Reflective Synopsis

Source: Katrina Johnston

I firmly believe that ICTs can be used to transform, facilitate, support and enhance learning. 

E-Learning is a new tool that can give today's students opportunities that will transform and enhance their learning experience beyond what we could ever imagine.

Source: Gogos, Roberta, 2013

With the speed ubiquitous technology is being developed, I can see the future of pedagogy looking like something from a science fiction movie. The tools we have looked at are a only a precursor of what will be available in the years to come.  E-Learning is a tool that has only come into being in the last 20 years, the term e-learning was actually introduced at a CBT systems seminar in 1999 (Gogos, Roberta, 2013). Defining e-learning not as easy as it seams, Sangrà, Vlachopoulos, and Cabrera (2012) wrote a paper on the definition of e-learning and found that the swiftly changing nature of technology must be taken into account and that it could not easily be defined in a single paper. They broke the definition down to four general categories;   "technology-driven", "delivery-system-oriented", "communication-oriented", and "educational-paradigm-oriented". As teachers we will deal with all of these categories in some way. To define E-learning is a means of facilitating pedagogy and is “a new way to learn.”(Sangra etal., 2012)

Teaching students to be creative is one of the best ways to engage higher-order thinking.

I discussed this in reflection 5: week 6.
Top of the Class (2013) notes that Blooms Taxonomy classifies creating as the highest level in thinking skills. E-Learning and ICT tools can be easily used to encourage students to become creative. Students go through Blooms processes of remembering, understanding, applying, analysing, evaluating and finally creating when using these tools. This creates a scaffold that will enhance learning and creating higher order thinking skills. (Top of the Class, 2013)

Source: Katrina Johnston

As a teacher it is important to understand learning theories and how they can be used to facilitate the learning experience.

I firmly believe that ICTs and e-learning should be used to enhance learning. In the week one blog we talked about learning theories; behaviourism, cognitivism, social constructivism and conectivism and how these learning theories can be applied e-learning. Wikis (week 2) are a great example of social constructivism. While  Websites and Blogs (week 3) show connectivism being brought into play, introducing students to link to other sites encourages them to start to branch out in their studies and find more information that they can then use to more actively participate and understand what is being taught. Multimedia activities involving images, audio and videos (week 4) are prime examples of cognitivism tricking the brain into remembering information that it might otherwise overlook. Tools like Prezi, PowerPoint and Glogster (week 5) are good examples of behaviourism at work, using presentations re-enforce what we are teaching our students using repetition and positive re-enforcement of the lesson. Animations and simulations (week 6) can also be seen as behaviourism with an exciting version of repetition and the positive re-enforcement of winning brought into play. The one thing that all these tools have in common is that used correctly they could be great tools to support and enhance what students learn, how they learn, and when and where their learning takes place.

Source: Katrina Johnston

E-Tools are ubiquitous technology in motion, using these tools to the best of our ability in e-learning is important if we want to help our student's get the best out of the technology available to them.

Tools like Mobile digital devices  take learning away from the classroom and allows students and teachers to study and learn anywhere.  We are surrounded with these tools in our everyday lives and if we don't take the steps to use them to their fullest pedagogical ability, we are letting our students down. 

Department of Education Training and Employment (2013)

There are safety and ethical issues with any use of  ICTs that we need to acknowledge and consider in this new technological world.

The Department of Education Training and Employment (2013) have standards of practice that we need to follow in order to keep our students a safe as possible when dealing with e-learning. You can see more about these guidelines in Reflection 3 - Week 4.  Also Cyber Smart (2015) notes cybersafety issues such as cyberbullying, sexting, digital reputations, digital reputations, social networking and location based services are big issues with students that need to be addressed when teaching in a school environment.  Teaching students how important it is to protect their private information, take responsibility for their own actions and treat others appropriately online is just the starting point. As a teacher we need to be aware that these issues can be happening in our classroom and to watch out for it.Cyber Smart has resources and information for teachers to help students to stay safe in the online environment.

Source: Katrina Johnston

E-Learning has changed my life and I firmly believe if used correctly it can take today's students and transform, facilitate, support and enhance their learning experience.

