Reflective Synopsis

The world we live in today is rapidly changing due to the growth in information communication technologies (ICTs) across our globe. Countries are now operating as part of international economies and at any point in the day millions of people can be found accessing information, purchasing goods and communicating with others via the World Wide Web - a reality our previous ancestors would not have deemed possible! These changes have sparked massive reforms in the area of education, with educational experts, teachers and governments realising the need to bring technology into the 21st century classroom. As Prensky (2005) argues, technology engages students in meaningful learning and thus teachers need to be altering their pedagogical, technological and organisational methods to facilitate the use of ICT with their learners (Vassiliou, 2012). Not only does working with technology engage students, but it encourages them to exercise critical thinking skills, collaborate with others, problem-solve and think creatively as they make decisions about how to obtain, use and present information (ED.gov, n.d.). Hence, when teachers make the shift to e-learning in their classroom, they are equipping their students with the 'digital fluency' they need to operate successfully in society, as well as numerous lifelong learning skills that will be required for the workforce (Vassiliou, 2012).

Taking these points into account, this reflective synopsis aims to reveal the important considerations teachers must make when incorporating ICTs within the classroom setting, such as working legally, safely and ethically online, promoting the collaborative construction of knowledge and the use of higher order thinking skills, and ensuring appropriate pedagogy is applied to facilitate the use of technology with students. An exploration of four effective digital tools for the classroom will also be undertaken to provide a practical context for the above considerations.

Working legally, safely and ethically online

The internet provides a fantastic platform for teachers and students to take part in meaningful, engaging learning. However, there are also many risks that come with working online, including copyright laws, inappropriate materials such as pornography, privacy issues, stranger danger and cyber bullying (Fasso, 2012). Anyone who has worked with children knows that they are not born with a clear sense of right and wrong. They need to be taught what constitutes appropriate and inappropriate behaviour, and this is the same when it comes to children understanding how to work legally, safely and ethically online. Teachers must actively model to students what the correct behaviours for working online are and take the time to explain concepts such as acknowledging sources of information and not providing personal details (full name, phone number, address) on online spaces such as blogs, wikis and websites (Johnson, 1999, p. 2).

Please see my blog post on working legally, safely and ethically online for further insight into this important consideration. I have included details about teacher expectations in regard to providing safe online environments for students, as well as practical ways educators can teach their children about appropriate online behaviour.

Promoting the collaborative construction of knowledge and the use of higher order thinking skills

The incorporation of ICT tools into the classroom enables teachers to create learning environments where students can work collaboratively to construct ideas, opinions and new understandings about a concept. The notion of working with others to build knowledge links directly to Vygotsky's learning theory of social constructivism, which highlights that interaction with others is vital for enabling learners to reach new levels of comprehension (Towards Learning Creatively, n.d., p. 3). This can be clearly seen in the digital tools of wikis, blogs and glogs, where students are able to comment on each others' work, upload information to be used by their peers and even peer edit information that has been produced by their classmates.

In week two of our e-learning course our class was involved in a wiki-based activity which required us to provide our thoughts on whether mobile phones should be used in the classroom (view the wiki here). This was scaffolded using the 'De Bono's Six Thinking Hats' and required the class to answer a series of critical thinking questions addressing the focus topic. Through offering my own opinions and reflecting on the arguments my peers provided, my initial stance on the use of mobile phones was completely altered. Not only was I able to construct new knowledge from the understandings of my peers, but I successfully used higher order thinking skills to reach my conclusions as a result of the activity being carefully scaffolded.

This leads to the third consideration for incorporating ICTs in the classroom - their use must be scaffolded effectively to ensure student learning is higher order. For example, if the mobile phones activity above merely required us to go onto the wiki and post whatever ideas we had about the topic, the learning achieved would not have been nearly as meaningful or constructive. Students need directional scaffolds (eg: headings, focus questions), particularly when working with ICTs, to help them focus their ideas and get the most out of the learning. As Yelland and Masters (2007, as cited in Campbell, 1999, p. 92-93) conclude "Teachers who effectively scaffold ensure that students are afforded the opportunity to maximise their potential and use higher-order thinking skills to solve problems".

