Online learning.

I believe many of our university fellows have shared or have been sharing the experience of doing some online courses over their degree in the university or other institutions. For my own experience, it would only be a preference of studying online or on-campus when enrolling, encountering preference way of learning, time, and transport issues. I understand that on a macro scale, studying online or on campus would mean a lot more than that. However, the first time when I have a chance to look at online learning and its benefit on a macro scale broadly is when I’m watching this Ted talk of Daphne Koller. She explained in detail how the online learning works and what makes it better than a traditional lecture-based classroom. I found that it is true for many of my situation. Since English is my second language, sitting an actual lecture might lead to not very well understanding the content due to a number of reasons. The biggest reason for me could be the language as I need more time to consume a piece of information, compare to other students. Understanding this aspect of students special needs, I will be able to generate solutions for this problem.

 

Assignment 3_word count

The greatest challenge that I found is …(it’s in the title above). Correct! Word count. I can’t really start writing because once I start, I will definitely go way over the word limit. Here is why it is so difficult for me to write precisely. English is my second language. And to an English as the second language user, vocabulary is not their strength. A sophisticate word that contains complex meaning can be a dangerous move if they use it in a wrong way or wrong context since it can produce a wrong meaning and confuse marker in several ways. That is what lead to many of my assignments got marked down including assignment 2 of this ICT course. Avoid using these word create the problem with word count since I have to use more simple words to tell the same thing a sophisticated word does.I know some of EDC3100 fellows might also few uncomfortable with the word count too. But it there for its reason and we are going to hit it anyway. So do try our best and good luck to everyone!

Interactive white board in my class

In a Moodle book, David mentioned this article about the misstep in the use of interactive whiteboard in the classroom nowaday. The same thing I have experienced in the placement. as a reflection after the placement, the way the IWB was used is limited. comparing to the RAT model, the IWB was mostly used as a replacement. In the article mentioned above, I agree with so many reasons of Why the IWB has not been used very effectively in the classroom. For example,

the lack of a critical perspective in the adoption (Moss et al., 2007; Lacina, 2009); the keeping of IWB classrooms up-to-date (Debolt, 2008); lack of adoption by staff (Moss et al., 2007); ICT literacy and ICT competency for staff and students alike (Slay, Siebörger & Hodgkinson-Williams, 2007)…

As a pre-service teacher, it is very important to understand these reason in order to find a solution for my own.

Refferences

Debolt, D. (2008). Colleges strugle to keep “smart” classrooms up to date. Chronicle of higher education, 55(8), A17.

Lacina, J. (2009). Interactive whiteboards: creating higher-level, technological thinkers? Childhood education, 85(4), 270-273.

Moss, G., Jewitt, C., Levačić, R., Armstrong, V., Cardini, A., & Castle, F. (2007). Interactive whiteboards, pedagogy, and pupil performance: an evaluation of the schools whiteboard expansion project (London challenge). Retrieved from http://eprints.ioe.ac.uk/905/

Slaya, H., Siebo¨rgera, I., & Hodgkinson-Williams, C. (2008). Interactive whiteboards: Real beauty or just ‘‘lipstick”? Computers & Education, 51(3), 1321-1341. doi:10.1016/j.compedu.2007.12.006

Willems, E., & Willems, J. (2011). Interactive white(board) elephants: A case of change mismanagement Paper presented at the Changing demains, changing directions, Hobart Tasmania, Australia.

Imagining holograms in the classroom_an experience with 3D learning

I had a chance to know about a Microsoft product called Hololens. This is a device that comes in the shape of a pair of glasses. What it does is provide 3D pictures/motion that interact with your own environment so you feel like it is a real object or it is really happening. But that is what I heard about the product. I came across this TED talk today which provides information about how the product work and what possibility it can give when I imagine my students immerse in this technology to explore and learn about the world around them. Imagining the every student standing in the middle of the solar system, moving around to look at the Earth from different angles and communicate collaboratively with other students to learn about it. I believe this will be the future of education where students are engaged and immersed themselves in meaningful learning.

Hanna Vu

The rule of three for learning.

Mr. Benson Johnson wrote an article about effective learning practice where he talk about the rule of three practice (Johnson, 2016). I found that this is good for sequencing learning experience which is what we do in assignment 2, the unit planning. I compared my own work to the step by step guide that Benson show in the article and feel more confident about my unit design. Here are the three step.

Step 1: Student first time engage in learning topic. The activity have to involve student in the process of learning in this first step. (ticked this)

Step 2: student have their second opportunity to practice what they have learn in step 1. (ticked this one too)

Step 3: Student will get to do something fun through project-based learning or product-based learning. (Absolutely ticked this one)

Hope everyone like the article.

