Week 4- Readings

Educational Networking:
The important role Web 2.0 will play in education
http://info.elluminate.com/Edu_Networking_edweek.html Accessed 12:59, Sept 26, 2010

This white paper focuses on how web2.0 tools help teachers become better at what they do by collaborating with other teachers through these tools. Up until this point, the only way teachers could be published was through academic arenas.Now, we can post through blogs, videos and other social networking apps. How we as teachers now approach our profession and how students approach learning has vastly changed since the explosion of social networking and web2.0 tools.

Supporting 21st Century Learning Through Google Apps
Nevin, R. (2009). Supporting 21st Century Learning Through Google Apps. Teacher Librarian, 37(2), 35-38. Retrieved from Academic Search Premier database

This article reviews how Google Apps will support education in the next one to five years. Cloud computing is the buzz word, meaning saving data on a server on the web. By using Google apps, many complications that occur when using disparaging software from home to school will be solved. By using Google docs, students will be able to access their work from any computer, home or school, and it will be in the same format. Teachers will be able to edit drafts of student prior to the student completing it. Beyond word processing, the free apps include presentation and video as well. It continues with an overview of the steps to become what is called a "Google App Educational Site".

Don't Be Afraid to Explore Web2.0
Thompson, J. (2008) Don't be afraid to Explore Web2.0.  Education Digest, 74(4), 19-22.  Retrieved from Education Research Complete database

This article summarizes the different types of web2.0 tools and cites some of the more popular apps. Many if not most apps are free. It gives a simple description of what cloud computing is and why it will be so important in the future. It mentions Google Apps as one of the most well known tools, as well as different social networking sites, blogs, and video sites. Many schools are concerned with allowing such sites on their network, but the author believes such sites could produce more learning through collaborative note taking and group discussions.


Technology: Web Applications and Google
Van Horn, R. (2007). Web Applications and Google. Phi Delta Kappan, 88(10), 727-792. Retrieved from Academic Search Premier database

Yet again, another article extolling the virtues of using Google Apps in the education arena, with cost savings, common platforms, and improved productivity as reasons behind it. The versatility of the Apps, the wealth of gadgets to aid you in your duties is unsurpassed by any other collection of apps out there. Google specifically targets educators with special apps designed for them, along with online training sessions available free for professional development.

AR Blog

According to McNiff (2003), action research questions should focus on my self-improvement or how can I improve what I do. During this first month of the certification program, my head has been swimming with all sorts of ideas, most requiring the cooperation of other teachers. I am new to the school I presently work at and do not really work closely with teachers but rather consult with students.

The largest “chore” I deal with is communicating with each students’ four academic teachers on a monthly basis. Emails are currently the way most contact is done. Information is sporadic, not consistent and ends up being a paper filing job after printing out each email. I normally have to send at least two reminders out to teachers before I get all information back. I started thinking about ways I could elicit information from teachers in a systematic way, gathering the exact information I needed, collected together under each student’s file and with as little effort from the teachers.

While I was studying different web2.0 apps, I discovered Google Docs, which lead me to Google Forms, which lead me to my action research direction. I would find out as much as possible about the Google Apps for educators and determine if I could develop a system to gather data and be accessible where ever I am at with a computer.

My official problem statement is the inability to gather timely and correct data on a monthly basis about the progress, behavior and academic success of my cohort of students.

The outcome I am expecting is to develop a form or survey through Google Forms to be delivered to teachers via their email. The survey will consist of multiple choice questions and short answer questions in a text box. The questions will be based on the exact information I need for each month based on each student. The questionnaire will be simple and to the point, therefore easier for teachers to complete and return. The data will be compiled in a spreadsheet and can be filed electronically within Google Forms, so I can access it at any computer in whatever room I may conduct a student conference.

My critical friends are two classmates who are also in the Certification Program and one teacher who is in an administrative position who also needs to collect data from teachers who are slow to respond. My two classmates will help me better understand the process we are going through together and the teacher can give me insights from the educational field.

As I previously stated, this is the first month in the program, so everything I have learned in ETC has effected my choice of project, the web2.0 apps I have reviewed by myself or through viewing other classmates blogs. I am glad I have two classmates traveling with me in the certificate program. We are different than the year long program and sometimes assignments are confusing because they are based on background knowledge we did not experience.