Please see my blog post on Using Wikispaces to read more about how this digital tool helps to scaffold higher order thinking and facilitate collaboration.

The importance of using appropriate pedagogy when teaching and learning through digital technologies

As revealed above, digital technologies have clear benefits for enhancing student learning. However, if e-learning is to be in any way effective, teachers must know the subject matter they need to teach, know the best digital tools for teaching that subject matter and know the pedagogies (ways of teaching) that best support learning in the particular subject area (Fasso, 2012). This is the basis of the TPACK (Technological Pedagogical and Content Knowledge) learning framework. TPACK provides teachers with a common-sense approach to effective learning design, emphasising that good learning experiences incorporate solid content knowledge, solid pedagogical knowledge and solid technological knowledge. Please see my blog post on TPACK for a deeper analysis of this teaching and learning framework, as well as a lesson idea that shows how TPACK works to scaffold higher order learning experiences.

Now that we have investigated some of the key considerations teachers must make when planning digital learning experiences, I am going to reflect upon four of the most effective digital tools I have explored throughout this course and their teaching and learning implications for the classroom.

Wikis

A wiki is an online work space which allows individuals or groups of people to upload text, videos, images and audio to one location. The uploaded information can then be accessed by anyone who is a member of the wiki and people can comment on the ideas or work of group members. I have personally used wikis a number of times throughout my university course as a tool for collaborating with peers to complete assignments. My fellow group members and I would each take a part of the assignment to complete, and once we had written our section of information or found some great research we would upload it to the wiki. The rest of the group could then either edit our work or provide comments about whether our research was on the right track (now that's social constructivism in action!). In the primary classroom context, wikis do not just have to be used as a tool for collaborating over assessment tasks. Teachers could set up a classroom wiki where students upload words they found in their daily reading that they did not know the meaning of, along with its correct definition. At the end of each week or term the teacher could copy the student definitions from the wiki and make a vocabulary list chart to display in the classroom. For effective learning to take place using wikis, teachers must provide students with a clear purpose for why they are using it as a learning tool (scaffolding). Otherwise, students may misuse the wiki as a place to upload meaningless and off-task information. Please see my blog post about wikis which contains a PMI of the benefits and limitations of this tool, as well as additional practical ideas for using wikis in the classroom.

Digital Videos

The world today is a visually stimulating place. We find images and video footage on our internet screens, television screens and in our favourite magazines. For our students to function successfully in society, they need to be able to interpret these visual medias and make meaning from them. Having students create digital videos is an effective way of not only developing digital and visual literacy skills, but also higher order thinking skills. This is because students are required to decide on how to make images, footage, music, text and audio work together to create a video that successfully conveys meaning. Furthermore, when students collaborate to produce digital videos they are exercising the ability to work as a team and communicate with others. Using digital videos as a way of teaching a concept can also be deemed as effective, because videos convey information through a variety of ways (visual, auditory, text etc). This would ensure the majority of learners in my class could access important information in their preferred learning style, and all at the same time! (Please see my blog post on the importance of teachers knowing their students learning styles and how ICTs can help teachers cater for them - Learning Styles).

Prior to undertaking this course I had not had a lot of experience with using digital videos in both a personal context or as part of classroom learning. However, now that I have discovered the lifelong learning skills that can be developed from engaging with such a digital tool, there is no doubt in my mind that I will be using videoing with my future students! Please see my blog post on digital videos to see a PMI of this digital tool's benefits and limitations, as well as some innovative ways of using digital videoing to support learning in both upper and lower primary classrooms - Digital Videos.

Glogster

Creative thinking is one of the key capabilities the Australian Curriculum states students need to be developing as a result of learning across all KLAs (ACARA, n.d.). The digital tool of Glogster is an online poster-making/scrapbooking tool that does just this - it provides students with a means of presenting information in a creative way and can be used to facilitate learning in any KLA. To make a 'glog', learners upload images, text, audio files or video files onto their main poster background and then arrange those pieces of information in whatever fashion they like. This is certainly an alternative to the cardboard poster idea, with teachers not having to provide a plethora of stationery items for students to work with. Furthermore, a glog can serve as a fantastic organisational tool for learners who struggle to coordinate their ideas when completing lengthy assignments. Students could simply upload all of their ideas/research onto a glog, sort through those ideas to see what ones best address the task and then delete the research that is no longer needed. This leaves them with a clear scaffold for completing their assignment.

