Since I received full credit on my first draft, I will save some room in cyberspace and refrain from posting it again. The previous post contains the finalized project.

Thanks for reading and I wish you all the best!

Dave

Student Audience

E-tools for Educators is a graduate level course directed towards current teachers who are teaching at levels where the implementation of advanced e-tools can occur. Generally this is the intermediate levels and above. The students will come from a variety of different teaching placements, leading to geographic, socioeconomic, and school district pedagogical diversity. This diversity will lead to students collaborating with teachers from different backgrounds, hopefully resulting in thick collaborative bonds.

Course Description

E-Tools for Educators is a practical, hands-on course offered through a distance-learning platform. Its emphasis is on tools that can be implemented into teachers’ courses the next day.  This course will also hope to reaffirm an important tenet of utilizing technologies: more important than the tool, the focus must be on achieving a set purpose. To help illustrate this, an example would help. Curriculum decisions should not be made on what technology is available. A teacher shouldn’t say, “Hmm…I have ______ (insert technology here), what should I do with it?” A more educationally sound thinking pattern is, “I want my students to accomplish ___________ (insert learning objective here), what tools can I use to help me accomplish this?” There is a subtle difference there, but a very important one.

Hopefully students leave the course ready to implement their new tools and knowledge in educationally effective, diverse manners. They will learn by doing, learn by collaboration, and learn by reflecting on their own classrooms.

Course Rationale for Offering

The ubiquitous online nature of today’s students is undeniable. They are online at home, on their phones, in their games, and at school. Generational theorists, believing those who were raised during similar events will share similar outlooks on the world and their place within it, have dubbed the generation currently in high school the Net Generation (Nicholas, 2008). They have grown up in an age of internet access, instant information, and instant gratification. This connectivity to the online world is not just for entertainment, either; their participation in a digital world defines who they are, how they communicate, and, perhaps, how they learn the best. As part of their online lives, the students discuss music, movies, and teen gossip. This is to be expected, but they also talk about their educations; sixty percent of students discuss school, and 50% specifically discuss class assignments (National School Boards Association, 2007).

This leads to a perceived education gap between the way the Net Generation communicates in the world and the ways they are expected to learn in the classroom. The disconnect forces students to learn unfamiliar content using unfamiliar methods. Bill Gates (2005), Microsoft’s chairman, when delivering a speech at the National Summit on High Schools, stated:

America’s high schools are obsolete….Training the workforce of tomorrow with the high schools of today is like trying to teach kids about today’s computers on a 50-year-old mainframe. It’s the wrong tool for the times. Our high schools were designed fifty years ago to meet the demands of another age. Until we design them to meet the needs of the 21st century, we will keep limiting—even ruining—the lives of millions of Americans every year.

Doblar (2009) furthers Gates’ suggestion; he claims if a student were to go back in time, roughly 100 years or so, the place where that student would feel most comfortable would be the classroom. Students learn using the same ways, they learn the same things, and all the students go along at the same pace. In essence, today’s students are not being prepared for today, not for yesterday, but 100 years before yesterday. Perhaps the effects of this are starting to be seen in today’s students. Two out of three students are bored in class at least once every day and 17% are bored in every single class because the social interaction is not what they are accustomed to or comfortable with (Yazzie-Mintz, 2007).

The successful preparing of students for life after school will be determined by maximizing access to technologies allowing students to work beyond the confines of the classroom and into the digital world where students can explore, can collaborate, and will provide real-world experiences (Donohue, 2007). If not, students’ educations will leave them ill-equipped to thrive in the world they will face as they leave school.

The introduction of internet technologies within curriculum is a paradigm shift for all involved. No longer does class have to exist within the 45 minutes the class is scheduled for; instead, students access materials, discussions, and assignments asynchronously, at all times of day and night (Doherty, 2002). Further, student-teacher interactions occur on a private basis, where students can freely ask questions without fear of humiliation from peers (Young, 2004). And with the utilization of internet technologies, no longer is the classroom just the collection of students in the physical classroom. It gives students access to resources and personal connections with other students—students perhaps a half a globe away—that cannot possibly be replicated in the brick and mortar classroom (Brydolf, 2007).

Learning Objectives/Activities

A note on my learning objectives: as this is an e-tools course, the evaluation tools are contained within the activities themselves. This is a slight deviation from the traditional learning objective writing format, but one that is necessary to fully incorporate the task at hand. For example, my first objective deals with evaluating certain technologies. There are many ways this could be accomplished, but for this course, it is imperative it happens through blog writing using WordPress. Therefore, not only is it mentioned in the learning objective, but it is also the method of assessment.

