Week 5

We finished off this series of workshops with a bit of fun and games. Looking at how we can include ICT animation in our classroom to assist in engaging our students in a variety of different ways.

Welcome to the ZimmerTwins animation at http://www.zimmertwins.com/. This website is an easy introduction to animated stories and can be used to help those students, who are reluctant writers, to come up with ideas for stories. It helps them select characters, their emotions, actions and settings. Once these have been chosen, the students can then provide dialogue for their characters. After spending practicum working with students who could waste half a session on topic selection for a narrative, I can see that this would have assisted those who were struggling. The stories can be saved on the website and can be shared with family and friends outside the school community, providing the students with a greater sense of ownership. On the flip side, I can also see that this could limit those students who would prefer to have a greater variety of scenes to choose from.

Another new site we were introduced to was http://www.buildyourwildself.com/. Similar to the Zimmertwins, this site could be used in literacy, but also could be extended to science and geography. You are able to create your own character. It can be a lifelike image, or a little bit more bizarre - similar to mine. The added benefit it offers, is factual information about the 'animal part' you have chosen for your character. For example, you click on the gibbon head and it tells you what animal it is and the animal originates. A very fun way of imparting knowledge. A classroom activity may be having to write a 'day in the life' of your particular character - do those ears have any special function? What use are all those legs and extraordinarily long arms? This type of activity can free up the childs imagination, promoting them to be creative.

While some students will have a good understanding of computer graphics and understandings, there will be many who have never attempted animation at home, and have limited access to computers outside of school. To provide these students with the background of how some animations are made, Greg recommended using www.abc.net.au/rollercoaster/rollermache. The use of familiar programs such as Jane and the Dragon, and Shaun the Sheep will engage the students, as I also took greater attention as they were using shows that I was familiar with. There are also clips that show how the professionals develop animation and provide step by step instructions for the students. The site uses both male and female artists, so it is great to try to break down the stereotypes of computer graphics. The presenters take you through storyboarding and how to structure your animation.

Lego is always popular in computer animation. During my last placement, there were 2 boys who had created their own Lego animations. One of the movies had included taking in excess of 150 photo images. Another site that allows you to build your own character and develop their personality is http://www.reasonablyclever.com/?page_id=29

Greg recommended this site should be used under supervision for character development. I would be less likely to use a site that had the potential for students to be taken to a section that I could not supervise. In a class where there is a hub of only 4 computers, I would most likely be supervising guided reading or another activity and would want to be secure that the students were on the correct section.

Ziptales is an Australian site that is great for school use. the school must subscribe to it at a cost from around $350 - $600 size dependent. It includes online stories with comprehension exercises, which the students complete online and receive an immediate mark. It also offers home work sheets related to the reading, ready to print off. Other great aspects include a 'make and Do' section, complete with step by step directions for activities to be completed in a normal class time. These range from split pin teddies to homemade mini parachutes. As Greg mentioned, you can take both of these activities and build on them. For example - use the split pin bear to make a short animation or use the parachute to look at science components; gravity and resistance. Using computers in literacy can be more engaging, especially for boys, than resorting to a photocopied worksheet. For poor readers, you can choose the voice over help, which also assists them in their reading and comprehension.

We also worked on making a short film using www.dfilm.com/live/home.html . When trying to load my film onto the blog, it worked successfully, until I then went back into edit my Blog and the entire Blog stayed 'encrypted'. Greg was unable to explain what had occurred, as the Uni server is playing up. I am reluctant to try this over the weekend, incase it all crashes again, however I include a link to my Alien Encounter for your enjoyment. The animation of some of the characters is not suitable for students and I would not use this in the classroom. Greg also showed us a couple of other unsuitable site, including, http://www.sketchswap.com/ and www.xtranormal.com/watchmovies (great high level lip synching). While these were entertaining in their own right, I would be avoiding these and would have preferred to have spent time on further exploration of sites that were appropriate for school usage.

To create your own independent class films, don't forget to download Microsoft Photostory 3. It is free and great for photos and attaching soundtracks to. Would be great for use after an excursion, school camp, sports day, integrated unit or end of year celebrations.

Unit suggestions: It has been terrific being introduced to a variety of websites that can be used to engage students and develop their skills. One area that I would have liked to have explored, is the use of the interactive whiteboards. Both of my teaching placements had them in the room, however as the teachers themselves were not familiar with them, they received little use. In my second placement, I was able to convince the Assistant Principal to give the run down, however did not have the opportunity to explore the contents of the 'Smart Board' technology. With more and more classes having access to the smart board technology, it would be of great benefit for La Trobe students to be familiar with what the technology can offer.