The use of Glogster as a learning tool must be carefully scaffolded by teachers, as it would be very easy for the design element of this program to take precedence over learning in the hands of students without clear direction. The possibilities for using Glogster are truly endless, but one idea I came up with was for a lower primary classroom (Prep to Year 1). To help young learners explore the idea of 'self', the teacher could have them create a glog poster of all of the things they like and what makes them who they are (Eg: Riding a bike, watermelon, singing , red hair etc.). As the learners are very young, the teacher would need to provide explicit teaching about how to use the program. However, it is certainly a digital tool they would be a able to use independently with a little practise. Please see my blog post on Glogster to see a PMI of further benefits and limitations to this tool, as well as additional practical ideas for incorporating glogs into classroom learning.

Google Earth

In a world where technology has made it possible to interact with others on a global scale, it is vital that students are equipped with the skills they need to operate as global citizens. What are these skills? Two that stand out are having an understanding of the location of different places on Earth and what those places look like geographically (landscape, city size etc.). Google Earth is an online software application powered by Google which allows users to view satellite images of anywhere on the earth. Consequently, this enables students to develop an understanding of both the location and geographical makeup of certain areas. This is not its only function however! Google Earth can aid learning in a number of KLAs, one being Maths. The program contains a 'ruler' tool which allows the user to measure the width, height and length of certain objects on the earth (eg: a house), thus providing students with an engaging way of exploring and practising measurement. Learners could work in groups to zoom in on a satellite image of familiar places, such as the school oval, and use the ruler tool to determine its dimensions. One drawback of Google Earth is that it usually requires fast internet connection to ensure it successfully operates. This is something teachers would need to look into before attempting to use it with a class of students. Please see my blog post on Google Earth for a PMI of further benefits and limitations to this tool, as well as a number of practical ways to use Google Earth for learning in different KLAs.

Through participating in this e-learning course my eyes have been opened to a number of digital tools that can be used to facilitate meaningful learning across all KLAs. Digital tools such as wikis, videos, glogs and Google Earth have the power to develop higher order thinking skills, creativity, collaboration, critical thinking, contextualised learning and an awareness of how to work legally, safely and ethically online. These are the reasons why I will endeavour to use such powerful technologies in my future classrooms. The world our students are growing up in is one that is driven by technology, and thus my role as a teacher must be to embrace the use of ICTs within the classroom. Not only as an effort to ensure my students are engaged in classroom learning, but to ensure they have the digital fluency to successfully operate in society.

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References:

1. Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA).(n.d.). The Australian curriculum: General capabilities: Critical and creative thinking. Retrieved from http://www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/GeneralCapabilities/Critical-and-creative-thinking/Introduction/Critical-and-creative-thinking-across-the-curriculum

2. Campbell, C. (1999). The role of the internet in the primary school classroom: From a learning and teaching perspective. Retrieved from http://researchonline.nd.edu.au/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1000&context=edu_books

3. Fasso, W. (2012). The TPACK framework. Retrieved from CQUniversity e-courses, FAHE11001 Managing E-Learning, http://e-courses.cqu.edu.au

4. Fasso, W. (2012). Working legally, safely and ethically online: The issues. Retrieved from CQUniversity e-courses, FAHE11001 Managing E-Learning, http://e-courses.cqu.edu.au

5. Johnson, D. (1999). Handout for teaching students right from wrong in the digital age. Retrieved from http://www.janinelim.com/bc/4thur/ethics.pdf

6. Prensky, M. (2005). "Engage me or enrage me": What today's learners demand. Retrieved from http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/erm0553.pdf

7. Towards Learning Creatively (TLC). (n.d.). Link to learning and teaching theories: Social development and peer assessment. Retrieved from http://www.creativeassessment.org.uk/asstheory/documents/LinktoLearningandTeaching Theoriespracticalthree.pdf

