WASCD Blog 3

After reading the 51 Competencies for the Online Instructor and completing the self-evaluations, here are my strengths and weaknesses.

MyStrengths:

1. I am well-organized, thoughtful, creative individual.  I create to-do lists and complete things ahead of schedule.  I can create a syllabus and a good rubric.  I like to know what I need to do in order to learn at my best.  I would be able to do the same for my students as an online instructor.  I am also good encouraging high-quality work and giving prompt feedback, i.e. grading in a timely manner with an appropraite rubric.
2. I am a life-long learner.  I love learning new things and going through the learning curve/process--hence the reason for taking this class.  :-)
3. I enjoy reinventing parts of myself with reflection.  Reflection has made me a more effective instructor and a better person.

My Weaknesses:

1. I do expect things to work, especially after I've pretested them.  How many times have any of you had everything ready to go for class, technologically speaking, and it's a bust?!?!  The server is down, the Internet is slow (as I type this on Cyper Monday), the computer locks up!  Am I frustrated--YES!  I would have a backup plan (that's the planner in me)--but it wouldn't be as good as the original.  I would definitely use humor (Murphy's Law, anyone?), but I would have to better learn how to tame this beast of frustration!
2. Keeping up/informed with the latest technological trends is increasingly more difficult with each year I'm teaching.  As soon as I feel comfortable with one program, poof!--a new and improved DIFFERENT one is out there.  Yes, I let the students show me, but what I really need is the time to learn it on my own.

Bottom line:  I believe this is a definite educational trend, especially in the wake of all the virtual schools coming into existence in the last half decade.  My greatest fear is that I won't be equipped with the resources/equipment required, i.e. those components where I have the least amount of control.

WASCD Blog 2

After learning about the different browsers, I decided to get off my Internet Explorer habit and focus on some more secure browers.  I think the only reason why I never considered using other browsers was that I felt comfortable with IE and never really had any issues with it.

After Thursday's class discussion on browsers, I decided that I should try a more secure browser and just learn how to use it in the comfort of my home. I downloaded and installed Mozilla Firefox.  I liked that it imported all of my bookmarks, cookies, and homepage.  I'm learning how to utilize the tabs, as I am unaccustomed to this layout.  Luckily my husband uses this browser all the time and has been very patient with me.  I also have been accessing all my homework using Google Chrome, and I really am liking this as much as IE.  In all honesty, I would have never done this if I hadn't been taking this class.  Wow!  :-)

ADDED 11/13/12:  I just thought that I would add that I now feel more savvy in helping my students/colleagues with browser issues.  I feel very comfortable in Chrome (which many of my students prefer) and am getting to be proficient in Firefox.

WASCD Blog 1

When I first began teaching, personal computers were a rarity, the Internet was there but not really utilized, and wireless phones were the closest technology to the cell phone.  In the last 20+ years, standard textbooks with pencil and paper just aren't the norm any longer.  In this class I am hoping to further my tehnological skills.  I feel like the proverbial "fish out of water" when trying to keep up with all the latest technology (software and hardware).

I have just begun utilizing Moodle at my school district this past Spring.  I am now trying blended/flipped class learning for my students.  My goal is to learn how to incorporate the technologies/information learned in this class to become a more effective 21st century teacher.

Topic 4

I decided to utilize StoryJumper to create a story.  I watched the 6-minute YouTube video the website offers as part of its tutorial.  This video is very useful in understanding the fundamentals of creating a book.  I found it to be the best tutorial yet for any of the topics I've attempted to learn and use.

I really like the simplicity of the graphics and the layouts.  Being a high school Spanish teacher, this is actually an advantage.  I would prefer that my students spend their time and energy on correct Spanish grammar construction than layout design.

I did find a few glitches with this application.  When creating a book, it really needs to be 16 pages long.  I spent almost 4 hours creating a story entitled, "Momentito" to learn the program.  My story is only 14 pages long with text boxes and illustrations.  The program kept adding blank pages to my story to make it long enough in the editing/creating process.  I found this to be most frustrating, as I repeatedly deleted unwanted blank pages in the editing component of the program.  I also noticed that it's not always WYSIWYG.  One web page made the cover look like it had NO illustration, but when you click on the book to read it, the cover has an illustration.  Go figure!

