Article 2 Review

Technology-Rich Projects
Connect with Tech!
By Sarah Marcotte

This article was from Heldref Publications, Vol. 43, No.2, Summer 2006. The ideas in this journal are especially helpful for a classroom teacher planning a field trip to a museum or a particular science-learning institute. The author gives step-by-step details on how to create a group project around a central theme or current exhibitions at the institute.
The article stresses the importance of preparing students before their visit to make it more meaningful. Because the purpose of most institutes is to instruct, their websites are usually geared with information correlating their exhibitions to content standards required by state curriculums.
Rather than preparing a scavenger hunt, the author suggests preparing activity sheets for student groups that require more thought-provoking questions. She also mentioned having the group bring a digital camera. I thought the author’s suggestion of bookmarking articles about the exhibition and other research information on classroom computers provided the scaffolding needed by many students working on group projects and reports.
When the students return from their outing, groups are required to put together a PowerPoint presentation that reviews and incorporates what they have learned in their research before, during and after their visit to a science-learning institute. The reports would address topics or questions posed to the group during the assignment. The PowerPoint would serve as an assessment tool. The presentations may include pictures from the visit as well as those found on the website. If the institute or the students had the equipment, then the author suggested incorporating Podcasts. This extension would allow the students to incorporate audio review.
I find that as sophisticated as this activity may be, it has some suggestions that I may be able to adapt to my grade level. I am taking my first-grade class to the Oregon Zoo on June 7th. After reviewing this article, I visited the Oregon Zoo website. I found that there are some items that I am able to share with my students before our field trip. I have shown a general zoo video in the past. Viewing exhibits on the computer that students will actually experience might make them focus on what they are viewing while they are at the zoo in a more thoughtful way rather than racing from one exhibit to the next. As a review, we could put together a classroom PowerPoint presentation.
I found the suggestions in this article helpful and useful. I think they are ideas that I would be able to adapt and incorporate into my program. If you would like to take a virtual tour behind the scenes of the Oregon Zoo, here is the link: http://www.oregonzoo.org/Animals/slideshow.htm

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Article Review

Technology-Rich Projects

Five Internet sites too good to miss

By Linda D. Labbo

I was happy to find this article in The Reading Teacher May 2006 issue. It is fairly difficult to find technology information or websites that are useful and those that pertain specifically to first grade. I agree with the author’s comment that many Internet sites that supposedly provide young children with suitable activities are not developmentally appropriate. Many sites that profess they are suitable for primary students, I find usually have too many words that children are unable to read or they lack enough support with pictures or audio instructions for children to actively maneuver. It seems most sites that claim to be for primary children are not user-friendly or they don’t parallel the primary grade curriculum.

The author suggested five Internet sites in this article that are unique. They appear to be user-friendly and appropriate for the primary student. Coincidently, I use the first site, www.starfall.com, in my classroom quite often. It is especially good for non-readers or emerging readers as well as offering extended lessons and open-ended writing lessons for diversified levels of students. For children who require more scaffolding, Starfall provides comprehensible transitions between pages. For example, a star blinks to indicate to the children what to do next.

The other four websites the author suggested for primary students are unfamiliar to me. She suggested MoJo’s Musical Mouseum at www.kididdles.com/mouseum, the Biography Maker at www.bham.wednet.edu/bio/biomarker.htm, MotherGoose.com at www.mothergoose.com, and Months of the Year Published Project at www.siec.k12.in.us/~west/proj/month/index.html#Top. I visited each one of these sites and spent some time becoming familiar with them.

I found MoJo’s Musical Mouseum a site that offered an extensive list of children’s song lyrics, many accompanied by piano to help learn the rhythm. I plan to use this website as a teacher resource to provide more songs for my students. I plan to print the song lyrics for their personal reading poetry notebooks. I do not feel my students would navigate or stick with this site to provide significant learning. It is what I would consider an adult-assisted site.

Next I toured Biography Maker. It is a website sponsored by Bellingham School District in Bellingham, Washington. It is a tutorial to help instruct students on writing a biography. I think it is well done and would be helpful to students at the level where writing a biography was part of the curriculum.

I also visited MotherGoose.com and Months of the Year Published Projects. I found MotherGoose.com fairly wacky. I wasn’t sure what it was all about at first but when I went to the games and played Jack Be Nimble I was sure it was silly. I had 12 chances to press the space bar and assist Jack over the candlestick but apparently I was not very nimble in my timing of the space bar and Jack landed on the candle repeatedly. Each time his bum hit the flame, he would scream. I am not sure this site would assist much with literacy but might help with agility using the space bar and timing.

Months of the Year Published Projects was by far the best site as a resource for myself and for my students. It is a website designed by a first-grade teacher and followed many of the same topics I cover. This teacher has wonderful links to photos for Painted Lady butterflies and Luna moths. It gives a visual tour of Mount Vernon and historic Lincoln sites. This site has wonderful ideas on organizing curriculum using technology-rich projects over the months of the year. I am certainly game to give a few of these suggestions a try.

Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture: Media Education for the 21st Century

Part 1 and 2

Review and Response

I enjoyed reading this article even though it was lengthy and had a tendency to reiterate several points. At times, it seemed as if the article could possibly be written by representatives or lobbyists for the Internet gaming industry.

The article continued to point out that children today live in a “hypermediated environment” and if something isn’t done or a “paradigm shift” doesn’t occur in how we educate students, there will be an even greater economical and cultural divide than what appears to already exist in our society. Besides students meeting the educational standards that already exist, students must possess the ability to use the computer to gather information, collate what they find, hypothesize, organize, and then communicate what they have found to a particular audience.

The article explores the powerful role computer games can play in children’s ability to navigate the Internet. Multiple examples were given on how games provide problem-solving experiences and simulations as well as opportunities to collaborate with peers to create collective intelligences to solve complex problems.

I agree with the authors that simulation and problem-solving experiences can be effective for students. I believe all the positive examples were directed toward those who are less informed about the positives of computer games and tend to dwell on the negatives, such as computer games being violent. Likewise, many believe all communication between teens on the Internet is inappropriate, and that child molesters are waiting to prey on undiscriminating and uninformed victims. While this may be true in limited instances, we shouldn’t let such fear keep us from gaining all the educational benefits the Internet has to offer.

The article stresses that one of our main objectives as educators of technology should be to teach children to decipher information and be able to discriminate what is legitimate information or a scam. Students need to be aware of the hazards and consequences of certain types of information as well as the benefits. Students who do not have the ability to use transmedia navigation will be left behind.

Access to the Internet is so vast that we cannot be gatekeepers of all the possible sites students may use on the Internet. We can, however educate them in the ethics of being responsible users.

And What's Up With Sexy Librarians?

I am completely fascinated with the blogging culture or phenomena. Bloggers have a good sense of humor. They're informal and do not seem to worry about rules. I spent a lot of time following link after link. I found that many of the blog sites I checked were all linked to one another and everyone was linked to "Bud the teacher." Did anyone listen to the podcast where he belched loudly in the middle of his message? That was unique!! I am definitely out of the loop. I just listen to the radio while I drive home.
For more on sexy librarians, see the Blue Skunk Blog. I am going to see if I can figure out how to link this.

This is a test

This is a test.

Third posting

This is my third posting. Mrs. House is a show off.