Final Education Portfolio

 

 

Digital Storytelling

Digital storytelling is an exciting way for students to learn. Students are able to create a multimedia project explaining what they have learned showing that they understand the topic. It is also a fun way to get them involved. As a student, I would have gotten much more involved, had more fun, and retained more information with a project like digital storytelling.

This is such a wonderful way to get students to learn because they are so immersed in media everyday. Students today are growing up in an age where media is everywhere and everyone knows how to use and create it. Today's students consider technology a part of their everyday lives so a project like this is natural for them and something they would enjoy. "Digital stories provide powerful media literacy learning opportunities because students are involved in the creation and the analysis of the media in which they are immersed." They are able to be a part of the creation of the media that is in their lives everyday.

Digital Storytelling: Social Studies 7th Grade

This is a history project of a 7th grade student talking about George Washington Carver. You can tell that the students really learned a lot during this project and were able to use the pictures and audio to relay what they learned to their audience.

Becoming a Zookeeper WebQuest

Becoming A Zookeeper

What makes a good webquest?

A WebQuest is a wonderful tool for students to have a different way to go about learning something. It should use the internet in as many ways as possible for the student to research and create a final product. It should teach them how to collaborate and use reasoning skills and problem solving to think deeper about a topic than just what they read on the internet.

1. A Scaffolded Learning Structure: "We ask students to do what expert writers do—brainstorm, draw pictures, compile lists, or make free associations—and then help them think about an audience and descriptive details." In our webquest, we ask our students to take on the role of a zookeeper and as they choose the animal they are the caretaker of, they have to learn everything about it. They learn what it eats, where it lives and anything else they would need to know about it to take care of it. When they have got it all, we ask them to present the animal in its habitat and explain it to zoo goers that have never heard it.
2. Use of Essential Internet Resources: "A teacher’s gentle orchestration of Internet experiences like these helps students develop their active understanding of the problem." We have given our students resources to find information about their animal, but also fun activities that will help them learn about it in a different and exiciting way that uses internet resources.
3. Authentic Tasks That Motivate: "The best way to address attention and relevance is to choose a topic that students find compelling and then create an authentic learning task related to it." For the age of the students we made this webquest for, animals are a fun and exciting topic that will be something they want to learn about. Giving them the role of the zookeeper makes the project come alive and something they will really enjoy and want to participate in.

WebQuest Evaluation

A Rubric for Evaluating WebQuests

The WebQuest format can be applied to a variety of teaching situations. If you take advantage of all the possibilities inherent in the format, your students will have a rich and powerful experience. This rubric will help you pinpoint the ways in which your WebQuest isn't doing everything it could do. If a page seems to fall between categories, feel free to score it with in-between points.