WordPress

Learning Objective #1

Students will display their abilities to evaluate the benefits, drawbacks, and potential implementation strategies of weekly through a blog reflection according to the standards (rubric) provided.

Activity Description #1

At the end of each week of the course, students will complete a reflective blog writing on that week’s activities. In this blog, the students must provide a detailed description of the technology, including how the technology works and the purpose it serves. When commenting on the technology, students do not have to give a technological description of the innards of the site; instead, it should be a description of how to use the site.

Along with the description, the students also must evaluate the technology, providing both positive and negatives, along with potential strategies for potential implementation in the student’s classroom. If the student feels the technology would not be used, that’s certainly fine, but a rationale for not using it must be provided. Reflecting on the worth of the technology and how to harness its strengths allows for students to learn using higher levels of cognitive functioning. This then, hopefully, would lead to lasting learning.

Assessment Description #1

WordPress is a free blogging tool founded in 2003, and currently is the most popular blogging tool used on the internet (“Blog Usage Statistics”). It is a very easy to use website, allowing for students to create professional looking blogs featuring personal touches they can modify.

Blogs give students and teachers the ability to expand the instructional time by breaking away from the class only occurs when students are in a classroom. With blogs, class becomes an anytime affair. Blogs also have the ability to enhance learning strategies, introduce new points, and provide enrichment (Colombo & Colombo, p. 61). Initial research on blogs have shown blogs have helped students feel better about their writing, increase the effectiveness of their writing, and encouraged students to write more (Ramaswami, p. 23). Further, blogs give “students a variety of ways to demonstrate their knowledge while appealing to diverse learning styles and fostering independent learning and self-directed learning skills in students, a critical capacity for lifelong learners” (Pape, p. 17).

As far as blogging tools go, WordPress has it all. It’s user-friendly, innovative, allows for students to create personalized elements to their blogs, and, above all, it gives students a platform to showcase their work in a venue much larger than the classroom. With WordPress, not only are students reflecting on their learning, they are now creating content; they no longer are a passive internet user. They are creators of their own internet content.

As an assessment tool, teachers can quickly access students’ blogs. Unique to blogs (as opposed to traditional journaling) is students receive immediate feedback from the instructor. As an extension of this, a student-teacher dialogue can continue well beyond the boundaries of the brick and mortar classroom.

Plagiarism and Diversity #1

As this assignment relies on personal reflections, including taking the technology discussed and suggesting how it could be implemented into the classroom, it is sufficiently differentiated to provide a good learning experience for everyone in the course. Also, because of its personal nature, opportunities for potential plagiarism would be minimal.

Wiggio

Learning Objective #2

Students will display their abilities to create a sample classroom network in their specific disciplines on Wiggio that includes a welcome post, a discussion forum topic, and an uploaded list of student expectations.

Activity Description #2

When learning how to use Wiggio, the students will be put into groups. Whether these groups are randomly selected or chosen for a specific reason would be determined once the instructor knows what type of student diversity is found in the course. Throughout the week, the students will take turns leading discussions based on the readings (these readings would be related to the research illustrating the potential positive effects of social-networking within the classroom).

The week’s culminating activity would be for each individual student to create a sample network they could potentially use with their students. Their network would have to include a welcome post that helps students understand how to use the site, an initial discussion thread, and a list of expectations of students when they are using the site.

Assessment Description #2

Wiggio is a relative newcomer to the internet world. Founded in 2008, Wiggio functions under a simple mission statement, to make it easy to work in groups (Hoffman). Wiggio combines listservs, voicemails, conference calls, text messages, calendars, group chats, and polls into a single location (Poston).

Wiggio allows classrooms to have virtual hubs, from which teachers can post files, conduct discussions, and pass on messages (through text messages, emails, and even audio files). In short, it serves as a do-all for conducting virtual meeting places. Wiggio could be used for distance learning, but also could be used by face-to-face teachers looking for ways to enhance their courses.

Where there are sites having many of the same features, there are few tying them all together in an easy-to-use, intuitive format. Imagine high school teachers who want to remind their students of an essay due the next day; they can communicate that to their students’ cell phones with a text message. Imagine a group of students working on a project together; they can share a realtime screen, allowing them to flawlessly communicate with each other. Imagine just about any scenario that can arise in the classroom and there’s probably a way Wiggio can accommodate.

There are drawbacks to using Wiggio. First, its visual design is very basic. The creators of Wiggio created a minimal interface so as to keep things simple, but with this comes a touch of blandness. Students may be turned off by the lack of character on the page. Second, and this is directly related to the first, Wiggio doesn’t look like sites students are familiar with. It doesn’t look like Facebook. It doesn’t function like Facebook. There will be a learning curve with learning a different type of social networking (not that this is entirely a bad thing).

