a) The issues in ways in which the teacher conveys new information
New technologies posses no inherent property that guarantees their implementation in educational contexts will, without fail, result in improving the quality of the teaching and learning environment. New technologies may be used inappropriately or in ways that replicate traditional teacher centred approaches and thus may contribute little to improving the quality of the learning environment.
Take this for example; the teachers have formed their own blogs. In whole teachers are simply traditional in methods, and their posting have gone to the traditional methods of reading and writing. Teachers are still lacking the ability to fully comment, give feedback and become collaborative in nature. Refer to the following example: [refer to email allan]
The hype surrounding the emergence of new technologies together with institutional pressures and learner demands to implement technology oftentimes obscure the fact that it is not the technology that is important, rather it is how it is used by the teacher to create new experiences for the learner.
b) The Encouragement of Collaboration among Students.
Please refer to email for entire section, both
a) Inspiration map
b)Image and text
c) Classroom Management Methods:
“Students, like adults, are social creatures who want some choice in their lives,” “If we, as adults, got a job that worked like the typical transmission-mode classroom, we wouldn’t last long– sit down, don’t talk, fill out the paper, take notes, ask to go to the bathroom, three minutes between activities, and 20 minutes for lunch. How many of us would stay?”
The constructive perspective of learning states that “knowledge is built by the learner, not supplied by the teacher. Distinguishing between ‘instructions’ and constructivism where instruction connotes more control and directiveness while constructivism connotes a flexible setting that fosters and supports learning. Creating such learning environments seems intrinsically problematic. Therefore, it is important that careful planning and design to the extent possible is employed, and that the environment also includes proper support and guidance and rich resources and tools.
For effective collaborative learning to take place, educators must recognise the following, and hence lead to successful classroom management strategies:
- Students decide which roles to play to reach goals.
- Students practice negotiation and social skills and evaluate both their own contributions and those of the other group members.
- Students learn to collaborate and reinforce one another’s strengths and observe that people with different strengths may accomplish goals differently or more efficiently.
- Students decide on goals and the means to accomplish those goals
Teachers should always, when mixing both classroom management and collaborative learning
1. Delegate responsibility:
Assigns roles to the members of her groups during cooperative-learning activities.
Leader– The leader directs the action for the day once the teacher has given the instructions.
Recorder– This group member does the writing for the entire group; he or she uses one sheet, which saves paper.
Encourager — The encourager gives compliments related to how the group is working, such as “That was a great answer!”
Checker– This member checks and hands in the work for the group.
Cooperative learning makes the classroom a friendlier place and that her teaching reaches more of her students
2. Grading a Group
Assessing cooperative learning activities presents a challenge for this educator. For each project, a daily grade, and an individual grade for group work should be given. In setting up the groups, one should randomly shuffles the students.
Because in uses group assignments often, students know they will be in a different group very shortly, which cuts down on complaints. The students have to really know what the procedure is for a project, or you repeatedly restate instructions and have no time for observation. Each child starts out with 10 daily points, and then add or subtract points to this total, depending on the behavior you see. After a couple of months, this is not really necessary in most classes.
A group grade depends on a finished presentation or project, according to the established objectives. You should develop individual grades, which receive the greatest emphasis in scoring, from confidential “brag” sheets given out at the end of a project. Each student should explain his or her role in the activity and the individual strengths he or she displayed. The students rate their work on a scale of 1 to 10 and explain what they did to merit the grade. The students also rate the others in the group on the same scale and write similar explanations.
This grading method reassures the hardworking students that their efforts will be rewarded, even if the group grade isn’t what they might hope for. The less-motivated students also learn quickly that they need to contribute if they want a desirable grade.
d) Ensuring that learning occurs at Blooms higher Levels
Bloom’s Taxonomy was originally designed for educators to think about objectives, communicate with one another, and formulate a curriculum. With advances in technology following the release of Bloom’s Taxonomy, there now exists a New Bloom’s Taxonomy.
This new approach to the classic taxonomy incorporates emphasis on contemporary research in learning and metacognition to evaluate learners’ experience and how it has been enhanced through the use of technology. The table below shows the changes made to the classic taxonomy for technology-using educators. In all, using the elements of The New Bloom’s Taxonomy could be beneficial when used in higher education because it serves a way for students to think deeply.
