Looking Back

The journey through the all the different methods of incorporating technology in the classroom has been an interesting one; there were so many technologies that I had not even the slightest clue about! For example, I had no previous knowledge of the interactive white board before using it in this course. Creating projects with each technology lesson gave me the chance to gain experience with that tool, whether it was a Web 2.0 tool or a computer program. All the tools and programs serve some benefit in the classroom for the students' learning; students can be motivated greatly if the tools are used in beneficial ways. One of the great things about these tools is that they are all free or allow use of trials before purchasing, so the teacher will not waste money through these tools. Everyone has access to all the tools, and so that makes them desirable to use in the classroom.

Web Authoring

The journey of making a website this semester has been an interesting one as well as beneficial to my knowledge of technology in the classroom! Creating a website has many tiny steps to it, but it is a great free Web tool from Google.  Also, it is extremely helpful in organizing classroom activities, keeping parents updated, or providing information to the students about any topic really. With a website, I think I could encourage students to become more motivated in my class after they have read my "About Me" page or when they want to become more involved in my classroom by following updates on my web site.  A lot of free Web Tools may not have a wide variety of options for creativity, but Google Sites definitely does. From changing colors to layouts to pages, Google Sites can be personalized for any individual, classroom, group, etc.

Digital Storytelling

Digital storytelling is a great tool for so many reasons! First off, it is a project in which the creator can use movie makers or slideshows to add music, text, video, or even photographs to put together a movie for any purpose. In the classroom, it is a great project for educational purposes, or to teach students about a topic as well as introduce the teacher.  Another benefit of this kind of project is there is no limit to the time frame; it can be as short as 3 seconds or as long as 30 minutes.  It is easily accessed on computers as well.  For my art classroom, I would use digital storytelling as way to introduce artists into lessons, using the movies as biographies of the particular artists.  Students can use digital storytelling to demonstrate how they made specific art projects, or to put together a biography after researching a famous artist or historical art period.

Digital Diagrams

Inspiration is a software program available for purchase online but also has free trials to try, and it allows users to create digital diagrams on any subject one can think of.  This program can contribute to many ideas in a classroom, such as creating diagrams for historical subjects, science, people, events, art history, etc. Basically, diagrams can map out ANY idea or topic! The possibilities are really endless.  In addition, I think Inspiration would be a great tool to use for the art classroom.  Ideas that could be mapped out for the art classroom are artists, art movements, art-making tools, art techniques, safety, using nature in art, color in art, etc. The possibilities are endless for the art classroom as well. Students can map ideas out in their own way with their own preferences, which can be motivating for them.  It is also faster than hand-drawing diagrams, which is what I did as a student back in the day!

Interactive WhiteBoards in the Classroom

The IWB in the classroom is a fantastic way to engage the students after a period of lecture or learning. It gets them out of their chairs and moving around, interacting with the board.  There are numerous ways to include interactive activity in the flipcharts. Using a storyboard, I can easily map out a lesson plan or activities, and create them on my computer at home. IWB allows the advantage of preparing lessons at home as well as saving files on USB to carry around! This can easily accommodate teachers so they do not having to be at the IWB to create a flipchart.  In an art classroom, I believe the IWB can provide another perspective of art activities other than creating art manually. Instead, students can learn about aspects of design, computer or graphic art, or even view historical works of art. Even videos can be embedded in flipcharts to view art making techniques. Art can even be CREATED on the IWB by using the paint bucket, paintbrush, pen, or eraser tools! In addition, lessons can consist of art vocabulary terms.

Interactive White Board is a great technology tool that can be utilized in the classroom at any age.  The tool does not require any typing for those students who cannot read or write yet, but it could include it for those who have more technology skills. Using simply visuals can generate infinite possibilities of class activities with the IWB.  It also keeps students active and moving around rather than sitting in a chair for a long period of time and having their eyes glued to a computer screen.

I think incorporating the use of IWB in my art classroom could have great potential as to what possibilities there are of including art lessons.  The variety of options in the toolbar encourage use of many elements of art such as colors or shapes or lines.  Teaching lesson plans consisting of the basic elements of art would be undoubtedly super easy with this technology tool, and some lessons on the IWB could provide a motivational change from the usual art classroom activity such as looking at famous artwork in textbooks.

Scavenger Hunt Slideshow

Lines Scavenger Hunt

Scavenger Hunt of LINES!

Well, this week was a fun outdoor activity! The activity consisted of a scavenger hunt (regarding my specific subject area of art) where several teammates and I had to search for various types of line, such as wavy line or curved line.  We searched right outside the building, and could find everything without a problem! Lines are everywhere. Also, what was even better, was the fact that we could use our iPhones to capture photographs! No camera was required nor was a cord required! iPhone is great technology in the way that one can easily upload photographs or videos to a computer through the Dropbox App.  Now, in order to apply this use of Dropbox to the classroom through the App, I would use iPads instead of iPhone becauase iPads would allow for more classroom management and control over what activities are used in the iPad (for example, you can discourage calls or iMessage better with the iPad).  They would be more appropiate for the classroom. After uploading photos to the computer, anything is possible with them! The students can create powerpoints, glogs, edit photos through Pixlr, or even upload to Blogs or Websites! All the possibilities with photographs can highly encourage and motivate students to learn in new ways other than traditional lecture. In addition to use of the Dropbox and photo editing tools, the scavenger hunt itself is a great way to get the class active and engaging in learning outside the classroom.

