Tony’s Teacher World

Looking back on the past 2 intense weeks makes me happy that I don’t have to go for a 3rd week. I did learn a TON about technology in the classroom and how it can be incorporated into education in order to supplement student learning. I really liked how this class opened the door to several new technologies that I neverthought that I would ever use. I never though I’d have a blog or a twitter account, I never even imagined some of the tools that the groups in our class presented. I particularly enjoyed creating my Prezi, I never thought about anything other than a Powerpoint and I really like how Prezi is not linear like Powerpoint, I can really see myself utilizing Prezi in the future. I enjoyed how we talked about the role of technology in education and how it can play an important role in teaching students. The class discussions about where technology was headed and where it was taking us were very interesting even though I felt a few were far fetched. In all honesty I felt this was a great class in terms of teaching me new skills, I really can’t wait to use what I have learned in this class, which is saying a lot considering some of the other material I have learn in other class. all in all I am very happy with this class.

See Me, Hear Me, Skype in the Classroom By Carolyn Foote (January 1, 2008)

Apace of Change Blog (March 19, 2008)

• Mr. Bariexca’s honors British literature class
• Hunterdon Central Regional High School in  Flemington, NJ
• Class prepared questions on their wiki site for Mr. Dave Stacy, a history and technology teacher at Olchra School in Swansea, Wales.

“In our session debrief, I asked my students what the value of an experience like this was for them – not why it was cool, or new, but what value it held for them. Responses centered around these major concepts:”

• first-hand access to a living primary source
• interactivity & having the ability to probe and ask for explanations & clarifications
• hearing a non-American perspective; combating ethnocentrism
• greater investment in preparation
• greater overall engagement due to all of the above

• Collaborate with museum curator on Canadian students’ history projects that were posted on their blogs.
• Curator was able to provide feedback to students through Skype.
• Following year, the teacher used Skype again to collaborate with a teacher on the same history project.

Horizon Project 2008

• Students from around the world analyze and compare information and make predictions.
• Used Skype to collaborate.

Part III: Teacher to Student Skype: Tutoring with Skype

Skype Directory – Tutoring and homework

• Tutoring advertisements on Skype website
• moderately priced, most academic help ranges around 15 cents a minute
• Huge directory ranging from language help to science and mathematics
• Part of the Skype website makes it very convenient

• Website made for EFL/ESL tutors
• Secure and reliable site
• Due to popularity and simplicity many tutors have switched from Yahoo and MSN to Skype
• Skype is currently translated into 24 languages making it a great tool for ESOL and language tutors
• ESL students can get help with documents since files can also be translated and shared

• Online English Professor
• All classes are done through Skype
• Very convenient considering it can be done from each participants home

Part IV: Student to Student Skype: Skype Pals

Random Connection: Skype Pals

· Diane McAlister’s first grade class at Reidville Elementary School’s was able to Skype with their pen pals in Washington State

· Teleconference with both classes as a whole

· Each student was able to meet and talk to their partner through the web cam

· The teacher gave them questions to ask

· Extra: they use the audio portion of Skype to let homebound students listen to the class.

Skype Buddies for Language Learners

· Interested in-High school language learners getting paired up with individuals who are native speakers in the language that the students are learning (french, spanish, mandarin).

· Reply-his students used Skype video to talk to an English class in Russia.

o Russia students were able to practice their English

o US students learned about Russian culture

· Websites were you can find Skype Pals

o Skype in Schools (Skype Extras**)

o Epals

o Students of the World

o Teachers.net (resource not included on this blog)

Epals

· Account you create (Students, Teachers, and Parents)

· Search for a classroom

· Connect with other ePals

· Blog

Skype on the iPhone

**Skype Extras

Lists other options you have when using Skype

· Callgraph

· Innerpass

· SkypeCap

· Talk’n’Write

· Unyte Application Sharing

· Yugma alone and with Skype

· Yuuguu (Powownow)

Today we checked out a lot of communication tools on Web 2.0 I checked out two very cool sites that really stuck out at me from the rest, bablewith.me and Voxlite.

Babelwith.me is an online chat room that allows people to chat with other in different languages, the really cool think about babelwith.me is that it will automatically translate you messages to whatever language the other users speak. I think this could be a great way for students to get to talk with children of other cultures and discuss daily things while still understanding eachother.

Voxlite is a website that allows you to send private video messages to your friends. I thought it was pretty cool because it like leaving a voicemail but just with video.

Today we learned about Twitter and Chatzy, Twitter does seem interesting to me but I’m still a little new at using it so I don’t really have the hang of it, I do like that I can get up to the minute news and sports. I personally thought the Chatzy was kindof fun, especially knowing that everyone in the class was on it and chatting. I liked the idea that Twitter could be used as a classroom tool and at the end of the year just erase all your students from your Twitter, I think a good idea would be to put up the homework assignments or when projects are due so students can just check your Twitter if they forget what is due. I’m not huge on telling people what I think so I thnk I could best use Twitter as a supplement to my instruction. Though I like Chatzy I’m not sure that I could use it in a classroom because I think it would become too distracting and a little hard to control if I was trying to teach a lesson or if someone was presenting a project. even though it worked well in this class not all students have the maturity of a graduate level class.

just posted my new philosphy

Today we talked about students learning in the 21st century and what teachers need to do in order to facilitate student learning. I agree that teachers need to do what they can to help students learn in the 21st century but I think that it needs to start with the higher ups because I know of many school districts that either do not have the money or the care to help teachers who want to use these new technologies in their classrooms. On another note Cindy has this Awesome Pen that records speech and and can be played back and made slower or faster, its pretty awesome.

My Philosophy page is up!

http://docs.google.com/View?id=d8nfxms_5d6hzm4fs

Today I met with my group to discuss our “technology in education” presentation. We are going to be talking about using Skype in the classroom, Skype is a software application that allows users to make voice calls over the Internet, Skype also allows for video chats if the users have a web cam. I’m excited to present my part of the project about tutoring children using Skype.