Those minor drawbacks aside, Wiggio is a remarkable site to facilitate a more complete learning experience. This is a can’t miss addition to the distance learning or face-to-face classroom.

Plagiarism and Diversity #2

Given the personal nature of the assignment, it tailors to individual diversity. Also, given the application of knowledge to specific teaching scenarios, plagiarism would be minimal.

Wikispaces

Learning Objective #3

By using a collaborative wiki, the students will display their abilities to identify five ways new internet-based technologies could enhance three different “traditional” lesson plans.

Activity Description #3

Students, in groups of three to four, will work on developing five ways internet-based technologies could improve a canonical lesson plan. They will complete this three different times (if they are in groups of three; four if they are in groups of four). This activity would happen towards the end of the course, when students have a chance to reflect back on the material they have learned about during the course and apply to their own situations.

This activity would be very hands-off by the instructor. Here’s the opportunity for the students to collaborate in their own environments, getting away from the class discussion board. Instructor presence would be as small as possible, as a goal of the assignment is to get the students interacting with each other. At the end of the week, their wikis would be shared with the rest of the class.

Assessment Description #3

Wikis are collaborative internet-based tool allowing users to add and edit content to a website. It allows for individuals to connect on the creation of internet content asynchronously and from different computers (Campbell, p. 83). Wikispaces was founded in 2005, and currently hosts millions of wikis for more than five million users (“Who are we?”).  Starting a wiki through Wikispaces is two things teachers love to hear: free and simple to use.

Perhaps the best classroom analogous situation would be thinking of students huddled around a small dry-erase marker board. Here, the students come to write where all can see. After a person has left, another group member can edit what the initial person wrote. Through this process, students interact and create the product they are working on.

Wikis are effective to use within the classroom. Although Wikispaces are plain, they are so for maximum usability. One will not find fancy features through the use of the technology; Wikispaces is utilitarian to achieve effective collaboration.

This tool can be used anytime students need to collaborate on an assignment. From a teacher’s perspective, one can see the individual contributions of students as they progressed through a given assignment.

Although wikis are not the most technologically advanced sites, they have shown the potential benefit of increasing student achievement and helping students stay engaged in the assignment (Campbell, p. 88).  For this reason alone, including wikis into a classroom—either distance learning or face-to-face—can be an effective educational decision.

Plagiarism and Diversity #3

As this assignment has students taking materials discussed in this course and applying to their own situations, it allows of creating a unique learning environment for each student. This activity does have some potential for plagiarism; students could find out how, for example, blogs are being used in the classroom and report that back to the wiki. However, part of being a teacher is using resources, so this research wouldn’t be necessarily frowned upon.

Jing

Learning Objective #4

Students will display their abilities to create a video tutorial for one of the Top 100 Tools for Learning[1] directed towards their target audience using Jing technologies, that shows and explains how this site functions and how it will be implemented within the course.

Activity Description #4

Jing can be utilized for both teaching and in assessment; this lesson hopefully will allow students to experience using Jing so they may use it in their own teaching situations. Students will be able to select one of the Top 100 Tools for Learning that has not been discussed in class. They must investigate it and understand how it could be used within the classroom. Students will post a summary of their selection to the class message board.

The culminating activity will be using Jing to create a screencast of the individual showing, along with narration, how the tool works and potential applications within the classroom. Not only will the creator of the screencast gain knowledge of the tool, other students will also learn about that tool through viewing their classmates’ videos.

Assessment Description #4

Jing is a screencasting tool developed by TechSmith, released in 2007. It allows users to easily capture images from their computer desktops, along with record video—with narration—of everything happening on a user’s screen. These images and videos are quickly shareable with others (Brandao).

Jing has a free version, along with a $14.95/year upgraded format. Both allow for users to quickly share images and record videos. The most notable benefit of the upgraded Pro version is any videos created are saved in MPEG-4 format, which means it can be quickly shared with YouTube (“Frequently asked questions”). The free version also can be uploaded onto YouTube, but requires an extra step.

Jing certainly has benefits for both teachers and students. For teachers, it allows to easily give feedback on assignments turned in, using both audio and video. Now, students are able to hear and see the feedback their teachers give them. It also is a handy tool to quickly create tutorials for students. For students, using Jing can allow students to reflect on their assignments. For example, when turning in a short story, students can screencast their thoughts on their own story, highlighting and commenting on specific parts. It gives students the ability to become more meta-cognitive about their learning.

Jing’s drawbacks are on the technical level. If a user doesn’t have a microphone (either external or built in), there’s no way to record audio. If the user is a computer novice, the extra step of converting a video into an acceptable YouTube format can be difficult.