Week 4

ICT in ENGLISH:
Today we have been looking at the Dreamtime stories and English retell using Inspiration 8, and cutting and pasting in 'Paint'. The activity was made difficult as we tried to interpret the story line in the video. Here is my attempt. We were required to take screen prints of the video and make a concept map in Inspiration. The idea is to use the teacher guide, and instead of the students numbering the order of set sentence strips, they would be required to watch the video over, to find the relevant part of the story and match it to the teacher captions.

This is a fantastic way of breaking up the monotony of writing summaries and comprehension cloze. In literacy groups with 4 or 5 computers in the classroom this would work very well or indeed as a whole class activity if the class were to have individual laptops. If you did not have a video of a story, you could also ask the students to work on a concept map of a selected text and to map the main ideas, in order of the story.

ICT in MATHS:
Again I am amazed at the professional results you can achieve, with little effort, with the aid of software. Greg was showing us how we can implement Excel into our Maths lessons, by using graphs, interpreting data, presenting our findings in a logical, visual manner. In a maths rotation, some children can use graph paper, some could use paper and glue, while others could be doing it on the computer. A website that we visited for graphics was m-ms.com.au or the US site: us.mms.com/us/fungames/ecards/. There is also information presented as percentages and nutrition information that you could use in a science unit.


This week's lecture was focusing on the Victorian education departments ICT site - The Learning Federation -. There are thousands of short clips and interactive games that are designed to stimulate the students and enhance their learning. Again this would be great for the visual learners. Many of the games for the younger ages have audio, so the youngsters can listen to the stories and follow the verbal instructions. A great idea. Just a pity that we had already completed our 'Webquest' and had no room for any of them.

I have found since being on practicum, that not all school internet servers are reliable. Each time I have tried to implement ICT into my classes in a meaningful way, the server is always down. I have had to quickly revert to plan B, on at least three occasions. This is not encouraging me to use ICT in the same way I was hoping. I now understand why the other teaching staff look at me with great interest each time I suggest I am going to give it 'another go!'. When technology does not work, it can throw your whole lesson plan out the window. I am not deterred yet. I will endeavour to try again next term!

Other interesting ideas for future classroom projects can be obtained from another education department site. There are many different uses and you could scaffold different activities across the educational levels. http://epotential.education.vic.gov.au/showcase/index.php?showcase_id=53

Week 3

Creativity and Design in VELS. We all participated in completing a design brief, and were challenged to make a jumping frog from these set materials; cardboard, rubber band, frog picture, sticky tape and scissors. Design briefs include I/D (Investigate/Design), P( Produce), A/E ( Analyse and Evaluate). Under VELS' design and creativity domain, students should identify simple systems using common materials. They need to test, evaluate and revise their designs and identify what has led to any improvements in their design. By all having a go, I could appreciate that it is actually a difficult task, and by looking around the room and all sharing our ideas, there was a large variety of options available. This enabled us to listen to other people's explanations and reasoning behind their choice in model. There were some designs that left me thinking 'WOW'. As a primary student, being given an insight into other ways of thinking, may just be able to open a 'doorway' for students who need to look at things from a different direction.

Today we also looked at games on www.quia.com/web. Moving onto the Quia activities was eye opening. Instead of the students using Blackline Masters to complete comprehension 'cloze' activities, it would be more engaging for the students come up with their own activities to determine their level of comprehension. A teacher could use cloze activities, matching game or 'Who wants to be a millionaire?', as fun ways of determining students' prior knowledge at the start of a unit, or to see how they have developed during a unit of work.

While we looked at the fun side of ICT, we also looked at the serious side of ICT, bullying, privacy and safety and our responsibilities as teacher. The DEECD site has a great teacher section on Cybersafety outlining 6 stages of cybersafety in the classroom: 1) Lead - the school in safe and ethical use of ICT, 2) Educate - staff and students what is safe and regulations on copyright, 3) Manage - internet management - filters, and the use of educationally approved sites, 4) Support - what to do when things go wrong, 5) Empower the students through student leadership and 6) Participate. It has been shown that learning occurs not solely because of the use of ICT, rather through teachers creating authentic student centered learning.

