Ideas for my Final Project

For the lesson that I will design, I will divide the fifth graders from my classroom into teams of four students and I will ask them to decide which of the four students is going to be in charge of the team. The students in charge will have to provide to me feedback of the work that the group has been doing and how each student is working. I will also assign specific roles to the rest of the group members.

I will assign one region of the United States to each of the groups. They are going to have to do research of that region, and come up with the states that are in that region, the capital of each of those states, the weather, type of vegetation, information of some of the most attractive places of that region, describe the population, etc. For doing this, students will be required to use Google Earth and also to do some research using Google.

Once they have all their research ready, they are going to have to organize all the information, look for pictures and some you tube videos, to produce a video with all the information gathered of one of the regions of the United States. For this they are going to use iMovie. Once they have the video ready, they are going to have to present it to the whole class.  

Second Tool - iMovie

With the use of iMovie, students are going to be required to produce their own video. With the use of this software students are able to easily create and edit a video by using pictures, voice over, music, captions, part of other videos, different backgrounds, and several cool effects. It is a software that even if it is very user friendly it helps you produce high quality videos. By having students create their own movie, you help them develop their creativity, self-expression, collaboration, self-reflection, and to reinforce and document their learning.   

By using iMovie, students are going to have fun, they are going to be engaged and interested in the topic so they are going to be able to retain the new information better. Also they are going to be able to create a great and creative project on their own and they are going to find different ways in which they can incorporate technology while learning. There is another software to create videos that is called Movie Maker, this software is used by Windows, but the reason why I preferred iMovie is because it is easier to use and it has more options and tools. 

Even if the activity that I want to design is about Geography, by using iMovie and Google Earth, students are going to develop many different skills. For example, they are going to learn how to work with technology, how to gather helpful information from the Internet, how to learn on their own, how to produce a video, how to incorporate all their findings to create a final product, how to organize information, how to work in effectively in teams, and how to present all their findings to other people.  

First Tool - Google Earth

Like I mentioned in my last post, the objective I will be focusing on will be the following according to the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills for Grade 5 in Geography:

The student understands the concept of regions in the United States. The student is expected to:

(A)  describe a variety of regions in the United States such as political, population, and economic regions that result from patterns of human activity;

(B)  describe a variety of regions in the United States such as landform, climate, and vegetation regions that result from physical characteristics such as the Great Plains, Rocky Mountains, and Coastal Plains;

(C)  locate on a map important political features such as the ten largest urban areas in the United States, the 50 states and their capitals, and regions such as the Northeast, the Midwest, and the Southwest; and

(D) locate on a map important physical features such as the Rocky Mountains, Mississippi River, and Great Plains.

With the use of Google Erath the 5^th grade students are going to identify and describe the characteristics of different regions in the United Sates. Google Earth is a free software that will allow them to see detailed photos and satellite images of any place around the world, for this activity they are going to use it to see photos and images from different region from the United States. By looking at his detailed images students are going to be able to describe different characteristics from those regions. Also with the help of the Weather layer from Google Earth they are going to be able to analyze the weather of the regions. With the Borders and Layers layer students are going to be able to identify which states are part of the regions and also identify the capitals of those states in the regions.  And with the time slider students are going to be able to analyze how geography from those regions has changed over time. 

 Once you get closer to the area that you want to see, many important areas from that region are highlighted, and when you click on them, you are able to see many cool pictures from different nice places that area from Panoramio. Because like Google describes it “With Google Earth you can explore the World from your computer”.

Ideas for my Final Project

       I would like to design a geography lesson with the use of iPads, Google Earth and iMovie. The lesson would be for fifth graders and the purpose of it would be for students to identify and describe characteristics of different regions in the United Sates. For the activity students will use Google Earth from the iPad. After having all the information students will create a video in iMovie to show their findings and they will have to present the video to the class. Following are the learning objective I would focus on for this lesson according to the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills:  

Geography. The student understands the concept of regions in the United States. The student is expected to:

(A)  describe a variety of regions in the United States such as political, population, and economic regions that result from patterns of human activity;

(B)  describe a variety of regions in the United States such as landform, climate, and vegetation regions that result from physical characteristics such as the Great Plains, Rocky Mountains, and Coastal Plains;

(C)  locate on a map important political features such as the ten largest urban areas in the United States, the 50 states and their capitals, and regions such as the Northeast, the Midwest, and the Southwest; and

(D) locate on a map important physical features such as the Rocky Mountains, Mississippi River, and Great Plains.