Becoming A Zookeeper WebQuest

	Beginning	Developing	Accomplished	Score
Overall Aesthetics (This refers to the WebQuest page itself, not the external resources linked to it.)
Overall Visual Appeal	0 points There are few or no graphic elements. No variation in layout or typography. OR Color is garish and/or typographic variations are overused and legibility suffers. Background interferes with the readability.	2 points Graphic elements sometimes, but not always, contribute to the understanding of concepts, ideas and relationships. There is some variation in type size, color, and layout.	4 points Appropriate and thematic graphic elements are used to make visual connections that contribute to the understanding of concepts, ideas and relationships. Differences in type size and/or color are used well and consistently.  See Fine Points Checklist.	4- Our WebQuest used very colorful text and had many pictures to go along with the theme and explain the topic.
Navigation & Flow	0 points Getting through the lesson is confusing and unconventional. Pages can't be found easily and/or the way back isn't clear.	2 points There are a few places where the learner can get lost and not know where to go next.	4 points Navigation is seamless. It is always clear to the learner what all the pieces are and how to get to them.	4- The WebQuest was easy to navigate and showed clear direction of how the students should complete the activity.
Mechanical Aspects	0 points There are more than 5 broken links, misplaced or missing images, badly sized tables, misspellings and/or grammatical errors.	1 point There are some broken links, misplaced or missing images, badly sized tables, misspellings and/or grammatical errors.	2 points No mechanical problems noted.  See Fine Points Checklist.	2- Some links took students to places that would be confusing to navigate.
Introduction
Motivational Effectiveness of Introduction	0 points The introduction is purely factual, with no appeal to relevance or social importance OR The scenario posed is transparently bogus and doesn't respect the media literacy of today's learners.	1 point The introduction relates somewhat to the learner's interests and/or describes a compelling question or problem.	2 points The introduction draws the reader into the lesson by relating to the learner's interests or goals and/or engagingly describing a compelling question or problem.	0- The intro-duction  is very dry and does not appeal well to the reader.
Cognitive Effectiveness of the Introduction	0 points The introduction doesn't prepare the reader for what is to come, or build on what the learner already knows.	1 point The introduction makes some reference to learner's prior knowledge and previews to some extent what the lesson is about.	2 points The introduction builds on learner's prior knowledge and effectively prepares the learner by foreshadowing what the lesson is about.	1- The intro-duction tells the reader what they will be doing but does not build on prior knowledge.
Task (The task is the end result of student efforts... not the steps involved in getting there.)
Connection of Task to Standards	0 points The task is not related to standards.	2 point The task is referenced to standards but is not clearly connected to what students must know and be able to do to achieve proficiency of those standards.	4 points The task is referenced to standards and is clearly connected to what students must know and be able to do to achieve proficiency of those standards.	4- The task clearly describes what the student will be learning and doing.
Cognitive Level of the Task	0 points Task requires simply comprehending or retelling of information found on web pages and answering factual questions.	3 points Task is doable but is limited in its significance to students' lives. The task requires analysis of information and/or putting together information from several sources.	6 points Task is doable and engaging, and elicits thinking that goes beyond rote comprehension. The task requires synthesis of multiple sources of information, and/or taking a position, and/or going beyond the data given and making a generalization or creative product. See WebQuest Taskonomy.	6- The task allows the student to research and creatively demonstrate what they have learned.
Process (The process is the step-by-step description of how students will accomplish the task.)
Clarity of Process	0 points Process is not clearly stated. Students would not know exactly what they were supposed to do just from reading this.	2 points Some directions are given, but there is missing information. Students might be confused.	4 points Every step is clearly stated. Most students would know exactly where they are at each step of the process and know what to do next.	2- Most of the steps are clear but some would need further instruction from the teacher.
Scaffolding of Process	0 points The process lacks strategies and organizational tools needed for students to gain the knowledge needed to complete the task. Activities are of little significance to one another and/or to the accomplishment of the task.	3 points Strategies and organizational tools embedded in the process are insufficient to ensure that all students will gain the knowledge needed to complete the task. Some of the activities do not relate specifically to the accomplishment of the task.	6 points The process provides students coming in at different entry levels with strategies and organizational tools to access and gain the knowledge needed to complete the task. Activities are clearly related and designed to take the students from basic knowledge to higher level thinking. Checks for understanding are built in to assess whether students are getting it. See: Process Guides A Taxonomy of Information Patterns Language Arts Standards and Technology WebQuest Enhancement Tools Reception, Transformation & Production Scaffolds	6- Tools are given to allow the students to complete the task presented to them
Richness of Process	0 points Few steps, no separate roles assigned.	1 points Some separate tasks or roles assigned. More complex activities required.	2 points Different roles are assigned to help students understand different perspectives and/or share responsibility in accomplishing the task.	1- There should be more roles split between students.
Resources (Note: you should evaluate all resources linked to the page, even if they are in sections other than the Process block. Also note that books, video and other off-line resources can and should be used where appropriate.)
Relevance & Quantity of Resources	0 points Resources provided are not sufficient for students to accomplish the task. OR There are too many resources for learners to look at in a reasonable time.	2 point There is some connection between the resources and the information needed for students to accomplish the task. Some resources don't add anything new.	4 points There is a clear and meaningful connection between all the resources and the information needed for students to accomplish the task. Every resource carries its weight.	4- All of the resources are great for the topics they are helping to find information on.
Quality of Resources	0 points Links are mundane. They lead to information that could be found in a classroom encyclopedia.	2 points Some links carry information not ordinarily found in a classroom.	4 points Links make excellent use of the Web's timeliness and colorfulness. Varied resources provide enough meaningful information for students to think deeply.	2- Most of the links were good and useful, some opened to a site that was not helpful for the project.
Evaluation
Clarity of Evaluation Criteria	0 points Criteria for success are not described.	3 points Criteria for success are at least partially described.	6 points Criteria for success are clearly stated in the form of a rubric. Criteria include qualitative as well as quantitative descriptors. The evaluation instrument clearly measures what students must know and be able to do to accomplish the task. See Creating a Rubric.	6- The rubric assesses the project well and is easy for the students to understand what is expected of them.
Total Score				42/50