8. U.S. Department of Education (Ed.gov). (n.d). Effects of technology on classrooms and students. Retrieved from http://www2.ed.gov/pubs/EdReformStudies/EdTech/effectsstudents.html

9. Vassiliou, A. (2012, June 3). Opening up education for new technologies - Changing teaching and learning through ICT [Web log message]. Retrieved from http://www.neurope.eu/blog/opening-education-new-technologies-changing-teaching-and- learning-through-ict

Image Acknowledgement:

Teacher and Students at Computer - http://newsletter.schoolbox.com/2011/12/14/get-out-the-pre-holiday-wiggles-aka-keeping-your-students-attention-in-december/

Week 5 - Google Earth

Google Earth is part of the Group 4 digital tools for e-learning and as I have discovered, is worth its weight in gold as a classroom resource. Google Earth is an online software application powered by Google which allows you to view satellite images of anywhere on the earth. If you have access to the internet you can download Google Earth from Google for free! This means all schools should easily be able to get their hands on this digital tool.

Once in Google Earth, you are able to search for different locations you would like to 'zoom' to on the earth. Within a matter of seconds (depending on how fast your internet connection goes!) your computer screen will be zoomed in on the country, city or landmark you searched for. Here is a screen shot of where I used Google Earth to see what the Egyptian capital city of Cairo looks like.

Initially I had very limited knowledge of what this part of the world looks like - I thought Cairo was a tiny town in the middle of the Egyptian desert with a couple of pyramids surrounding it! As the Google Earth satellite image shows however, it is certainly not a tiny town, but a very large and densely populated city! Thus, Google Earth has clear applications for helping students to develop global awareness (having an understanding of what countries look like geographically and where they are located on the earth).

Google Earth has several other functions which can enhance learning across the KLAs. One of these functions is the 'Ruler' tool which can be found in the 'Tools' tab. I used this tool with my students last year on prac when we were learning about measurement. Using Google Earth on the interactive whiteboard, I was able to zoom in on the school tennis courts. From here, the class and I worked together using the ruler tool to find the width and length measurements of the tennis courts. This really engaged the students in the concept of measurement because they were getting to measure something they were familiar with (learning in context) and using the internet to do it! Here is a screen shot of the tennis courts we used.

One more function of Google Earth I want to elaborate on is the 'Sunlight Across the Landscape' button at the top of screen (the button has an image of a sun coming out of the clouds). This tool actually shows what parts of the earth are in sunlight (day) and what parts of the earth are in darkness (night). This would be a perfect tool to use in the KLA of science (Earth and Space Sciences) for teaching the concept of 'night and day' to students. Learners can rotate the earth to physically see what parts of the world are experiencing night and day, helping to remedy common student misconceptions such as 'Everywhere on earth experiences night and day at the same time'. Here is a screen shot of how Google Earth shows the world experiencing night and day.

Here is a PMI of the benefits, limitations and interesting things about Google Earth.

Plus:

Students can become 'globally aware' through getting to view satellite images of what different parts of the world look like

Google Earth contains a number of handy functions that facilitate learning in different KLAs (eg: 'Ruler' tool for measurement in Maths and 'Sunlight' button for exploring night and day in Science)

Can be used to find directions from one location to another

It is an engaging and interactive tool for learners

Google Earth is free for anyone to download

Minus:

Some of the satellite images of parts of the earth are not detailed (can't be zoomed in on)

Some of the satellite images are outdated and don't show the most recent development in places (are 5 or more years old)

A fast internet connection is required to ensure Google Earth works effectively (it will take forever to load satellite images if the internet is slow, wasting valuable class time!)

A moderate level of technological literacy is needed for learners to operate this program independently.

Interesting:

Google Earth contains a fantastic function called 'Street View'. Street View is where you can zoom into a city or town so closely that you can physically see what their streets look like - it is as though you are walking down the street in that particular place! (Mindboggling stuff people!!!). I can see this function being particularly helpful in a unit of work exploring different countries and what it would be like to live in those places around the world. I used Google Earth to zoom in on a street in Amsterdam in the Netherlands and also to zoom in on a street in Bundaberg, Australia. By taking a screen shot (using the 'Snipping' tool on my computer) of both of these street views, you can see below the difference in housing between these two places.

