Monday, November 2, 2009

Journal 10 - 5 Great Tools to Perk Up Your Classroom and Engage Your Students - NETS-T V

Yoder, M. (2009). 5 great tools to perk up your classroom and engage your students. Learning and Leading with Technology, 37(3). Retrieved October 30, 2009 from http://www.iste.org/AM/Template.cfm?Section=November_No_3_5&Template=/MembersOnly.crm&NavMenuID=4436&ContentID=24614&DirectListComboInd=D

Yoder presents her five top picks for some of the cool tech tools available for fun and learning in today's K-12 classrooms. Tools range in price from the free Google applications to the exorbitantly expensive Smart Table priced at $7,999 - how smart is that in today's oppressed economy? Yoder's top five include WeDO, Smart Table, Aver Pen, MUVEs, and Google Apps.

MIT's Lifelong Kindergarten group collaborated with Lego Education to develop WeDO, a moderately priced ($309.85 for all three components) robotic construction set of virtual manipulatives for 7-11 year old children. Students integrate virtual and physical worlds as they create animations to illustrate stories and even share their projects on the worldwide web. The three component parts can be purchased separately, with each successive part upgrading the program's capability. The robotics construction set ($139.95) allows students to use online LEGO bricks, gears, and motion and tilt sensors to construct 12 different models that demonstrate the four basic themes of the program: mechanisms, wild animals, soccer and adventure stories. With the addition of the activity pack ($129.95), students can create and program their own simple machine designs, learn to measure time and distance, and write about their creations. The software ($39.95) has a user-friendly drop-and-drag interface, an interactive building tutorial, and a teacher guide to assist in designing projects across the curriculum that allow students to share their animated adventure stories with other children around the world.

The Smart Table is an interactive multitouch learning center that just does not seem to be worth the $7,999 price tag. After watching the video promotion for this product, I think the multitouch Smart Table is out of touch with reality. It seems to transform 3-dimensional manipulatives into a 2-dimensional format in a virtual reality environment. It does solve the problem of young children picking up blocks and other manipulatives - there simply aren't any to pick up. I don't think this tool would be cool at any price!

The Aver Pen, $799 for a starter pack of 1 teacher and 4 student pens, can project an image on any surface in the room. It functions like an interactive whiteboard without the physical whiteboard. Using radio frequency that operates within a 100 foot radius, the teacher pen can interact with up to six student pens at the same time. A built-in keypad acts as a group response system to record results and display them as graphs and tables. This could be extremely useful in science and math classes. Applications useful in other content areas include interactive tools, image capture, and video recording capabilities. This device could cut down considerably on the amount of equipment needed to manage a high-tech classroom.

With some minimal materials costs, Multiuser Virtual Environments (MUVEs) are free to anyone with access to a computer and the Internet. Yoder lists some of the new MUVEs that teachers might want to join or explore to design their own classroom MUVEs. Whyville (www.whyville.net) is designed for younger children in early primary grades. Quest Atlantis (http://atlantis.crit.indiana.edu) combines a gaming environment with learning and motivational strategies for children from 3rd grade up to early high school. EcoMUVE (www.ecomuve.org/index.html) is an ecosystems science curriculum for middle school. Skoolaborate (www.skoolaborate.com) was designed for high school students to integrate the curriculum with digital tech tools in a collaborative environment using blogs, online learning, wikis and virtual worlds. These would be a good starting point for a teacher who would like to incorporate MUVEs in the classroom.

Google Apps links teachers, students and classrooms around the world, offers tutorials on using Google Apps, and maintains a discussion forum for educators to share ideas, lesson plans and advice on using Google Apps for K-12 learning environments in every conceivable course content area. Google Apps has a new site specifically designed for teachers (http://edu.googleapps.com) that could be a lifeline for anyone struggling to use technology in the classroom.

Which tool is the right tool for my classroom?
Unless you have unlimited personal resources to spend on tech tools, an educator must first consider the resources available at the specific school site. Ask other teachers what they are using and find out what works well in the classroom at your school. For primary grades, the Lego WeDO construction set is affordable and fun, with cross-curricular applications for science, math and language arts. This tool engages many different types of learners at all ability levels. For teachers with limited finances, Google Apps is the best place to start. It would also be worthwhile to explore some of the many MUVEs. I would ask for help from the school site tech expert and go from there.

What's the learning curve for these new tech tools?
Yoder selected all these tools for their accessibility and for the support they offer to users. Even so, there is a steep learning curve for any new technology that can be frustrating as well as time-consuming. The best approach for me is to try and keep up with technology advancements by reading ISTE's online L&L journal articles, and then ask other teachers and tech experts for their advice. I would start small to build confidence and to assess student comfort level with different types of technologies, then take it global.

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