Wednesday, April 20, 2016

Week 8: Educational Technologies Blog

THIS IS A LINK TO QUIZZLETT:
Quizlet is very simple; it's a basic framework that students fill with their own information. Therefore, its quality depends on the accuracy of the user-created flashcard sets. On the whole, they're pretty good, sometimes great, but there are some unhelpful and sometimes inappropriate sets floating around, too. Quizlet's social perks are nice: Kids are able to compete against their friends, discuss sets, and entire classes can share teacher-created sets. The ability to choose flashcard photos from Flickr's pool of Creative Commons licensed photography really adds to the efficacy of Quizlet for subjects like anatomy.
          When it comes to education, Quizlet takes a different path than other online learning platforms and learning management systems. Unlike Khan Academy orLynda.com $25.00 at lynda.com, which relies on video tutorials, Quizlet employs user-generated sets of terms and descriptions. While those sets lack the glamor of videos, Quizlet has systematically added features to its repertoire for rote learning. With access to literally millions of sets, students can practice up on just about any topic, from intermediate Spanish to early American history.





THIS IS A LINK TO ADOBE ILLUSTRATOR:
I looked at Adobe Illustrator on my PC, and it has the same feel as Photoshop, but there is a significant difference. Adobe Illustrator is an advanced vector-based software. So, unlike Photoshop’s pixel-based format, it uses mathematical constructs to create vector graphics. In Illustrator, a line is composed of two dots connected by a computer algorithm, instead of just a line of pixels. Because of this, Illustrator is often used to create logos or anything that may need to be printed or displayed at different sizes. A vector graphic will never lose its quality if it is scaled up or down. Illustrator will also give you a better print output since it is not resolution-dependent.

Adobe will definitely help students in the graphics designing programs. It is the standard for graphic design. Most of us have very little knowledge of this technical tool, but mastery of it can accomplish some pretty impressive stuff.

Friday, April 8, 2016

Week 7: Educational Technologies Blog

THIS IS A LINK TO COMMON SENSE MEDIA:
Common Sense is dedicated to helping kids thrive in a world of media and technology.  They empower parents, teachers, and policymakers by providing unbiased information, trusted advice, and innovative tools to help them harness the power of media and technology as a positive force in all kids’ lives.
They state that Media and technology are at the very center of all our lives -- especially children.  Kids today spend over 50 hours of screen time every week. The media content they consume and create has a profound impact on their social, emotional, cognitive, and physical development.  Learning how to use media and technology wisely is an essential skill for life and learning in the 21st century. However, parents, teachers, and policymakers struggle to keep up with the rapidly changing digital world in which our children live and learn.  Now more than ever, kids need a trusted guide to help them navigate the world where change is the only constant. 
Common sense media offers a portion of their site to certifying in Digital Citizenship for an educator, school and district. Digital Citizenship Certified Educators are dedicated to teaching digital citizenship to young people and engaging parents using Common Sense Education materials. The certificates are not test focused, but instead, ask a series of questions based on your experiences as an educator. It asks a few paragraph based questions such as: “What impact do you think teaching digital citizenship has had on your students? Their families? School culture?” This is a novel approach to these types of certifications, although I am not sure some certificate in this type of program is completely necessary. Certifications can be beneficial to the educator, but I would like to see more of the site emphasize, the sense of being a good digital citizen. A certificate is great, but the landscape is constantly changing to keep up.


THIS IS A LINK TO EXAMPLES OF ONLINE NETIQUETTE GUIDELINES:

Distance education can give a false sense of anonymity regarding the consequences of what we are doing. As a result, many people feel less inhibited in online situations than in their everyday lives. This heightened sense of inhibitions sometimes leads people to use less than their usual sense of personal respect for each other when communicating online. As a result, online communication guidelines have developed over the Past few years. This informal set of guidelines for online behavior called Netiquette. Three simple understandings can summarize netiquette: remember that there is a human being on the other end of your communication, treat that human being with respect, and do not transmit any message that you would not be willing to communicate face to face. Email is public domain and is not considered private information. The same goes for information shared in our classroom discussion and chats (Examples of Online Netiquette Guidelines, n.d.).







References
Examples of Online Netiquette Guidelines. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://wnmu.edu/: http://wnmu.edu/old/facdev/files/SC_netiquette/NetiquetteGuidelines.pdf







Friday, April 1, 2016

Week 6: Educational Technologies Blog

THIS IS A LINK TO EDMODO:

Edmodo is an educational technology company offering communication, collaboration, and coaching tools to K-12 schools and teachers. The Edmodo network enables teachers to share content, distribute quizzes, assignments, and manage communication with students, colleagues, and parents. Edmodo is an online networking application for educators and students. Think Facebook, but in a safe and controlled environment appropriate for school. Edmodo is primarily a tool for within-class communication, but it also provides several ways for teachers to connect with other teachers. Over 500,000 students are using Edmodo worldwide (Executive Summary- What is Edmodo, n.d.).

One way to use Edmodo is as aTeacher Lounge. Setup a “Teacher Lounge” (a comfy sounding staff room) where you can share ideas, files and links that would seem like spamming if we sent it via email to “all teachers” on staff. Edmodo does not have to be for learning exclusively. A teacher's lounge can be one way to set it up so that teachers can discuss things unrelated to the school, or to make announcements for events or parties happening in their areas. It can be as easy as a casual environment. 

Another way is for students to create specific groups for themselves and create a “Diversity Day” Typically this is done via real life using foods, and traditions and customs of a particular ethnic group. By Using Edmodo, you can turn that experience into a virtual one. Now students can get together and collaborate on a particular country and build their Edmodo page to reflect the traditions, customs, cultures, and food of a particular nation. Students can focus one aspect and then teach all the other students about it.


THIS IS A LINK TO EASYCLASS:


Easyclass is a Learning Management System (LMS) that allows educators to create digital classes whereby they can store the course materials online; manage class discussions; give assignments, quizzes and exams; monitor due dates; grade results and provide students with feedback all in one place. Our tools provide unique opportunities for the instructors to engage students in various activities and offer a new dimension for interaction and efficient learning.
 Easyclass sets out to disrupt the Learning Management System (LMS) industry by creating an easy to use, yet powerful solution that will be the new standard for open technology in education. We believe that an LMS shouldn’t be a closed system; rather, it should be a platform that connects everyone in education and promotes anytime, anyplace learning (About Us, n.d.).

One way an instructor could make use of easy class is to ease their administrative work. No more photocopying, carrying and grading stacks of paper and writing comments out. All of this can be done online for the assignments, tests and quizzes whenever wherever you want.

Easy learning is a Great platform for Blended Learning initiatives. If you are looking to incorporate more digital content in your curriculum and looking for a robust platform that is affordable (like, free!), then Easyclass may be a perfect fit.



References

About Us. (n.d.). Retrieved from www.easyclass.com: https://www.easyclass.com/about
Executive Summary- What is Edmodo. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://edmodoteacherhub.wikispaces.com: https://edmodoteacherhub.wikispaces.com/file/view/Exec-Summary-Edmodo.pdf