In response to the assignment:

This week, you will design two technology-based learning activities for your target group of learners. In the Learning Activities section of the wiki, find your page and post to it a description of two learning activities you design for your learners. Explain 1) your learning goal or what you hope to accomplish with each one, 2) describe the technology you will use, and 3) justify your choice of technology or technologies based on the cost, usability, and how well it addresses your learning goal. Provide links and descriptions of any Web-based resources you will use.

Activity A — Vocabulary Wiki Activity

(1) Vocabulary acquisition is central to all levels of language learning, and especially at the early stages, such as I teach at Fort Couch Middle School.  In middle school German Classes it is easy to reduce units of study to lists of words to be memorized for the upcoming quiz.  This is a dangerous area, as students are experts at rote memorization for an assessment, only to immediately discard all of that ‘learning’ as soon as the test is done

Additionally, students in my classes do not have a ‘textbook’ per se.  Students know how to use online German-English dictionaries such as http://dict.leo.org but these results are often too ‘raw.’  It turns out that middle school students are pretty bad at using the dictionary to help them find German words.  They can look up the meaning of German words with some success because they understand the context of the English words that are offered as meanings.  When faced with the opposite scenario, students just grab at the first word that appears in the results, often using the word in the wrong context.

By using a student-generated wiki as a resource for content appropriate and previously learned vocabulary and grammar, students will be provided contextually appropriate definitions and examples of use that have been created and vetted by their classmates.

My learning objectives are:

Create a usable student generated reference

Find and correct errors in the wiki

Use “fair-use” content to enhance the vocabulary wiki entries

These objectives directly address the Communications Standard of the National Standards for Foreign Language.

COMMUNICATION

Communicate in Languages Other Than English

Standard 1.3: Students present information, concepts, and ideas to an audience of listeners or readers on a variety of topics.

CONNECTIONS

Connect with Other Disciplines and Acquire Information

Standard 3.1: Students reinforce and further their knowledge of other disciplines through the foreign language.

COMPARISONS

Develop Insight into the Nature of Language and Culture

Standard 4.1: Students demonstrate understanding of the nature of language through comparisons                                                  of the language studied and their own.

For each entry, students are required to provide the English meaning for their German word, provide relevant grammatical information (gender of nouns, stem-changing verbs if any, verb conjugation tables), a sentence using the word, and a fair-use picture to enhance the definition.

(2) For this project I use the Wiki tool that is included in the BlendedSchools.net delivery of BlackBoard.  This wiki features an easy to use WYSWIG (what you see is what you get) editor, and an intuitive clean looking interface.  By nature the wiki is a ‘walled-garden’ accessible and editable only by registered students.

Other tools used in this activity are: Online Dictionaries, Creative Commons image search, and class resources, either online or in the classroom.  For teaching about what a wiki is and how it works, I use the instructional video: Wikis in Plain English by CommonCraft.

Since the wiki is included with the existing software, the cost of this learning activity is not an issue.  Other free wiki websites are available for educators such as pbwiki.com or wikispaces.com.

(3)  This activity addresses my learning goals above, only if it is regularly updated and used by all members of the class.  Time must be dedicated during class for students to get into the habit of updating the dictionary and some sort of accountability must exist for such a project to take off in the classroom.  At first, I offered extra-credit for students who contributed to the class wiki.  I found that this resulted in high-quality entries, created by a few hard-working dedicated students, who frankly didn’t need the bonus points to begin with.  When I required everyone to contribute a minimum amount, I found that there were many more errors, and as they ran out of new ideas, the entries became less and less contextually relevant.  I feel that the latter situation is preferable, especially of part of the assignment is to find and fix errors in the the wiki.

Students, especially in my middle school, are not accustomed to this style of collaborative work, where everyone’s contribution builds value for the group.  Working in a loosely structured group like this is a skill that needs to be taught to students.

Examples:

Web Resources:

CommonCraft Video

Behold.cc

Creative Commons Search

In response to the assignment:

This week, you will design two technology-based learning activities for your target group of learners. In the Learning Activities section of the wiki, find your page and post to it a description of two learning activities you design for your learners.  Explain 1) your learning goal or what you hope to accomplish with each one, 2) describe the technology you will use, and 3) justify your choice of technology or technologies based on the cost, usability, and how well it addresses your learning goal. Provide links and descriptions of any Web-based resources you will use.

