EDL 755 Reflection # 2

Day three and four were less overwhelming and easier to follow. As we were learning Pixlr, Screencast, and reviewing Wikies, again my mind was races a million miles a minute full of potential learning opportunities for my students. I also was thinking of ideas on how to incorporate the above tools personally.

Pixlr is by far my favorite program learned in the last four days. I really wished I had known about this program two years ago when I got married. I wanted my photographer to edit a few pictures. I really wanted him to change some pictures black and white except for the flowers. I was disappointed when he never returned my email; however, this website allows me do fulfill my wish two years later. I spent two hours at home changing five pictures from my wedding.  My husband will love that I will be buying more wedding pictures, especially two years past the date.

I also feel that I can use Pixlr in the classroom. One of the first ideas sparked was incorporating Pixlr with Glogster. When I had my sophomores create posters via Glogster for an independent book project that was actually part of a Wiki, many students wanted to upload personal pictures to make the poster more fun and personal. Unfortunately, most were stuck with odd uploaded pictures or the dull clip art pictures the website offered. I can use Pixlr now for students to edit pictures first, and then upload the pictures to Glogster. I also can easily implement Pixlr with Voicethread during the To Kill a Mockingbird unit. I have freshmen create a narration to a collage of pictures. The rationale is to share their life story with the class so that the class can experience what it is like to walk in another person’s shoes. To walk in another person’s shoes is a huge theme in the novel. Pixlr would allow students to edit baby pictures all the way to current pictures. Students will easily be able to change embarrassing expressions or change an attribute in the picture to distract the audience.  One of the best selling components for me to use Pixlr in the classroom would be that students would be able to connect this lesson with their life. This is a life skill. High school students tend to be obsessed with pictures (I have caught students taking pictures during class time to later upload on Facebook). Students would be able to use this website for school work, personal work, and show it to their parents to use. Students could teach students and parents a lesson learned in English, which is a huge bonus.

Screencast, on the other hand, was a bit harder to use. I think it is a nice website to use if a student does not have an audio recording device at home. I do think, however, there are better programs to use. One such program is Audacity. When I have students create audio and/or videos, I usually have them use Movie Maker or Audacity. I don’t see, at this point, a bonus in using Screencast over Movie Maker or Audacity. I have used Movie Maker to create a video as well as just audio. Also, one does not need to use Screencast to upload a video to Youtube. It is just as easy to create a movie in Movie Maker and upload it to Youtube.

Another feature discussed and learned in class was Youtube. I love Youtube, and so do my students. I would love to post videos, especially in my speech class, for other students to view as a model. It would be awesome to not waste valuable class time to show a model of what I want a project to look like. Instead, I can guide students to Youtube, and tell them if they want an example, look on their own time. Unfortunately, privacy laws will hinder this. A child or parent may have a problem with posting work on the internet for the world to use. I understand this concern, as I too do not want my face plastered around the cyber world. I have two choices: I can either send home a sheet for parents to sign granting me permission to upload videos to the internet, or continue not using the internet in that way. I am wary of sending home permission slips. Many students may forge their parents’ name, which would provoke more problems. The solution, I can encourage students on their own to upload their videos to the internet.

The last website discussed was Wikispaces. I have had my sophomores create a wiki page for the purpose to share information with the class, and the world, about their independent novel choice book. The project, on paper, was 21^st century based. Unfortunately, the students were not eager to learn Wikispaces. I had many students ask me to change the project to PowerPoint instead of a Wiki. When I asked why, they responded that a Wiki was too hard to learn. After three class periods, and twenty whining sophomores in each class, my emotional state of mind was drained. I started to dislike Wikispaces and second guess the project. Not giving up, I had the students complete the project. The finish product, however, was depressing and way below my expectations. After today’s class, however, I no longer blame Wikispaces for an unfriendly website. Through my reflections, I realize the problems and limitations the project had. First, the students only worked with Wikispaces once a month. Obviously, they were not learning the website and could not retain how to navigate the website. Secondly, I needed to push the collaboration part the Wikispaces has to offer to make a real audience for my students to give them the motivation to create high level projects. Through the lecture today, I better understand how to manage and create that collaboration. My only wish would be to create a global connection for my students. I learned to appreciate Wikispaces a little more today. I do, however, feel that Google Sties still may be a better choice for my students.

     I am very appreciative of the new technology sites I have learned about in the past four days. I see the value of most of the sites to integrate them into my classroom. My goal is to not only use the websites once, but to try to incorporate Pixlr, Google Sites, and Wikispaces into each unit. This will build confidence with my students with using technology. More importantly, however, students will learn technology skills and integrate the skills in to their everyday life.