Overall, Jing can be an excellent addition to the classroom for both students and teachers. Easy to use, budget friendly, and with the potential for educational effective use, Jing is a technology to focus on.

Plagiarism and Diversity #4

This assignment has no potential for plagiarism. The students will turn in their own work. This activity relates to the individual student, so it caters to being a personal, effective, learning opportunity.

A Note on the Taxonomy of Assessment Choices

My assessment choices reflect the students in the course. Because this is a graduate level course, and because the students are practicing teachers, the assessments occur at higher levels of cognitive functioning. Although it would be easy to have a class like this function on lower levels of cognitive functioning (describe what Jing is, list school appropriate social-networking sites, etc.), this wouldn’t lead to lasting learning.

A Note on Plagiarism Prevention, Authenticity, Diversity, and the Creation of a Student-Centered Learning Environment

E-tools for Educators is a course catering to a student-centered learning philosophy. Tech tools are introduced at the beginning of each week, with the remainder of the week focusing on how those tools function and their potentiality to be implemented into the individual student’s classroom. By use of a precourse survey, the professor could also refine to course further, this ensuring all tools discussed will be new to the students.

The range of students this course would be directed towards would be a bit limited. Given most of the technologies would be for older students, teachers in the earlier grades might find much of the material irrelevant. Also, students with limited computer proficiency would be at a bit of a disadvantage than their tech-savvy counterparts. Other than providing significant instructor help in making sure those students feel comfortable and confident in the course, there is not much else an instructor can do.

Finally, I would not claim that any assignment is entirely plagiarism proof, but the assessments offered in this course are close to it. The assignments require personal connections to the materials—the students are taking the technologies and implementing into their own professional situations. By making this class idiosyncratic to each individual professional situation, the potential for plagiarism significantly declines.

References

Blog usage statistics. (2010). BuiltWith Technology Usage Statistics. Retrieved July 19, 2010, from http://trends.builtwith.com/blog

Brandao, C. (2007). Jing Project reveals magic behind net toil. Honolulu Star-Bulletin. Retrieved July 20, 2010, from http://www.webcitation.org/5cyzGBu6R

Brydolf, C. (2007). Minding MySpace: Balancing the benefits and risks of students’ online social networks. Education Digest, 73(2), 4-8. Retrieved July 19, 2010, from ERIC database.

Campbell, K., & Ellingson, D. (2010). Cooperative learning at a distance: An experiment with wikis. American Journal of Business Education, 3(4), 83-89. Retrieved July 20, 2010, from Education Research Complete database.

Colombo, M., & Colombo, P. (2007). Using blogs to improve differentiated instruction. Education Digest, 73(4), 10-14. Retrieved July 19, 2010, from Academic Search Premier database.

Doblar, D.D. (2009). Ten schools and school districts to get excited about. Educational Horizons, 87(2), 116-127.

Doherty, K. (2002). Students speak out. Education Week, 21(35), 19. Retrieved July 29, 2010, from MasterFILE Premier database.

Donohue, N.C. (2007). Reinvention, not reforms. The New England Journal of Higher Education, 22(1), 15-16.

Frequently asked questions. (2010). Jing. Retrieved July 20, 2010, from http://www.jingproject.com/faq/

Gates, B. (2005). America’s high schools are obsolete. Address presented at the National Governors Association education summit, Washington, D.C.. [Transcript] Retrieved July 19, 2010, from http://www.sanjuan.edu/files/filesystem/Gates%20Speech%20May-03-2005.pdf

Hoffman, H. (2008). Wiggio finally gives us accessible group collaboration. CNET News. Retrieved July 19, 2010, from http://news.cnet.com/8301-13515_3-10041326-26.html?tag=mncol

National School Boards Association. (2007). Creating and connecting: Research and guidelines on online social–and educational–networking. Retrieved July 19, 2010, from http://www.nsba.org/site/docs/41400/41340.pdf

Nicholas, A. (2008). Preferred learning methods of the millennial generation.  International Journal of Learning, 15(6), 27-34.

Pape, L. (2010). Blended teaching and learning. School Administrator, 67(4), 16-21. Retrieved July 19, 2010, from Education Research Complete database.

Poston, L. (2009). Aggregation gets schooled with Wiggio. Mashable: The Social Media Guide. Retrieved July 19, 2010, from http://mashable.com/2008/09/15/wiggio/

Ramaswami, R. (2008). The prose (and a few cons, too) of blogging. T H E Journal, 35(11), 21-25. Retrieved July 19, 2010, from Academic Search Premier database.