When I went to school we did not have this technology and I barely passed when I finished year 10 in 1986. In 2001 I started University, e-learning was now being used and I finished my degree with twenty HDs, four Ds and the highest GPA  in my faculty. I went on to work as a Graphic Designer and in June as a Lecturer at CQUniversity. I don't believe this would have been possible without ICTs and the advantages they have given me.  We have been given these tools that will take our teaching up a level and all we have to do is reach out and take them, if we don't grab the opportunity we have been given, to take these tools and use them to transform, facilitate, support and enhance learning, we don't deserve to be teachers.

Regards Katrina Johnston

Katrina Teaches Links

Week 1- Learning Theories


Reflection 1: Week 2- Collaboration and Scaffolding


Reflection 2: Week 3- Technology; Wikis, Websites and Blogs


Reflection 3: Week 4 - Multimedia;Text, Images, Audio and Video


Reflection 4: Week 5 - Presentation Tools; Prezi, Powerpoint, Glogster


Reflection 5: Week 6 - Animations and Simulations


Reflection 6: Week 6 - Mobile Devices

Reference List

Source: Top of the Class 2013

CyberSmart. (2015). Sybersafety Issues. Retrieved from http://www.cybersmart.gov.au/Schools.aspx

Department of Education Training and Employment (2013). Standard of Practice. Retrieved from http://education.qld.gov.au/corporate/codeofconduct/pdfs/det-code-of-conduct-standard-of-practice.pdf

Gogos, Roberta. (2013). A brief history of e-learning (infographic). Retrieved from http://www.efrontlearning.net/blog/2013/08/a-brief-history-of-elearning-infographic.html

Sangrà, A., Vlachopoulos, D., and Cabrera,N., (2012). Building an Inclusive Definition of E-Learning: An Approach to the Conceptual Framework. Athabasca University. Retrieved from http://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/view/1161/2146

Shashank Kodesia. (2014). Learning styles and learning theory. Retrieved from http://www.jcu.edu.au/wiledpack/modules/fsl/JCU_090463.html

Swiftserve (2015). Case study. Retreived from http://www.swiftserve.com/casestudy_cdn02.html

Top of the Class (2013). Higher Order Thinking. Retrieved from http://topoftheclass.com.au/higher-order-thinking.html#

Reflection 6 - Week 6

Mobile Devices 

Okay, as a mother of 4 ranging from grade 3 through to grade 12, I can tell you that smart phones and tablets do seem to own my children at times, in fact I regularly call a ban on anything electrical and send them outside to play! So saying, as ICT is one of my KLAs, I am not exactly against electronic devices and nor do I limit myself too much as far as using my own smart phone and tablet, however there has to be healthy and safety limits applied to how much anyone uses electronic devices. I firmly believe that mobile devices should be in every classroom. The sheer number of apps that could be used is astonishing. But there need to be safety measures in place as there are many things that can go wrong.

Now while a lot of this week's tutorial focused on the Apple IPhone and IPad there are a number of other brands and interfaces out there that are just as good. I am going to look at some android apps as I have an android phone and would need to test anything that I used in a class situation. I have had both an IPhone and and Android and both are easy to use and good quality, so there not really an issue as to which one is used. On a quick search of "android apps for high school mathematics" I found a website on Abbcrawlr (a, 2015) with 25+ Top Apps for High School Math. This site has a variety of apps for different uses from homework, helping kids, practicing and onto calculator apps.

25+ Top Apps for High School Maths

Wabitemu

Fast Pass Maths

In a maths class alone there are numerous apps available. Smart phone apps for graphic calculators are prolific and assorted  apps to create graphs, help with homework and practice maths are as easy to find as game apps. I had to pay over $100 for my Texas Instruments graphics calculator back in the day and now with apps like Wabitemu, whereas with the advent of smart phones and apps, anyone can download a graphic calculator free. The Appcrawlr (b, 2015) site notes "Wabbitemu creates a Texas Instruments graphing calculator right on your Android device. Wabbitemu supports the TI-73, TI-81, TI-82, TI-83, TI-83 Plus, TI-83 Plus Silver Edition, TI-84 Plus, TI-84 Plus Silver Edition, TI-85, and TI-86. Fast and convenient, Wabbitemu allows you to always have your trusty calculator with you. Because Wabbitemu is an emulator, the calculator it creates will act exactly like the real thing." This alone is worth allowing students to bring their phones to school. Additionally , programs like Fast Pass Maths, help students to study for the big exams like the HSC and other entry level exams while on the go. They can study anywhere without needing to lug along a lot of big textbooks.

