Web 2.0 Resources Provide Teachers Improved Tools to Reach Students

There are many interesting technologies available to assist teachers in getting the attention of their students. One reason why teachers should utilize these Web 2.0 resources is that by by doing so teachers are able to take advantage of using the technologies which most of their students already utilize and enjoy. These technologies are also fairly easy to use, even by teachers who are not the most technologically savvy.

One Web 2.0 technology is www.bubbl.us which can be used to generate concept maps. Below is the concept map I will use to demonstrate the interconnectedness of all life.

Another Web 2.0 resource is available from anamito.com. On this website video clips of 30 seconds or less may be produced.  The process is simple. You can use pictures from the website or upload your own photos. I very easily uploaded some pictures I had taken while vacationing in Monterey, CA this past summer to make my video which you can view below. I plan on using this video to introduce the the diversity of life discussion I will have with my class as I introduce the taxonomy lesson in my Biology class this January.


Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

The animato website was very easy to use. I think students could make their own video's easily. I plan on asking them to make a video using eight pictures which they take of various life forms during the classification section of biology.


Another example of a Web 2.0 resource which is easy to use and will catch the eye of students is glogster.com. Glogster, which is a completely new take on the classroom bulletin board or poster. Your glogster poster can have traditional text but much more. You can embed video clips and URL links. The animated graphics also help teachers draw attention to content by using the proverbial "bells and whistles.".

I found glogster easy to use, although embeding the video took some time, primarily because the tutorial video I viewed was not based on the current website's design.


The ability to construct computer games with content which you provide is also available from classtools.net. I have discovered that many student's will work hard to compete in a game who seldom study for exams.  This Web 2.0 resource allows teachers to input their own content into various game formats for teachers to use to build games with which to challenge their students.

Click here for larger version

You can also use your own content and help students study and improve their quiz scores on this website as well utilizing flash cards.

Click here for larger version

I found each of the Web 2.0 resources rather easy to use, after taking time to familiarize myself with each website. I will utilize them in the future to transfer some of my class lecture content into formats that I will include on my class's website. I will also give my student's assignments to complete using these Web 2.0 resources, especially glogster, for various units in our curriculum. I recommend these resources to other classroom teachers.

Other Web 2.0 resources which teachers may find helpful include:

• VoiceThread http://voicethread.com/
• Tikatok http://www.tikatok.com/
• Google Lit trips http://www.googlelittrips.org/
• Big Huge Labs http://bighugelabs.com/
• Blabberize http://blabberize.com/

Educating for Today and Tommorrow

Watch this video and ask your self whether you agree or disagree with her regarding our need for improving education. Also, What is the role of vocational education in the information age? If we only educate information workers who will I call when I need a plumber?

Musings on Education as a Profession

Based upon my own analysis, achieving professional status for educators should not be a primary concern for teachers or their proponents. Teaching students so that they can master the material and thereby be properly prepared to move forward in their own education should be the preeminent concern. Of the six trends presented in the text the three which demonstrate the most promise of enabling education to obtain a professional status in American society are professional practice boards, mediated entry and staff development.

Professional practice boards could contribute to education being viewed as a profession if they seriously focused on ensuring that quality instruction occurs in the classroom. The amount of time utilized for school announcements and extracurricular concerns is a potential enemy to quality instruction. National certification by one credentialing body such as the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS) may prove problematic. The political organization of the United States leaves great authority to the states. Ballooning federal deficits and unfunded mandates to the states further exacerbate these tensions. Therefore, national efforts in education become over politicized by necessity. It is my opinion that a 50 state strategy which shared a common purpose would be more advantageous, less controversial and accomplish more results in credentialing educators for their employment.

Of the six trends listed in the Foundations of Education (Ornstein, Levine & Gutek, 2011 pp. 36-44)   mediated entry has the greatest potential to most positively impact the field of education. On the job training cannot be over emphasized. Teaching is as much an art as it is a science. One’s ability to teach improves with practice. When new teachers are paired with good veteran teachers both the veteran and apprentice can benefit. Much of the technological expertise and theoretical information which are fresh in the mind of the new teacher may prove helpful to the veteran, while the learned experience of the veteran teacher can potentially save the new teacher both time and trouble.

Staff development should be a primary responsibility of the local school principal. It has been my experience, however, that too often the school administration becomes so engrossed in day-to-day operations of the school campus that staff development takes a backseat. Whether it be the department heads, or master teachers someone in each local school should be researching and sharing their findings with all teachers in an effort to continually improve the practice of teaching.

