Web+2.0



Meghann Jordan Long 01/27/2011      EDT 3010: Web 2.0 I found many of these websites extremely helpful and I could defiantly see myself incorporating and utilizing many of these websites in my lesson. The first website that I explored and found very useful was the “Pezi” site which works as an alternative to the traditional power point presentation. This site is useful for teachers because it helps to make presentations more interesting and almost pop-off the page. This site has a number of resources to make an interesting presentation, for example a new teacher can do a presentation with pictures and videos that gives their students more information about them in a fun and intriguing manner. Also, this form of presentations helps to keep the information interesting for the students and could even make them dizzy! These tools offer teachers the resources to have certain words jump off the page and the ability to highlight and accentuate important information and de-emphasis information that is not important. This tool also helps teachers to incorporate different forms of media including, pictures, video, sound, and interesting transitions and organization to make a presentation more interesting and keeps the students attention for longer periods of time. Podcasting through “Audacity” is one tool we learned how to utilize. This is a system of recording through a downloaded portal, like an ipod which can then be broadcast on the internet almost like a radio broadcast. This can be helpful because certain information, like speeches or personalized audio messages can be sent to students in your class or played in a lesson. Exceptional learners and students with disabilities could use this web portal as a way to verbalize their thoughts. This tool could possibly be used as an alternative to typing papers, instead they could be recorded and a podcast could be sent straight to the teacher. Also, this could be an alternative option for students that do not do well in or wish to not be in a traditional public school. Podcasts could be used as a method for online instruction; teachers could record and send or set up a portal for students to retrieve lectures online. The website “Arounder” is a good tool for social studies teachers because it gives students the option of exploring first hand different cities around the world. The city that I investigated was Rome, Italy (my favorite city I visited) and I was not only able to have a first hand view of the city through Google earth, but you can go on virtual tours of cities, certain attractions, museums and galleries. One of the negatives of the site is that you can not go into certain attractions, say the Pantheon, but you can go in others like the Coliseum. This site was really interesting to me because I went to many of the attractions that I could now take a virtual tour of on the internet. This could be utilized as a teaching resource because I can take my students on a virtual tour of a geographical area that they are learning about in a particular lesson. Sites like “WikiSpaces” and “PBWorks” help teachers and students communicate and turn in assignments online and publish other work, such as podcasts, images and useful websites. This is a way for teachers to keep track of students work without having to waste paper and resources turning in a paper copy of an assignment. We are using this with our class and I find it fairly easy to work and set up. This would be very helpful for teachers that instruct primarily online. I could see this resource also being useful for a student that may be sick and can not attend school; the student would still be able to turn the assignment in on time. This website is also very useful in the fact that many different types of media can be stored and transferred through this portal. Students can post a number of different sources such as papers, podcasts, videos, images, websites, and other personal information. The website “Conflict.com” has a great deal of useful information and resources for history teachers. I am planning a lesson on the Vietnam War for my other education course and I could utilize this site in that lesson plan. This site gives students a first had satellite view of the city of Ho Chi Mien and they are able to navigate the city and surrounding areas and zoom in and out appropriately. I could use this information in a lesson to help demonstrate and clarify the sequence of events and battles that occurred in the Vietnam War through use of the timeline. I could also explore those prospective cities and areas first hand with Google map and satellite. As a future secondary social studies teacher I found these websites to be very helpful and resourceful tools that I can use to bring the information that I am teaching my students to life. These websites offer a variety of information, resources, tools, interactive resources, not only can enhance my teaching and bring the lesson to life, but it also promote more student-centered interaction and learning, where students have the opportunity to navigate the websites themselves and research more information on topics that interest them. These sites offer an alternative to the traditional power point presentation and add pizzazz and flair to make the presentation for intriguing for the students and may help to keep them focused for longer periods of time. These sites also offer an alternative to the traditional need for students to type, print and turn in papers. Not only does this save paper, but it offers alternative to students that do not do well in the traditional public school setting. Online school it becoming a popular alternative, particularly for high school students to traditional school. Teachers can communicate and present information and lectures to students and student can turn in assignments, all with out even having to meet your teacher.