CEP 800 Audio Production

My technology certificate is complete, and now I begin the journey toward my Masters. The first class I am taking this summer is CEP 800 and then I will have CEP 822.

On this blog, I will display assignments, projects, and reflections as I continue through this program. The first assignment we have is for an audio production. I completed this assignment by interviewing upper elementary students about locations and attractions within the United States. The student in this audio file was asked verbal questions as well as hoping that he could point to the location on a map of the US as well. The audio portion is included in this file, and I have given some description as to the success of their ability to locate the sites on a map.

The United States Mismappings

Wicked Project Final

Powerpoint Presentation

Wicked final

View more presentations from czernelt.

Part 1

Part 2

Script:

This is Linnea Czerney, speaking to you about my Wicked Project, I apologize for the difficulty you must be having understanding me, but I have lost my voice.

As a first year teacher, in a completely new environment, I found myself struggling to have effective communication with parents. In the past, the students’ agenda has been a very useful tool, but many of my students will remove a note from their agenda, lose it, or continuously “forget” to show the note to their parent.

After completing 50+ parent teacher conferences, the need has never been clearer for more effective parent communication. This has been an ongoing process with trial and error, but I hope that the inclusion of more technology availability will help to allow parents to be more involved and more informed about their child's class as well as their performance within that course. I have tried several methods to communicate, but not through technology. This is so important because so often parents are not involved because their student does not convey the message of homework or the material we are covering in class.

I had created a website for my classroom, but had been using it for educational resources geared toward my students, rather than using it as an informational tool to communicate with parents. When realizing the problem I was having, I immediately decided to use technology to help ease the communication between parents and teachers. Although I recognize that this is not a cure all, and is virtually useless to parents without internet access, I found technology and a website to offer many solutions to this problem.

To begin, I created a survey using Google Forms to give parents input and influence in the direction of my project. The resounding results told me that these parents wanted to have access to homework pages, school information, and access to grades. With that in mind, I made several changes to my website and sent mass emails to parents informing them about the website and what was going on in our classroom.

I then took their feedback and implemented a variety of technology tools in attempts to ease their concerns.

In the survey I had parents create a code name for their student. Some parents returned the survey in paper form, and some did not fully understand the purpose of the code name. I had one student’s parent choose the name of another student in the class, and one parent give their child’s name for the code name. I then had to email them to have this changed, and include further explanation of the code names. I then used these codes to begin using engrade, per feedback, I have been practicing with this before I make it public to parents. I also wanted to get the rest of my grade level on board and they have not, so although I set up engrade and hope to use it in the future, the rest of my team would not agree on this grade level decision.

Another aspect that has not been used at all, is the feedback option I posted on the site. Parents have not used this feature at all. I have kept our class google calendar up to date on the website, and parents have referenced this as helpful in emails. In addition to the calendar, I added an “announcement” feature on the site so that they are able to have up to date important announcements.

Lastly, parents wanted access to homework assignments after students have lost them. These are posted under the homework tab, when applicable. This last week, my students did not have homework, so there was nothing to post. Through emails, parents have also mentioned that this has been useful to them.

The amount of parent communication through email has greatly increased from the use of technology, which is much easier for a teacher, who cannot make phonecalls whenever necessary with students in the classroom. Many have utilized email and informed us of this through the survey.

I have seen the amazing effects of the increased parental communication, but have also seen the aspects in which technology could not solve the problem or features that were not as beneficial as I anticipated. I have proof through my website that there has been increased use. Since beginning this project, there have only been 3 days that my class website was not accessed, and this graph illustrates the unique users that have utilize the sites features.

There is still more that I would like to develop on my website and need to continue to remind myself that technology will not fix all the problems of communication, but is an excellent aid in this ongoing process. As teacher parent communication increases, I would like to increase the tools and information that is accessible through this site. As commented through feedback for this project, I need to ensure that this is not overwhelming and I take the process one step at a time. If I bombard my parents with tools they are expected to use, it may have a negative effect.

Overall, I am very happy and satisfied with the results of my project. I have asked parents for their input about the increased technology and availability of content and information to them, and it has been greatly appreciate. Is the problem completely solved? No, but I have taken several steps in the right direction, to bridge the gap between home and the classroom.