Another problem that occurred was when I needed to reprint just one page after fixing a mistake; it added blank pages to the end of my book.  I'm assuming this is because I do NOT have the 16-page minimum.

Finally, I could not figure out how to do correct Spanish punctuation, i.e. upside-down question marks and exclamation points, as well as accents and tildes in this program.  I used Microsoft Word to construct those words/phrases and then copied and pasted.

I actually had a lot of fun creating this book.  I like that I have the option of sharing this book online or keeping it private.  I can also purchase a professional hardcover version of my original story (provided it is at least 16 pages long).  Prices begin at $19.95 and increase based on story length.

As a bonus, my tweener son wanted to start his own book online because he thought my book was "silly in good way, Mom."  I plan on showing this masterpiece to my colleague and then using his wonderful wit to expand it to that magical 16 pages (or more if our creative juices are really flowing).  My ultimate goal is to use this book in my Spanish III class this fall as a comic relief when reviewing grammar basics.

Topic 3

I first tried Poll Everywhere and created a sample poll--What is your favorite color?  I tried to type this question in Spanish, but I could not type an upside-down question mark or accented vowel.  I used Mircrosoft Word to type in this quesion and then copied and pasted it Poll Everywhere.  I have seen this used during a quick inservice this past spring.  I like the instantaneous results, but the limitations are that every student in my class needs to have access to either a cell phone or a computer.  This may present a problem, as my building has one writing lab with a classroom set of computers that is shared by the entire staff.  The other limitation is cell phone signal strength.  My cell phone carrier has a weak signal in my classroom (1-2 bars only).

I then decided to try Hot Potatoes after reading some positive reviews on the blogs.  I went through the tutorial and created my own exercise.  I created a JMatch using 5 clip art images (used Microsoft Office clip art saved to my desktop for easy access) with its corresponding Spanish vocabulary term.  I then saved and went to "Create Web Page" and chose the "View the exercise in my browser".  I like the standard and drag/drop choice.  The flashcard option would be useful for my students, but it didn't seem as user friendly.  I also noticed that altering clip art size is a must.  I found that 100 height is a good size and then keep the width to whatever the program automatically adjusts it to for proper ratio.  Anything larger and 5 clip art pictures didn't fit well on the screen with a height larger than 100.  I found that I had to delete the entire clip art image link to resize it; I couldn't figure out an easier way to do this.

I am also a High School Teacher

Hola,

I have tried numerous times in the last three weeks to leave comments on other blogs.  Every time I type a comment, I'm asked to select a profile.  I then begin a never-ending loop of logging into my Google account, seeing my post (but labeling me as "anonymous" rather than identifying me as my blooger name) and then typing in a captcha.  Once I type in the required captcha, I am then rerouted back to signing in on my Google account--where the process repeats itself.  The only difference--a new captcha.

I noticed Blog_Watson_East_West  is having the exact same issue.  I am so happy that I am NOT the only one.

I'm hoping there's an easy solution to this.  :-)

Topic 2

I first went to Cloud Canvas and clicked on the red LAUNCH button.  But it was stubborn and wouldn't launch.  I even created an account to use it, thinking that might be the problem.  But it still wouldn't launch!  Too frustrating.

I then went to Splashup.  I tried loading a picture from Facebook but it wouldn't work.  I went to my desktop and found a few pictures to play with.  Splashup reminded me of a photo editor (which I can't remember the name of it for the life of me!) I used when my colleague "Hoovie" and I created a Power Point presentation.  I wish I had a printed manual with examples so that I could utilize the full power of this tool, as I did not know what some of the special effects meant.  I could definitely use some of the enhancement tools to improve the photo quality of my digital pictures I took of my students doing various cultural activities.

I then downloaded Picasa.  It took more than 20 minutes for it to load and organize all my pictures and videos from my computer!  I spent over TWO HOURS revisiting the past.  It had located photos and videos that I had completely forgotten about.  Amazing!  This tool organizes everything for you and shows you duplicates (and those duplicates are so easy to delete).  This tool will be useful because NOW I can finally locate all those those student pictures I've accumulated over the last two decades.  In fact, I found photos of Mexico that students had given me copies of that I showed in class over five years ago.  Hoovie, I can't wait for you to see some of these pictures!

My overall choice is Picasa.  I can't wait to show these "lost" photos of cultural projects to my students!  :-)