Yazzie-Mintz, E. (2007). High school survey of student engagement. Indiana University School of Education. Retrieved July 19, 2010, from http://ceep.indiana.edu/hssse/pdf/HSSSE_2006_Report.pdf

Young, J. (2004). Virtual schools: Personalizing learning online. Media & Methods, 41(2), 11-12. Retrieved July 19, 2010, from MasterFILE Premier database.

Who are we?. (2010). Wikispaces. Retrieved July 20, 2010, from http://www.wikispaces.com/about

WordPress: About. (2010). WordPress. Retrieved July 19, 2010, from http://wordpress.org/about/

It’s Monday, we’re back from the hospital, the girls—my wife and my daughter—are asleep (as I type as quietly as possible), and now time to reflect.

I hadn’t heard the term cybercoaching before, although when reading about it, it seems to encompass much of what makes quality educators (both in distance learning and the face-to-face classroom). I think one of the most important aspects of education—and one that is often forgot—is giving authentic feedback. And this feedback should lead the student to understand the material better. Assessment shouldn’t just assess; it should teach as well. Cybercoaching allows for this to occur.

This brings me to a point I’ve mentioned a couple of times on this blog, as its an idea that tumbles around my brain quite a bit. The teaching of distance learning and face-to-face learning are different. They focus on different lessons, use (sometimes) different assessment tools, and the role of the teacher is much different. I think distance learning is a great evolution of education. It’s a step forward to preparing students for the futures they will face.

However, I also see technology advancing to making the distance learning able to function quite similar to the face-to-face learning. This can be evidenced by this week’s Vyew virtual office hours. Now students can see, hear, and interact with an instructor much the same as a face-to-face instructor.

It’s important not to regress. Distance learning should not aspire to be face-to-face instruction. It should be a progression of education of a different sort. An exciting sort. An innovative, personal sort. And a sort that face-to-face instructors can learn from.

I’ve been “working” (maybe an overstatement as you’ll soon discover) with learning objectives for the past two school years. My principal, with screws being tightened to him by our director of curriculum, has driven home the importance of creating learning objectives for all of our courses. His rationale: to appease the higher ups.

As would be expected, when the information regarding learning objectives was presented with skepticism, it was met with skepticism. The English department—note, not under the direction of me—then proceeded a mad dash to complete the objectives in a single inservice so as to never discuss learning objectives again (they are a bitter bunch, that department).

So that’s what we did. Fast. Referenced all the courses. And absolutely terrible…Hence, my parenthetical “working” comment above.

But it was finished and we never heard from our bosses if what we completed was what they were looking for. We assumed no news was good news.

(As an aside, I’m not sure they actually read them, as one referenced after reading a selection of literature the students were to create a topographical map of the Dakotas, which, essentially, would be as flat as a sheet of paper.)

So as this course has veered more directly into learning objectives, at home, in front of my computer, I bristled a bit, thinking, “Arrggg, not again!”

However, my frosty demeanor towards learning objectives thawed a bit this week. What did it, and what caused me to think about the courses I currently teach (a goal of the lesson, I would guess), was combining the learning objectives with Bloom’s work. I never took the time to think about how my learning objectives were connected with the levels of cognitive functioning. And to take it a step further, I never took the time to think about the assessment component of learning objectives

As an example, I went back and dug through my school files to find my learning objectives, written in a rush to satisfy cranky, bitter women (my English department members who hopefully don’t read this blog).

Here’s an example from my film course (just copying and pasting, warts and all):

–By being active viewers of film, students will identify imagery, symbolism, and other directorly fun stuffs.

Pretty terrible, huh?

Let’s take a more honest stab at it.

–Through active film viewing, students will identify key elements of film through discussion board postings according to the discussion board rubric.

It’s not perfect, can certainly be more specific, but it does have the basic behavior, condition, standard information. There’s a long way to go, I know, but it starts with a step in the right direction.

This week will certainly help me next fall, when we are again to visit those learning objectives. This time though, I’m going back to my classroom to work on it, where I’ll be able to do good work, honest work, work that will benefit the students and me.

A second, quick note on this week: the power of collaboration. What an inviting, effective learning space our class (and, you, our fearless leader), have created. When I log into the courses I am often overwhelmed by the number of comments (“How do there become 45 posts in a couple of hours!”). But this is a good thing and speaks to the strength of elearning.

When taking online courses, I often wonder what they would be like if we were in person? What would change? How would our interactions be different? I think for this course, it would be dramatically different and not nearly as effective. Mostly because I can’t imagine there being the amount of dialogue, of students helping students, in a face to face classroom. Yet another reason why I’m intrigued by this whole internet thing.