All online collaborative learning, should not simply be research, but should entail students to:
| Taxonomy ElementHigher order to lower order thinking | Keywords & ActionsItems in italics are part of Blooms’ digital taxonomy | Digital ApproachesKey: WP word processing, DTP desktop Publishing, GIS Geographic Information Systems |
| Higher Order Thinking | ||
| CreatingGenerating/creating new ideas, products, or ways of viewing things (Putting together/combining ideas, concepts or elements to develop/construct/build an original idea or engage/stimulate in creative thinking). | Designing Constructing Planning Producing Inventing Devising Making Building programming, filming, animating, Blogging, Video blogging, mixing, remixing, wiki-ing, publishing, videocasting, podcasting, directing/producing | Film (Movie maker) Presentation (Powerpoint, Impress, Photostory, Google present) Story [WP, podcasting, photostory, voicethread] Project (charts and inspiration) Blogging video blogging - Blogging tool, blogger, wordpress, classroom blogmiester, bloglines Vodcast, podcast videocasting screen casting - voice thread, blogging tool, skype Song (finale notepad, WP, Sound recorder, Audacity, podcasting, recording narration in presentations [photostory 3, powerpoint, impress] Online toold sand Web 2.0: http://voicethread.com/ http://www.looplabs.com/ http://www.jamglue.com http://www.podomatic.com/mix ) |
| EvaluatingJustifying a decision, solution, answer or course of action (Judge/evaluate/analyse the value of ideas, concepts, materials and methods by developing/constructing and applying standards and criteria). | Checking Hypothesising Critiquing Experimenting Judging Testing Detecting Monitoring (Blog/vlog) commenting, reviewing, posting, moderating, collaborating, networking, reflecting, (Alpha & beta) testing. | Commenting, moderating reviewing posting - discussion boards, forums, blog, wiki’s, twitter, threaded discussions, bulletin boards, chatrooms Collaborating: discussion boards, forums, blog, wiki’s, twitter, threaded discussions, bulletin boards, chatrooms, video conferencing, chatrooms, instant messaging, txt and pxt messaging, video messaging audio conferencing Networking - social networking tools, audio and video conferencing, email threads, telecommunications, instant messaging etc |
| AnalysingBreaking information into parts/components to explore/develop/construct understandings and relationships (Breaking information down into its component elements). | Comparing Organising Deconstructing Attributing Outlining Structuring Integrating, Mashing, linking, reverse-engineering, cracking, mind-mapping, validating | Survey (Web, WP, Spreadsheet, surveymonkey email, discussion boards) Database (relational; databases using MySQL and Access,Flatfile d |
| ApplyingUsing information, concepts and ideas in another familiar situation (Using strategies, concepts, principles and theories in new situations). | Implementing Carrying out Using Executing Doing, running, loading, playing, operating, hacking, uploading, sharing, editing | Presentation - impress, powerpoint, google presentation, Zoho presentation Interview (WP, mind mapper,podcast, vodcast, audacity, sound recorder) Performance (Podcast, vodcast, film, audio recording, speech, Powerpoint Show) editing - video and sound tools playing - mmorpg’s online games, simulations like Global conflicts palenstine |
| UnderstandingExplaining/defining ideas or concepts (Understanding of given information). | Interpreting Exemplifying Summarising Inferring Paraphrasing Classifying Comparing Explaining, Advanced searches, boolean searches, blog journalling, twittering, categorising and tagging, commenting, annotating, subscribing | Summary (WP, Mind map, internet, wiki) Collection (WP, Mind map, internet) Blog journalling - bloglines, blogger etc Diary/Journal (blogging, Myspaces, bebo, facebook, bloglines, blogger) Categorising and tagging - Del.icio.us etc tagging, comments annotating - -noticeboards, discussion boards, treaded discussions, adobe acrobat reader, blog readers |
| Remembering*Recalling specific information (Recall or recognition of specific information). | Recognising Listing Describing Identifying Retrieving Naming Locating/Finding, Bullet pointing, highlighting, bookmarking, social networking, Social bookmarking, favouriting/local bookmarking, Searching, googling, | Bookmarking internet browsers, web 2.0 tools del.icio.us Social Networking - facebook, myspaces, bebo Basic Searches - search engines google |




