Video Sharing and Screencasting!

This week our task was to think about the implications of mobile learning and to create a screen cast on a Web 2.0 tool. I watched some very interesting videos about mobile learning. One discussed the future of education, and how it will be the "iSchool." Students would use their iPhone or iTouch to communicate with their teachers. There are so many applications out there for learning that I had no clue about. They have applications for learning about the different US Presidents, viewing globes, exploring space, checking out the periodic table, or even word processing applications. Students would utilize these applications to learn useful information and communicate and collaborate with their peers through other apps. It seems like a whole other innovative way of learning, but it is probably where are future is headed. As far as video sharing, there are many things that teachers need to take into consideration when using videos in the classroom. They need to ultimately obtain permission from the original creator and make sure that they are using the video for educational purposes. Teachers should also make sure that the videos that they provide to students are accessible to all individuals. Videos must be able to work on various browsers, and should even include captions when necessary.

I decided to create my screencast on Voki which is a free service that allows you to create avatars with different backgrounds and physical features. There are many interactive ideas for using Voki in the classroom. Voki can be used for students to introduce themselves to the class, read poems, explain math concepts, create characters from a book, or even practice saying English words to become fluent. There are endless opportunities of ways to use Voki in the classroom. I could definitely see how screencasting could also be a helpful tool to use in the classroom, especially in distance education. The teacher can model a process and students can then follow exact steps presented.

Photo Sharing!!

This weeks focus was to learn more about photo sharing sites, their features, and to think about how you could incorporate them in your final website. I learned a lot from browsing through each of the websites for the photo sharing applications. I looked at the information for Flickr, Photobucket, Google Images, and Picasa. I chose to create an account for Flickr. I really like the option that it provides for embedding a slide show of pictures into a website. I ended up integrating this into my website that I am creating. I am creating a website that teaches third graders about the human body, and for lesson 1, they will learn about the three main types of joints in the body. So, I embedded a Flickr slide show of pictures into my joints lesson. I found three pictures of the three different types of joints, and then described each one and created a slide show of pictures. I think that students will benefit from being able to visually see each joint. I may even try to find some videos to incorporate in the slide show so students can see how the joints actually work in the human body, and so students can see how each joint moves differently at different body parts.

Concept Map & First draft of Website

I found this week's activities somewhat difficult because I had never created a concept map for designing a website before. I found this process difficult at first, because I had to decide on a topic. I chose to create a website that might have useful information for me and my future students. I decided to create a website about the human body and the different parts of it. I designed it for third graders. I organized it into different lessons that the students would be going through on their own as well as a review and quiz after the lessons.

The tool I chose to use to aid me in developing a website was Weebly. I have been very impressed with Weebly so far. It has been easy to use because all you have to do is drag and drop different items such as text, images, or videos, on to the site and they appear on the page. Also, Weebly provided several tutorials that were useful when first learning to create a website.

I think this new experience of developing a website will be challenging and exciting at the same time. I am excited to begin planning my lessons and deciding what multimedia I should incorporate in the lessons. I am glad I am getting the chance to develop my own website, and I hope to be able to use what I learn while doing this in the future.

De-constructing a Website

This week in ECI 719, I had the task of de-constructing a website. At first, I was a little overwhelmed with this task, but once I began mapping out the site, I was able to get the hang of de-constructing it. By using the site map provided on the ISTE website, I was able to successfully create a concept map of the de-construction. Also, I found it helpful to begin with the top of the page and move to the bottom of the page while looking for all of the links.

From the readings, I learned a lot of valuable information to consider when creating my own website. Bob Hunt provided steps to take when designing websites. He urged the importance of knowing what your visitor's are looking for and understanding the purpose of the website. Also, he discussed the importance of organizing a site map and arranging visual elements so they work together. Phil Brisk also offered suggestions of things to think about when designing a website. His three main suggestions were: remember how the brain works, remember how eyes move, and remember you're here to communicate, not decorate. All of these suggestions seem to focus on the importance of making sure that the site is organized so that it is easy to read, simple, to the point, and providing relevant information.

Accessibility is Key.

This week allowed me to use what I read about accessibility and put it in to practice by evaluating a school's website. I found that to determine if a website is accessible, it is important to make sure the website is perceivable, operable, understandable, and robust (Web Design in a Nutshell). Also, I used the checklist provided in the readings by W3C to help me determine if the website I analyzed was accessible.

The website that I evaluated was able to be opened on several different browsers, and handheld devices. It also was able to be magnified and still easily read. Also, the pictures were good quality when magnified. The website also did a very good job of grouping related links together, and providing links to go to the top of the page. The "Home" button was also accessible from every page of the website, and it was the first link on the website.

The main problems that I encountered as far as accessibility of the school's website were the school not providing titles for their pictures, using different color texts and not making them available without color, and providing crowded/long text in some places. All of these issues seem to be pretty simple to fix. I plan on using what I learned about the importance of accessibility in the readings this week and apply them to any website I create in the future.

The Benefits of Collaboration & Rubrics

Through this week's lesson, I learned a lot about the importance of collaboration. I think that working on creating a rubric with a group helped show me how many great ideas can be brought together as one. It also conveyed that putting your thoughts together can create stronger points and ideas. By working with a group this week to create an evaluation rubric, and working with the class to finalize it, we were able to come up with a very good evaluation tool that will be able to be used in the future.

It is important that we have a way of effectively evaluating websites so that we are able to use them in our future classroom. Websites used in the classroom must be appropriate for the students being taught. Also, providing students with this rubric and having them evaluate websites would be a good tool for teaching them how to distinguish what makes a good website. Students would then be able to apply what was evaluated by the tool, and look at these criterion in the future when browsing for good websites.

Evaluating Educational Websites

This week I learned a lot about how to evaluate different websites and what features make a good website. The book, Web Design in a Nutshell suggested the importance of being able to open websites on different browsers and screen sizes. Other articles, such as the Ten Good Deeds in Web Design provide many other ideas of ways to evaluate websites. This article mentioned the importance of having a search bar, having the Logo take you to the homepage, having subheadings and simple paragraphs, and link titles. Jakob Nielson, also wrote an article that gave ways to evaluate websites such as splitting up long information in to different pages, using bulleted lists, and subheadings. Another article stressed that content was more important than graphics.

From all of this criteria presented in the readings, I was able to evaluate 5 educational websites. Most all of the websites met the criteria which was impressive, however they were all designed slightly differently. I never thought about how much planning goes in to making a website, but through the assignment this week, I learned much about the little things that go into making a website accessible, aesthetically pleasing, easy to navigate, organized, and uniform. I am looking forward to working with my group to create a rubric of our own to use to evaluate websites in the future.