Google Apps Lesson Plan

Lesson Plan: Choose Your Own Adventure Story

West Virginia CSO

• Students will arrange thoughts and ideas in graphic representations to plan and write a product.

WebQuest Worksheet

 The Technophile: 

• You love this internet thang. To you, the best WebQuest is one that makes the best use of the technology of the Web. If a WebQuest has attractive colors, animated gifs, and lots of links to interesting sites, you love it. If it makes minimal use of the Web, you'd rather use a worksheet.

Your Impressions

WebQuest	Strengths	Weaknesses
Grow School Greens	fun gifs, many links to help with the project.	very bright but not much variation in color
Where is My Hero?	Very colorful, Some really good and fun links.	Pictures good, but nothing that pops.
Underground Railroad	Links to some cool interactive sites, Very fun and unique way of teaching the subject matter.	Could have some better pictures to describe the railroad and those involved.
Ice Cream	Very bright and appealing to the eye, fun and lot of hands-on activities.	Some links didn't open.
Ancient Egypt	Did a good job of putting links to help explain the subject.	Not much color, not many activities outside of just reading the resources.

Bernie Dodge, Department of Educational Technology, SDSU


Which two of example WebQuests listed below are the best ones? 

• I think that the webquests about the ice cream and the underground railroad are the best.

Which two are the worst? 

• I think that the worst webquests were the ones about ancient egypt and heros.

What do best and worst mean to you?

• The best ones caught my attention just by looking at them, had good interactive links and fun, hand-on activities that I feel the students would enjoy. The worst were more plain to look at and seemed like they would have a more difficult time getting the students involved.

Group Discussion

• All of us agreed that the Ancient Egypt webquest was the worst. It was least appealing to the eye, and seemed like it would not do a great job of keeping the students attention.
• We all thought that the We All Scream For Ice Cream webquest was the best. It included some fun activities and did a good job of using what is found on the web to describe the tasks.

Storybird Reflection

ISTE NETS-T Standard 3: 

• B. Collaborate with students, peers, parents, and community members using digital tools and resources to support student success and innovation.

Storybird addresses the above standard by allowing the students to interact with people outside of their own classroom. Whether it be someone they already know, will soon meet, or a face they may never see creating a story with them, they are able to see how people who may be in different places can work together to accomplish a common goal.

In today's world, the way people work together is different than it has ever been in the past. With all of the technology available, people no longer all have to work in the same office building to be a part of the sasme company. People from all over the world are able to come together to work on projects, help one another troubleshoot, and collaborate or guide members to carry out certain tasks. In the article Technology Enhanced Collaborative Learning they said, "[a]fter working for over a year on the bulldozer, he posted the problem on the company's web forum and received an immediate solution from an engineer in California who had had the same problem." In this example, two employees that had never met were able to solve a problem together just by collaboration through technology. There are so many advantages to this useful tool and students should be learning ways now to use this in their future.

(2009). Technology Enhanced Collaborative Learning. Retrieved from https://docs.google.com/

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These resources that we have used, such as Skype, Storybird, and Edmodo, are wonderful ways to get students involved in the classroom. However, they will help them so much more than that. Our world is constantly changing, and to get ahead or even keep up, you have to be updated with the knowledge of the latest technology. Chances are that by the time the children we have in class get into the workplace, things will be completely different than they are now in ways unfathomable by our minds. Yet if we continue to keep ourselves and our students "in the know" of what is coming next and learning the new tools available to us, then it will make the transition into that new technology so much simpler.