Assignment 2 - Pathfinder

Well I have completed my pathfinder (I think) for Assignment 2.  I only have part B to do now.  The critical reflection.   There is so much more to this assignment than I previously considered.  In 1000 words (+/- 10%) we need to reflect on what we have learnt through the creation of the pathfinder, and also bring into it what we have learnt through this unit of study.  Mmmmm...and only in 1000 words.  I have created a mind map on the various parts we have to include, as well as my thoughts, and I think it is going to be difficult.  Particularly as I can't get 5 minutes to myself (being school holidays).  Tomorrow hubby says he will take the kids out for the day so I can get a good run of it.  We'll see.

Topic 6 : Improving Student's Web Use

My notes from topic 6 module's activities. 

How could you teach this to a Year 7 class???

a)      DEFINING  Concept maps.  Student directed activity: what is a mind map?  Why do you need one?  What should it have in it?  Show students a range of different maps to stimulate ideas.  Ask how do you group ideas on a mind map/distinguish between the different sections.  Students work in groups & share ideas with other groups to come up with an outline that suits their needs.  Relate to a tree/branches. Show students how to use an online tool such as bubbl.us to brainstorm/create concept maps.

b)      QUESTIONING  Ask them why they should ask questions (purpose).  Groups come up with ideas through a mind map.  Share with class to explore reasons.  From "Teaching Students to answer their own questions" : “When you ask the question, you feel like it’s your job to get the answer, and you want to figure it out.”  Use QFT (question formulation technique): See QFT Six Steps  - prompt, produce, improve, prioritize, decide, reflect.

c)      SEARCHING  Developing search strategies. Brainstorm "search strategy"/concept map, reasons for. Other ways: Use Boolify to get students to look at different ways to search, look at how search engine works/different search engines, practice searching/comparing engines using Search Tools for Kids.

d)      SELECTION/EVALUATION  Teaching students to be critical readers/what to look for.  Concept map- benefits of website evaluation, then share ideas.  Using the Web from Education Place-  contains good pointers for students. Kathy Schrock's 5Ws- easy for kids to understand. Credible sources count! - useful for showing the importance of credible sources.  Students could create concept map of different ways to take notes.  Look at positive/negative aspects of each. Use this summarization strategy to develop note taking skills.

e)      REFLECTIVE/EVALUATION Teaching students to be reflective web users.  Include this IN the assignment! Allow students to grade their own and/or another students research process using a rubric.  Base the rubric on Bloom using questions similar to The Reflective Student to develop deeper reflection.

ETL 503 Topic 5: Web 2.0 and The School Library

I have had the most amazing, busy week!  Monday I started my new position as Kindergarten teacher at a local school.  Finally I can put into practice all those ideas I have been pinning on Pinterest!  But it has also kept me very busy after school, not to mention tired.  So study was put on the back burner this week until the weekend.  The house may be a mess but I have ploughed through topics 5 and 6.  Here are my notes for topic 5 which I had to post on the forum.

Key Aspects of Web 2.0 - sharing ideas and info: between teachers, between teachers and TLs, between exec and teachers, between students and teachers, ....possibilities are only limited by creativity. Everyone from the school community can be involved.

Opportunities for TLs- foster collaboration and participation, greater student involvement in the learning process. Links between home/school.

TLs cannot ignore such a unique, useful, interactive learning platform.

TL Blog use - promote new books & library activities, links to author's websites, links and info about searching, evaluating websites, useful links for assignments....

Possible problems - time, finding new ways to encourage readers/interaction.

Wikis - exploring the research process with students, publishing students work, student collaboration, student/teacher collaboration,  teacher collaboration, professional development, use as a sharing platform as you would a blog.

Social bookmarking - used in school context to gather information on specific topics/areas for professional development, collaboration on topics, collating resources for student use/teacher use.

Possible issues - need to check regularly that info is up to date, are there any dead links, evaluate links as you would any library resource which takes time.

Other aspects of web 2.0 - I use flickr for my logging any creative stuff I make and ideas for classroom displays/craft, Picasa for sharing and storing personal photos.  Pinterest has been the most useful professionally for me, it's great for finding ideas and storing faves visually.  I also use twitter for keeping up to date and finding new/interesting happenings in the world of the TL.

