.com
  This is a new resource that a college of mine introduced me to. It has songs and videos from current Spanish pop culture. With the songs there are games, vocabulary quizzes, and other activities that students really get into.
  
• I use a variety of websites when we talk about culture aspects such as el día de los muertos, la navidad, el día del san valentin, and cinco de mayo to show examples of yarn paintings, tin ornaments, or costumes before students create their own original craft.
  
  Sometime I feel I am pretty green about technology and am just learning how to incorporate it meaningfully in my classes. Another obstacle that I have come up against is that our computer labs are called “extenda labs” so they do not have USB ports on them. It is difficult to input data at school and students can be unreliable to get their homework done at home. There are a couple of stand alone units that we can share, but that takes time. As I can imagine with other school districts in the state there are limitations on students internet privileges and, like I mentioned before, students don’t have access to certain websites. These programs are convenient time savers as I have found that instead of spending hours creating visual aids, worksheets, and writing stories I can use these some of the free technology that is available to do the work for me.

WEB 2.0

Web 2.0 is a revolving door that the entire world is walking in and out of. It is constantly changing and provides many opportunities for educators and students. Although, we do have to take the good with the bad.

• 
  More opportunity to publish so one can reach a broader audience
• 
  Ideas are shared at a rapid rate so information is always changing
• 
  The future of education is collaborative. Students will not be doing as much work individually as that is not always the case in the workforce

Information is everywhere on web 2.0 and we have to be careful about what information we publish, especially about ourselves. I don’t know if I want the world to know every detail about meJ