During this week I found two interesting videos about the benefits of using iPads in the classroom and about how to use iMovie with your students. Here are the link to the videos,

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EV8M6P9st9Q

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dd4Cjfjtgqw

Twitter Update Week 9

     The resource that I found during this week and that I shared through Twitter is about schools in Arlington, VA., that are taking the lead on innovation, they are investing on iPads for their students. They mention the advantages they found for students with iPads. They explain how students are able to use many different tools, activities and application that are going to help them in their understanding and make their learning experience better. Here is the link,

http://www.bellinghamherald.com/2012/03/27/2456060/schools-across-the-country-bring.html

 

     Also I am following new people and organizations on Twitter. The people I am following are Floppy the Monster and CharlieTravers are educators interested in technology as well, and iSchoolSource is an education technology student that posts information about technology and different applications. I am also following MacRumors.com and Apple News that provide the more recent news and rumors about Apple products and about the company.

     The resources that I read from my classmates are Edutopia that is helpful information about education shared through Twitter and Scholastic Teachers which is another source from Twitter that provide helpful information about books  and education trends.   

 

Visualizing with Technologies

The second chapter I selected from the textbook is Chapter 9 Visualizing with Technologies. This chapter describes how we as educators can take advantage of visualization tools to engage our students and make them have a better understanding of all the concepts while implementing hand on activities with these kind of tools. Visualization tools are devices that allow us to share images with other people and can help us comprehend different concepts easily. Next I am going to mention some of these visualization tools.

·      Draw/Paint Programs – this type of software allows us to make our own drawings or sketches, they also allow us to change or fix pictures. These programs are very helpful in math, biology, science, and geography.

·      Digital Cameras and Mobile Phones – these devices allows us to take high-resolution pictures, we can use download those onto a computer to use them in any document. Also with mobile phones we can easily share the pictures we take with other people.

·      Video – There are many programs that allow us to create and record our own videos. Students are going to acquire many skills producing their own videos.

·      Digital Storytelling – By designing activities in which students are able to produce their own movie, they are going to be more engaged and interested on the topic. In digital storytelling, students can use a combination of video, pictures, photos, text and music to create their own movie. 

·      Video modeling and Feedback – With the use of videos students can learn a specific behavior. Also students can record themselves doing a specific activity and then be evaluated about their performance; this activity helps students evaluate themselves as well.   

With all these visualization tools available we can help our students develop many different skills. They are going to be able to work in a collaborative manner, they will enhance public relations, increase their creativity, and they will develop planning, producing and communication skills. So this is a very fun and innovative way in which we, as educators, can take advantage of technology and at the same time help our students learn in a better and original manner.

The visualization tools that I would like to explore are iMovie, Movie Maker and Google Earth.  iMovie is a Mac software that allows you to create your own movie and makes it easier for you to share it. iMovie can be installed in any apple product, such as laptops, computers, iPads and iPhones. By using this software you can create your own movie with the use of videos, pictures, text, transitions, slides, music and voiceover. The second tool is Movie Maker, that allows you to do the same thing that iMovie, but Movie Maker is used for Windows. The third tool is Google Earth, as mentioned in one of my posts, is a software that will allow students to see very detailed photos or satellite images of any place around the world, so it makes it easy and fun for anyone to navigate the Earth.    

 

People and Organizations I am Following on Twitter

I am following TEDTalks Updates which are conferences about different ideas for technology, entertainment and design that are available online. These conferences talk a lot about education and ideas about how to integrate technology into education. I am also following A Googler that is about news from Google and BBC Breaking News.  Eder Langhorne is one of the persons I am following; he is a consultant that helps schools and small businesses operate in the 21^st century and Bill French who is a technology entrepreneur.

 

I also checked two websites posted by my classmates, which are the following:

http://www.edtechmagazine.com/k12/  and,

http://edudemic.com/2011/12/15-flipped-classrooms/

The first website is about a magazine that offers different tips and advice about how technology can improve teaching. It also contains product reviews and case studies. The second one is about 15 schools using flipped classrooms, which are classrooms in which students watch different materials for their classes at home through the web, so classroom time can be used more effectively to answer questions and practice what they have learned.