collaborative software

In today's class, Sept. 30, 2009, we journeyed into the land of collaborative software. We explored both "google docs" and "zoho.com" in search for collaborative software that we could potentially use in our future classrooms. In school, we go through DOL (Daily Oral Language) as a daily routine to have our students practice their grammar and Language Arts skills. The collaborative software (found in zoho.com) allows the teacher and students to use the computer and internet to do their DOL. They could possibly even do collaborative works on a website and get the same advantage of being able to share and view each others works. In doing so, students and teacher are able to see, edit, and give immediate feedback as they work on a particular task.
This would be very useful to students because this is the application of living in the age of technology. Students are being exposed to tools that we as teachers have barely explored ourselves. Having this convenience in the classrooms could be helpful for those students who may have visual difficulties. Using this software can eliminate the distance factor that might be affecting their participation in assignments such as DOL. It may also be helpful for students who have problems with writing manually. Typing becomes another path that students might be more willing to take. In addition, having students share their ideas and answers allows others in the class to see a model. By having a model, other students are seeing examples of how to do a particular assignment, and students will hopefully take that as a lesson learned rather than being too shy and embarrassed to where learning becomes hindered. The exposure to such technology is the greatest benefit for the students. By the time students graduate from high-school, they will have probably become experts in technology and all the different types of tools that are out there.
I like the DOL assignment that Mr. Jenkins showed in class. That is a very practical use of the software that I can see myself using in the future. In my assignment I would create two sentences that each student must correct and re-type. Before correcting,they must include their names at the beginning of the sentence. After correcting the sentences, students must compose their own sentence (relating to the topic). Each student must then correct one other student's composition to complete the assignment.

Webquest

1) This past week, we had an assignment to make a webquest. A webquest is similar to a lesson plan on the internet, where students can view their assignment, see the required criteria, find resources, and exercise computer skills all in one project. In our project for this class, we chose the topic of our interest and created out own webquest project for our future students.

2) The software that I used for this particular assignment was zunal.com. I liked this software because it was user-friendly. I was able to create my webquest project with ease and I think others would find it just as easy to use. On a scale of 1-10, I give it a 9.

3) I would use my webquest in my classroom when I create projects for my students in the subjects of science and social studies. I found that using this software really allows my students to get hands-on experience with using technology to both research and present.

4) Like I stated earlier, my students would benefit by getting hands-on experience with using technology for researching and presenting their assignments. It would also cover the standards and objectives in the content subject areas.

5)I really liked the assignment, because I got to create an assignment that I could pull off the web when I become a teacher. It was fairly easy to use, and that makes it another plus. The only dislike I had does not directly relate to using the zunal software, but rather the research needed when creating the lessons. Having to go through different websites to check for relevance and searching for resources for my students to use was the hardest part. It gets tough to sort through all the junk floating around online.

6) Here is a link to check out my webquest project. Enjoy!

time-lines

1. Today we went over some cool tools that we could use in our classrooms. Mr. Jenkins instructed us to go to a couple of websites where we could create our own time-line.

2. I would introduce this to my students by showing them a time-line that I made, then I would ask them to create their own timelines as an assignment and practice. I would definitely use this tool for history projects or topics that could use a timeline as a graphic organizer.

3. I used the teachnology.com program and I thought that it was very easy to use, but it was more for the simple time-lines. I'll give it a 6.5 for simplicity.
I also used the xtimeline.com program and I thought that it turned out pretty cool with some graphics. This program is a little bit more complicated to work with for first-time users, but it's made for the more detailed time-lines. I give it a 8 for making it look really cool.