There are fractal apps to generates fractal images, Fractoid by Dave Byrne (2011) describes its functions as:


-Multitouch pinch-to-zoom
-Supports multiple equations
-Renders Mandelbrot and Julia Set fractals.
-Save fractals or set fractal image as wallpaper
-Multiple color schemes
-Escape-time, Triangle Inequality Average, Curvature estimation algorithms and
-Uses NDK for improved performance

Even CQUniversity has an app for mobile devices to make study easier on the go. You can look up your timetables, staff contact details, courses, exam timetable, Access the Library Resources, Moodle and your emails easily on any mobile device with CQUniMobile. 

As far as using mobile devices for my second KLA - ICT. There is an astonishing variety of uses. Just the inbuilt features that come with most phones are enough to get students creating. The camera app with both still image capture and video recording high quality voice recorders and image and movie editing apps are now commonplace on every smart phone. As ICT students could at different times be asked to create posters or flyers, film a short video, make a web page or create a 3D object, the basic programs that come with a smart phone or tablet will be enough to capture the photos, video and audio for most of these. For the more in depth ICT subjects like web development and 3D graphics, there are specialised apps.

WordPress for Android

For web design there are apps like WorPress for Android App, an open source content management system app, WordPress for Andriod "is like WordPress itself, an open source app that allows you to create new posts, edit content, view stats and manage comments--and it comes with built-in notifications, so you're kept up to date as you work." (Clark 2015)  For those who have started coding their web pages, Clark (2015) recommends  the JavaScript Reference App. This app describes the properties and methods of each object, along with examples.  For the Graphic design side of ICT there are a variety of sketch and drawing apps available.  

Auto Flow - Simone (2014)

Simone (2014) mentions Paperless Draw, Sketch'em, Sketchbook Pro and Art Flow among its top five design apps. And for 3D animations there is even the Autocad 360 app, that allows you to view and edit AutoCad drawings whenever you want to.I could go on and on about the apps for ICTs, but instead I will leave it with a few screen shots of what these apps are capable of.

AutoCad 360 - Simone (2014)

AutoFlow - Simone (2014)

AutoCad 360 - Simone (2014)

Paperless Draw - Simone (2014)

Paperless Draw - Simone (2014)

SketchBook Pro - Simone (2014)

SketchBook Pro - Simone (2014)

QR CODES

QR code to this blog

QR codes are yet another technology to come around with the advent of mobile devices. Using an App that makes use of the inbuilt camera to take photo of a unique monochromatic images consisting of vector rectangles. Each QR code contains the code to send the device to either a phone number, website, address or even just a message. These can be used in a class environment to engage students. With ICT they can incorporate them into the websites, posters, flyers and other design assessments. Whereas within a maths class they could be deconstructed to see what mathematical formula's and equation actually go into making them work. The QR code below was generated from one of many QR Code Generator sites: The QR Code Generator  to link to this blog and could be used on assorted websites and social pages to link students to a page or site that is helpful without them knowing what they are going to. They could be used to create a treasure hunt around the  school with printed image posted around for students to find and each image holding a message or link hint to the next. A good example of a QR Code Treasure can be found here. Other educational applications for QR codes can be seen here. They are a simple and effective tools to add an element of fun and surprise to a classroom.

SAFETY

Safety issues with mobile devices are definitely a problem to be considered. There is Cyber bullying, social network issues and apps that are completely inappropriate for students.  Then we get into what should and should not be uploaded, who should be taking photos of who and what they do with them, and of course all the problems tat come with the Internet and students and anyone underage is another thing to be considered.  I think it is worth looking into the legal guidelines again as I did in Reflection 5 - Week 6. There are standards of practice that we need to follow to keep our students as safe as possible in this new technological world. As photography and video are a big part of mobile device use, the standards that refer to these, Internet and social networks are good ones to refer to to find the safest course to follow with these devices.

