Futures Perspective

How would the future classroom like like?

THIS??

OR THIS??

Personal insight: I identify myself as a digital immigrant. Born in 1975, I am actually an in-between bewteen Generation X and Y. i remember only having to use the computer- Microsoft Word when I was attending a night course. Then I was already working and was 22! I now can see the advantages of harnassing technological tools to our advantage. Being a mother of 2 young children and taking a full-time university course, this would not have been possible if there was no e-learning available. I can now do my assignments when the children are asleep or access Moodle even in singapore (a 12 hours flight away).

A final thought: As digital immigrants, we can see the transformation of education and learning from a world without technology to one that is greatly dependent and enhanced by it. We are thus in an advantegous position to retain good teaching methodolgies of the past- tried and proven and use them in new ways, making effective use of technology.

Game based Learning- Learnig Objects

As a parent and educator, I have witnessed and thus standing fully convinced how game-based learning makes learning so engaging it does not even seem like learning at all.

My son has learnt all his phonetic sounds, sight words and reading words by playing computer games like Sesame Street and PBS, to name a few. Enagagement was never an issue as he could sit on them for hours. Arithmetic skills like addition and identifying quantities were part of the game process and he simply picked them up as part of the playing process. The only downside is only that his hands which were used for the mouse and keyboard often now find it a chore to write. As an ironic twist, he actually prefers to type!

As an educator, I have used the learning federation objects in class and seen the transformation in the students' faces. I had no problem with classroom management and I had the total engagement of all the students. the visuals made it easy for me to illustrate my points and the instant responses kept the students interacting.

As a futures prespective, I would hope that learning managers embrace the flexibility of technology and use ICT on a everyday basis. This would remove the commonly percieved notion of the classroom being "boring, traditional, conformist" to one of "creativity, self-direction and socially collaborative.

Below is a list of game-based learning websites.

http://pbskids.org/lions/games/

http://toytheater.com/

http://www.sesamestreet.org/games

http://www.readwritethink.org/

http://www.tburg.k12.ny.us/mcdonald/mathfun.htm

In a Science Unit I taught during my Prac, we used a learning object from the Learning Federation website titled "Where does tap water come from?
to illustrate the journey of water from its source to the tap. Studets fix a jigsaw that shows the passage of water that students do not normally get to see because they are in pipes or underground.

R11124- Water Quality and Use is a collection of 25 curriculum resources that has learning objects and images that demonstrate the importance of keeping waterways unpolluted.

Linking Bloom's Taxonomy to ICT

http://edorigami.wikispaces.com/Bloom's+and+ICT+tools

A link of ICT tools to the cognitive processes as defined by Bloom's Taxonomy can be accessed at the above website.

My map

My evening walk

I have experimented with goggle Earth and constructed a route of my evening walk around my neighbourhood. Having dabbled in this, I now feel more confident in using this as a digital tool. Before this course, I did not even know we could do that!

Thomas Andy- Space Shuttle Launch

To introduce students to Thomas Andy, Australia's astronaut that travelled to space, a video clip of the launch of the space shuttle in his first mission is shown.






This will spark off interest for students and allow them to witness a real-life connectivity to the project. The lesson moves to a wider social context within which students live and extents the value and meaing of the lesson beyond its instructional context as promoted in productive pedagogies - connectedness to the world.

Digital Video as a tool for learning

In my e-learning journey. I discover that presenting text with an image will enhance learning. Now that I have also learnt to make a video, I realise that to have moving images and sound added, the captivation to the students becomes further heightened. Therefore, I have converted my powerpoint to a video and added animation and music and even surprised myself as I become more emotionally engaged to the movie now that the Australian National anthem is added.

Click on the link to watch the movie.

This movie can be used as a "hook" at the beginning of the unit to solicit prior knowledge. Students can be asked to pen down the famous Australians' names as they flash by. As such, the learning manager can assess how much the students already know and also gauge the students' interests by observing the responses to the diverse Australians.

It can also be used as a concluding activity at the end of the unit as students write down the Australians they now know so that it will display the knowledge they have explored and retained throughout the entire project.

Students can be encouraged to present their projects in a movie by using Moviemaker and this movie can serve as a spark of interest or model for them to decide. This will encourage multi-model ways of completing project. Students can choose between a poster, a powerpoint, a website, a video or a photostory to present their project.

The use of images and podcasts as digital tools and pedagogies

Recently, I was given the oportunity in Prac to help deliver a project unit titled "Famous Australians". When we conducted a brainstorm with the students what famous Australians they already knew, we were surprised to hear answers like: “Michael Jackson, Pink, Lady Gaga.."

Apparently, the students are exposed to a fair amount of American culture and pop culture as that and thus I took the liberty to construct a powerpoint with pictures of many famous Australians and making sure to include a diverse range of achivements, spanning from medical, sports, arts, literature, aborginal, music (including opera, aborginal, classical), dance and others like business, crime and science.

These are some of the pictures used.

(Google Images, 2010)

I have chosen to pepper the powerpoint with images and have one or two liners to introduce the Australians as my objective was to give overview of the many diverse achievements Australians have attained and to stretch the students' present knowledge of Australia being famous for sports and pop to the many other (less-represented in popular culture) achievements like science and opera. This is an example of pushing the limits of the students' knowledge and abilities stated in DOL habits of mind- creative thinking.

As an ancient Chinese proverb says:" A picture speaks a 1000 words." and the above images will illustrate that. Andy Thomas with his astronaut suit, John Simpson statue with his donkey and Vivian Bullwinkel in her military nurse suit. The genre, the clothes, the background, to name a few are the many visual cues in the image that the students will pick up without having to teach. The high frequency of images ensure that the students stay absorbed and the impression is retained in their minds. This is far more effective than reading out.

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In a Science Unit titled:" How do I do my part to save water?", a photograph of the water cycle was used to illustrate the journey of water. This is used in conjunction with a learning federation object-" Where does water come from? L203.


The image gives a comprehensive illsutration of the water cycle. The stages marked out clearly how water changes state throughout the process. The writing process starts with the top and ends at the bottom, This does not illustrate the cyclical process. It gives a false impression that a certain stage of the water cycle is the end in itself. However, by drawing out the closed cycle as illustrated in the picture below, students have a visual impression of the cycle being one lending to another and it is impossible to pinpoint which is the beginning and which is the end.





(Google Images, 2010)




Concept cartoons can be an excellent hook to start a science unit. It starts the class discussion and gives students the context to start predicting, justifying and collaborating.



(conceptcartoons.com)







As a SOSE lesson on Japanese culture, images of Japanese art to be presented.

A vodcast of thw water cycle can be viewed at the following link-

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YswL4dIDQuk

With a catchy jingle and flashing captions, it gives an animated and engaging visual vodast of the water cycle. The short clip is well organised with true-life vivid pictures of different types of clouds and the storage places of water, stopping to show the stages of water and refreshing the memory with the same picture of the water cycle cleverly inserted throughout the clip.

I would have used this vodcast during the Science "Water" unit when we introduced the water cycle. I can also use this to illustrate the different stages of water and to show the importance of conserving water.




I attempted creating my own podcast with podomatic. This is the link- http://oas75.podomatic.com/entry/2010-08-10T19_12_07-07_00

However, i have experienced difficulty in embedding the slideshow and thus this podcast is yet to be improved. I have found that using the Movie maker is a much faster way of making a video

Some ways that I have used images in teaching:

1. Photostory

2. Flow-chart

3. Organization chart

4. Calenders

5. Life cycle

6. Diary

7. Power point presentations

8. Projects

9. Movie maker

10. Games