Amsterdam - The Netherlands

Bundaberg - Australia

This clearly helps students to see that not all people live in the same way as we do here in Australia! Thus, overall I believe this exploration of Google Earth has shown what an invaluable learning tool it can be for the classroom. In a world where our students must become global citizens to function effectively in society, Google Earth is a sure piece of online software to help them on their way!

Thanks guys :) talk soon!

Sarah

Week 5 - Glogster!

Glogster is one of the Group 3 digital tools to be explored as part of our e-learning course. From the moment I read about Glogster on Moodle I could automatically see the benefits of using such a tool in the classroom! Essentially, Glogster is an online poster making/scrapbooking site which allows users to upload images, text, audio and videos onto a pinboard-like screen. You can then arrange the uploaded files on the screen in whatever fashion you like. To give you an example of what I mean, I have embedded a glog that I made about the topic of Reptiles.

Please click on this link if you would like to view the Reptiles glog in full screen mode - Reptiles Glogster Page.

Pretty cool huh? :) The great thing about creating a glog is that it enables you to display information in an incredibly CREATIVE way. You can add frames around your uploaded images, change the colour of your text boxes, choose from a plethora of font styles and font colours and probably the best part of all - your information isn't restricted to being organised in a linear fashion, it can be placed around your glog page in whatever way you like. This tool would clearly benefit visual learners as glogs are a visual way of presenting information. Furthermore, it would also benefit learners who think 'globally' and need to have all the information about a topic/concept laid out in front of them before they can make sense of it. Glogster could also serve as an organisational tool for students who struggle to organise their ideas when completing a task. They could simply upload all their ideas/research onto a glog page and then sort through those ideas to find the ones that best address the task at hand, deleting those that are no longer necessary.

How can Glogster be used in the primary classroom? I created my Reptiles glog with an introductory lesson to the animal group of reptiles in mind (Prep - Year 3). To get the students thinking about what reptiles are and drawing on what prior knowledge they have, I would display my reptiles glog on the interactive whiteboard. The students would read through the text if they are able to and share their comments about the reptile photos displayed. It is a VERY simple idea (and with more time I would love to add some more text and images), but this glog provides an effective launching pad for further learning throughout the lesson (and the best part is... it only took 15 minutes to make!).

Below is a PMI that I have constructed on the use of Glogster in the classroom. It explores the benefits, limitations and interesting points about this digital tool.

Plus:

It is a fun and creative way for students to display their ideas

Glogster pages can be set to 'Private' to ensure student work is safe and secure

Allows images, text, audio, videos and hyperlinks to be embedded

Can be used collaboratively by groups of students

Is a great alternative to the cardboard poster idea (no need to provide students with a plethora of stationery items!)

Supports visual learners and global thinkers

Students can comment on their peers' glog pages

Minus:

Students might focus on trying to make their glog look 'pretty' rather than on the learning content they are meant to be displaying

If the purpose for using the glog is not presented clearly by the teacher, students' glogs could simply become a space for posting meaningless and off-task information

Interesting:

The possibilities for using blogs are truly endless, and the best part is they can be incorporated into learning across all KLAs. While researching about how different teachers have used Glogster with their students I came across this great website - 1001 Super Tools for Teachers: Glogster. There are a few really great teaching strategies, but one I particularly liked was the idea of using Glogster to display the steps students took to complete a science experiment (in both text form and through digital photographs). Be sure to check out the rest of the ideas from the website to extend your strategies for using glogs in the classroom!

Week 4 - Digital Videos

Week 4 is all about Multimedia, and whilst I can see how the Group 2 digital tools of images and podcasts can enhance student learning, I believe digital videos provide the greatest platform for fostering critical thinking, research skills, problem solving, visual literacy skills, creativity and the ability to work in collaboration.

Digital videos enable students to incorporate images, footage, music, text and audio into one polished product that reflects their ideas on a topic. With the world today being saturated in visual media, from billboards on the side of the road, to images in a magazine, to advertisements and movies on our television screens, it is vital that students know how to interpret these visual medias and make meaning from them (aka - Visual Literacy). Producing digital videos themselves, or engaging with ones a teacher has created, drives students to develop visual literacy skills.