A trend mentioned in the text which can do great damage to the field of education ever being seen as a profession is collective-bargaining. Collective-bargaining hurts the perception and prestige of teachers in the public mind. Nothing can more quickly erode goodwill in the public mind than to see teachers on the picket line, while students miss classes. Besides uniform remuneration is not a characteristic of professionalism. Disparity in pay exists for doctors, engineers, and lawyers. One’s wage is tied to his/her specialty. A surgeon, and general practitioner make different salaries. A corporate tax attorney and a divorce lawyer make different wages and an assistant district attorney makes far less.
Being seen as a professional may be important to teachers but this desire should not take precedence over the purpose of teaching. It is my contention that education will never be considered a profession equal to the practice of medicine or law because the principal source for funding public education in America is taxes. The government does not support any profession. Instead professions are funded on a fee-for-service model. If one’s goal is to make education a profession then its principal source of funding must change. Were one to seriously consider changing the principal source of funding for education then reform movements should stress the importance of education for improving America’s ability to compete in global commerce with the economies of other countries. Were we serious about such global competition then educational funding would no longer be tied to local property taxes but to corporate taxes instead. Then, American corporations, who are principal stakeholders in this global competition, will be investing their money in also improving the nation’s ability to compete globally. It is likely, however, that such investments would introduce disparity in teacher salaries based on subject matter rather than solely on experience or educational attainment.

In conclusion, for teachers ever to be viewed as professionals in the United States, much will have to change. Agreement about what professional teaching practices are will not only have to be determined but depoliticized. Boards of education will have to make mediating the entry of new teachers into the profession a priority which they fund. Administrators and at least some teachers will have to become researchers in residence in each of the local schools. Educational unions must accept that striking is not an option and that uniformity of pay across all disciplines will be a necessary casualty for obtaining professional status. Finally, American corporations must be made to pay in a greater way to fund the excellence in education which they claim is needed for America to compete in the new global economy.

References

Ornstein, A. C., Levine, D. U., & Gutek, G. L. (2011). Foundations of education. (11 ed., p. 555). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.

Here I Go Again

After 27 years of marriage, and two children my entire family is now enrolled in college. My son's are pursuing the prerequisites to apply to pharmacy school, while my wife is completing her EDS at the University of Alabama. After having earned a seminary degree from Samford and a Ph. D. from Southern Seminary I am now beginning to work on my Masters in Education hoping to return to the classroom.

Many of my friends find my new status as a student, comical.  I, however, am excited.

For the past two years I have been learning how to tell Bible stories (as opposed to traditional preaching/teaching) in church in an effort to help children and youth discover and internalize the truths of the Gospel more readily.  This strategy is new in the contemporary church although it was Jesus's basic strategy.  I was excited today while reading in Curriculum Planning, the textbook for my Educational Planning class the following:

Gerald Campano (2007) says, . . . one of the most powerful ways students can share their knowledge, partake in their own education, and intervene on their own behalf is by telling their stories, (as cited in Henson, 2010, p. 5).

I believe that Campano and others who are emphasizing the importance of story are connecting  our current education and increased dependence on technology to the ancient wisdom of how our minds have processed information from the beginning. The challenge for educators is learning how to guide students in sharing with one another the stories that are pertinent to the lessons contained in the curriculum. 

The hope is that connecting education curriculum with the students through students story is that this may assist in engaging the relucant learner.

Children and adolescents we label as "reluctant learners" are often anything but reluctant to learn some things. They commonly expend prodigious intellectual energy on whatever engages them--collecting hockey cards or seashells, deciphering arcane rules in online gaming communities, amassing vast amounts of information about pop stars, maneuvering through the Internet, or manipulating a cell phone with skill that seems close to wizardry. No reluctance evident there: They exhibit all the signs of imaginative engagement. It's just that their imaginations seem unable to connect with the curriculum they encounter in school. What accounts for these students' reluctance to expend effort on school learning? The world we expect them to learn about in school is, after all, wonderful and endlessly varied. Why do they fail to see it as such? And how can we make the curriculum as engaging as the world we want to reveal to students?  (Egan & Judson, 2008, p. 20).

My desire is to improve my own skills in engaging students in the lesson I am teaching them whether that lesson is quantum numbers in Chemistry or The Greatest Commandment in Matthew 22:37-39

References

Henson, K. (2010). Curriculum planning:integrating multiculturalism, constructivism, and education reform. (4 ed.). Long Grove, IL: Waveland Press, Inc.

Kieran, E., & Judson, G. (2008). Of whales and wonder:by using cognitive tools to shape instruction, we can make the curriculum more imaginatively engaging. Educational Leadership, 65(6), 20-25.