A final, final note on this week’s posting. I hope you didn’t take any offense to the first line of this posting. I’ve been really enjoying the class and have been impressed by your selection of materials and the presentation of them. In short, you’ve done a nice job with the sell!

Bloom categories

Learning objective verbs

Activity

Knowledge

(recall, list, define, identify, collect, label)

Research/define

Students research the Patriot Act and the American Civil Liberties Union’s views.

Comprehension

(summarize, describe interpret, predict, discuss)

Summarize

Students will research and explore how standards of appropriateness have changed over time.

Application

(apply, demonstrate, illustrate, classify, experiment, discover)

Analysis

(analyze, classify, connect, explain, infer)

Connect

Students will find examples of news stories they feel redefine the Code of Ethics of the Society of Professional Journalists. They will then classify what types of materials do so and the manner in which they do.

Synthesis

(combine, integrate, plan, create, design, formulate)

Create

Students will create guidelines for appropriateness.

Evaluation

(assess, recommend, convince, compare, conclude, summarize)
]]> http://davekunkle.wordpress.com/2010/07/15/assessment-taxonomy-table/feed/ 0 davekunkle http://davekunkle.wordpress.com/2010/07/11/week-four-reflections/ http://davekunkle.wordpress.com/2010/07/11/week-four-reflections/#comments Sun, 11 Jul 2010 16:25:56 +0000 davekunkle http://davekunkle.wordpress.com/?p=46 Continue reading →]]> This week centered on our work with the Jigsaw Midterm (see previous post for more information on that). Reflecting on our group’s work on the project, I discovered yet another way elearning’s functioning is inherently different than its face-to-face counterpart.

To preface this thinking, let’s accept there are obvious differences between online and face-to-face learning. These include physical space, teacher interactions, and asking permission to use the restroom.

When thinking about this week’s midterm, the way the project would have unfolded would have been much different had it been a face-to-face course. I’m a doer; when given a task I prefer to get after it, get it crossed off the to-do list, and move onto the next assignment or to beloved free time. If in a face-to-face classroom we were given the assignment, we would’ve completed the assignment in a much shorter time frame. In fact, I think in the face-to-face environment, this assignment would be completed in a couple hour collaboration. Instead this was strung over a week and a half.
Critics of elearning will argue this is an example of how inefficient elearning is in delivering instruction. I’m not certain that’s the case.

In that face-to-face meeting, I would have taken a much larger share of its completion (this is not to say my group members’ were anything less than great, because they were wonderful to work with). This would’ve lead to me doing more work, my group members doing less, with the final result being just about the same.

Thus, elearning—and assignments like the jigsaw midterm—lead to a better educational equity within the classroom. The reliance on peer collaboration becomes greater so it is more imperative for students to pull their educational weight. This is certainly a benefit of elearning.

As for how I would use this at my school, I already to quite a bit of collaborative assignments. However, I think it would be an interesting learning experience for students to work on a collaborative assessment using online collaboration tools instead of traditional face-to-face meetings. I believe it would stretch them educationally, providing experience with assessments and situations they will face as they continue in their educations and their lives.

A bit of behind the scenes on how it was created: we initially discussed who was going to focus on what on the D2L site. From there, I set up a wiki (which can been seen here) allowing for us to post/edit our responses. After all was posted, Karen took care of the introduction, Marilyn the conclusion, while I made all the last minute final touches to make it a cohesive document and posted it on our discussion board. I hope you enjoy our work. 

Introduction

Below are our findings from researching Survey Monkey and Zoomerang (Survey and quiz builders), E-pal (Reflection tools), and WebEx (Peer-to-peer collaboration tools). Together these tools provide a variety of ways to assess students with diverse learning styles and backgrounds. Some tools are better suited to specific learning objectives, while others might be chosen to help specific students deliver their best evidence of learning. All of these tools help us think more deeply about learning objectives, our audience and creating effective assessments.

Assessment tool #1: WebEx (www.webex.com)
WebEx is a collaboration program allowing users to hold virtual meetings in real time. After downloading the basic software, WebEx allows users to log on to the same meeting place (or classroom in school jargon), where collaboration can occur. The site allows users to text and video chat, share a whiteboard (think of a sheet of paper all members can write on in real time), and even share a user’s desktop. We were dubious of the site initially, spurned by the price tag, $49/month, as there are websites that can do similar with less cost (or in some cases, no cost). However, after experimenting with the site, we can see its value and would offer our recommendation.

WebEx is primarily directed towards businesses; in fact, when registering for a free trial, “education” wasn’t even one of the categories of businesses we could choose from (and there certainly wasn’t a “teacher” in the job title, so we went with CEO!). This would allow companies to have both in-house and across the globe meetings with their employees revolving around one, internet-based hub. In an ever-shrinking global economy, we can appreciate this site’s value.