Activity B — ed.Voicethread as a speech and listening tool in Foreign Language

One of the most difficult things to do during foreign language acquisition is to verbally produce language.  Students can listen to and comprehend simplified language quite early, and through training can read level-appropriate text.  Even writing is commonplace in the early stages of  most traditional language teaching programs.  When students are asked to speak, often a look of fear or anxiety is visible to me.  Part of this is the concept of an affective filter.  When asked to spontaneously draw upon their knowledge of the language, students freeze up and make excessive mistakes.  This is summarized on the website learner.org in the teaching foreign languages section:

In order to create the low-anxiety environment that is called for by Dr. Krashen and his colleagues, I will employ a series of oral practice assignments to prepare students for the end-of-year oral proficiency interview in 8th grade German.

My learning objectives are:

• Lower the anxiety level surrounding spontaneous speech in the foreign language.
• Increase fluency by providing a safe environment to practice speaking aloud in the target language.
• Respond appropriately to spoken and visual cues in the target language.

These objectives directly address the Communications Standard of the National Standards for Foreign Language .

(2) This technology is easily accessible from school computer lab facilities.  The basic requirements are: 

• Web-capable computer
• Functioning microphone
• Functioning speakers
• ed.Voicethread subscription

For this activity I will be using our department’s Logitech Premium USB Headset Microphones.  These headsets retail online for around $50 each.  We purchased a class set of 35 at a lower price using education discounts.  These headsets are the upper-end of what is required for recording.  The benefit of buying higher quality equipment is the quality of sound recorded.

ed.Voicethread.com is Free for an individual account, although there is a one-time $10 fee for validating educational users.  The ed.Voicethread section has the added benefit that content can be placed with a walled-garden of validated educational users.  This means that, if i choose to allow it, my students could interact with students from all over the world who are registered through ed.Voicethread.

A teacher may register his or her students for an annual fee of $60, or a school may purchase VoiceThead accounts for all students $1 per user per year.

As this explanation is getting rather lengthy, I will allow the following example to explain the functionality of VoiceThread.

More on voicethread: What’s a VoiceThread anyway?

(3) Based upon my own initial user experience, and that of my students there is a small learning curve for end-users when they first try to use VoiceThread.  The interface is intuitive, especially for anyone with experience using Web 2.0 tools online.  From an administrative standpoint, I would say that the set-up of user accounts and the backend administration is moderate, requiring import of comma delimited files of student usernames and passwords.  Once the accounts are created, it is easy to assign students to groups and create the initial Threads.  Recently (2/8/09) ed.Voicethread upgraded their administrative tools to improve user experience.

I find the cost of this tool to be a great bargain.  For $60 I have registered over 1/3 of the students in my school to use VoiceThread for my class.  This is about 200 students.  For the initial run of voicethread, the fee was paid out of pocket. (I’ll get it back when I submit my taxes this year.)  I hope that future costs will be covered by the departmental budget.  The additional costs of the microphones was previously covered for local audio recording, but have been an investment with multiple uses including VoiceThread recording, Listening Comprehension testing, Podcast recording, etc.

Finally, VoiceThread proves to be a great collaborative tool with implications in any classroom.  It is particularly useful for Foreign Language, but dozens  of examples of collaborative presentaions in other disciplines exist.  Other applications of VoiceThread incude peer feedback on assignments, reflection and much more.

One of our first Voicethreads:

http://ed.voicethread.com/share/296135/

Web Resources:

Affective Filter -Dr. Stephen Krashen’s Website

Foreign Language Standards – http://www.actfl.org/i4a/pages/index.cfm?pageid=3392

VoiceThread – http://ed.voicethread.com/

Penn State World Campus Resources – https://courses.worldcampus.psu.edu/public/faculty/studentactivities.html#virtual

This was harder than it looked, considering that I didn’t find any neat and simple solutions, but just parts of the puzzle.

The assignment:

You will begin by identifying a group of learners and a set of learning goals. You will search the Web for three examples of distance learning courses or programs that serve that group’s goals (e.g., health care office receptionists seeking customer service training). For each example, describe what kind of provider it is and write a summary of its activities. Then, compare the examples to one another and evaluate how well each one fulfills your goals.

LEARNERS & PROVIDERS ASSIGNMENT

For the purposes of this research I identify my target group of learners as the professional staff at my current school district.  This is a relatively large and diverse group of educators, classroom teachers, educational support staff and other specialists.  The district employs over 300 full and part time professional staff.  This staff ranges widely in age and experience, and most notably in their ability to integrate technology into teaching.

In my new role as a member of the “Tech Team” I intend to be quite involved in the professional development of the staff in the area of educational technology integration.  As part of our new (draft) six-year Strategic Plan, one of the objectives is to:

The Professional Development leaders in the district have intimated that they are considering some sort of distance learning (education?) solution as a way to deliver staff development, although other options remain available.  It is in this vein that I have researched three possible solutions.

