The Final Video

This took an excruciatingly long time to upload.  With this being the last assignment of the semester, the "upload complete" prompt couldn't have been sweeter!

Overall, this class has been a joy.  Suggestions from everyone have opened up a new world of technologies and how to apply them in today's classroom.

The link to the video, as required in the "Technofy a Lesson" is available BY CLICKING HERE.

Hope everyone has a great summer.  All the best.  

Technofing Revolution

I.  


After a history course this semester, I've become fascinated with the French Revolution.  Dietrich Bonhoffer, a prominent German philosopher, called the French Revolution the beginning on the decline of western civilization, the time when western man became disillusioned with himself.  David A. Bell, writing in The First Total War:  Napoleon's Europe and the Birth of Warfare as We Know It, argued "the modern era has unfolded in the shadow of the French Revolution.  The growth of republics and liberal democracies, the spread of secularism, the development of modern ideologies and the invention of total war all mark their birth during the French Revolution."  I had heard the argument that the Industrial Revolution was similar in consequence and wanted to explore the similarities between these two events.  So, as much for my own learning as for my future students, I thought I'd put together my technofied lesson on this topic, the French Revolution.


I found an interesting lesson plan at PBS.org.  A PDF version of the original lesson plan is available for download BY CLICKING HERE.


II.  


The side by side comparison of the original lesson plan and my revised version is available as a Word document BY CLICKING HERE.


III.   


The stand alone revised lesson plan is available as a Word document BY CLICKING HERE. 


IV.  


A 500 word justification for technology application is available as a Word document BY CLICKING HERE.


V.  


A short video describing some of the tech features, as soon as it uploads, will follow.






  

A Polished Blog

I've had a great time re-working some of the design elements.  I actually like the update that Google has done their Blogger platform.  I had the goal of creating a minimalist feel to my blog, trying to keep distractions to a minimum.  It would, however, be nice to incorporate ads and start generating some revenue!  With that in mind, here's a list of some of things I re-worked:

1. I messed around with fonts, font size, background color, link color, and the date/time headings.
2. I renamed my blog.
3. Reformatted the introductions to each post so that they are uniform. 
4. Reformatted videos and images so they appear uniform.
5. Uploaded a higher resolution video of my "personal story, part 2" assignment.   

Wibaux Revised

Given the low quality of my "personal story 2" video, I thought I take some time to upload a higher resolution video.  Wibaux:  Take Two, is below.

A Quest For Truth

In this WebQuest, students will be asked to explore truth on the internet while learning more about the 2012 Presidential candidates.  I chose to use QuestGarden and found it a fairly easy platform to work with.  You'll find the link below.  

A WebQuest Search for Truth on the Internet

Presentation Software Presentation

This went a little longer than I had hoped, so I hope people can still muster the courage to sit through the video. Anyway, for this assignment, I chose to finally figure out how to use the 'screen capture' function on Macs. I'm sure Windows probably has a similar feature. I also explored the use of Twitter in the classroom and created a short Prezi on that topic, the Prezi starts at about 2:30 mark of the movie if you get impatient.

Wibuax's Future

This assignment allowed to me to make use of some footage that has been taking up valuable space on my hard drive for far too long. It's a short piece on Wibaux, Montana. Wibaux is my dad's hometown. To ease export from Final Cut, the editing program I used, I dropped the quality quite a bit. Therefore, video quality is quite low. Sorry.

All content, other than the U.S. Census Maps and Google Map, is mine.

Rubric

I thought that many of our classmates designed great rubrics. After looking back through the discussion following our first stories, I thought that many people made good points concerning what goes into a great video. I tried to encapsulate some of the best ideas into my rubric. And I'm even reconsidering my point about credits. Credit where credit is due! I just wish there was a an easier way to do them so they don't appear as if I'm scrolling down in a Word document.

Introducing Iter

This is the first public announcement of a little side project I've been working on for a couple of years. Still waiting for the first donation.  I tried to go with some hand made signs and sketches which is inspired by some of our classmates videos.

Smart Grammar

I chose to do a simple grammar lesson that explains using comparative adjectives. I downloaded the SmartNotebook software and then went over to the TRC on campus to use their SmartBoard and capture the presentation on video. This was my first experience with SmartBoards.

At first, I found the software to be a little overwhelming, however, after watching a couple of tutorials online I quickly got the hang of it.

Even easier, actually, is using the SmartBoard itself. After we got the SmartPen calibrated correctly it was quite enjoyable using the technology.

For a geography class, there were a couple of interesting videos that showed students dragging and dropping the names of US states onto the correct position of the map. This could be useful in any region of the world as well as for identifying geographic features likes lakes, mountain ranges, peninsula, etc.

It seems to be that this tool works best when kids can be in the driver seat. I didn't really see the advantages to my lesson or the ones online that simply featured a teacher lecturing. However, the tool seems to be most engaging when kids are interacting with the board themselves.

Maria Montessori: A Google Earth 'Bio' Tour

Below you should find the link to my Google Earth "Bio Tour" of Maria Montessori. For some reason, the audio kept cutting out at 2 minutes. After a couple different attempts at I kinda gave up.

Here is the information that I was unable to include in my audio portion of the tour, information is drawn heavily from Rita Kramer's 1976 work Maria Montessori: A Biography:

In 1913, Montessori arrived America, she was at the height of her fame and one of the most famous women in the world. The Brooklyn Daily Eagle described her as "a women who revolutionized the educational system of the world-whose success has been so wonderful that the Montessori method has spread into nation after nation as far east as Korea, as far west as Honolulu and south to the Argentine Republic.

However, within 5 years Montessori would be all but forgotten in American, known only to a few professors of education.

She died in the Western Netherlands in 1951 at the age of 91.

Roughly a decade after her death, her methodologies would see a resurgence and today there are thousands of Montessori schools around the world.

Click Here 4 Maria Montessori: A Google Earth 'Bio' Tour

iHomework

A couple of my students are trying out this app this semester in hopes of keeping them a bit more organized. I think it is a couple of dollars in the App Store. I'll reply back and see how they find it.

Stories

First Post

What I'm hoping to learn...

I guess one of the main things I'm hoping to learn in this class is how computers and technology can be used in the classroom in a way that is not distracting for students. While I do understand why and how new technologies can be so advantageous for learners, my experiences in the classroom tell me that iPads, laptops and other flashy technology are just as distracting as there are helpful. Obviously, it is important for our students to be literate and savvy in new technologies, so I'll be looking for ways to best use and teach new technologies in a way that does not become too distracting or too flashy for my kids.

What's my technology expertise level...

I consider my tech expertise to be of a higher level.

What grade I'm hoping to teach...

I'm hoping to teach high school social studies.

How long I've been teaching...

While I'm not currently teaching now, I have over 2 years of ESL experience and a half year of high school economics experience.

Something Interesting...

While I wouldn't necessarily considered things I'm interested in interesting to other people, I do have an acute curiosity for oral historians, good storytelling and American folklore. I'm a native of Montana and my ancestry can be traced through the copper mines of Anaconda and the prairies of Wibaux county.