In terms of educational use, there certainly is some applicability. The main features listed above (chat, video chat, whiteboard, and screensharing) could all be used in an educational setting. Imagine a study session or a lecture, where the instructor is able to see the students and respond to their questions, either in writing or through the use of a webcam. Seeing classmates and the instructor, and having questions answered immediately, could improve the educational experience.

Screensharing, where users can see what is on the meeting host’s computer screen, would be valuable as part of an orientation to online learning. New users could follow along, learning how to log on to D2L, fill out personal profile, start discussions, and email members of the course.

There are drawbacks to WebEx. The aforementioned price would certainly be prohibitive in a financially-strapped educational environment. Another drawback would be the necessity of all the bells and whistles WebEx offers. It’s great that it can do so much, but too many features can be detrimental to the success of the software. It’s tough to imagine a time when in a distance education program, all of the functions would need to be accessed at the same time.

WebEx could help aid in the assessment of many learning objectives. For example, if the learning objective was, “Given an article, students will discuss the applicability of the article in their current professions,” the instructor could view the discussion and assess the individual’s responses for understanding of the article.

WebEx will be around for the long haul, as it is owned by a powerhouse of the computing world, Cisco (who purchased it from its original developers for 3 billion dollars). However, even though it has educational applicability, its intended audience is definitely the corporate world. Because of this, we don’t foresee it being used in distance learning.

Assessment tool #2: Survey Monkey (www.surveymonkey.com) and Zoomerang (www.zoomerang.com) Survey Tools

Survey Monkey and Zoomerang are two online survey tools to help users design and deploy surveys and to collect and analyze the results. They both offer free basic services. Both take users through a “design survey” phase, which includes choosing various types of questions. Both show how to deploy the survey and collect responses and analyze the results. Support is offered online for both tools.
Survey Monkey and Zoomerang are used to make surveys, which unlike quizzes, elicit opinions and are not graded for accuracy. Neither tool is specific only to educational uses, but both can easily be used in academic settings.

Advantages of both Survey Monkey and Zoomerang are that instructors and students can create surveys. Both are simple to create, free for basic subscriptions and have flexible, easy formats. Survey Monkey doesn’t have templates with its basic service, so everything must be created from the ground up. Surveys can have up to 10 questions only for basic subscribers. Zoomerang stores data online for only 10 days and there are ads that pop up. Zoomerang has some templates, although only one is geared specifically to students. Both have limited security, although Survey Monkey touts its privacy advantages. Most reviews we read named Survey Monkey as more complex and complicated than Zoomerang, but we found both straight forward and fairly easy to follow. In addition to first-hand experience building surveys with each site we also consulted the following sources: http://www.listio.com/reviews/2009/01/comparing-survey-applications-zoomerang-surveymonkey-fluidsurveys-and-mysurveylab/

Educational uses of surveys could include teacher surveys, student surveys and students creating their own surveys. Teachers could measure interest of a certain topic, give feedback about a conference, or ascertain skills and assess necessary professional development needs. Teachers could survey students in order to collect information about students’ interests or prior knowledge to plan instruction or to collect feedback about how students evaluate the success of project. Students could create their own surveys as part of their research for particular assignments. Students can also get feedback on their own projects they might make available to wider audiences. Our own applications for surveys might include a learning strategy survey at the beginning of the course. Students could better know what to do if they struggle with any content or skill as they progress through the course.

Teachers could use Survey Monkey and Zoomerang in the assessment of learning objectives by having students create their own surveys. Students could learn content and develop skills in how to ask good questions. In order to write a good survey, students must consider what is important to find out and then they must also learn how to interpret the results. They can also reflect on their own learning by filling out surveys. We might use these survey tools for students to build a survey, thereby showing their skill at asking and answering questions. This is one of the learning targets of beginning language levels.

We see both Survey Monkey and Zoomerang as valuable tools for online teaching. We like the flexibility of use by the instructor and students. Instructors can gather information about students, students can self-reflect and show evidence of learning valuable skills.

Assessment tool #3: ePals
ePals is a free collaborative learning tool supported by Microsoft that provides a student safe environment by allowing districts, teachers and parents the ability to control content and interactions within a global context. Teachers and students facilitate teaching and learning by sharing projects and connecting with others around the globe and accessing content designed for networked and digital world.

There are several benefits of using ePals. First, online safety, which is a paramount concern of parents, teachers and administrators, is efficiently controlled through ePals’ use. Also, there are various forums to select collaborative projects such as National Geographic Teacher Created Projects, ePals Video, Digital Storytelling or Team Earth e-films.

