Mr. Mellott’s Weblog

I created this podcast about an impending disaster in central Asia for my ITEC 501 class. Click here if you would like to listen to it. Click here to read a transcript of the podcast. I was trying to think about the best way that I would actually use a podcast for my classes when the idea came to me. I could use this quite effectively as an opportunity to expand the course content a little more for those students seeking a challenge. This is one way that I could possibly differentiate the course for those students who show a knack for the content. Further, though, by offering grades for those students who complete these optional assignments, I could use this as an opportunity for some students to make up points at the end of a grading period. Some people do not believe in extra credit, but I believe that, sometimes, we have to make up for the failings in the system. This becomes just another method of assessing what a student truly knows about a subject and how to apply it to everyday events. No SOL or quiz is going to test for that. Some students will never need that type of assessment to do well in a class. Others have a hard time making it through without it.

I had to create this screencast for my ITEC 501 class. Creating a screencast for even a relatively simple operation takes a surprisingly large amount of planning. A teacher using this method to create a tutorial for a class may have to recreate it several times to ensure that no mistakes are made. I chose not to include voice in mine and that meant adding a plethora of notes. I think I underestimated how many notes it really would be for a simple 3 1/2 minute demonstration.

I would love to see students use this in the classroom as part of a project to demonstrate their process knowledge as well as their content knowledge. A simple use in Geography might be to have students record the screen as they identify places on an internet map site. As they fill in the notes, they might have to list a few pieces of information about the place.

Other ways that I might use this in the classroom would be to record an internet research lesson that I could show to multiple classes. It might mean a bit more work on the front end, but during the lesson, I could pay more attention to the class itself and attend to individual questions without interrupting those who may already be familiar with the content.

I visited a “Tips and  Tricks” session on TappedIn.org last night.  I learned a couple of new things, but, honestly, nothing that I couldn’t have found by looking around a little on my own.  A tutorial video or FAQ would likely have helped a person like me just as well and would have taken infinitely less time.  I understand, however, that the owners and moderators of the site wish to create a feeling of community.  At that, they certainly succeed.  BJ was as sweet as she could be walking us through little pieces of the site and introducing us to some of the functionality.  I felt, however, that she let the chatter continue on a bit much (so much so that I had to type something in when two people from Staten Island started talking about who they knew there).  If the other individuals had been able to review the simple instructions that Prof. Coffman provided for us as part of the assignment in Week 5, the experience may have been much more enjoyable for me.  As it is, I feel like I spent an hour and a half ready to poke my eyes out.

All of that having been said, the site as a whole appears to be an excellent community for educators.  I look forward to attending other discussions, particularly the one about K-12 classrooms led by Jeff C.  Over the course of the next week, I would like to start setting up my office on the site in preparation for some online learning opportunities for my students down the road.

Besides the obvious spell checkers and grammar checkers with which we are all accustomed, technology can help students to become more engaged in and to look more critically at their own learning.  With technology, tasks can become more authentic or useful to the student.  They can visit the Pyramids and other sites in a way that was not possible only a few short years ago.  Assignments also become less theoretical and more applicable to life after high school.  Since the assignments are to be completed through a medium with which the student is comfortable, they are also much more likely to enjoy the task and will put more effort into it.  Perhaps the most significant role that technology plays for the student is by way of the sheer volume of information through which the student must sift in order to complete an assignment.  As teachers, we are responsible for guiding the students’ searches to that information which is both credible and reliable.  In this way, students begin to look much more critically at information, in general, and that skill will eventually work itself into all facets of their lives.

Critical thinking involves a complex mix of analytical and evaluative skills.  In my classroom, I intend to introduce real-life problems and issues for which the students will work, both individually and collectively, to provide solutions.  These “case studies” will provide the basis for developing critical thinking skills and will be based on both historical and present-day events.  Social studies is ripe with possibilities for endeavors of this nature, but other subjects can benefit from this approach as well.  Case studies force students to break problems down into their component parts and apply their knowledge to those parts.  Further, students must evaluate the problems and develop theoretical solutions to them.  Lastly, presenting their solutions to the class allows other students to see the number of potential solutions to a single problem.  Hopefully this will teach them to weigh their decisions carefully as they move forward in life.

Thanks for stopping by. Please feel free to read what you want and ignore what you don’t want. I likely will not post all that often, but hope that, when I do post, it will be something of substance worth taking a look at. If you’re up for it, take a look at my website. Thanks again.

Brian