Assignments for Internet Applications

Wiki: Very important aspect of this class. Showed how to apply the internet in a meaningful way. End product very useful. A great tool to learn and use in the k-12 classroom to encourage collaboration and participation.

WebQuest: A easy way for teachers to integrate technology. WebQuests are fun for the students and neat to create. Something to consider for future semesters… many students in this course had no experience in web design so it would be helpful to have the assignment due date later and additional resources on web design. Perhaps make that a prerequisite for this course, web design experience or to take authoring systems prior?

Participation:
Synchronous- I did not like Second Life. Although neat to play with, it took a really long time to download and install and I had a lot of technical problems with it afterwards as well. Palace worked fine, but DimDim or something similar would be my ultimate choice. These “class times” were very enlightening though! Just like the student led discussions, I really enjoyed the opinions from my classmates.
Asynchronous- I enjoyed the topics used for discussion. It did seem like there were not very many discussions in the beginning and then all of a sudden it was hard to keep up with them all. Also, the amount of “unnecessary” replies was a bit overwhelming. 2000 posts looks good, but many of them were simple “I agree”or “thanks.” While I did read all of the posts and commented on each one, I only felt it necessary to reply when I had meaningful and thoughtful comments to make.

Discussion Facilitation: This was fun! It was really neat to be able to pick a topic I was interested in, research it, and hear everyone’s opinion. These student led discussions were my favorite posts! I think for future courses that all of the discussions should be this way, even the early discussions could be students led. Start in the beginning of the semester picking topics and facilitating early on. This way students will quickly feel confident and comfortable in their discussion posts.

Web Site: Same comments as the WebQuest.

CMS: Moodle was a very easy program to use. While the project was a lot more comprehensive then I first imagined (but I probably did that on my own!), it was still very easy to edit and add content. I created a CMS that I will actually continue to add to and use for my students next year. A very powerful (and free!) application of the internet!

Blog: Blogging has a lot of educational potential. I personally do not enjoy blogging because I do not like for any personal business, thoughts, etc.. published to the internet. Although, for students in k-12, blogging is a great way to encourage participation, get answers to questions, discuss content, and even create stronger bonds with classmates and instructors. I will definitely be trying out blogging next year! And now with RSS feeds, I won’t have to worry about inappropriate content being posted!

PodCast: I really liked this assignment! I had a few friends come over and record the character voices. We all got really into it and had a blast! The end product was great too. PodCasting is definitely an internet application that should be used in k-12. Not only teacher created, but the students could create them as well which will help them better master content.

Twitter: Not a fan. Would be interested to see what that online seminar says are the benefits in education. The only benefit I see is important mass information to parents and students. Apart from that I do not think it is appropriate for parents, students, and teachers to be tweeting. It is too personal.

Overall these assignments were appropriate for the learning goals. There was definitely a lot going on at once which made things very stressful at times. I felt like I was repeating thoughts over and over in discussions, twitter, and blogs. I definitely recognize the educational potential for all of these assignments as a teacher, but I found it hard to really enjoy using some of the applications because I was so overwhelmed with it all. All three of these communication tools at once in one semester was just a lot of work on top of all of the other assignments. Maybe in future semesters, these things could still be used but not all at once?