Following the Department of Education, Training and Employment Standard of Ethical Practice under the Electronic Communication/Social Networking Section, it can be seen that any photography or video that uses students in it, must be approved by the principal. This being the case, it would be safest to run any ICT projects that are going to use personal images or footage past the department head first. Also It would be important to be aware of family issues that can arise from split families and assorted other reasons where any images or footage could not be uploaded to ensure the safety of your students. Anytime cameras or video is going to be used, a note should be written to advise the parents and to get permission from them just to be on the safe side. It is a huge issue in some schools and would have to be taken into account in any work you did with students Another issue that could come up would be bullying. With social networking and student's having so much access to the Internet, images or footage could be uploaded without permission and innocent footage could be used as a peer pressure or bullying tool. Again all due care would have to be taken to prevent this.

In CQUniversity's (2105) Digital Video and Audio Course, a case is quoted where a Canadian student, in 2003, videoed himself enthusiastically mucking around with a toy light sabre. The video was not flattering, and was not intended for public consumption. However, some classmates found the videotape in Raza's locker and uploaded it to a popular file sharing site. Soon, Rasa was famous as a figure of ridicule world wide, and was labelled as "the Star Wars kid". Soon, all types of remixing was done to the footage with real light sabre sounds and effect were added, along with techno music. Variations on the theme of humiliation using the stolen footage is now all over the Internet. This had a extremely negative effect on Raza. At 15, Raza was being treated for depression. Consequently His family sued the boys and their families and settled out of court with CAN$351000 damages. The ethical and legal problems inherent in digital video, audio and photography need to be given full consideration. (CQUniversity 2015)

PMI - MOBILE DEVICE APPS

SWOT - MOBILE DEVICE APPS

 SAMR - MOBILE DEVICE APPS

CONCLUSION

We should use the technology we have in these devices as much as we can. Ignoring something that is so prevalent in today's society is just plain silly. These devices have the apps  to use freely available and can be a great tool if used properly. Yes there are safety issues, but these issues are the same that face any ICT in schools. If we are diligent and monitor how they are used they could be one of the best things to happen to ICTs and education ever!

USE THE TECHNOLOGY TO THE MAX! DON’T JUST SUBSTITUTE, MAKE A DIFFERENCE! MOBILE DEVICES ARE EVERYWHERE, LET’S USE THEM. TAKE ADVANTAGE OF WHAT IS AROUND US. UBIQUITOUS TECHNOLOGY IS NOW HERE!

Regards Katrina Johnston

Reference List

Appcrawlr (a). (2015). 25+ TopApps for High School Math. Retrieved from http://appcrawlr.com/android-apps/best-apps-high-school-math 

Appcrawlr (b). (2015). Wabbitemu. Retrieved from http://appcrawlr.com/android/wabbitemu?_src=discover_group

Byrne, Dave. (2011). Fractoid. Retrieved from https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=byrne.fractal&hl=en

Clark, Scott (2015) Html Goodies -Top 10 Web Development Apps for Android Devices. Retrieved from http://www.htmlgoodies.com/beyond/mobile/top-10-web-development-apps-for-android-devices.html

Sala, Simone. (2014). SitePoint - 5 Must Have Android Apps for Designers. Retrieved from http://www.sitepoint.com/5-must-have-android-apps-for-designers/

Source: Katrina Johnston

Reflection 5 - Week 6

CREATIVITY

After reading Heather's comments on this week's theme of animation and simulations with the inclusion of flash I looked into other animation software. Over the years I have used Flash, Photoshop, Premiere Pro and Adobe Director to create animations both for University courses and for my own children and their classes. However, these tools tend to be rather intensive and require a lot of time and knowledge to create. This is not always an option in a class situation with 20 to 30 students. As such I decided to have a look online for some easy to use animation tools.There are a lot of open source tools out there that are both easy to use and free. This makes them accessible for students to use both in class and as assignments outside of the classroom. I found the video below by TJ Free (2014) that introduces a few interesting programs. Inkscape, Pencil, Tupi, scratch and synfig are discussed. In a similar video here he discusses a similar selection: Synfig, Blender, Pencil, Tupi and Gimp. Each of the programs he discusses are free open source programs that anyone can download and use. The ability to download a free program would mean that students could practise using the programs at home and not be left relying on the school for the programs as would most likely be the case with Flash.