Conversely, there are also some challenges when using ePals. We question the management of forums with numerous classes with student enrollments sometimes topping thirty students.  In ePals, most of the Classroom Matches with a global perspective contain classes of five-seven students. As we looked for the assessment pieces, we noticed the use of reflective tool, think pair share, but we did not notice any reference to the use of rubrics and we were not sure how teachers conveyed to their students what the quality of their work was in reference to achieving the learning objectives. Curriculum wise, there was no indication students took part in the creation of any of the lessons.

ePals could help in the assessment of students if the lesson is generated appropriately. For example, students could learn about the age-old practice of storytelling and use 21st century tools to create their own digital story. Students would explore digital storytelling as a way to tell a story, promote cross-cultural understanding and build meaningful connections with others.
As for learning objectives, they could be: Students will critique two ePals collaborative tools and students will summarize the progression of edublogs as an online collaborative tool to enrich student learning.
Using ePals affords students the opportunity to interact, review and reflect on the postings and responses of others throughout the global community.

Conclusion
Why is assessment important?
Teachers’ assessment strategies are significant because they provide a relational prompt for students and insights into the educational process.  As we investigated different collaborative assessment tools in order to consider our audience and learning objectives, we found that each tool presented benefits and challenges.

The one unifying theme—and an intrinsic benefit—seen in the technology explored can be best summed up by a quote from Bonk in his book, The World is Open, “…with the emergence of Globalization 3.0, individuals from all corners of the globe can participate in a world economy. Collaborative tools bring their ideas, talents, resources, networks, and products together for sharing and innovation.”

Hopefully this jigsaw review helps shed a little light on each of the technologies and the potential benefits and drawbacks. We enjoyed putting this together and hopefully that is illustrated through our work.

It makes me wonder in six years, what will distance education resemble?

I think there will be a much greater emphasis on collaboration—whether that is through real-time discussion boards or use of webcams. With this, I wonder if the emergence of new technologies will lead distance education functioning more like face-to-face education. Currently distance education is fundamentally different than face to face education. My online courses don’t resemble the face to face courses I’ve taken. Although I think the end product—what I’ve learned from the course is comparable—the road to that destination is far different. This is done out of necessity; it’s nearly impossible to recreate a face to face environment in a digital environment.

But, if this difference is bridged by new technologies, it becomes far easier to recreate face to face learning in an e-learning situation. This could lead educators, most of who have been trained in face to face classes, to teach like they were taught, thus leading to teaching like a face to face instructor on the internet.

Is this a good thing? I’m not sure. A bad thing? Not sure either.

In any case, the emerging technologies presented have been part of my classes and will continue to do so. Earlier in the school year, I passed on that same list of top 100 technologies of 2009 to some of my co-workers. It’s fun to revisit the list and investigate the technologies I’m not familiar with.

The second half of the week, focusing on concept mapping, was a good experience to go through, but not something I will use. Much to the chagrin of my high school English teachers, I never used graphic organizers. And, if I was forced to, I’d write just random thoughts down so I had something to turn in. My mind doesn’t work that way; putting thoughts down in a concept map form just seems to slow me down.

I am not questioning their worth, as I have my students complete graphic organizers often. They do it in Creative Writing when formulating stories, in Short Film when thinking about what makes a successful movie trailer, and Shakespeare when discussing Hamlet’s emotional state.

I’ve made it clear that sometimes I think technology can get in the way of learning. That the use of technology doesn’t make it inherently better. I felt Inspiration was a good example of that. I accept that as I would use it more I would become more familiar (efficient) when working with it and I would learn more about the features, but does it make it better than the pencil and paper version. Cost sides with paper and pencil; the time to create probably also is with paper and pencil. Inspiration makes it look slick, and you can email  and post it quickly, which is certainly nice. But I believe in proceeding with caution, just because its shiny, doesn’t always mean it’s more effective.

And as a last thought, what do I do with that student in my classes who doesn’t want to use graphic organizers? And, in a last second rush to slop it together, just writes random thoughts down on the paper. Well, I give that student full credit (which is what I wish my teachers would’ve done!).

The nine principles of good practice for assessing student learning are definitely applicable to my role as an English teacher. In fact, working at a high school and in the English department, allows me to really get away from those “one-shot” assessments and instead focus on growth within each individual student. It has been a shift for me, to think of assessment prior to content. What I mean by this is that I used to work through the content and when I got to the end of the unit, I would give some sort of assessment (sometimes a test, sometimes not) on what we have studied the past three weeks. Now, prior to starting a unit, I create the assessments that will be used throughout the unit, and then start teaching it. This way I have a goal in mind when I start and it tightens up instruction and provides a better view into student learning.