Digital Images

Digital Images have multiple uses nowadays.  Ever since technology advanced in the 1990's and 2000's, the access to technology such as digital cameras or anything that captures images has skyrocketed.  In addition, there are even free tools on the web that allow anyone to edit digital images.  Furthermore, the easygoing accessibility and editing methods of digital images has encouraged the use of them in the classroom among educators and students.

I think digital images allow people to see the world from a different perspective than they would if they were there in that moment.  Digital images can motivate students to become interested in photography, which is an art subject I would like to incorporate into my art classroom curriculum.  Aside from digital photographs as art forms, they are also ways of capturing special moments in the classroom and demonstrating them online for parents or other people to show current events of my instruction and student activity/projects. 

Web 2.0 Tools in the Classroom

This week was an introduction to the use of Web 2.0 Tools in the classroom.  Web 2.0 tools are of valuable educational use, as well as free for all.  They allow for students and teachers, even parents, to use the web beneficially for a tremendously better classroom environment when used appropiately. To name some of the tools, they can include Wordle, Pixlr, Google Docs, or Animoto.  Some tools promote editing of images while other tools encourage creation of virtual storybooks on the web. 

Once the class divided up into groups, my group was assigned to get acquainted with Pixlr and learn how to work with digital images using this tool. I think Pixlr is very interesting in the ways you can edit a photo without having to have Adobe Photoshop or other programs that you have to download onto the computer.  I think Pixlr is an extremely flexible web tool in terms of how much you want to edit a digital image. Instagram, which is a photo editor app on iPhone and Android, is what Pixlr reminds me of in the way that both allow you to add filters to images in one step and not having to add a bunch of layers like one would in Adobe Photoshop. As an art teacher, I think Pixlr undoubtedly could be a part of my classroom activity that students engage in and learn how to create art in digital form.

Research and Wikis in the Classroom

This week was spent on coming up with ideas for a wiki page which the students could create using research they conducted from online and the textbooks.  My idea consisted of using both a 5th grade art textbook's pages on elements of art and an interactive website for understanding elements of art to create a wiki that tested students' understanding of the subject. I placed an image of a famous work of art (Edvard Munch's The Scream) and asked questions based on that work of art. 

I believe activities like this one, of having the students create wikis with their own control or some control, could be beneficial and motivating for students.  Wikis could be used for introductions to another activity or lesson because children know that they already have this background knowledge to apply and give them confidence.  In the art classroom, the wikis can be used utilized toward applying art history or art terminology to an art project following.  I approve of the idea of allowing students to collaborate for online research assignments because of their different backgrounds with technology. All in all, technology can either motivate or disappoint the class depending on the assigned activities or websites for research, so it is important for the teacher to evaluate the websites beforehand.

Evaluating Webquests and Inquiry-based Lessons

Before this class, I had never seen or heard of Webquests or inquiry-based lesson plans online.  I had guessed that educators posted lesson plans online, but Webquests contain more organized formats for the audience to follow.  Now that I have seen several Webquests from the evaluations we completed in class, I believe I can detect a efficient and useful Webquest pertaining to the art classroom.  They are a great resource for integrating technology into the art classroom as well, since technology is a booming industry and pretty much inevitable in modern education.  The only thing I disliked about the Web tool is some Webquests seem doubtful.  In addition, it can be a motivation strategy for the students after a while to try something different in terms of learning tools.

In specifically the Webquests search engine, various art lessons don't seem to exist outside of widely known artists such as Picasso and Kadinsky.  I think a great Webquest would include the perfect balance between introducing historical art works and generating a creative outlet for students to create a project with open-ended instruction.  These inquiry-based lessons can be a useful tool to introduce historical artworks or artists and lead students into unit plans and allow the integration of technology to flow more.

One last thing, the Webquests are tools which can benefit the Deaf community greatly.  Deaf people, teachers, family or students, are extremely visual people.  Children in my Deaf classroom can work some motivation towards any lessons that require visuals.  Parents can also keep up with what their children are doing in the classroom from home when they can access the Webquests from my Website!

Websites for Classroom Use

This week, evaluating websites became the focal point of lesson activities.  As I worked on my evaluation with my chosen website of National Geographic's Photography page, I aimed to comprehend what deemed a website worthy of classroom utility or not.  In the end, I believe I was capable of determining if the website was dependable and beneficial for my classroom. This ability is utterly essential in the outcome of the lesson activity for my students because the reliability of the website can certainly affect how my students will perceive technology usage in the future.  Sometimes, a puzzling experience with a website can prevent a student from visiting it again, even if it is a beneficial website for the his or her learning.  In addition to providing advantageous or meaningful learning experiences for the students, it is also important to evaluate websites for appropriateness within the grade level as well as to make sure there is nothing inappropriate for a student to view on the website.  Doing this will allow any teacher in the classroom to avoid conflict with parents or administration, which can be unpleasant if not taken seriously.

My Expectations for TPTE 486

Here is the start of my new and first blog for TPTE 486! I am not a really technology-savvy person, but hopefully this blog and my website could change that this semester! That is the first thing I want to expect from this course. Other than that, I expect to learn how to put a website together in which kids in my future class could interact with, as well as parents. It is a way of asynchronous communication that encourages a community to keep in touch with current events and news! Hopefully, I will be able to get into the habit of posting regularly in time for my first class!  In addition, I am eager to familiarize myself with all the gadgets and learning tools that I can possibly include in my website as well as my blog for the enrichment of my students' learning experiences.  Here is to learning the basics of technology in the classroom!