Through creating digital videos, students are automatically required to exercise higher order thinking skills because they have to decide on how to make images/footage, text and sound work together to achieve a certain purpose and to make meaning. For example, in an English unit on persuasive texts, instead of having my students create an advertising poster, I would have them create a video advertisement persuading me to buy a particular product (Eg: Hamburger).

To effectively persuade me to buy their product, the students would have to think carefully about a lot of different aspects in relation to their video. What camera angle will they use to ensure their hamburger looks enticing to the viewer? (Close up of the beef patty etc.) And what words will be used on the background audio to persuade me to want to eat the hamburger? (Eg: Juicy, succulent meat patty and crisp, fresh lettuce etc). A lot of critical thinking is needed to create a video advertisement that effectively persuades an audience.

For lower primary, digital videos can be used as a tool for 'digital storytelling'. Digital storytelling is basically where students use images, text, audio and footage to create a digital story in the form of either a personal narrative, a narrative about someone else or an event in history or a set of instructions (please see this website by Bernard Robin for a deeper look at digital storytelling - The Educational Uses of Digital Storytelling).

An example of how I would use digital storytelling with a Year 1 or Year 2 class would be to have them work in groups, using digital cameras, to take photographs of the things they do throughout a school day (Eg: Going to parade, eating lunch, going to Music etc.). With the help of the teacher, the groups could use a program such as Movie Maker (which is readily available on any Windows computer) to construct a simple video of their day at school. This is not only teaching the learners new ICT skills, but is helping them establish the vital literacy skill of being able to sequence events.

I recently had a go at creating my own digital video using Windows Movie Maker and was pleasantly surprised with the results! My video reflects the idea of the personal narrative digital story as it was one I created for my 21st birthday party. It contains a number of still photographs and videos from my childhood to the present day, along with accompanying text and audio files playing in the background.

To finish, I have also constructed a PMI for the use of digital videos in the classroom. As with any digital tool, there are a couple of drawbacks to using digital video and it is important to highlight these. But overall I do hope I have been able to persuade you that digital videos are a fantastic higher order thinking tool that will really get your learners engaging in classroom tasks!

Plus:

The use of digital videos by the teacher to present content allows students to learn through a variety of learning styles (visual, auditory etc.).

Creating videos encourages students to use higher order thinking skills and creativity to make a product that serves a particular purpose (eg: to persuade, to inform, to justify...).

Fosters visual literacy skills in students through requiring them to analyse the best way to use images/footage to convey meaning

The majority of school computers are either Microsoft or Mac based and both of these operating systems automatically come with video making software (Windows Movie Maker or iMovie)

Collaborative learning skills, communication skills, presentation skills and organisational skills are all exercised through making digital videos

Minus:

Making video presentations takes a substantial amount of time and this may jeopardise learning in other KLAs

Movie Maker and iMovie can sometimes be difficult tools to operate for beginner students and thus this will require a lot of teacher attention

Digital video software can sometimes take a long time to buffer and render a completed video presentation

Interesting:

Digital videos can be used for learning across all KLAs. Please see one of my previous blog posts for a great way to use digital videoing as part of a Year 5 History unit on the Australian Gold Rush - Week 1 Reflections on Prensky (it is at the end of the post!).

Thanks everyone :) Talk soon!

Sarah

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Image Acknowledgement:

Hamburger - http://www.flickr.com/photos/26777958@N05/3070041561/

Child Using Digital Camera - http://www.photoreview.com.au/tips/buying/Buying-Cameras-for-Children

Working legally, safely and ethically online

After working on resizing images this week my mind was taken back to Week 2 of our e-learning course when we discussed the importance of copyright laws and acknowledging the images we use from the internet (working legally, safely and ethically online).

Now, because the image I resized in my previous post is one of my own I did not have to acknowledge it. However, throughout my blog posts I have used a number of images from Google which are not my own, but rather the property of those who uploaded them. Despite knowing this, up until now I have been getting into the nasty habit of uploading photos without acknowledging their source! (EEK!). This has led me to go back through my blog posts and ensure that I have acknowledged all of the images I have used by providing a link to their original source on the web.

