Week2 Lecture, Introduction to the Course

Today went well. I started with an introduction to the course. The Simponize characters went over well. After a brief review of the course, I had students get into groups based on their content areas. It took me some time to reorganize them once they were in the correct spots. The TAL learners kind of mixed things up in the 1st lecture and so now all the TAL folks are up at the top in one small corner. I will try to move them a little. They had a mission to create a collage of their pictures and names. I didn't care how they did it, but they needed to get this to me by Monday at 8:00. I already have one team that sent theirs to me. A little more time was dedicated to this assignment since they all seemed so energized about it. I will try to give them more problems to solve. I really liked this approach and it seemed to energize them.

Next I discussed some aspects of globalization and the flat world and how it's impacting our students. I think this gave them more of an appreciation of how our world is expanding. However, some of the stories and short quips need to be worked on. I think perhaps watching Thomas Friedman's MIT video and then finding a PPT or video on how this concept applies to K-12 education would be helpful. That's my note on professional development.

I had some good videos, but unfortunately, the sound didn't work too well on the students' description of why to use technology. These should be deleted or checked back on to see if the audio is audible next semester.

Overall, I felt like there was a good energy in the room and students really talked to one another about the questions. I think the first two questions are a little drull, but probably need to be asked (about globalization). Perhaps there is a way to spice this up. The second two questions were interesting, but I need to find a way to make students expand on the questions and to get more excited or engaging with the content. By changing the content area to the group section, they could circle it there and have more space to write. Or perhaps I make these all 2 sided or have all the questions at the top and have them number their responses below.

Overall, I'd like to think of more ways to involve them in discussions with their subject area group in the lecture. This is important because it is probably the majority of interaction they will have in their subject area. Think-Pair-Share is always a great possibility. I'll have to think of some more ways to increase interaction in a large lecture hall. I could always ask one person in each group to bring their laptop in. Hmmm.....

I would like to find more videos that show the amazing ways technology is being used. The Hamilton High video, Shift Happens, and A Vision of Students Today were all great. However, the new tech high page was dull, as was the Evansville page and perhaps even the Kokomo movie (although the later part of this movie was well done.

So for next week, I'm looking at standards, electronic portfolios, and I have less information in that presentation that I need to cover (this lecture had a LOT of videos).

Week2 Lecture, Introduction to the Course