STEPHEN COWART

Chapter 3: Tools for Teaching Online

Tools we’ve used before

BlackboardWebspirationMoodleClassroom wiki pageScreencasts We have seen these before and have used

them from the viewpoint of a student. Let’s take a closer look at tools you might not have seen before.

Games

Free games designed for your specific field

Easy to findAlready createdCan have students log

on and play!Useful for review

Images obtained from http://www.mangahigh.com/en-us/games

Games cont.

Games such as World of Warcraft and Guild Wars 2 have been used in classes.

Main focus is on Language Arts.

Students write stories about their characters adventure and talk to each other about strategy on forums.

Information from http://www.foxnews.com/story/2008/10/06/world-warcraft-gets-kids-interested-in-school/ and http://wowinschool.pbworks.com/w/page/5268731/FrontPage

Social media tools

Facebook is still a gray area for most teachers

Fakebook allows students to create a fake profile

Could be themselves, or more often, a famous person

The student has to decide how their person would act and respond to others

Page will eventually be deleted by the site

Picture and information from http://www.classtools.net/FB/home-page

Screencast tools

Used for making screencasts

Can upload to YouTube or link on main page

Free (such as screencast o matic) or your school may provide one.

Can record lessons or directions to be played back multiple times

Picture from http://www.screencast-o-matic.com/

Simulations

Can be used for most any subject

Useful because they are free and can be slowed or sped up if required

Allows all students to do the same experiment

Can show items that are hard to see without the use of expensive technology or a lot of time (decay, light, fake stock market, etc)

Picture taken from https://phet.colorado.edu/en/simulations/category/physics

Tutorials

Should not be used in place of teacher teaching

Great for remedial help or extra help

Can be found anywhere from YouTube, to KhanAcademy, to programs your school might have

Best ones give feedback based on student responses

Teacher should suggest and monitor any activity done on a tutorial if they can

Picture from https://www.khanacademy.org/exercisedashboard Information from Roblyer, M. & Doering, A. (2013). Integrating Educational Technology into Teaching

Cell Phones

Nearly 80% of teenagers have a cell phone (Betsy Hammond, The Oregonian)

There are apps (free and paid) designed for school

Can be used as a method of communication between students and teacher

Picture from http://www.graphite.org/reviews?type[0]=csm_app information from http://www.oregonlive.com/education/index.ssf/2013/03/nearly_80_percent_of_teens_hav.html

Learning Management System

Used to post assignments, grades, announcements, projects, etc

Moodle and BlackBoard are examples of this

May be provided by school or you may find your own

Picture from https://www.edsurge.com/products/school-operations/learning-management-systems

Want more tools?

There exists an endless amount of tools on the internet for those who are willing to look.

Here are two of my favorite sites to get tools from

https://www.edsurge.com/products/ http://www.graphite.org/