It is our responsibility as teachers to be setting the example for students when it comes to working legally, safely and ethically online. Students cannot be expected to 'just know' about copyright laws or issues like stranger danger online - we must teach them about it. Furthermore, teachers must, at all times, model the appropriate behaviours for working online.

The Moodle webpage for our course relating to working legally, safely and ethically online provides a list of the areas that both teachers and students need to be aware of when working online. These include:

Copyright laws - Learners need to be taught that any image, video or piece of information they use from an online source must have its author acknowledged - unless it is their own material.

Inappropriate materials such as pornography, sexually explicit images or any information/images relating to violent, hateful and offensive behaviours - Teachers need to ensure that their school has online security measures set in place which limit the type of websites students can access. Teachers also need to encourage students that if an inappropriate image or website does appear when they are using the internet, they need to report it immediately to the teacher or another adult.

Privacy - If teachers would like to share a students' work online they need to ensure they have the permission of both the student and their guardian to do so.

Stranger Danger - Teachers need to speak openly with their students about the dangers of talking with strangers on the internet. They also need to ensure that students are not providing any personal details (i.e. full name, phone number, address, photographs) on things like blogs, wikis or websites that could lead a person to make contact with a student. Additionally, teachers need to ensure that when using digital tools such as wikis, blogs and websites that the privacy settings are set to 'Private' not 'Public' so that only the student themselves or other class members can view their work.

Cyber Bullying - Teachers need to make students aware that online work spaces such as blogs, wikis and websites are not to be used as tools for bullying others. Teachers need to model to students what appropriate and constructive commenting on other peoples' work looks like and talk with them about the devastating, long lasting social and emotional effects that are left on people when they are cyber bullied.

Some of the practical ways that teachers can help students to learn about working legally, safely and ethically can be found on this website - Teaching Students Right from Wrong in the Digital Age. I personally found the idea the author presents of working through real-life scenarios with students, such as 'A student locates a story online, recopies it in his own writing, and submits it to the teacher as his own work', as a very meaningful way of helping them distinguish between the right and wrong ways to work online (Johnson, 1999, p.2). This website provides countless scenarios that teachers can work through with their students relating to each of the issues spoken about above. As well as this, two questionnaires have also been created for students to answer as a way of testing their knowledge about appropriate online behaviours.

The internet is a truly wonderful tool for helping to enhance the learning of our students. However, as highlighted above, there are clear risks that come with working in online environments. It is our responsibilty as teachers to ensure we provide safe online experiences for our students and that we explicitly teach them how to work legally, safely and ethically online. In doing so, we are setting our students up for future success, as both secondary and tertiary institutions require students to strictly adhere to copyright laws when producing academic work.

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References:

Johnson, D. (1999). Handout for teaching students right from wrong in the digital age. Retrieved from http://www.janinelim.com/bc/4thur/ethics.pdf

Image Acknowledgement:

Online Safety - http://theteenagertimes.blogspot.com.au/2011/12/schools-add-internet-etiquette-safety.html

Cyber Bullying - http://aspanational.wordpress.com/2012/02/07/cyber-bullying-a-question-of-punishment/

Week 4 - Working with Images

Hi guys :)

So Week 4 saw us exploring Group 2 of the digital tools for this course. In our tutorial we were stepped through how to resize images so they can be successfully uploaded to the web. I had never really thought about the whole process of having to resize images before, because the times when I have used images in websites or wikis they have been straight from Google and already resized by the original person who uploaded the photo onto the web!

When I was taught how to look at the dimensions of a photo by the wonderful Carike, I quickly realised however that if I was to try and upload an original photo taken on my Nikon camera (WITHOUT resizing it) it would not end well!

Below is a photo that was taken of my lovely man Peter and I at our engagement party earlier this year. In its original form the photo's dimensions were a wopping 4288 x 2844. I was then able to resize the image using a free online photo resizing program called Mobaphoto. This program was incredibly quick to download and very easy to use. With a click of a button I was able to upload my photo into the program and then choose for it to be resized to the appropriate dimensions for being put online. The result of resizing was that the dimensions were reduced to 640 x 425. Now that's a significant change in size!

