February 25, 2009

Today we worked with digital images. We worked on resizing them and making sure that they were saved as JPEG of GIFF. We had to make an album of 5 photos all of different media. We also used the Picasa Web Albums to put them all together. The pictures had to be no more than 3x3 and 72 dpi. I thought that this was a good activity to refresh about how to resize pictures in photoshop. It was also good to work with 5 different types of photos. I have always loved working with pictures, so this is something that I enjoy. I think that this could be useful in my teaching career because I would be able to make a Web Album of pictures of my students and share it with the parents. I also think that it is useful for if I want to use pictures in a powerpoint, either for teaching purposes or a presentation to parents. Here is the link to my web album. http://picasaweb.google.com/ssadler1027/DigitalImages486?feat=directlink

February 23, 2009

Today we finished up our lesson plans that we started last week. We had them peer-reviewed and turned them in. I thought that peer-reviewing the lesson plans was very helpful. It was interesting to read someone else's lesson plan and hear their ideas. It is interesting how different all of the plans can be. I liked the format that we used to write the lesson plans, because it helped in how to plan out the lesson. The format made me think through many specifics that I may not have thought through otherwise. I also thought that the format was helpful in reading another person's lesson plan because it helped to see all parts of the lesson and envision what would be going on. The format helped the writer to be very thorough in the plan. I think that it is hard to write a lesson plan in a class like this because it will not be implemented in a classroom any time soon. I also think that it is hard to think of a good lesson because there is not a specific group of students that you are thinking of when writing the lesson. I think that once I am a teacher it will be much easier to write lessons because I will know the students that I am working with and what kind of lesson fits their learning style best.

February 9, 2009

Today we worked with partners to create Webquests in wikis. I worked with another girl who is in ECE with me, Kelly Sauer. We did a science Webquest for second graders about the phases of the moon. This was interesting to make on a wiki, and different than just creating a Webquest like we did last week. I think that this lesson is something that I really would use with students if I end up teaching 2nd grade. I still think that Webquests are impractical for early childhood students because their access to computers is limited, as well as their skills in using computers. I do think that it is interesting and good to learn these things so that I have the option to use them when I do become a teacher. It was good to work together today with someone within my major to create a lesson that is realistic and could be used. I also think that using the wikis today was good because it gave some more practice on using the wikis which we still have to use for some other assignments. I think that practice is always good when learning a new skill so that it is not forgotten as easily.

WebQuests

Yesterday in Instructional Technology 486 we worked on creating WebQuests. I found them to be very interesting, and a great way to walk students through something that they are supposed to be doing. I found a lot of WebQuests that seemed like they would be a lot of fun for students and make that subject area interesting to them. I think that these can be useful in allowing students to take initiative over their learning and feel like they have some sort of control in it. I do think that there is a limit to WebQuests however. I think that in certain schools they would be great for the students to be able to work on outside of school, but the reality is that many students may not have access to computers. I think that this needs to be seriously thought about before assigning them to the students for homework. I think that if there is a school computer lab that would be available for the class to use during that lesson time to work on the WebQuests, that would be the best idea.
I worked with Ashley Cole to create a WebQuest for early elementary students for learning about different animals and their environments. It was a lot of fun to create, and I think that students would have a lot of fun with it. Here is the link to our WebQuest: http://questgarden.com/76/08/3/090202055507/