Hanna Vu

Johnson, B. (2016). Using the Rule of Three for Learning. Retrieved from http://www.edutopia.org/blog/using-rule-three-learning-ben-johnson

When technology is not working

This blog post of Monique reminds me of my last placement when I plan to teach my first Math lesson about fraction using IWB. In the plan, the students will do an activity on the IWB and will watch a YouTube video. When the lesson started, the IWB stopped response and only show the screen of the computer. I was so worried as my whole lesson was built based on this activity. My mentor offered me to take over the lesson. Fortunately, an idea sparked when I was about to let her teach the class. I turned the computer off and start using the play dough to teach them the concept of fraction. I received good feedback from the mentor for that lesson. I was so lucky that day but I learnt a lesson to myself that technology does not always work so I can always have a plan B. 🙂

Hanna Vu

Outdoor ICT

It was a great thing that Beehappy4life share a resource, in this blog post, of her own interest in ideas to use ICT outdoor to improve time quantity and quality in outdoor learning. I love the article and the idea of it so much. To be honest, I find so hard to think of outdoor activities that involve ICT. The document the Beehappy4life share gives me many ideas. And not just to the early age, older students will also enjoy being in such activity like measuring rain level, humidity, temperature; taking photos and video of plants and animal, etc. These activities are great for science, math, drama and so on. Tons of ideas about using ICT outdoor just came across my mind and I’m so excited to make it happen.

Hanna Vu

Trello

In an effort of staying organize, I make myself write down a tomorrow task every night in my notebook. It’s not that I am an old grandma who still use a handbook to make to do lists but I find hard to make myself comfortable in a new practice. I tried different programs and applications to take note, make to-do list other things to stay organized. I do understand that they are far more advanced compared to a notebook as are easy to access, connect to other people and communicate with them. But then I would always give them up for the one same reason: “not familiar with”.

I read this blog post of Michelle today. She wrote a blog post about how she has a go with Trello and how she likes it. Well done for giving it a try, Michelle. Your blog post made me want to try again and I did sign up and start using it. I will work on getting used to with it and I’m getting there J.

Hanna Vu

Teaching kids to code.

This previous blog post looked at teaching the students to code in the aspect of fulfilling their need in self-expression. However, the benefit of coding for the students does not stop there. In this articles, Michael Trucano provides a list of what the students can benefit from coding (Trucano, 2015):

1. Coding education will help students acquire vocational skills that are immediately relevant to today’s job market.
2. Coding helps develop important logic and problem-solving skills.
3. Understanding coding helps students better understand the nature of the world around them, and how and why increasing parts of its function as they do.
4. Teaching students to code can serve as a gateway to the subsequent study of STEM topics — and hopefully to jobs and careers in related fields.
5. Introducing coding in schools can be a force for greater equity and equality of opportunity.
6. Being able to code enables new avenues for creativity and creative expression.

The article also raises a question that whether or not, all students should learn to code. I think to answer the question, there is a lot to do with what we think about learning to code and the purpose of learning them. The article argues that the purpose of teaching the students to code is not just to prepare them to be future programmers but to develop their cognitive ability as the process of learning to code will nurture it (Trucano, 2015). Therefore, the Michael idea of the purpose of teaching kids to code is not that they would know how to code but to prepare them with cognitively ready for later learning.

Hanna Vu

 

Trucano, M. (2015). Learning to code vs. coding to learn. EduTech: A world bank blog on ICT use in education.  Retrieved from http://blogs.worldbank.org/edutech/learning-code-vs-coding-learn

Heads Up.

I love to watch the TV show Ellen and of course I do love many of the games in the show. One of the games that I really enjoy watching is Heads Up. To people who don’t know this game, it a card game using you digital devices such as mobile phone or tablet. You will choose a topic to play, and you will get a certain amount of time to play. One person will hold the device face the other person and they cannot see what word they have on the device. The other person has to describe it without mentioning the word for this person to guess. Now I guess you would think that what a game get to do with my ICT learning journey. Here is the answer, it inspired my unit planning for assignment 2. In fact, for the first entire learning experience, I plan to have my students to play this game. Here is how the game can help students acquire the learning objectives. One of my learning objective is:

Understand that language is used in combination with other means of communication, for example, facial expressions and gestures to interact with others(ACELA1444)

This game is all about using expressions and gestures to communicate which can  help the learning content comes naturally to the students’ thinking. It also creates a connection between the content and their own experience when the students involve in a hands-on activity like this. A bonus is that the game itself is very fun, exciting and competitive in which the students can stay engage better.

Hanna Vu