Class 12 Readings: Going on the Road

"How to Hold Audience Attention: Be Clear, Be Quick, Be Gone" is the most important message I came away with from the readings. Too often we try to fit too much into a presentation or give the audience more information than they can readily absorb. I college, we've all sat through 3 hour long PowerPoint presentations that were word for word what we read in our text books the night before. this type of presentation does not get across any message except that it's long and boring.

I made the mistake a few times of using the projector to show students articles about topics in social studies. Now, after many groans from students, I instead show brief PowerPoint slides and then let them take the full articles to read on their own.

Class 11 Readings: Portfolios and Assessment

The benefits of portfolio assessment far outweigh the drawbacks in my opinion. However districts, schools, parents, and teachers differ in their opinions regarding traditional grades and standardized tests. The main caveat for many seems to be with applying standard grading to assess portfolios. Another issue has been storing students work. This is becoming less important in the advent of didgital portfolios. Students can take home the original documents and still maintain electronic copies for their portfolios. Time is the other thing that deters many teachers from using portfolios. With digital portfolios, students can be allotted a short time each week to upload, scan, and reflect on items they are submitting. The teacher can then spend less than an hour responding electronically to the students submissions and reflections.


The last two years that I did paper portfolios, there was an entire day spent each semester just sitting and conferencing with each child to determine what they wanted to include and why. I hope that the process will be much smoother in the coming school year.

As far as grading goes, I use Exceeding, Meeting, Progressing Toward, or Below Expectations for academic work and then there is a second grade for effort.

Class 10 Readings: Electronic Portfolios for Students

The readings for today were very exciting. I was thrilled to see so many teachers showcasing their student's work on the web. While I like for each of my students to have a formal portfolio to measure growth, it's also important to let them show off their hard work throughout the year.

Giving students opportunities to share their work electronically also encourages them to put forth their best efforts when completing assignments. I decided to start letting my students post writing assignments of their own choosing on our class web page. This has increased the quality and legibility of many students' work. All students do have the option to type their work and students with disabilities in writing are encouraged to do so.

After seeing some of the other teachers websites I have a million new ideas to try with my students!

Class 9: Electronic Portfolios

Many of the links did not work, but I did enjoy visiting the site of Dr. Helen Barrett. Especially intriguing were the ideas of using different web2.0 technologies to create and host e-portfolios. I also liked the the acronym MOSEP (More Self-esteem with my ePortfolio).

I think e-portfolios are important for teachers and for students. I have two eportfolios, one on Task-Stream and the other in my own web page. My students created portfolios this year, but they were paper based. I hope to incorporate e-portfolios in the fall.

Class 8: Professional/Teaching Portfolios

Two important aspects of portfolios are self- reflection and the criteria for selecting artifacts. In a professional portfolio, this would probably include examples of one's best work and the reasons for including it in the portfolio. In a student portfolio, there would likely be a range of work to demonstrate growth. The reflection piece might be more formal as well.

My first two portfolios during my undergraduate training were 3" binders filled with examples of work from my courses with typed reflections about each one. The binders were covered with stickers and I used fun papers and borders to decorate the pages inside. I was very proud of these and still have them.
My next portfolio was in Taskstream. I uploaded 10 documents and gave them appropriate titles. Then I emailed a reflection paper to my instructor. While this is an efficient way of sharing one's work, it's not very creative or satisfying.

Whatever method of portfolios my students will use, I want them to have a chance to be creative and to feel a sense of pride when they're finished.

Class 7 Readings: Tips for Different Types of Presentations

Preparation is key for a successful presentation. It's important to know what you're going to say and how you will say it. Rehearsing can build confidence as well as to help perfect timing. In addition to preparation, one must also consider both the type of audience and the purpose of the presentation. Planning for a conclusion and letting the audience know when you're about to wrap up are also good ways to make a presentation more memorable.

It's true that much of what we call butterflies can be eliminated if we are well prepared. I know that if I'm asked to speak I get very nervous unless it was planned in advance. I try to remember this with my students and give them time to prepare before they present anything.

I need to work on conclusions I think. I have oftene ended a presentation with "I guess that's about it" or something similar.

Class 6 Readings

The tips from Kodak are mostly familiar to me, as my uncle was a professional photography and I learned a lot from him. I think a couple of things most people don't pay attention to are using flash during the day to fill in shadows and making sure that the light is on your subject, not behind it.

"1001 Uses for a Digital Camera" is now one of my bookmarks. My favorite idea, which I hope to implement next year was under Math; Measuring growth throughout the year.

Class 5 Readings Using Fonts, Clip Art and Photographs

The KISS rule is one everyone should follow. In the past, I have been guilty of trying too hard to make a presentation interesting. This usually results in busy pages that detract from the message.
The idea of emotional response to a typeface is and important one. I love to use comic sans MS in my classroom, but this font would not work for presentations of a more serious nature.

Clipart may still have a place, but I have always preferred to use photographs whenever possible.

Class 4 Readings Copyright law and Fair Use

It's important, as a teacher, to respect copyrights and to know the fair use rules for different types of instructional media. Equally important is the need to teach students about copyright laws, plagiarism, and fair use policy.

In my classroom, I try to discuss these things with students at the beginning of school and then to reiterate them whenever students are preparing presentations or research papers.

Class 4 Readings Defining Multimedia

Multimedia refers to the myriad ways information can be presented. For me, as a teacher, that means PowerPoint, webpages, videos, wikis and podcasts. I hope to learn and implement more new ways of sharing information with my students and to teach them new tools with which they can share what they are learning.

Class 3 Readings- Storyboarding

I enjoyed reading about the different ways storyboarding can be accomplished. I always thought of using paper and pencil like they do in movie scripting. Now I realize that I have been using some of these other methods (iMovie, inspiration) without thinking of it as storyboarding.

Somethings I think work better for me with an outline format though, PowerPoint presentations for instance. I like to type my entire presentation in outline mode, then add design elements.
After viewing the slide show, I then make any adjustments to help with the flow of the text.

2nd Day Readings Presentation & Design

Presentation & Design

It's important that we as teachers explain these presentation "do's and dont's" to our students. Many of my students have gotten caught into the trap mentioned in these articles They have web pages that use garish combinations of colors, make PowerPoint Presentations with lots of cutesy clip art, annoying sound effects and confusing animations. In addition to design flaws, children often have trouble displaying content in meaningful ways. I've seen entire research papers copied onto slides and then read to the class or, even worse, a few bullet points read to the class with no elaboration about any of them.

In my classroom I try to use a lot of multimedia tools, which I hope models good presentation skills. We are working on presentation skills and I will often show students the wrong way to do things and let them explain to me what isn't working and how I could have done it differently.

2nd Day Readings Constructivism

It is important for students to be able to construct their own knowledge. The old fashioned but still prominent teaching style of standing in front of the classroom and lecturing and then having students practice and pass an exam is lost on today's kids. They live in a world where they can think, see, and do anything imaginable. Then they come to a school where they'r e told what to think, find nothing to see, and have little control over what they do.

In order to make our teaching, and our students learning, more relevant we must find ways to let students have more control and ownership of the learning process.