Placement Blog Post

1.       Developing innovative classroom lessons using technology: I’m the best suited person to come up with lesson plans

Finding ways to incorporate technology into existing projects: I am pretty good at coming up with ways to incorporate technology into projects

Designing and developing websites: I have very little experience in web designing

Teaching teachers and students to use technology and software: I am somewhat good at teaching others about technology and how to incorporate it into schools project, and I’m somewhat good at teaching about software programs

Finding online resources for teachers: I am interested in this but I have never done this type of assignment before

Teaching video creation and editing techniques using movie maker: On a previous assignment I had to learn and present to the class about windows movie maker, so I’m experienced and conferrable with working with Windows Movie Maker

2.       Responsibility: 7/10 I think this because I am responsible but at times I am very forgetful

Web Design: 3/10 I have very little experience

Developing action plans: 6/10 I am good at coming up with plans

Teaching other people: 7/10 I am pretty good at teaching others what I know

Meeting deadlines: 8/10 I always meet my deadlines other then the occasional time I can’t meet a deadline

3.       I am conferrable leading a group of students to the point where the numbers aren’t over exaggerated and I have another person with me, I get to shy when I lead alone.

4.       I prefer to work in a group, but with just one another person is also good, but I have a hard time working with a group of students alone

5.       Geography: somewhat comfortable

Media: Not comfortable

Business: very comfortable

English: somewhat comfortable

Biology: not comfortable at all

Pursuing Prezi

I say to pursue my idea because all that is required is the internet so it is very easy to learn the Prezi program. I suggest working with any of the business classes, preferably a business class that does and works more with presentations. As for the teacher I don’t know which teacher specifically teaches the business classes, although if Mr. Stoffman or Mrs .Gram is teaching, any of those 2 would work, or any other business teacher.

Enriching Technology

Idea: Incorporating Prezi into all presentations instead of the traditional basic PowerPoint presentations

Subject Area: All subjects can benefit, however, I believe business classes can benefit the most since they will learn and utilize Prezi into their daily lives based on the amount of technology at their disposal.

Details:  Business classes (or any class) can present their projects using a new flashy and attractive way, discarding the traditional method of presenting using PowerPoint. Prezi is the new way of all presentations that is fun, attractive and more beneficial to you and those watching your presentation

Technology needed: Internet access to download Prezi

Pros:
Ø  It’s fun to use

Ø  Prezi comes with many attractive features such as zooming or rotating the screen to expand and emphasize your points

Ø   Its new and more beneficial than the traditional PowerPoint

Ø  Your viewers are more intrigued and interested by your presentation

Cons: 

Ø  You need to have access to the internet to create an account on the Prezi website

Ø  You rely your presentation success based on whether or not internet is working

Ø  Takes time to learn how to use Prezi properly

What Needs to Happen to Make the Idea Work – Who is Responsible:

Ø  You need to talk to the teacher first to see if your teacher will allow a presentation method such as Prezi

Ø  You need to have access to internet

Ø    You need to learn how to use Prezi effectively

Windows Movie Maker

Windows Movie Maker is a basic editing program that allows you to make your own videos or edit videos already made. Windows Movie Maker contains features such as effects, transitions, titles/credits, and an audio track that you can incorporate into your movie. Windows Movie Maker also allows you to edit your music such as fading in or fading out. Another feature of Windows Movie Maker is that you can clip out sections of your movie, if you feel that parts of your movie are inappropriate or if you just feel the movie would look better without certain sections.

  /windows_movie_maker.aspx?WT.mc_id=moviemakerguide_googlecanada

Pros of Windows Movie Maker: It’s very easy and basic to learn compared to other software editing programs, it allows you to create your own movie starting from the title screen all the way to finishing credits, and it also allows you to incorporate your music of choice along with special effects

Cons of Windows Movie Maker: Sometimes windows movie maker crashes as you’re making a movie which makes you start from the beginning, it can’t save huge movies you edited, and the video quality is basic, and often when you’re creating even a basic video, windows movie maker freezes a lot.

Windows Movie Maker is a good program to start with for making short basic films

Some suggestions I have based for educational purposes include the history and science classes. For the history classes, for example, if you’re showing a war movie and some parts are to violent for students to watch, with windows movie maker you can clip out sections of the movie that you don’t want, and with special transitions already included in movie maker, it will look like those deleted scenes never existed. For the science classes, especially biology, if you want to show a quick movie on the anatomy of the human body, then with windows movie maker you can add effects, pause the movie when you want, add transition slides to emphasize what you want to say and you can emphasize, for example, important sections of the human body through special effects already installed in windows movie maker.

Windows movie maker is very simple to use, but if you’re ever having trouble then this tutorial will help you learn the program in less than 10 minutes. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZXK68NS7gU

This link is from you tube and it’s a step-by-step tutorial that is easy to understand and learn.

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/moviemaker/getstarted/default.mspx This link is directly from the windows movie maker website and it’s an inquiry and answering page that answers any questions you may have. This website also has step-by-step tutorials for any question you may have on windows movie maker.

Blog Number 7- I Thought I Posted This

For this contest I don’t have any ideas on which original song we can make a parody that demonstrates or envisions the use of technology in the classroom, but I do have ideas on how we can make the video. One aspect of the video can be how we made surveys on the benefits of using netbooks in classes to help students create and learn more effectively. This is a good idea because we can possibly create lyrics for this.  Another aspect of the video can be how our classroom has a smart board, and how students are learning how to use the smart board to teach the other classes in our school. We can talk about how the smart board could be used for personal use to enhance one’s school presentations. We can also break up into groups and get teachers feedback on the video, or possible suggestions that will enhance the video.

Blog Number 6- Future Shop Contest

I think that this contest will work against us, because when reading the application it seems like this contest was created to help “schools-in-need” which can’t afford computers of their own, instead of asking to make a video of how our school would use a new renovated computer lab. I think that this contest is the one we should consider last for applying. One idea however, I think, that would assist the IDC class in completing this application is by showing the judges how our school is currently using new technology, and how we can improve and motivate others by being more involved in learning, if we had a bigger fund for proving the students with more technology to use at their disposal. We should also talk about how we have high academic standards, so the technology would be a privilege and an opportunity to increase our academic standards

Blog Number 5- Staples Contest

I’m not too sure on what you mean by brainstorming ideas, but if you are asking how the essay should be written and what criteria we should put on it, then I think that instead of every student writing the same essay on the same topic, the students should break up into groups and write an essay together consisting on how our school is environmentally responsible. We can talk about how one of our own teachers hosts the switch club which provided us with solar panels on top of our school, along with how we have courses at Mackenzie teaching the students about the damages and pressures humans have put on the earth, and how to change them, along with writing about our gardening club. I also think that by entering in this contest we will have the opportunity to upgrade our computer lab, although on aspect of the contest is to write about how we influenced the community, and I personally don’t see how we influenced our community around us. We will however I think be successful with environmental attributes and school and student leadership portion of the essay. Out of the three contests I think the Staples one is the more successful one.