I downloaded pencil2D to try; "Pencil2D is an animation/drawing software for Mac OS X, Windows, and Linux. It lets you create traditional hand-drawn animation (cartoon) using both bitmap and vector graphics. Pencil is free and open source." (Chang, Matt 2013) Below is my effort at a hand drawn animation. Beware there is a second DOS screen that opens when Pencil is open, don't close it! You lose all your hard work (speaking from experience). Pencil didn't export to AVI as it promised, but with some screen capture software and Premiere I have created a video of the animation I made. It did export each screen as a png so could be put together with Movie maker or any other sideshow maker also. While I am definitely not a brilliant artist this shows how even a few simple lines can be made into a fun animation with very little time and effort.

Blooms Taxonomy
Image sourced fromTop of the Class 2013

While Pencil2D is a little clunky and simple to use, in general animation programs would be great to use with a class. With these animation programs I would have to think straight away of my teaching area of ICT. Getting the students to draw and create animations using one of these programs would be a great learning technique. They would have to write a script of sorts, create a story board and then start on the drawing and finally the animation. Adding audio and any voice overs at the end to finish off. This would give them an idea of how animations and movies are created and be a great building block for both creative and technological  knowledge, not to mention building higher order thinking as they have to create from  nothing and will end up with an exciting animation at the end.  I have said in the past that one of the most exciting things for anyone when they are learning is the creativity of making something for themselves. We live in a culture where children have forgotten how to be creative, their games are made for them, their books turned into movies, their food is either pre-made or fast food, their clothes are bought at the shops and most people have lost the ability or knowledge to make even the most basic things for themselves. This ability to create is something to be encouraged. It encourages higher-order thinking and pushes them out of the rut of letting others think for them. Lewis and Smith (2011) note that higher order thinking, critical thinking, problem solving, rational thought and reasoning are all labels for the same process.  Critical thinking is seen as disciplined self directed thinking, needing clarity, precision, accuracy, consistency, logic  and depth among other things (Lewis and Smith 2011).  In 1985 Cuban (Lewis and Smith 2011) noted that defining these skills is troublesome.  While these philosophies are nice in theory, it is difficult to get students to follow them. In order to get students thinking like this we need to engage their attention. Creative exercises will do this. Analysing, evaluating and applying knowledge are other ways to encourage this thinking as seen in the images. Creating an animation from scratch uses all of these throughout the process. Top of the Class (2013) notes that building basic ability to create outstanding achievement, requires delving progressively deeper into exploration by engaging the ‘Higher Order Thinking’ processes such as analysis, evaluation and creativity (sometimes referred to as ‘critical thinking’).These are best described in the cognitive domain of Blooms Taxonomy, as can be seen in the image above. Blooms Taxonomy is one of the best known models used in Educational Psychology for categorising the depth and layers of thought involved in the learning process (Top of the class 2013).

Pencil2D PMI

PENCIL2D SAMR

Group 4 Tools

Having a look at the group 4 tools  presented in Week 5's Moodle was interesting. I especially liked the GapMinder site, the video about the last 200 years certainly had me hooked. With the information available on GapMinder and the animated graphs you can produce, it could be used in a number of ways as an educational tool in both Maths and ICT. I downloaded the GapMider Desktop program to play with, but found it limited as you cannot export your findings. I followed the FAQ's section of GapMinder where they said they used screen capture software to create their tutorial videos and captured a screen recording of the GapMinder I created looking at the energy use per person for the last 50 years comparing it to the income per person. You can see this below.

Google Earth has some great ideas about how to use their tools for education. Measurements using the ruler tool embedded in Google earth. There are concept lessons with solving proportions, estimating area, and calculating volume in unique locations. These can be found at Real World Maths.org, (n.d.) "a collection of free math activities for Google Earth designed for students and educators".

Using Google maps to teach students how to create maps and judge distances as well as uploading their own maps would be very useful in both a Maths and an ICT class. An effective use of Google maps would be in a ICT capacity to embed a map in a web page and create and upload their own map. At Google Earth Outreach there are a number of tutorials and ideas for how to incorporate Google Maps into education. And at Google Maps Education this is evident everywhere you look.

Google Maps Education Home Page

Flash Startup Screen

Flash Game Development Site

Adobe Flash is a great program for creating games and animations and could be of great use in a Maths class for a variety of purposes. However, it does have the problems of time and knowledge. It is an excellent tool for creating games and animations but requires a lot of both time and knowledge to create these. However if you do have the time  there are numerous tutorials online teaching how to develop flash games. Adobe have a number of game development tutorials on their Game Development site.