Another one bites the dust...

Well another assignment done and dusted!  Submitted at 12:30am, due at midnight - hopefully I won't lose marks for lateness.  This one was on website evaluation criteria and was to be written as a report with dot points, not an essay.  I found it so difficult!  Essays are a breeze for me because I know exactly what is expected, but this sort of thing was another story.  I have found the word counts in the last couple of assignments extremely difficult to adhere to.  If you are writing a policy or a critical analysis, for goodness sakes supervisors, give us a decent word count to work with.  I know I went well over in this one but as it was late at night and I had to work the next day,  well... you know how it goes. 

I must admit I learnt an awful lot through this assignment though.  I also got very frustrated with a lot of writers of website evaluation criteria. It seemed that none of them, even when supposedly catering for educators, put educational criteria first and some didnt even include anything remotely related to education!  Also, how can you write website evaluation criteria for teachers and not even mention students?  I had to wonder if the authors of the criteria had actually used their criteria for sites to be used in the classroom.  The majority of website evaluation criteria in use today (particularly by universities) was written in the late 90s or early 2000s.  There have certainly been some changes in the way we use the internet since then.  I believe this area is well overdue for an update and it shouldn't be long before we see more appropriate criteria appearing in our professional journals.  Educational institutions, as well, have been too complacent accepting outdated criteria as guidelines for students and staff. 

What do you think?  I would love to hear what others think on this issue.

Website Evaluation - Educational Criteria

I have been a bit slack with my blog posts and uni forum posts for the first couple of topics for ETL 501- The Information Environment.  I have finally got my act together for Topic 3: Website Evaluation.  In the past, when I have looked for websites for a particular topic and class, I have always considered whether the site fit in with the topic, whether the students could understand it, and the reliability of it.  From my readings so far I am glad to see that I was on the right track.  Looking at different sets of criteria however, I can see that I needed to be more specific in my evaluation - to consider other factors relating to educational quality, reliability and the technical aspects of the sites.

The following is my evaluation of the Cyberguide Ratings For Website Evaluation as a tool for website evaluation.  This was one of the activities in our Topic 3 module.

In my opinion, the Cyberguide Ratings for Content Evaluation contains some educational criteria but is made up of mainly reliability criteria.  I would not rate this tool very highly as a guide to assessing the ed criteria of a site because the educational criteria is either incomplete or is not written in a way that highlights educational needs.

At the top of the page where info is requested I would add to "Audience" the teacher's name, the grade of the students and educational needs ie their reading level range.  Instead of "Purpose for exploring this site", I would put "Teacher's Purpose". 

Our readings mention that fit for purpose is the most important evaluation criteria in an educational setting so I would consider rearranging the subheadings in the table, effectively moving "Information Quality" to the top.  It would probably be worthwhile  changing this subheading to "Educational Quality", to ensure that teaching/learning is the main consideration. 

I would also rearrange the individual criteria,  putting first: "This site sufficiently meets the teacher's needs/purposes", with room to explain/indicate  how/why.  Then "This site sufficiently meets the students' learning needs", again with room to explain or indicate how, i.e. The information in this site is written using language the students could understand (a) independently, (b) with some assistance (c) with a lot of assistance.

Criteria should explicitly draw attention that the website is required for an educational purpose.  Criteria 4.H. This site provides interactivity that increases its value, for example, could be rewritten as "this site provides interactivity/ activities that extends the learning of students. 

Criteria also needs to be added so that the evaluator considers whether the site allows for differentiation. 

We also were asked to respond to another person's post on the forum.  I found particularly useful some points made by another student. She thought that criteria needed to be added that asked whether the content was relevant in terms of the curriculum framework.  Good point!  As a teacher I would want to know that a website I intended to use met specific educational outcomes for the topic I was teaching.  She also thought that TLs should consider whether the website had been scholastically reviewed.  This could give the evaluator a view of the website not previously considered, particularly if the reviewer had actually used the site in the classroom. 

Next post: Reliability and technical criteria for website evaluation.