While reviewing these resources I kept the following key elements of a Professional Development plan in mind.

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1.) BlendedSchools.net

This year Upper St Clair entered into a pilot partnership with BlendedSchools.net.  This company, based in rural central Pennsylvania, emerged from the need of rural schools to pool resources to efficiently offer a variety of courses, not least of all the AP courses that could not be offered without sufficient enrollment.  BlendedSchools.net is a provider of both hosted services and pre-designed course content.  The BlackBoard Academic Suite is the primary technology behind BlendedSchools.net, although the software is augmented by several additional plug-in style tools.

As you can see in the screenshot to the left, BSN provides standards-aligned courses for immediate consumption.  It should be noted that the courses are provided, but an instructor must still manage the course.

Coursework is available in a variety of areas, including all academic areas, PSSA recovery and Professional Development.  However, upon further examination, the coursework offered tends to be relatively poorly developed.  The Professional Development modules available as part of BlenededSchools relate solely to how-to use BlackBoard.

Thus, BlendedSchools.net offers a viable platform for content delivery through the BlackBoard system, but the onus would be on the district to develop, design and implement an effective technology professional development program.

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2) Teacher-to-Teacher Initiative (Fact Sheet)

The Teacher-to-Teacher initiative, sponsored by the US Department of Education.  This resource, aimed at the development of “highly qualified teachers” is a combination of different modes of instruction.  Professional Development is offered in various fields, including technology through partnerships with the Teacher Training Corps (including site-visits, webinars, email mentoring), email updates, Teacher Roundtables, Teachers Ask the Secretary [of Education], Tribal Teacher Workshops.

The nature of these resources is difficult to ascertain based on the limited information on the Government website.  After following up on the resources associated with the program, it appears to be a catch-all for teacher training resources.  Many of the resources provided show promise.

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3) Discovery Education Professional Development -

Many Schools in Allegheny county already have a membership to the Discovery Education resources, but Discovery Education offers so much more than just the media resouces that many schools make use of.

Professional Development services to “train educators to meet the needs of technology-savvy students are available in both online (Webinar format) and in-person form by bringing in guest speakers.

I have met two of the DEN speakers, Steve Dembo and Lance Rogeux and found them to be excellent speakers.

Another valuable part of the DEN package is the included DEN Educators Network, a community of learners, including blogs from DEN Certified educators.

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Evaluation:

In order to fulfil the seven elements of a successful professional development plan, it is important that the professional development team first conduct the first four steps.  The leadership & vision section stems from the (draft) Strategic plan.  For the first time, I feel confident that the leadership (not just a few individuals) shares a vision for where we are going in technology professional development.  The planning will be intensive, an effort requiring the combined skills of the central leadership and professional development team, with feedback from the teachers themselves. The plan must be aligned to goals set forth in the new strategic plan.  These broad goals have been set, but must be made concrete in the coming months.

It is my expressed opinion that professional development should reflect the same principles of education that we profess to value in our classrooms.  In this case, I primarily mean differentiation of instruction.  The fact is that not all teachers need the same level of technology professional development.  Some are quite comfortable with technology and move quickly through training, others require more assistance and time to master the skills.  A technology professional development program that challenges staff to apply their skills, and contribute to a community of learning will have to start with some sort of needs assessment.

The final three elements are time, support and assessment.  Time exists for professional development, but perhaps we need to question whether the current model (in-service trainings) is the best way to deliver technology education.  Support could be central in nature, but could also stem from a community of learners contributing assistance, or a mentor program for teachers.  Lastly, Assessment and Evaluation means that the users of the professional development tool gives feedback on more than just a reaction-level (how did you like it), but also gives information about the level of learning, the transfer of learning into practice, and more big-picture results such as effect on student learning.

None of the three tools alone are enough to provide an out-of-the box solution for professional development at Upper St. Clair.  However elements of all three could be combined to deliver a powerful package.  By drawing on the familiar BlendedSchools platform as a tool for LEARNING, teachers would become more knowledgeable about the opportunities for TEACHING.  Most importantly, the BlendedSchools platform allows for a level of local-control (and differentiation if developed properly.)  By supplementing locally-developed content from the Professional Development team, with high-quality resources from vendors like Discovery & the Teacher Training Corps.  The district can continue to “be visionary and vigilant in addressing the constant evolution of technology and the ways that these emerging technologies can augment thinking.”  Which is, after all the overall goal.