Group Leadership Project

After our brainstorming session, our group really felt as though showing professionals how to make a Prezi using Prezi would be the best method. Since Prezi does not have a voice feature (although I think they will in the future), we needed to use jing to do a screencast to make it more accessible. By coupling auditory and visual learning, we can appeal to more professionals. Not only did we create a Prezi as we progressed through the tutorial, but I made an additional Prezi describing the process to that they are able to access more of the written script. This seemed like the best medium to present the information through. If the audio does not make sense, then hopefully they will be able to follow the steps in the video, or they can access the Prezi for a good example. We had talked about including images of other Prezi's, but time was limited. It would have been nice to have additional time to show more features, as well as examples of how teachers can best use Prezi in their classroom.

During the development, I learned a lot! Jing is a challenge for me and something that I need more practice and experience using. I realized more flaws in Jing than I did using Prezi. I was suprised that my struggles were not as much with Prezi, but actually with Jing. I really enjoy using Prezi, but also found features that I wished it had, and some that I discovered. I realized that you can schedule viewing meetings with it to share the link with others. As I mentioned, I think a voice record feature or more of a timing option would be nice. There were features that I have used in Powerpoint that I could not access with Prezi. It is also a tool that you must play with and practice as far as setting the path. In my opinion the path is the most important part - making sure that you are only showing the text you want, that you don't have too many steps, that you would have something to say at each transition, and making sure that the movement will not be a problem for your audience. Students love the movement and change of direction, but adults may not be as receptive to many twists and turns.

As for Jing, the 5 minute time limit affected me, as I ended at exactly 5 minutes. I would love to use this to record information for my students when I have a sub, but would need the sub to access multiple Jings. Another feature I wish it had was being able to edit or cut parts. It would have been nice to cut out pauses. I did really like the pause feature and being able to switch screens or take a second to regroup. It seemed too that with Jing, there is room to grow. There is the settings option, but there isn't a lot offered there. It is definitely something that would become more natural with more practice, but for this project I re-recorded a lot. At one point, I tried to record just the audio using Audacity so that I could focus more on the clicking and changing screens/adding to the Prezi while it was playing, but my microphone quality then lacked. This could be very very difficult or choppy for someone not good at multitasking.

Another challenge was the requirement of images and sound effects. In my personal style, I thought we should keep it simple without distractions, but I understand the purpose of adding that element. However, the amount of sound effects is a little overwhelming. That seems like something someone might have a few go-to sounds that they use. I listened to countless ones on several sites, but none of them seemed right to include. If I were teaching a lesson, I would use them in Jing, but for a professional development, they did not seem very professional in my opinion. That is one aspect that our group struggled with and were only able to incorporate a couple. If I were to do it again, I would really consider better use of sound effects to cater to auditory learners. I think it is much easier to incorporate sounds in a lesson, for example with a vocabulary word so that they have a sound association with that word, or even having the word as a sound effect said in a unique way.

I would definitely do another project like this for staff members to have a stand alone professional development tool, this opened my ideas to creating these for several web tools that I use on a regular basis. If I were doing this project again, I would work more on the collaboration. Our group worked really well together and all did a great job together. My group members are excellent and I have really learned a lot from them in this course, and greatly appreciate their feedback and input. If we were to do it again, I may have suggested a weekly or bi-weekly group meeting, even if it is only for 10-15 minutes, just to make certain we are all on the same page. It also would have been nice to have a more cohesive final product all together, but putting that responsibility on one person was not fair. It also turned out to be helpful to be able to access specific parts that were recorded, for example, if professional has started but just needs to hear how to create a path they do not need to sit through the entire Screencast, but rather can jump straight to that section. We decided to all work together in that respect. I would have encouraged using a more developed Prezi to progress through in our Jing. The reason this could not happen, was because of the time limit, and it would be difficult for a viewer to all of a sudden see aspects in the Prezi that were not there before, and had been added without showing the addition. It would have been nice to include more features of Prezi. I think we did an excellent job with what we have, and as we discussed, it may have been a little overwhelming to show a viewer every feature all at once.

Overall, I am very pleased with the outcome of our project and am eager to share this with staff at school who have expressed an interest in using Prezi, but need a tutorial that they can access at their own leisure. This was a great opportunity.