My website URL is http://web.me.com/sandyerickson1954
My ETC blog URL is http://smerickson1954.blogspot.com/

Week 4 - Practical Experience #3

After listening to several hours worth of Flash CS5 video, I decided to just play around a little bit.  Nothing exciting mind you, but just to show some of the graphic features built in for the non-artists to enable us to actually come up with something that doesn't look too bad.  I didn't spend much more than fifteen minutes to come up with these shots.  A little more time and effort would have produced something a bit grander.

Week 4 Pratical Experience #2 - Flash Review

Flash Professional CS5 is being described by some as the industry standard for interactive authoring and designing that delivers content consistently to PC’s and Mac’s, mobile devices and white boards/screens of virtually any size and resolution. It is an application that creates web-based animation and web-sites without the ability to write code. This opens up web and graphic designing to many more artists and dreamer-type people than those computer geeks who write code.

The programs overall diversity included the ability to embed video into websites, create interactive websites, drawing and animating graphics and cartoons, and creating games that are web-based. It’s main strength is for making interactive menus, buttons and websites.

The work flow is pretty straight forward and intuitive. There are similarities to design apps, such as buttons for editing color and creating shapes, drawing lines, curves and shapes as well as writing text. Drop down menus provide options to select and speciality menus for those exceptionally creative tools.

The Flash CS5 app integrates with other Adobe software, such as Fireworks, Illustrator and PhotoShop. This ensures the users ability to move between the different apps with out the fear of losing the interactive parts that have been built into their Flash creation.

Week 4 - Practical Experience #1

Before I started at Full Sail, I heard of Flash because of things on the web that either required Flash to view it or Flash wasn’t installed and I had to download it.  Never gave it much thought, just some computer thingy.  :)  Like I said, that was pre Full Sail days.  Now I OWN it or at least the software.  Which probably means some class will want me to do something with it.  Now I need to figure it out.

First I looked at Lynda.com to see what she had.  Good lord, the “essentials of Flash” runs over 20 hours in video tutorials.  What is Flash and why does it take so long to learn.  Flash is part of a “Creative Suite” of Adobe applications which puts together a collection of software that performs graphic designs, video editing and web page designing.  Flash helps create graphic art designs that are far superior than any paint shop program I’ve ever played with.

So far, I’ve listened to three chapters of Essential Flash.  I did each chapter twice, the first to see what’s important without the necessity of note taking and then to go back and take notes for things I need to remember but probably won’t without writing it down.  I realize that equates to 40 hours of video, but maybe after I get the initial vocabulary down and what the buttons do and where all the buttons are hidden in fly out maps, then perhaps I will be able to view some of it only once.

I’ve learned how to draw lines, snap pictures together and take them apart.  I now know the difference between bitmap pictures and .swf media pictures.  I can fill in spaces, draw outlines around them, shade pictures and have objects have gradients.  (That’s one of those vocabulary words I was talking about.)  I’m still too early in the mix to make anything move yet, but I’ll get there.  Keep tuned for further developments.

AR readings

Still reading websites on collaboration with Google Docs.  Checked out more on Forms this time.  Discovered how to write quizzes that actually grade the quiz as it posts on the spreadsheet.  Now I can get behind that.  There are plenty of uses for Forms, as a teacher, administrator and students gathering data for projects.  Will continue research on spreadsheets and presentations.  Lynda.com is an outrageous resource of "how to" on Google Docs.

Being a certificate student, I'm focusing more on actual software, especially free and open sources because schools are short on money and I can't afford to buy it either.  I really am enthusiastic about  checking out the free apps that we've been given plus the ability to learn through lynda.com everything we want to when we need it.

This week I started working on Flash, an iMovie type software, on steroids.  It is a complicated program compared to iMovie, but from what I see so far, has greater abilities in "drawing" graphics and putting motion to other things.  iMovies puts pictures and movies together, while Flash has the ability to start things from scratch.  I've only watched about 2 or so hours with over 20 hours to view, and will have to review and move on as I make my way through the program.  The "essentials" video is over six hours.  It has a look similar to iMovie, enough to make viewing Flash comfortable.  Vocabulary is somewhat intuitive, but there sure is a lot of it.  It will take me more than the remaining three months I have left to become an expert but hopefuly long enough to become "good enough".

BP_11 Google Forms

Yeah!  It worked today!  Had problems loading it on Sunday and Monday, but today for some reason it worked.  Not going to ask why, just glad it did.