Day 9 Collaboration through Technology

Discussion of Reading:

• difference between group work / collaboration / co-construction
• group work can be high stake for some students - e.g. carrying loafers 
• strategy: perhaps give a check mark for group bit of work (e.g. researching the function of the heart), then assess individually (e.g. through a test)

Some tools for collaboration through technology (Yay!)

1. TitanPad

• e.g. T writes down categories beforehand - can save beforehand if T has account, Ss brainstorm vocabs under each category) Warning: allow silliness for the first 10 minutes
• e.g. T can write first half of the conversation, and have students come up with the second half
• After all, can export as a document in the end

2. TodaysMeet

• I don't really find this app useful. 
• It's used in conferences for a real time discussion

3. Board800

• play charade
• how is this necessarily better than using a whiteboard?

4. WallWisher

• create "rooms" for different groups
• arrange words into verbs, nouns, adjectives
• can save if have account
• cannot export. To save = take screenshot
• embeddable

Day 8 Reading Skillen (2011)

Skillen, P. (2011). Collaborative Projects: What Does It Mean to ‘Co-construct’?. The Construction Zone. Retrieved from http://theconstructionzone.wordpress.com/2011/09/01/collaborative-projects-what-does-it-mean-to-%E2%80%98co-construct%E2%80%99/ on 6 August 2012.

The article argues for collaborative practices in learning, which seems to me that the writer focusses on its application on the levels of collaboration among students and collaboration between student and teacher. For collaboration among teachers and educators, the topic was as if dismissed with merely a sentence or two. It is an interesting topic, however. I have always had doubts about group work. I enjoy working with people towards a common goal, and I agree that many heads is better than one. Nonetheless, this is definitely not always the case. During my undergraduate years, I have worked with others in group work for which they showed lack of responsibility and maturity. The writer notes the problems of team work. He also outlines some ways to tackle these problems, quoting Saloman's suggestion that "the whole environment be designed to maximize mindfulness and interdependence."

I find the writer's suggestion on having students build "thoughtful environments" through social networking very interesting and equally implementable for my teaching practice. I am excited by the prospect of integrating student-centred learning with technology.

Day 8 Toolbox!

This thing allows you to customise a webpage (mainly getting rid of irrelevant things) before you print. Cool tool!

Day 8 Homework Curating using ScoopIt

Day 7 Reading White (2012)

White, N. (2012). Understanding Content Curation. Innovations in Education. Retrieved from http://www.readability.com/read?url=http%3A//d20innovation.d20blogs.org/2012/07/07/understanding-content-curation/ on 1 Aug 2012.

I have never heard of the word "curation" used in an educational context before. The writer of the article makes a useful context to understand the term by bringing up the idea of a museum curator. Upon reading through the article, it seems the idea of "curation" of knowledge seems rather obvious. Learning does not necessarily occur when one simply collects facts without synthesizing them and turning them into meaningful elements within a context.

My first podcast !

listen to ‘Miss Tory's First Spanish Podcast’ on Audioboo

Day 7 Podcasting

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PODCASTING
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1. Create sound file (podcast) through Garageband, Audacity, or Mynah (Gordon recommends but all flash-based support will be discontinued on September 2012)
2. Upload sound file to audioboo and embed onto one's blog OR
3. Upload sound file to Dropbox and add students to share group

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CROWDSOURCING PRO-D:
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• Listservs
• A mailing list that serves as a forum. Examples here.

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TO EXPLORE
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languagepod101 (free trial for 7 days) Advanced Spanish study ! My login details is in my email.