CALL Course Review

Description: This CALL Course was intended to give a brief overview of a number of different technologies, while providing a deep understanding of a handful of apps, programs, and sites. While the idea was to familiarize students with some of the currently available digital learning tools, the instructor's main goal was to endow students with a sense of empowerment and confdence in trying out new resources and tools on ther own, long after the course has ended.

Pros: Students were able to create their own blogs and to use it as a learning journal. They were able to assess various tools and decide for themselves what the benefits and negative points were. Students were able to select the technology that they wanted to become experts in, and were thus able to increase their own understanding of how to use it by teaching it to the class. Students benefited from having not just one instructor, but 10, as the other students all became teachers as least once.

Cons: At the start of the semester, there were still many questions left unanswered. Students were often unsure of what the homework was and what was required of each assignment. While the instructor tried to impart the necesary information, sometimes it wasn't made clear enough for the students. In hindsight, she should have provided more detailed, step-by-step instructions for most tasks. Also, the workload was concentrated on the same schedule as the other courses, so there was often a great amount of homework to be done.

Overall Feelings: This was a very enjoyable class because of the sense that no one was an expert in everything. Everyone had questions and, more importantly, everyone was willing to help each other. There was a stong sense of community that brought the students together. While in the future, this class may go a little more smoothly, this time it was unique because it was designed as students' needs were assessed. The class requirements were designed based on the needs and interests of all of you. Thank you for making it such a valuable experience for me, and for your classmates!

Final Project

Hi everyone! Your final project for this class will be to create 3 Lesson Plans.

Description: You will create a unit plan, or a series of three interconnected lessons. This can be a single project or three days of lessons based on a book chapter, novel, grammar points, key expressions, etc. In each lesson, you should include:

• Step-by-step lesson plans. (These don't have to be too detailed, but someone should be able to follow your instructions and teach the lesson.)

• Each lesson should include a semester-long technology (i.e. Canvas, Blogger, etc.)

• Each lesson should include at least one single-use technologies (i.e. Educreations, Socrative, Screencast-O-Matic, etc.)

One lesson plan must include the actual technological materials you will use. For example, if you are going to show an Educreation video, you must create it. If you give a quiz on Socrative, you must make one. The other two lesson plans can just be step by step instructions, without any real materials being prepared.

Final Project Details

dHere is an example of three lesson plans. I will add the technology examples in the next day or so. My lessons are very conversation based, so I included vocabulary and key expressions. These are optional for you.

Final Project Example

Here is the rubric I will use to assess your project.

Final Project Rubric

 

Screencast-O-Matic

How to Edit Google Docs

1. Log into docs.google.com
2. Go to Google Drive
3. Create a new document
4. Copy and paste the whole article from the link into the document.
5. Click to Share.
6. Give it a title: Smartphones in the Classroom
7. Change “Who has access” from "Private" to "Anyone who has the link," AND change "Access" from "View" to "Edit," and hit Save.
8. Copy the URL.
9. Open an email and email it to the people in your group.
10. Paste the URL into the email and hit Send.
11. Once everyone has access to the document, read it together and make comments.
12. To add a comment, using the mouse, highlight the text you are commenting on, and then go to the menu and click on Insert.
13. Select to insert a comment. Type what you would like to say. Hit Comment.
14. Keep commenting and asking questions until everyone has read the article.
15. Using everyone’s comments, together, come up with a final opinion about the article.
16. Type the conclusion underneath the article.

http://www.teachthought.com/technology/smartphones-in-the-classroom-working-smarter-not-harder/

Canvas Review (Student Perspective)

Description: Canvas is a course management system that allows students to have complete control of their role in a class. From anywhere, justing a smartphone, PC, or tablet, they can gain instant access to their grades, assignments, due dates, announcements, etc. Course management systems like Canvas take the guessing and uncertainty out of the life of the students. The assignment due dates, syllabus, files, and every other resource for the class is available 24/7 and makes the course requirements very transparent.

Pros: Being able to access their grades instantly may encourage students to turn their work in early. Also, being able to clearly see where they stand as far as grades go, puts the responsibility in the students' hands, and removes the mystery of the final grade. This can empower students to achieve the score they wish to receive. Also, being able to upload the assignment to Canvas can save time and paper.

Cons: If students fail to check Canvas regularly, and the teacher has been using Canvas exclusively, they will tend to miss assignments and important announcements. Also, if Canvas goes down for any reason, students will lose access to the entire course until the site is up again.

Overall feeling: It is my opinion that the benefits of using a course management system like Canvas far outweigh the negative aspects. While students may feel overwhelmed when Canvas is first introduced, it will quickly become a helper and facilitator in their learning.

Socrative Quiz

I created a quiz to review simple addition!

Just log into socrative.com and then click on this link: Import a Quiz

Then input this code: SOC-2083866


I look forward to seeing your quizzes as well!

Review of Socrative/Educreations

Description: Socrative is an application that is available for use on most devices, including PCs, tablets, and smartphones. The teacher is required to make an account, and is then assigned a "room number." Students may then access any quizzes made by the teacher by visiting the Socrative website and inputting the teacher's room number. Teachers may create quizzes or surveys, and can then receive real-time results about students' answers and may also choose to receive a spreadsheet of all the students' results.

Pros: The benefits of Socrative are that teachers can receive quick and accurate assessments of students almost instantly. By simply putting the assessment on smartphones, students are instantly engaged. Also, if some students do not have smartphones, once completed, a phone can seamlessly be passed to another student to be taken again.

Cons: Setting up a quiz is a little arduous. Also, if there is a delay on the teacher's part, the whole class has to wait to begin the activity. Finally, some students may take a long time to finish, thereby holding up the class.

Overall feeling: I think that the ease of use of Socrative, as well as the student engagement it promotes, outweigh any downsides to this software. It is such a simple and easy way to get information quickly and accurately from students. It even mails you results instantly, or can show you before students are even finished. I can't say enough about how great this application is.