Activity #7 Cloud computing

I created a google doc that I would use in class as a tool to have students write and share information during a unit on food and restaurants. I would have 10 students or perhaps a whole class share the document so that they could read about other restaurants. They would obviously share it with me also.

I would probably use this as a formative assessment - students would discuss what they wrote in class. At the end of the unit I would do something similar as a summative assessment.


https://docs.google.com/a/moundsviewschools.org/document/d/19XNzV50xS1rotYfE2snxwYHwnMM4sKghv_SrCcUOlow/edit?usp=sharing

I like the idea of using this as a tool for students to share work. I guess they could do the same thing on paper... but it is nice that they can comment on each other's work. I would probably add a piece that they have to make a comment on at least 2. As with all of these tools they are nice and some very fancy - but I am not sure if this makes my job easier. The positive is that they are easily shared and all students have google accounts so that is nice. The negative is - do you do this is class or as an assignment? If it is an assignment there are always some kids that do not complete it, but in class seems like you might be wasting time having them write.

Activity #6: Study tools

I used Tagxedo for my first study tool. It took only a few minutes to create a word picture and it was easy. I could not figure out if there was a place to sign in OR if I was simply supposed to save it to my computer. I did a few of them because I was not sure what I was doing. I can see using this for word poems or a fun way to display a vocabulary list. I made one with all of the members of my family. I printed it and used it as a card. FUN colors to choose from and fun outlines - though some don't look so great once the words are in them. This example is a simple geography of South America word bank in the shape of South America. I could use this to introduce the geography - or to use as a matching activity with countries and capitals.

For my second study tool I tried to use study blue but it kept making my computer crash! :( So, I moved on to quizlet. I have had students use quizle to study Spanisht in the past, but I have never generated my own flashcards. I have had students search the many thousands of card sets already available.

I decided to enter a set of vocabulary that I will be using this fall. Then I played with all of the activities that you can so. I really liked all of the activities! The flashcards are useful just to start studying. I liked that the Spanish characters were already there so I didn't have to use html codes. I also was really excited when you can actually hear the words spoken in Spanish - and it actually sounds ok! It took moments to create and seems to be useful. I will use this and/or offer it to my students to create their own.

Activity #5 You Tube Channel

Finally something that I have actually done! I set up a you tube channel last year so that I could have students produce and upload a news cast (which was their final speaking assessment for the semester) to my youtube channel. In groups of 4-6 students created a newscast and filmed using Ipads. I had already logged into my youtube channel (on the Ipad) so when the students were done with their presentation they simply hit upload. I checked my channel and then deleted them from the Ipads. They completed.the task during 1 class period. (They were to be ready to go with their news story before class.)

I had a lot of feedback from my students. Many loved it because they did NOT have to present in front of class. Some HATED it because they kept on trying to get a perfect take and got really anxious. All in all it was a decent activity. It took a while to grade, but wasn't too bad.

I did also link the videos to moodle so they could use the videos as a listening activity. We did watch some in class, but mainly they did the listening outside of class. It was a nice review of lots of different vocabulary.

Activity #4 Screencasting

I am very familiar with the SMART software, but I have never used the video recorder. It was not difficult,  but again this time I cannot get it uploaded properly to the blog. I can see it just fine in my computer - but when I revert over to the blog it is a screen capture instead of the video. I will have to go to one of the sessions for help - but Wednesday's don't work well for me. I tend to get very frustrated when I cannot figure out something and this is the second time in a row that I cannot figure out what I am doing. I do like learning all of these new tools and perhaps this would be easier if I were actually at school instead of at home. It seems like everyone else gets how to embed stuff into their blog. Can it be that difficult??

OKAY! So, 2 weeks later I have come back to this and I think that I figured out how to do this. I uploaded the screen cast to my you tube channel and then uploaded it that way. Perhaps that is an extra step - but at least it works. I am sure that there is more than one way to do pretty much everything!

Activity #3: Digital Storytelling

#3 Digital Storytelling

I thought that both of these sites had some opportunities for student use. I like the idea of students writing and creating their own stories. This is a great way for students to share stories without using a bunch of paper. I found myself spending time uploading pictures so that I could create a book that I could use with my students.I decided to use ZooBurst because it was the one that I could upload my own images. First I had to upload the images to my computer. From what I could figure out I couldn't download them directly from the internet. It didn't take too long to get what I wanted onto my computer. Then it was really easy to create the book with text. It did allow me to use Spanish character - but I needed to use the HTML codes for each Spanish character.

Tapas book with ZooBurst