Here is the final resized photo:

Week 2 - Reflections on Using Wikispaces

This week in our tutorial we engaged in an activity on Wikispaces which required us to provide our opinions on whether mobile phones should be used in the classroom. The wikispaces activity was scaffolded using De Bono's Six Thinking Hats model, with the class having to answer a series of critical thinking questions for each of the coloured thinking hats (these questions led us to directly address the focus topic of mobile phones).

The use of De Bono's Six Thinking Hats was an extremely effective way to scaffold such a discussion, as it personally got me thinking deeply and critically about the question at hand. I believe the biggest benefit of this wikispaces activity however, was the fact that it provided a platform by which we could build on the thoughts and knowledge of other students in the class. This idea of building on the ideas of others links directly to Vygotsky's reserach on the learning theory of constructivism, and is vital for ensuring that we not only construct new knowledge, but replace the incorrect knowledge we have with the correct knowledge we gain from others(Handfield-Jones, et. al., 2002, as cited in UBC, n.d., p. 3).

This very notion of replacing knowledge occurred in my own mind whilst completing this activity. When I answered the first set of questions in the wiki relating to the black thinking hat, I passionately proposed that I would NEVER use mobile phones in the classroom. Sounds pretty resolute right?! However, as I moved to answering the next set of questions relating to the blue thinking hat, my once very set opinion began to crumble! As I read one of my peers' arguments, which had some very strong evidence of how mobile phones could be successfully incorporated into classrooms with the right security measures, my mind totally lit up to the amazing benefits of using such a well-known and readily available ICT tool with students!

To me, this is what real and meaningful learning is about. The type of learning that is carefully scaffolded to produce higher order thinking skills and that encourages us to question and challenge the ideas we have come to understand as truth.

But not only is the mobile phones wiki activity grounded in the constructivist learning theory, it also incorporates elements of the cognitivist and connectivist theories. Part of Piaget's cognitive theory is the idea of 'accommodation', which is quite similar to constructivism in that it focuses on how people modify to accommodate the new information they come across (PSU, n.d.) . This means that when my brain took in the new information presented by my peer about the positive ways mobile phones could be used in the classroom, my cognitive structure actually changed so that it could make room for that new information. Pretty cool huh? Connectivism is also apparent in the activity through the way we as a class were accessing the information provided by our peers to shape our own ideas, as well as using knowledge from other digital sources such as websites, blogs etc. to form our arguments.

There was one clear drawback involved with participating in this activity, and this was that when we tried to put our ideas on the wiki in our tutorial every new person who attempted to add their viewpoint actually typed over/deleted the previous person's work. This was due to the fact that we were all working from the same uni network server at the same time. Effectively, we could only begin to add our ideas when we got home to our own computers, and I found that a lot of the thoughts I had come up with to post during our tutorial discussion had completely left my mind by the time I got home! This was quite frustrating as you can imagine, but it was good for us as pre-service teachers to see that sometimes technology can fail (shock horror!) and it is in these times that we have to be flexible and find ways to work around it.

Overall, I believe the mobile phones wiki activity was very effective in scaffolding higher order thinking through its clear foundation in current learning theory and the effective questioning used as part of De Bono's Six Thinking Hats model.

Time to sign out for another day guys, happy blogging! :)

Sarah

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References:

University of British Columbia (UBC). (n.d.). Self-assessment, self-direction, self-regulation and other myths : Deconstructing our beliefs about the adult learner. Retrieved from http://books.google.com/books

The Pennsylvania State University (PSU). (n.d.).Cognitive theories of learning. Retrieved from http://www.personal.psu.edu/wxh139/cognitive_1.htm

Image Acknowledgement:

Six Thinking Hats - http://www.mkk.school.nz/Site/Learning_MKK/Thinking_MKK/De_Bono_s_Thinking_Hats.ashx

Surprised Face - http://regjackonline.com/what-two-words-can-characterize-your-personal-brand

Cartoon Brain - http://www.apr16.com/?cat=27

Thumbs Up - http://www.radian6.com/blog/2010/09/guest-post-getting-managements-approval-for-incorporating-social-media-into-your-ir-program/istock_000005604144xsmall/