Embedded Task Two - Reflection On The Practical Uses of Blogs.
Unless you are enumerating 240 different types of tobacco ash (243!)or depicting the adventures of a sociopathic yet charming mad man, blogs are not a type of technology you would commonly use in everyday life. In fact, numerous people are under the assumption that a blog is similar to a online diary shared with anyone who wishes to read it.
I must admit, before this course, I was under the same assumption. Who could possibly want an online diary that anyone could read? I had not considered the possibilities beyond an online diary. But after using the technology, I'm discovering a world of alternate possibilities.
Blogs, being part of Web 2.0 technology as they are, contain the ability to be more than just the simple static text and inserted pictures of a website. Customisable to a point with a few, simple easy clicks -and even further with a few more complicated ones - blogs can become as personal or impersonal as you would like. In fact, this week I did just that - my background is now purple!
Of course, just like the websites of Web 1.0, you can insert static images, like the one below:
(Retrieved from samandfuzzy.deviantart.com)
Multimedia becomes a tool at your fingertips with a blogs instead of a hindrance: videos, GIFS, links and even inserted quotes - the possibilities become endless with a little creativity.
"Creativity Is Intelligence Having Fun." ~ Albert Einstein.
Of course, blogs do have their limits, as nothing is infallible. Upfront is the restriction of it being a single author platform. Of course, multiple people could run it together, but therein lies the difficulty. Privacy settings allow only the account holder to edit, but everyone to read, comment and follow. With a touch more navigation, you can restrict search options.
Another limitation is the commenting system. There is only the ability to comment on the post, with no discussion threads to have. If you were conducting the blog as we do in the course, having one person post content, then others comment upon it, the system would be sound - to have debates, move somewhere else!
This is not to say that the technology could not be enhanced through pedagogy. Using SAMR, for example, could boost the abilities of the blogging technology. Instead of being a static blog, you could use embedded links, videos and pictures to aid and assist learning, scaffold tasks and assessment, and set students on the right research track.
But does that mean it should be integrated into my classroom and my lesson plans? After all, the adjustment and set up with this blog was easy enough, after I found which button to press! If a 19 year old who grew up with a block of a cell phone and a Nintendo 64 (I know, a bit behind the times!) could figure it out, a tech savvy student should find it a breeze!
Funnily enough, I ended up with a picture in class that asked me how you would upgrade your usage of a blog in the setting of a classroom. Call it fate or luck... but it made me think. Obviously, substituting it into the lesson plan in place of something else would be easy - but getting it to the M and R levels of SAMR would be much harder.
After a good ponder, and a bit of old-school scribbling on paper, I decided a blog of the M and R levels would have to have the following:
- Multiple readers
- An ability to interact with the creator and vice verse.
- A wide feedback response
- Multimedia - audio, video, games, links, pictures, GIFS etc.
- Be a communication hub
Of course, the only question then was what did that look like in a real life classroom? Obviously more than my feeble first attempt! Firstly, I would have to determine my students' technology level - how many grew up with their finger glued to the keyboard, and how many were like me and preferred mud to computer games. In other words - the technology savvy and the stragglers.
Perhaps this would then turn the first lesson into a pure technology lesson - how to create and use a blog. Therefore, it would become not one lesson, but a series of lessons using the technology. Creating wikis might be the next step, as the two are a well linked pair. Of course, then, we would need activities! As a history teacher, I might ask them to keep a blog series on topics learnt over the year, or ask them to role-play a blog post as one of the historical figures they are learning about - posting and commenting in character of course! Video technology certainly would come in handy there.
Really, the plans would have to change depending on my students though. I'm sure there would be a mischievous student - like I once was - who would take the role-play task and have a bit too much fun with it...
(CUE my "I-am-Death" rant as I lay on the floor in English after reading The Book Thief.)
Embedded Task One - Reflection On Activity: De Bono's Hats
De Bono's Hats; one of the most memorable and interesting primary school group tasks ever accomplished in the 00's. Familiar as I was with this type of activity, I was ready to jump right in. Metaphorically placing that first hat on my head felt like primary school all over again.
That being said, De Bono's Hats is not limited to primary school. In fact, being as thought-directing as it is, De Bono's Hats can be used in any situation. For example, as an English teacher, I could utilise De Bono's Hats with my students to work out their argument in an essay or feature article piece. The possibilities, as they say, are endless.
De Bono's Hats, structured as it is, allows students to untangle their thoughts and look at one piece of the argument at a time. First off, the White hat asks them for the facts, and only the facts. No personal opinion here! The Yellow and Black hats ask for the positives and the negatives, respectively. Students, with these hats metaphorically on their heads, can focus individually on the benefits and the judgements that may arise about the issue.
The Red and Green hats turn the matter away from the facts and more toward the student's own personal opinion. The Red hat asks for the emotions and feeling about the topic, which allows the student to move from a logical and empirical outlook on the topic to a more emotion driven one. The Green hat then asks the student about possibilities and alternatives, challenging them to be creative about a solution.
All in all, a rather well thought out approach to a topic or issue. Its thought producing style encourages student's to slow down and consider each piece instead of looking too much at the picture as a whole. This keeps in mind Bloom's work and the idea about how student's must break down work to understand it.
Useful even in everyday life, this activity will remain happily amongst my pedagogy tools.
Technology Within The Classroom: It's Drawbacks And It's Advantages.
Advances within technology means the software and hardware we use on a day-to-day basis is becoming smarter and better than ever. No longer are we rewinding VHS tapes or flipping the cassette over to the other side to hear the rest of the tape. However, these advances cause us as users and educators to ponder to question: "What place does technology take in the classroom?"
The answer should be simple, should it not? If technology has a place in everyday life, surely it has a place in education - which, to many young people, is 5 days a week of everyday life. Now, as a pre-service English, History and - eventually - Japanese teacher, I am all for technology within the classroom; until the help becomes a hindrance.
Broken laptops, dead batteries, faulty internet connections and DVDs that skip the most important part; technology morphs from the greatest classroom resource a teacher could have at their finger tips, to the worst enemy ever encountered in the classroom (or at least it feels so when you can't make the stupid YouTube video work after the fourth try.) And thus, my wariness of technology within the classroom begins.
Restrictions are not limited to the technology alone, though. Students, their responsibility and their backgrounds often come into play. I never owned my own laptop until grade 10, when it was bought for me. I only bought an iPod this year. And my phone was an old web-slider until 3 years ago. Teachers now would have labelled me as having a low socio-economical background, especially as I had a single mother. My case is not unique, and many a child - especially in public school like I was - can not afford the technology demanded by the school.
Of course, this isn't to say technology is an inherently bad resource to use within the classroom. The internet, being a database - or at the very least a link - to all the information the human race has ever collected as it is, becomes a tool for not only research, but creative outlet.
As mentioned in Sir Ken Robinson's TED speech (2006), the education system puts entirely too much merit on the academia, and not enough on the creative. As a creative soul myself, I distinctly remember doing as Judy Willis mentions in her video - bored out of my mind and scribbling over my books, or staring out the window. Now, this is not simply because school in the late 90's and early 00's was boring, per say, but because the lack of creative items to engage me.
Therefore, in the end, I can only state that whilst technology is a wonderful resource I will utilise, my students will still be handwriting their English rules and History dates out in full hand on pen and paper.