Group Leadership Project

Part 1 How to get started with Prezi by Lisa Napierala
http://screencast.com/t/STGZvwBV

Part 2 How to move, rotate, scale and zoom by Steve Veldman http://screencast.com/t/C8PFKglY3Svt

Part 3 How to use frames and create a path by Linnea Czerney http://screencast.com/t/GzKcHHAf

Part 4 How to invite others to view by Amanda Kain
http://screencast.com/t/8umJelEDrRr

Prezi:
http://prezi.com/hghw3c2dogey/copy-of-technology/

Professional Learning Plan

I feel that I came into this program very knowlegeable and interested in using technology in my classroom, but I think that during these courses, I have really grown in my comfort using it and my exposure to a variety of tools. As we learned new technologies, I really tried to integrate a new one weekly for my students. This course pushed me to think harder and really reflect on the effectiveness of using a specific technology. As I realized, it is not just using as many tools as you can, but really making sure that you are using them effectively. Throughout the MAET, I have integrated a large amount of what I have learned. This has been recognized by my administration, my students, their parents, and staff. As part of the teacher evaluation, technology has allowed me to take on a leadership role, presenting to staff and my principal has commended me on the utilization of technology in my classroom.

Despite my comfort, there is still a great deal of tools for me to explore and gain experience using. I have not only found the tools I use best, but also the ones I want to use, but need more practice. This has been a situation of "the more you know, the more you know you don't know." That really sums it up. I have been exposed to so many opportunities for similar purposes, it is finding what works best for you and exploring those. I have challenged myself to continue working on a weekly basis to use a new tool in some form between my ActivBoard, Ipad, flipcamera, and the internet/mobile labs. There is still so much I'd like to use. I have recently been shown the flip your classroom videos and concept, and have been greatly intrigued by that. My favorite lab was the data visualization, which exposed me to so many tools I hadn't used or heard of. It also confirmed that I have been on the right path with how many I have used and integrated into my classroom.

Jing is a tool that I really need to practice and experiment with to use in my classroom. I would say that Jing is the most challenging of the web 2.0 tools that I have used. It is difficult for me to ensure that my screens are perfect and that my narration is smooth. I created a Jing to show some of what I have done through this program and my emphasis on taking tools and learning we have done into my classroom. Again, this skill still needs work and my perfection is not where I'd like it to be (despite repeated efforts). My next steps with Jing are to record instructional references for students on specific skills we have learned, as well as brief tutorials for parents.

As a last tool for me to explore, I really wanted to work with Glogster. I have created a poster for all the web 2.0 tools I have used in this course, specifically in my classroom. Each bubble is linked to the site or my product using that tool. I fully plan to continue my exploration independently as well as through other MAET courses. I do not feel I have other staff or professionals to go to, but am eager to share what I have learned with them.

Mobile Learning Lab

I love the idea of Mobile Learning! However, i cannot figure out the best way to utilize these educational tools in the most educational way possible. After going through the learn part of this lesson, I realized that cell phones would be an amazing tool if they were issued to students and could use the internet without calling, or that texting could be limited. I think that if cell phones were used in a whole class manner, that they could be used on a regular basis in the classroom. After polling my students, many have said that they have a smart phone, but there are still many that do not. Some have regular phones, but no internet. I wish that there were a more reasonably priced plans for education that could pay by the month for internet usage, and texting as you go. This would open up countless resources for students. Using polleverywhere is great! There are a lot of different polling programs and resources out there, and I do not feel that poll everywhere is the greatest. I have seen it used well with adults; when they have their cell phones readily available. There are many other online polls that I have used and feel that they are very useful. If I could solve the mobile phone complications, then poll everywhere could be an excellent tool.

One way I explored to use mobile technology is the polling. It would be a great way for teachers to do fun checks for understanding or polls to get to know their students. Teachers could set up a poll of the day to connect to content material or just to better understand their students as individuals. I definitely would like to bring this up to my principal to discuss the options for this. Our superintendent is very pro- mobile learning using cell phones, however, he has not found great ways to have teachers regulate this usage. When we are told to take away cell phones that are brought out during the school day, it is hard to then ask students to use theirs during class for instructional purposes. If we could tap into the potential of polling with texts, texting answers, using apps for learning, allowing them to use the camera feature on the phone, or the internet as a resource - it may greatly increase participation and peak students' internet. Strict expectations would need to be outlined in the beginning, and they would need to be enforced. Students would not be able to participate if this is abused. I also think that it is impertinent that a set of cell phones be given to students, not asking them to use their own. I think eventually, or based on the grade, each student may be expected to have a cell phone, but in elementary it is not fair to expect that. Another issue may be asking students to use their minutes, data, or texts to participate in school.

