Technologies on Technologies on Technologies

Almost every Teaching with Tech class this semester has consisted of presentations of new technological advancements that are either meant for or can be adapted for learning.  I have a feeling some of these are going to be fantastic for world language teachers, and am pretty pumped to try some of them out in the German classroom!

My own group drew attention to Padlet, an application that has been described by some of my colleagues as "Pinterest for Teachers."  I suppose this is accurate, but it can be used for so much more!  As a class, everyone created their own Padlet relevant to their own content areas, and I must confess, I was surprised by some of the creativity involved in creating these online bulletin boards.  I hadn't even thought of using the space in order to create a sort of matching/scavenger hunt activity...In my own German class, I used Padlet in order to link vocabulary words with pictures to make the meanings more tangible for my students.


Another tool I could really see myself using, or one similar to it, is Socrative (www.socrative.com).  With this device, students could take surveys and quizzes at home, thus saving class time.  Yes, they could, theoretically, cheat on these quizzes; however, they are just cheating themselves out of valuable learning for the test in this manner.  Furthermore, like we did in our own class, students can take quizzes in class with partners as part of a "space race," bringing in some aspect of competition.  It's pretty cool from a student perspective to see your own progress as your spaceship zooms across the screen!  Recently, my MT has also brought Quia to my attention, which seems an even better option; however, while Socrative is free, Quia requires a 50$ fee.  Quia does have 2,316 premade online German activites, which seem like they would be an excellent research.  Through Quia, one can also create a class webpage, an online schedule/calendar, upload pretty much anything, and modify pre-existing activities/share creations.  My MT is doing a 30-day trial period--we'll see how this works.  It appears to be a great collaboration resource with over 3 million activities in a variety of content areas.




Audacity, a podcast creating tool presented by a group of fellow MACers, will probably not make an appearance in my classroom.  It does seem to take a fair amount of time to teach students how to use it; in addition, I can find very authentic podcasts in German online.  My students hear my German every class; it's better for them to hear different dialects from authentic sources.  In regards to hearing their own language production, my students can simply record themselves with their phones or computers.  One German teacher, who is amazing at what she does, still uses a tape recorder with her students.  It works well, students learn German at rapid speed still, and it functions perfectly in its role...not everything that is new and current is totally necessary.

Also, if anyone needs a pick me up, found these little guys when we were creating our voice threads today (which, in time, will be awesome for use in a German class...too buggy for now, however):
Not going to lie, I kind of just want to be them right now...fat, happy and on a beach!

 

Thinking Outside the Box with David Theune

Rethinking rubrics, audience switching, motivation, cloud-based video systems, livestreams, audience variety, book clubs...Resource overload!  Last week, a guest speaker visited us here at UM: David Theune, a high school English teacher from western Michigan.  What might an English teacher know about technology that you don't, you might ask?  How might technology fall under connections, when it so often pushes people farther apart?

Honestly, I was ready to take a nap before David Theune walked into the room.  Despite having just given a presentation on Padlet (it's a pretty sweet resource, check it out), nothing seemed better than Mac 'n Cheese and my bed.  Seriously, how great does this look when you're sleepy and hungry...

I wasn't prepared for his big personality and dynamicism (might have made that word up, but you know what I mean)--his energy and intriguing presentation woke me right up.  Guest speakers tend to have about a 50/50 chance of being awesome vs. being boring; David fell into the awesome category.  So many resources for connecting with our students and the community, not even all technology based, in a mere 45 minutes or so!

One of the main take-aways for me was the switching around of audiences for student work.  Thinking back on my own experiences as a high school student, it certainly grew dreary knowing the only person to read and evaluate my work would be my teacher.  I would write a paper, turn it in, have it tossed back to me a week later with a big red grade on the front.  For less motivated students, where is the incentive here, especially if the teacher is not especially well liked?  This is one of the reasons I really enjoyed David's talk about rubric flexibility and switching audiences for student work.  Imagine how much harder students would try if their work mattered in different ways...for example, students wrote research papers on non-profit organizations, during which they basically had to call/e-mail the organization in order to obtain better, accurate information.  Students also ended up raising money for various organizations, which is awesome.  Like David said, giving students the opportunities to exercise choice and discover their own agency is important.  Students could also teach content to other students...

For other assignments, parents would either come in and teach or listen to student essays.  At the high school level, this is especially important; did your parents' involvement die down or cease all together as you entered high school?  I know my mom stopped even going to my sporting events by that point, forget about school work.  Why should parental involvement stop?  Why can't it just change to better suit student motivation and learning?  Studies have shown that increased parental involvement (not too much, however) helps increase student motivation and achievement...Students could also livestream for their parents in order to show them their class and what actually goes on in their school via ustream.tv.

As a whole, the presentation made me even more excited about trying new things in my own classroom, such as livestreaming students presenting in German for their parents.  It would be awesome for them to show their parents what they have learned, and most parents won't understand a single word!

Also, big Nelson Mandela fan...