webquest link

http://zunal.com/webquest.php?w=58615

Web quest reflection

A) I think the best thing about my web quest would have to be how straight to the point it is. The kids will find word for word the questions on the internet so I dont think you would get a bunch of kids asking you questions and you can keep your attention on the class as a whole.

B) I wish I had more time to create something where they could act something out. Kids are very creative and always put a smile on my face when they make something up and perform it. I think it would be really cool to have them do something like that.

C) I am not much of a planner. But I really liked the peer evaluation. Just having another set of eyes can tell you a lot about the web quest and the usually can spot all the errors you missed. I think having another set of eyes look at your web quest is a great idea.

D) I realized how important it is that you truly know your subject. There were many times when I was not sure of something and had to look it up. If I would have known it right off the top of my head it would have saved me a lot of time.

You know what I'm talkin bout!

I really enjoyed using comic life. I have used photoshop quite a bit but everything is so technical, using comic life made it really easy to change the font and add captions, plus they look great. I think that I will definitely think about using a program like this in my classroom for presentations or things of this nature.

Web App-lica-tions

There are many great web applications out there. Many of them are great for learning tools, but there are some out there that you must be careful about. I recommend trying it before you assign it option. You always need to go in and play it yourself. With todays games they are getting more and more violent at earlier ages and show no signs of stopping. Many children come from homes where they are playing very violent games and see no problems with it. If all children were like this it would not be a problem. But some parents are very strict about this kind of thing, this is why you need to find games that would be appropriate for all ages.

I recently played a fireworks game where you ran around and set off fire works. You cold connect this to Standard 1 Objective 1 of the Social Studies 5th grade core. It talks about expansion of the colonies and immigration and I know for a fact fireworks were founded in China so people would have to immigrate here. Also the building in the background is Independence Hall which you could build a pretty cool lesson plan off of.

I also played a word scramble game which you cold really connect to almost anything. They had categories for science, english, social studies and more. You could also have them do this at any age. There were some that were really easy but then i went to the harder ones and i could barely answer them. I love unscrambling words so i thought this was a great application

Ode to Webquests

Yo diggity. I am here to rap about web quests. No i am not. i am just kidding. I really like the idea of web quests because it helps the children learn while also using a computer which in todays world you really need to know to get by. They can also learn how to work in a group or individually. it really matters on how you set it up.

I plan on creating a web quest on volcanos and earthquakes and how they happen. Students will learn about subduction zones and mid ocean ridge, convection currents and the different layers of the earth.

Web site Evals to the hizzy!

I evaluated a volcano website using the wave evaluation and the Kathy Schrock evaluation method.

The wave evaluation came up with 8 accessibility errors. 1 of these errors was that the title is missing. I think that this could be very confusing for kids as the title of the website would show them what the website is all about. Another one of the errors was that there was important information in the background which could be covered up very easily by other content. The final error i am gong to talk about is that it contains no structure. When a website has no structure it is hard to follow and hard to get information off.

The Kathy Schrock evaluation showed me many things. This website gives you plenty of information, but, it is not the most user friendly. There are headings at the top that can guide you but if you were to scroll down and miss those you would not know how to get around the website. It is from a credible University so you know that it is legit. Almost 2 legit to quit if you will. Anyway on a scale of 1 to 10 I would give it a 7. Which is a good website but I would definitely make some changes.

Word it up!

Today i learned that there are many things you can do with google documents. One thing that i know you can do is post things so that only people can view it. The Sky View Lacrosse team uses this to show where they are ranking on the team daily. I think that this is really cool because it is much easier to manage than say a website and it is also so much more private. I wanna teach 5th grade and there are many things that i can use google docs to help me achieve different standards in the class. Well to start it can help with their keyboarding skills, it can help with their literacy skills. You could even set up with another class to be pen pals or something with other kids. They could then save their conversations and have them for the rest of their lives.

Copyright and Me.

I have learned many about copyright today. One of the most important things I learned was that you must always get permission to use something. It does not matter if it is print, video, or audio, you always need to make sure you do not need permission to use it. There are so many copyright laws going around you really need to be up to date on what is good to use and what is not good to use. I thought it was really helpful to go over the case studies and see how we should handle each situation. It really helped deciding what is breaking copyright law.

YETC

Today we went to the YETC and took a tour. This was my 3rd tour of the YETC but don't worry, I still learned some stuff. I think it is really interesting how you can get so many resources and yet you can only get it as a student. It really makes me think i need to get a external hard drive and get all the resources. That would be my 3rd external hard drive but maybe i will just make it a specific school resource and only have school things on it. I also think that it would be really cool to rent some materials out and get used to it, then try using it in my praticum. You get it checked out for 3 weeks so you might as well try it out. My favorite part was the boy playing the MMORPG in the corner. That just made me laugh real hard. He will probably be there till the lab closes, which in my mind is quite the accomplishment.

UEN: The most awesomeness resource......ever

Today i found a great resource called the Utah Education Network. We had a few troubles at first but for the most part it all worked out. You can do many things with it such as make lesson plans, find videos, and pictures. You can use many of these things in your classroom. Holy. Stop the presses. I just found out they have magic school bus videos on this website. Oh happy day. This makes my heart grow 2 sizes larger. There have been many days when i wake up and wish there was a magic school bus video on. I wonder what other videos are on the website? I will go to check it out. You can also use wimba classroom which is just straight dope. You can have a whiteboard and draw on it. You can also join other peoples rooms and chat it up all days long.

Blogging in the classroom

Sup Dawgs,
There are many ways in which I could see blogging in the classroom to be very helpful. You can post things that parents might want to see. You can have attachments or extra copies of the homework, announcements, and permission slips online so hte parents can print off a new one if the student or parent loses it. You can also let parents know what you did every day and see what the children are learning about.

There also are some disadvantages to this. Basically if the parents are not really tech savy then it would be pointless for them as they could not see it. Also the parents might not realize what they post can be seen by everyone and they may put up personal information that they do not want others to see. You would really have to emphasize that if they are going to tell you personal information that they must do it in another way.

This is Nick Baker signing off.
Hope you have a fannnntasitic day.