Through this lap, I explored quite a few of the topics. I was recently given an Ipad for TFA and finally got internet access. i explored several apps that would be useful in the classroom. This led me to organizing the apps on my Ipad and thinking deeper how I can better use my Ipad on a daily basis. I think that this would be great in small groups or as a reward for performance or good behavior. I also gave more consideration to the idea of e-books. We have a few internet accounts that I have used, such as tumble books and e-books our library has purchased, but there are countless more resources out there. We have mobile laptop carts and my Ipad to use these e-readers. I think this would be a good poll for my students to see how they feel about reading books on a screen versus in print. We have asked about the possibility of kindles for the students, but I think first we need to consider if they are more or less engaged in e-readers, and what effect this has on their comprehension. Maybe it is a generational thing, but I personally need to hold a book in my hand when reading novels, but informational texts I read better on a computer.

One big push this year was the purchase of a flip camera. We have talked a lot as a grade level about "flipping your classroom" This is an excellent video that fully explains the concept. I think that this will really help my Wicked project as I continue to include to communicate with parents lessons in my classroom. However, it has been challenging to get my hands on one of the cameras.

I also looked at the Ipod resources. I have used an old Ipod mini for audio books to aid my students who are auditory learners and as an auditory aid for reading a longer novel. Our kindergarten classes just got an Itouch listening station with headphones and a doc to use. Itouch would allow for very similar, if not better, opportunities than a cell phone. There would not be as great of concern for the misuse of texting and calling. The new itouch would be perfect for using video, photos, and skype. However, I would settle for old ipods that people aren't using for listening or podcasting. This crossed between the Ipod and mp3 players. There are countless mp3 players that are thrown aside as people upgrade, but where do they go? I am hoping to put out a plea to buy them cheaply or have them donated to my classroom for educational uses.

We have asked for USB's for all of our students to use, especially with the purchase of our mobile carts, it provides a great place for students to save their work. However, without a budget for USBs, we have had to look further into Dropbox, Google Docs, pbworks, and other means for them to upload and save their documents. One other issue with USB's that I have found, that was not discussed, is that many of my students lose pencils and I cannot imagine that they would be able to keep track of a USB drive for an extended period of time if they were able to take their USB home to work on material.

Lastly, I really was hoping to explore PDAs. We previously used palms for our Reading 3D program, which means there must be a lot of palms that are not in use. However, we have switched to touch screen laptops. I feel that palms were not as developed as they could have been. It would be nice to just have them for internet access or pdf's. I hope to continue to look into getting ahold of these resources and finding materials to use with the palms and programs available.

Part D - Findings and Implications

For my Wicked Project, I really strived to make information more available to parents and increase communication between the teacher and parent. I took on this project for not only my reading class, but also for our fourth grade team. I began by creating a survey for parents to give me feedback of what they want to change and how I can best communicate information to them. This far this year, we have been relying on their student to give them information and it has not worked. I had to take into account that technology is not a cure all for communication, this perspective was taken into consideration when giving the survey. I sent it home as a paper copy, but asked parents to submit it online. Some were unable to do it online because they do not have internet access. This also made me realize that no matter my efforts, all of my students' parents did not want increased communication because they were not as involved in their students' academics. Along with this, I needed to ask parents if they wanted to receive information/notes home via the agenda or email. Many chose email which supported my desire to increase the use of technology and provide resources this way, but still realizing that this was not the best way for ALL parents.

Due to a lack of some parents support and additional set backs, this was not implemented as flawlessly as I had hoped. However, this is an ongoing project and effort that will not end with this class. I had hoped that technology would greatly increase the convenience to parents, but many of the parents who responded were the ones that are involved in their students' lives. I do feel that this was a better change for a lot of parents. As I mentioned, after parent teacher conferences, many expressed concern that they weren't getting enough information about school and class material. Since then, I have been able to refer parents to my website where all the resources and additional tools have been used for communication. They have been able to use the google calendar, the additional sites for students, the announcements, and more information about homework/course work. Had my plan been implemented fully, I would have up to date grades on the webpage using an online tool. Parents emphasized their urge to be kept more up to date on grades. However, as advised, I considered the advice I was given from my feedback, not to do more than I could handle. It is not helpful to parents for me to include a plethora of technology without implementing it fully. I should not start the grades, if I cannot guarantee to keep up with them. I have committed to offering polls and surveys, google calendar, feedback post, and updating my website much more frequently.

As I continue with this effort beyond the class, I still would like to use jings or screencasts to help parents through material, or create references for them to use in helping their child with homework. I would also like to see grades posted using an online tool or google spreadsheet.

