Reflect on the following: What tools did you choose and why?; What worked and what didn’t?; Exploration of classroom use and application; What are barriers to your use, or student use?; How can video be used as an assessment tool?
I chose to explore the tools Screencast-o-matic and EdPuzzle. I often use YouTube videos with my 3rd grade System 44 class since teaching phonics to older kids can be tricky business. They are older and so many of the beginning phonics lessons that they need are geared toward K/1st grade age and seem babyish. I always sing along with my students, but I had never thought of making a screencast with a voice over of an existing video. After I got over my initial horrifying shock at hearing my singing voice, I think the video was improved because I was able to slow down the pace of the song and emphasize those sections that I thought were most important. Every Friday ("Fluency Friday"), I play the recordings of 2 students reading their paragraphs from that week and the class rates their fluency. I also email the recordings to their parents so they can get kudos from their families as well. Since this is already a built in feature of System 44, I don't think I would have my students use Screencast-o-matic . I considered using it for my older students, but I think they need practice with presenting in front of a "live studio audience" because they need to learn about projecting their voices, making eye contact, avoiding those dreaded "umm's" etc. I played around with EdPuzzle and I love it! I primarily use YouTube as a video search engine, but it was great to see all of the other options for videos on this site. I found a new site "Crash Course" that I will definitely be using as a parent. I can see that this site could be very useful for high school teachers who can assign videos with built in quizzes along the way. It seemed very intuitive and relatively simple to modify existing video sources. My primary criteria when I look for a new tech tool is the level of user-friendliness. If I can't figure it out in a few minutes, then I wouldn't want my students to use it because then it becomes an exercise in madness. I can't afford to lose my sanity just yet!
4 Comments
Kris Drew
11/20/2016 04:35:05 pm
Dana- good to know about Crash Course- I will check it out. I totally agree with you on the user-friendly aspect. It is an interesting phenomenon discussed in Gee's book- so more on that later!
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Joe Madigan
11/22/2016 02:12:56 pm
Two things:
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Kristin Pruitt
11/25/2016 01:01:40 pm
I love that you play to students reading and rate their fluency with your class! I also love that you share their recordings with their parents. What a wonderful way for them to celebrate their learning. I completely agree with your user friendly assessment. I don't need to lose my mind quite this early in the year either! Although my students, 5th graders, would probably be able to help me.Ha!
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Dana HandI teach Read 180 at Northwood Elementary School and I am passionate about reading (obviously!) In my "free time" I love hanging out with my 2 teenagers and taking our two dogs for long walks. Archives
March 2017
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