Cool Maths Games Home Page

A great selection of Flash Maths games can be found at the Site Cool Maths Games where you can find a variety of Flash Maths games in their menu that could be used in a class situation with genre's like Strategy, Skill, Numbers, Logic as main categories and more with memory, board, geography science and Jigsaw Puzzles. One example of flash found on the Cool Maths Games site is the game Divide. Divide is a Maths Logic Game created with Flash. The player has to divide the timber into a set number of pieces using a limited number of cuts. Getting more difficult as the levels progress. In an ICT class, Adobe Flash could be used to create games, animations, slide shows and even websites depending on the age of the student.

Titan Pad Fun

As for collaborative tools, Google Docs is a well known tool that is already being used in schools so I looked at Titan Pad. I found it was a simple yet effective way to collaborate using written text within a group. You don't have to log in or sign up to anything, just start typing.  So Titan Pad is an interesting idea, you can type, make BOLD Italic and of course underline. And if you are working with others you need the cross out line. Hahah And everyone gets their own colour highlighter so everyone knows who is typing. You can share the pad and there are a number of download options available. An interesting addition is the time slider so that you can use to see what went up and when...

Titan Pad Download Options

Titan Pad Time Slider

 

Just out of interest a different tool that I have just found thanks to Isabel's reflection last week is MathCast.  MathCast is an open source equation editor. Open Source basically means that it is a legitimately free program which has been created for everyone to use without cost or legal issues. Now I have been struggling to find ICTs that lend themselves to Maths. MathCast is an equation editor that allows you to type in mathematical equations. I have struggled to type indices in my reflections and presentations over the last couple of weeks and this program would have helped me past this problem. It could be used for students to be able to create a Prezi Presentation or assorted other Graphic and Design tools with the correct Mathematical syntax and give a far neater more academic look to any presentations. MathCast works with Word and can also be exported as an image file for easy use in web pages or presentation software. MathCast can be downloaded HERE. It requires a computer with Windows XP or newer, so that should not be a problem for most people nowadays.

Conclusion

The group 4 tools we have looked at are fun and could be used in a myriad of ways in both a Maths and ICT class, there are collaboration tools, mapping tools and even game development tools available for anyone to use, and best of all, most of them are free of charge. However in order to encourage Higher Order Thinking through creativity, you can't beat a program which encourages a student to start from the basics and develop something from scratch such as the animation program Pencil2D and others of it's kind. While a very basic tool, it can be used to great effect with a little imagination and  students will end up with a video that they are proud of and can say that they did by themselves. We need to inspire creativity in our students in order to encourage critical and high order thinking.

Source Pinterest

Regards Katrina Johnston

 

Reference List

BBC Active. (2010). Using Prezi in Education. Retrieved from http://www.bbcactive.com/BBCActiveIdeasandResources/UsingPreziInEducation.aspx

Chang, Matt. (2013). Pencil2D - Opensource Animation Software. Retrieved from http://www.pencil2d.org/pencil2d/

Glogster. (2015). Home Page. Retrieved from http://edu.glogster.com/?ref=com

Guest66ae43. (2008). SlideShare - How to Add Power Point Presentation to Blogger. Retrieved from http://www.slideshare.net/guest66ae43/how-to-add-power-point-presentations-to-blogger

Lewis, Arthur & Smith, David (2011). Defining Higher Order thinking. Retrieved from https://castl.duq.edu/Conferences/Library03/PDF/FOV1-00014A9E/Lewis_A.pdf

Oregon State University (2015). Technology Across the Curriculum - Prezi. Retrieved from http://oregonstate.edu/tac/prezi

Real World Maths. (n.d.). Real World Maths - Home. Retrieved from http://www.realworldmath.org/

Stannard, Russell. (2015). Teacher Training Videos - Glogster. Retrieved from http://www.teachertrainingvideos.com/e-portfolios-iwbs/glogster.html

Top of the Class (2013).  Higher Order Thinking. Retrieved from http://topoftheclass.com.au/higher-order-thinking.html#

TJ Free (2014). Free 2D Animation Programs for Windows, Linux, and Mac. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NvaumveRH-0