Week Two

So this week, working with information about databases and spreadsheets, I found this URL very useful:

Using Excel for Classroom Activities - LinkClick.aspx

It gives many links to sites that use spreadsheets as well as descriptions of these websites.  This was invaluable in that it made my search of sites much less time-intensive. 

Through this site, I found another site, http://nces.ed.gov/nceskids/createagraph/default.aspx?ID=803144fb3b7140118ba1e977fe0aa840 that is already set up to for students to take their data and create all types of charts.  This site was simple to use and provided a very quick method of setting up graphs.  As a teacher, my biggest apprehension about introducing spreadsheets is the time involved in teaching how to set up a spreadsheet.  This site eliminates the learning curve of using Excel – but still allows the students to see the connection of data graphically.

•  One of the biggest surprises in reading the class documents was that these documents make it appear that many classes use Excel. Out of curiosity, I I surveyed high school students in Lexington and they all told me that they did not use spreadsheets other than to set up tables.  So, I am struggling to find a local school that supports that assertion.

As mentioned before, as much as I use personally use Excel, I think it would be very time-intensive to teach it within my math class.  I do believe that if a school has a dedicated computer lab set up to teach students applications such as Excel or Access, introducing these technologies into the classroom could be highly beneficial.  However, for me to give up the instruction time required to teach either of these programs, I would compromise getting through all of the needed material to meet the standards of our state and our school.

• In the past, I have used spreadsheets to do all of my grading.  When I was at a smaller school (private) that had no funding for grading software, I set up each of my classes on Excel.  I had columns marked in categories and then I set up a formulas that would calculate the averages per category and then weight the categories to determine a final grade per class.  This worked extremely well and even though it took some time to set up the initial spreadsheet, it saved an immense amount of time in the long run.

Fortunately now, I have software that does all of this for me and I don’t have to set anything up on Excel.  I still use Excel in my other job – which is running a business.  I use it for my deposits, setting up budgets, and setting up the different groups of our team.  I do feel like it is a very valuable tool and students should be given exposure to it.

I also wanted to elaborate on one of the most interesting things I came across during this week’s lesson.  I really enjoyed the article regarding the Knowledge Repository.  As a teacher working in a private Classical school, collaboration is highly recommended if not required.  This is sometimes hard to do and it was always hard for me to pinpoint why.  This article brings to light some of the reasons that teachers have a hard time sharing information.  The fact that teachers need a ‘social gathering hole’ to begin a level of trust made so much sense to me and gave me a sense of understanding what our school may be missing.  I also loved the suggestion of having an online forum to put our plans/lessons/information so that it could be easily viewed and then incorporated into different subject matter.  I have shared this article with my principal and am going to do more research into setting up wikis.  I am not familiar with that at all and think this idea may be an excellent way for our small school, which has no ‘break room’ to gather, to share sources of information comfortably and without feeling territorial.

TE 4a

 http://www.xmind.net

1.	Describe what you learned from exploring this resource.  Be thorough in your response.
	This website is a mind-mapping website.  It has a free download.  I am not familiar at all with mind-mapping – so this website is very foreign to me.  It appears that it allows you to visually create organizational information that can be shared with various users as it is an open source program.
2.	How could you use this resource in a school setting?  It does not matter if it is in your field or level, you need to understand how the resource might be used in educational settings.
	It appears that mind-mapping is a good tool to use for brainstorming.  It also looks like it could be used to share ideas and keep open lines of communication.  So if your class is doing a project, they could establish a timeline for it to be done, assign various people certain responsibilities and everyone could connect via the mind map.
3.	Would you recommend this resource to other educators? Like/Dislike; Ease of use, fee or not, and so forth.  Why or Why not?
	Right now I’d say no because I am not familiar enough with it.  It looks rather time-intensive and for the school setting, I’m not sure if it would be worth the learning curve if there are other things available that do the same thing.

  TE 4b

 Freemind

1.	Describe what you learned from exploring this resource.  Be thorough in your response.
	This was not a website but a wiki page that describes free mind.  It appears that free mind is another free mind mapping program.  Unlike xmind, it is not nicely packaged and does not appear to be as user friendly.
2.	How could you use this resource in a school setting?  It does not matter if it is in your field or level, you need to understand how the resource might be used in educational settings.
	It appears that mind-mapping is a good tool to use for brainstorming.  It also looks like it could be used to share ideas and keep open lines of communication.  So if your class is doing a project, they could establish a timeline for it to be done, assign various people certain responsibilities and everyone could connect via the mind map.
3.	Would you recommend this resource to other educators? Like/Dislike; Ease of use, fee or not, and so forth.  Why or Why not?
	Right now I’d say no because I am not familiar enough with it.  It looks rather time-intensive and for the school setting, I’m not sure if it would be worth the learning curve if there are other things available that do the same thing.

TE 5

Tech Ed 5 Animoto

1.	Describe what you learned from exploring this resource.  Be thorough in your response.
	This has a free component that allows you to input your own videos/pictures/music into a video.
2.	How could you use this resource in a school setting?  It does not matter if it is in your field or level, you need to understand how the resource might be used in educational settings.
	This is a very user friendly program that quickly allows you to create videos of your choice.  Students could use this to create quick videos for any of their classes.
3.	Would you recommend this resource to other educators? Like/Dislike; Ease of use, fee or not, and so forth.  Why or Why not?
	Yes – this was fun.  It was easy.  Kids would love it because it has a very easy learning curve and the end result looks pretty professional without having to do much work.  The free version is very limited, but the cost is pretty inexpensive for upgrades.

TE 6

Tech Ed 6b PhotoPeach

1.	Describe what you learned from exploring this resource.  Be thorough in your response.
	This has a free component that allows you to input your own pictures/music into a video.
2.	How could you use this resource in a school setting?  It does not matter if it is in your field or level, you need to understand how the resource might be used in educational settings.
	This is a very user friendly program that quickly allows you to create videos of your choice.  Students could use this to create quick videos for any of their classes.
3.	Would you recommend this resource to other educators? Like/Dislike; Ease of use, fee or not, and so forth.  Why or Why not?
	Yes – this was fun.  It was easy.  Kids would love it because it has a very easy learning curve and the end result looks pretty professional without having to do much work.  The free version is very limited, but the cost is pretty inexpensive for upgrades.

 

 

Tech Ed 6 a Google Docs

1.	Describe what you learned from exploring this resource.  Be thorough in your response.
	This is very similar to DropBox except that you can create documents without having to have Word, Excel, etc..  You can login to your gmail account and then create documents right on the server that can be shared with others.
2.	How could you use this resource in a school setting?  It does not matter if it is in your field or level, you need to understand how the resource might be used in educational settings.
	This is a very user friendly program that quickly allows you to create documents of your choice.  This would be great for students who may not have Office products available to them as well as will allow them to share/collaborate with their teacher or peers as needed.
3.	Would you recommend this resource to other educators? Like/Dislike; Ease of use, fee or not, and so forth.  Why or Why not?
	Yes – definitely.  This is a great free program that everyone can use and you do not have to have the same program (doc vs docx, etc.).  It offers both the ability to create documents of all types and the ability to share.