A better site aimed at children themselves is Cybersmart.gov.au. It targets children age appropriately by having different modules - lower primary, middle school and teenagers. Audio is used to get the messages across as well as interactive games and quizzes. The students should be introduced to this site and educated on responsible use on the internet as they start to use it, rather when it is too late and cyberbullying has occurred. Topics covered include: online bullying, mobile phone bullying, privacy and staying e-secure.

Week 2

Introduction to Publisher and ePortfolios

Introduction to MS Publisher. This week's workshop has progressed at a much better pace. Using the interactive board to slowly go through the steps, the class has been able to better follow the steps. I can see that I am not the only one, as everyone is appearing more relaxed.

Our first task was to produce a brochure of a holiday destination. Publisher was a great mode to do this in, as it provides you with professional looking results, quickly. The design templates allow you to experiment with different looks. The students would take great pride and ownership of their works, when using these ways of displaying their texts. A great way to complete procedural texts - as Greg said - for example - 'How to change batteries in a torch.'

After completing the brochures we moved onto ePortfolios - looking at how we can use them in the classroom and also how we can use these for our own job hunting. The readings advise us that the use of Digital portfolios allow for the students to learn ICT skills in a real life situation, by creating their own multimedia presentation, and saving their works in a 'workable area'. Rather than using their ICT skills in the ICT lab to produce works that are often thrown into the schoolbag - never to re-emerge.

James Andersons' (2004) article of Habits of Mind - informs us that students, using a digital portfolio can learn skills that will help them become lifelong learners. The 4 important steps are: 1) Collection of data to display 2) Selection of the types of data to display, 3) Reflection upon the progress that enabled you to complete the work and 4) Projection for future self learning. For example the students can show a range of works and how they have improved, or learnt how to complete these. From here, they can set their own goals on how they want their portfolio to look, and how they can go about learning the steps to show further progress.

Woodword and Nanlohy's reading highlighted the benefit for visual and auditory learners. That it is a good tool for authors of a digital portfolio to learn ICT skills. As student teachers, their study group found it good for developing self esteem, a tool for professional development and a method of ensuring good teacher practice. A digital portfolio also allows the author to think about who their audience is and provides them with an opportunity to design their own individual, creative presentation while still complying with all the task requirements.

Here is an example of my first attempt at an ePortfolio. It requires a lot more work!

Week 1

This is my first introduction to a Blog and to Inspiration 8.0. I have found that the class has moved too quickly for me, and I am not comfortable with the steps. Maybe having the steps in writing would have made it easier for us to follow, or alternatively going through the initial parts slowly, as many of us who were not familiar with these steps, were then lost for quite a period of time to follow.

I had been looking forward to the subject as I have a lot to learn and most importantly, want to learn. I really needed the steps broken down and then be given the opportunity of having a go, without being rushed to the next section - where I have again missed the vital aspects.

Today we started with a Concept Map in the program 'Inspiration 8.0'. I look forward to having a better play around with it. I was surprised at how you can get a great effect with only a few steps. A student would love to be able to make the visual connections, especially in the lower primary years, where their written work may not be strong.

I can see how I could use the Concept mapping in a classroom to connect a number of ideas across the curriculum, including literacy, science and humanities. Time can be set aside for the students to work on individual projects or as part of a comprehension exercise in a literacy block - for example with use of the 'listening post'


After having a familiarisation session, we then moved onto Mind Maps within the same program. I can see how links can be made for students to use it in the classroom. Greg suggested using it for tests for global regions and breaking off for countries and capital cities.
Another idea could be to connect the various science concepts. I came up with this for a recycling unit for Grades 3/4. There are a number of free mind mapping websites. These include http://www.bubbl.us/ , http://www.mindmeister.com/ and http://www.mindomo.com/ .

The 'Inspiration' website makes good connection between visual thinking being transferred to a written view with just a click of the 'outline view' button. This can be of benefit to help students start to order their thoughts. 'The White Paper', shows us the importance of children being able to compute all the information they are exposed to, and computer mind mapping software can be a perfect way for the children to make sense of all this information. Their research showed that in studies, the use of computer mind mapping lead to higher understanding and test results in both science and literacy activities. It is argued that visual learning can improve reading comprehension, thinking skills, student achievement and retention. Before I commence any assignment, I have always drawn my own map - although as mentioned in the readings - this can get messy and the links can appear less clear than when computer generated.

The ISTE report sets out the standards for North American teachers concerning IT, with some of these being: incorporation of digital tools in the classroom, the ability to model digital age work and learning and the importance of IT responsibility, including copyright. IT is an area that will require ongoing teacher PD as new programs are introduced and updated.