Well, I continue to be amazed by what Google Docs can do and what I am learning to make my life easier! I heard a commercial today, about cloud computing and someone said they got rid of MS Office, since they rely on GD alone!!
As I am planning to be a Social Studies teacher, I set up a quiz I might give to middle-school students. I designed my quiz on Google Form, followed the directions on setting up a formula using Excel, given on YouTube. Although, I have used Excel often, I was never very good at using formulas. This gives me a practical reason to learn how to use them!
The NETS-T standards used by this activity are:
2. Design and Develop Digital Age Learning Experiences and Assessments &
5.Engage in Professional Growth and Leadership.
Links:
Summary of Responses
Self-Grading Spreadsheet
Self-Grading Form
I had quite a bit of difficulty with Google's website builder. There was a huge learning curve for me in learning how to navigate the pages to get them the way I wanted them, before I could even begin to add content!!
But, I persevered and now I have the first website I have put together from almost, scratch! All I can say is, I am glad this assignment is behind me, and I am glad I have all of my work from this class, organized in one site that I can honestly, "call my own!!!!"
I created my Home Page, and linked the intro to my Blog in this area, since both are "intros" of sorts.
My Resume/CV is included with an Introduction to personal and professional information about myself.
Activities, contain all of my activities and docs to date, completed for this class.
Photo Gallery, has most of the interesting and historical graphics used in my docs, for display.
My site includes a Sitemap for easy navigation to my website. All of the pages are included for easy navigation on the Sidebar of my Home Page.
I included one additional site addition, for laughs (I hope). It is my countdown to the "end of the world" post!
I intend to include all new content from this class, and keep updating and adding to my website, using it as a professional tool in my job search, and educational (college) progress and path to professionalism.
The NETS-T Standards covered by this activity include:
1. Design and Develop Digital Age Learning Activities and Assessments.
5. Engage in Professional Growth and Leadership.
Link to "Marci's Ed Tech Experiences" website
Since I am a substitute teacher, I am not really in the position to design a test, for my students. However, I have been curious as to my neighbor's opinions of recent development in the town of Purcellville, so I sent my survey, via email, to friends and neighbors in the Western Loudoun area.
I sent it out to only a few neighbors, and then upon reading the instructions for the assignment more closely, I realized I needed to employ the use of all of the types of questions, not just one. So, I revised my survey, and emailed it out to a larger group of recipients, so I would have a broader response.
What I found out was very interesting! I have never formulated any type of survey before, although I have taken a bunch! So, it was informative not only to design my survey, and see the responses, but to see what the various questions & resulting answers looked like, in summary form! It is also nice to be able to assign a theme to the survey.
I can see many future uses for such a tool, both in and outside of the classroom! This is a wonderful tool for polling parents, members of an organization, etc. Available from Google (so cool!) and easily distributed through email, and easily collated into a spreadsheet and the resulting numbers, simply by changing the view of the ss!
I shared my survey, by making it "public", and sending it out through Google +, including the link in my post.
The NETS-T standards covered in this activity are:
2. Design and Develop Digital Age Learning Experiences and Assessments &
5.Engage in Professional Growth and Leadership.
Link to Spreadsheet
Link to Survey Summary
Survey Form
Well, I really enjoyed this activity! Once, I figured out how to locate my files, that is! I have been having major pc performance issues, and last weekend, finally bit the bullet, and "wiped" my laptop! I thought I had backed up everything, but apparently, I made "copies" of programs I had downloaded for this class, that......didn't open! I had my Google Drive, but it was not saved to my hard drive, like it was before!
Turns out, Jing...my little sunny buddy, saved the day!! I found the existing GD slide show I wanted to use to build my Prezi, and copied the slides, thus re-creating my Jing history. That is what, along with rebuilding my laptop, took so long in creating my Prezi. However, FUN!!! And CREATIVE!! I do not think I will ever create a regular ole PPT, again!!!
This is a program that is easy and fun to use, and will definitely grab student's interests! The NETS-T standards this activity covers are:
1. Facilitate and Inspire Student Learning and Creativity; and
2. Model Digital Age Work and Learning.
Here is the link to my Prezi:
Take Me Out to the Ballgame - A Short History of the World Series
Yeah, I finally got this!! I had to figure out how to save my presentation from a .wp3 file to a .wpv file, that YouTube supports!! Lesson....do not attempt to solve issues at 2am!!
Anyway...to my process! I found this wonderful game a teacher I subbed for in 3rd grade, had on her desk, on teaching kids about technology! Well, what a great lesson!! Especially, since I am in a Ed Tech class, right?
I went to the Museum of Science/Engineering is Elementary page, noted on the teachers lesson, and found the game! I used Jing (my little friend!) to capture all of the pages I wanted included in my presentation, which I built on Google Presentation, since I do not have PPT.
After I got all of the slides where I wanted them (they added up to 19-which served my purpose exactly) with graphics formatting, etc. I saved the file in a .jpg format, and was able to load onto PhotoStory, add my voice-overs and appropriate background music-so cool!!! When I went back into my settings, I adjusted my resolution, timing etc. and came up with a wait for it......wp3 file!! I figured out what I needed to do, and saved into a movie format (i.e. .wpv) which was nice enough to upload to YouTube!!
I must remark, I found this activity to be quite the challenge, and it took me awhile to complete it. However, now that I am on the other side of it, it does not seem so daunting, and I look forward to creating more movies for both personal & educational uses!
The National Educational standards met by this presentation is included in the game, as a slide, but cover: Science, Physical, Life, Earth Science, History and Nature in Science, Social Perspectives of Science. Specifically, the NETS-T standards are:
4. Promote and Model Digital Citizenship and Responsibility.
5. Engage in Professional Growth and Leadership.
Here is the link to my YouTube video!
Short Presentation-Stepping Into Technology!
This is the most thorough slide show I have ever undertaken! Whew!! First, I must say that since I only have Office 7 Starter, I do not have PowerPoint!! After searching for applicable freeware slide programs, I tried SlideRocket. I found it very difficult to use, and exceedingly slow!
I next tried Google Presentation, and found it very user-friendly!! It has an especially nice "cross-hairs" feature for centering your text box/slide on the page! Although, in trying to make my slides creative, I used a lot of different layout techniques, and also a great deal of images from free to use/non-copyright sources.
I found those images by using the Advanced Search setting on Google Images. It allows the user to narrow their search for images based upon usage rights.
In planning my slideshow presentation, I read the required reading selections for the activity and viewed the videos on John Cleese, (being a longtime (uh, older individual) Monte Python fan, I thought this was so interesting & cool!) I used a mind-mapping technique for brainstorming.
When I finally knew the direction I wanted to take my viewer, I began to put together my content. I chose baseball and the World Series, because I love MLB & it is that time of year, and I feel it is a natural selection for a teacher of Social Studies to present to their students.
The NETS-T standard my slide show presentation represents is:
1. Facilitate & Inspire Student Learning and Creativity.
Here is the link to my Slideshow. Enjoy!
"Take Me Out to the Ballgame"
