Group items tagged

"The Frayer Model is a strategy that uses a graphic organizer for vocabulary building. This technique requires students to (1) define the target vocabulary words or concepts, and (2) apply this information by generating examples and non-examples. This information is placed on a chart that is divided into four sections to provide a visual representation for students."

"The invention of the LMS (Learning Management System) was a mistake. And here I'm not going to make the same frustrated argument made numerous times before now that LMSs are limiting structures, that their interface and functionalities control how teachers teach online (although those things are true). The LMS was a mistake because it was premature. In a world that was just waking up to the Internet and the possibility of widely-networked culture, the LMS played to the lowest common denominator, creating a "classroom" that allowed learning -- or something like learning -- to happen behind tabs, in threaded discussions, and through automated quizzes. The LMS was not a creative decision, it was not pushing the capabilities of the Internet, it was settling for the least innovative classroom practice and repositioning that digitally. As a result classes taught within its structure generally land with a dull thud. No matter how creative and inspired the teacher or pedagogue behind the wheel, the LMS is no match for the wideness of the Internet. It was born a relic -- at its launch utterly irrelevant to its environment and its user." Very thought-provoking article on how digital pedagogy really differs from just "teaching online."

"As part of the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), students need to "ask questions to clarify evidence of the factors that have caused the rise in global temperatures over the past century." Many teachers have little to no formal training on how to teach about climate change. Along with the ever-changing research and the controversy that comes with it, some teachers inevitably shy away or even prevent students from digging deep into the content. Some suggest that teachers might be getting climate change all wrong. Since teachers can't rely on books to stay current with all the new research, digital resources are the only effective way to stay on top of such a dynamic field. Consider these practices when using technology to teach about climate change:" Sites include NASA Global Climate Change, Climate Kids for younger learners, Global Oneness Project, and Earth-Now to analyze realtime data.

As with ICT more generally, positive impacts on student motivation depend on the ways in which the ICT is used. Improvements in students' attitudes in learning and changes in behaviour will inevitably be reliant on the capacity of teachers and students to use ICT as an effective pedagogical tool. Drawing clear conclusions on the effects of ICT from the range of research evidence and reports available can be problematic.There are a number of factors that limit effective comparisons, such as differences in sample sizes, methodologies and effects, and the extent and purpose of ICT use involved.However, ICT can help to motivate students in a number of ways.

Poetry Forge has online (Flash) tools for generating instant poetry, as well as a downloadable version of the tools to use on the desktop. It's really fun to add some words to a list and then have the poetry-maker pop up your new poem. Students can learn a lot about metaphorical language here.

Good tool to generate ideas.

A huge list of materials online related to listening, speaking, reading, writing, grammar, and general study skills. Teachers need to review and select from sites to use them effectively in an academic program. Prepared by Christine Bauer-Ramazani for her Academic Skills courses.

R. Byrne: "Wideo is a nice tool for creating Common Craft-style videos. You can create animated videos on Wideo by dragging and dropping clipart and text in storyboard frames. You set the position and animation sequence for each element in each storyboard frame. When you have completed your storyboards Wideo generates a video for you. "This week Wideo added a new feature that allows you to build interactive buttons into each frame of your video. The buttons can be hyperlinked to any webpage that you like. When people are watching your video they can click the buttons to be taken to the webpage you want them to land on. For example, clicking the buttons in the video embedded below will take you to the website of my favorite animal rescue organizations." Older students could, of course, create videos themselves to instruct others. The new interactive button might also lead to a quiz on Quizlet or in Google Docs, for example.

"This study aims at investigating the efficiency of web quests in enhancing the 8th graders' descriptive writing. The 8th graders in the Lebanese public schools in general usually demonstrate poor writing skills. Consequently, they don't show motivation to write in English. The subjects of the study are one control group (n=22) and one experimental group (n=23) enrolled in grade eight in a public school in Beirut and whose ages range from thirteen to fifteen years old. The purpose of the study is to examine whether or not the web quest helps 8th graders achieve unity and coherence in writing descriptive paragraphs and to examine if the motivation towards writing is increased after using the web quest. Based on a pilot study conducted earlier by the two researchers, the prospective findings of the study shall convey that the experimental group produces unified and coherent writings. More importantly, the experimental group is expected to reveal great motivation towards writing. The researchers' prospective recommendations will be mainly urging the teachers of all levels to use the web quests as an indispensable tool requested to enhance students' motivation and to better their descriptive writing skills."

"Programming is magic. It's the ability to create things from pure imagination. We started CodeCombat to give learners the feeling of wizardly power at their fingertips by using typed code. "As it turns out, that enables them to learn faster too. WAY faster. It's like having a conversation instead of reading a manual. We want to bring that conversation to every school and to every student, because everyone should have the chance to learn the magic of programming. "CodeCombat is a community project,with hundreds of players volunteering to create levels, contribute to our code to add features, fix bugs, playtest, and even translate the game into 50 languages so far. Employees, contributors and the site gain by sharing ideas and pooling effort, as does the open source community in general. The site is built on numerous open source projects, and we are open sourced to give back to the community and provide code-curious players a familiar project to explore and experiment with. Anyone can join the CodeCombat community! "