I know that this has been successful so far and this has been proven through statistics and conversations with parents. I have had several conversations with parents about utilizing our class webpage for information and to keep in touch. Email has also increased greatly as a communication tool with parents because of the survey and use of my webpage. Parents feel that they have access to homework and materials that they did not before I began this project. They can print reading contracts and homework if their student does not show it to them or if they lose it. I have also been able to refer parents who come with questions or concerns about sites and assignments to the webpage. It has provided further information about what the students are writing in their agenda and the materials we are researching. I have also seen evidence of success in the stats feature of weebly. I am able to track how many people are visiting my website on a daily basis. However, that data is skewed when I have students use the site in class, but it has even improved student research activity; which was a result that I did not anticipate. The students have made reference that they have gone on the website from home to use the resources, that has been a big positive :)

I think that many problems could be solved through this process. It would be helpful to introduce this as a professional development to encourage other teachers to consider the problems in their classroom and take action using technology and the TPACK model. This process has opened my eyes to other problems in my classroom, such as using technology to improve reading strategies; to take literature from books to technology and encourage students to use technology to spark their interest in books. It is important not to just throw technologies at a problem and hope that they solve the problem, it is necessary to really work through the problem and think about what is working, how the technology is aiding the content, and if the technology is truly solving the problem. That is the major lesson I have learned. Taking the feedback given, I have understood that technology is worthless if you do not implement with fidelity and fully understand the technology and its purposes before using it. I have been able to practice and play with a lot of technology and it is less important to utilize all of it, than it is to use just a few and use them well. That would be my greatest advice. Really focus on something that needs improvement in your classroom and that technology could help, then choose 1 technology at a time to explore and implement well. Just knowing about technologies is not as useful and really understanding how they are best used and what purposes they can serve. Technologies purpose is to make life easier; not more complicated.

I don't know that I would change a lot in doing the project again. I think the reflective part is very important, but I would use a podcast to solve my problem in some way, rather than as a reflection. It might be helpful to introduce different technologies, and have us think about how that technology might be used to help solve the problem we are having. For example, in looking at data visualization, I was thinking about my need to display goals, or how they could contribute to solving this problem. For the project of this class, the wicked project would be a good constant to apply the technologies that we learn about throughout the course. I think it would also be helpful to give sample topics for the project; there may be a problem that I have not considered in my classroom that could be assisted by technology. I did not think about content at all when brainstorming topics, but my group members all had different topics: teaching math, working on the writing process, and improving collaboration and accountability within groups. I would like to challenge myself to continue finding problems in my classroom to solve using technology. This is a process I could see my self doing annually to improve my classroom overall.

Part C - Wicked Project Implementation

As I strive to increase and improve the parent teacher communication in my classroom, I have utilized a variety of aspects to have a bigger presence of technology as an outlet for parent communication. In this, I have made better utilization of my class website and have seen the statistics of usage for this grow and grow as the weeks have passed. I also implemented a google forms survey to have parents give feedback on their student's homework and efforts in their classes.

I have been surprised at the immense support and resounding excitement I have gotten from parents about using my webpage to convey more information to them. Many have reassured me that having access to this information themselves, and not solely relying on their student has really helped. Also, I have been surprised at the few parents who have been resistant. I anticipated some parents not being able to access this information due to a lack of internet access, but some even with internet access have made mention that they would still prefer a note in the agenda to email communication. However, these parents also have tended to be those that are not as concerned about their parents performance either from a lack of interest or a lack of concern for their academics.

An unexpected bump has been the pushback from parents wanting more information and not being satisfied with what is given. They want access to all worksheets, additional materials, and their students' grades. This has caused me to look into more resources like scribd and engrade to be able to incorporate these for them. Other revisions include using a poll for parents to answer, just a one question survey to find out if features of the website are helpful to them at all. For example, I had posted a google calendar to my site and have not had any feedback about that at all.

Overall, this communication has been good, and can only improve as I am able to incorporate more resources and materials for my students parents. I have put websites up on there for students to practice skills, but have not found a way to track what links are clicked on most frequently. Also, more parents seem not to mention the use of these resources, but rather want direct worksheets for them to go through with their students.

Due to a lack of resources, I have not had the chance to tape any lessons or include tutorials on my website, but I do think that is one revision that I should definitely make. Many parents are often confused on material, or how to do something and would benefit from that resource.