Glogster Training

Great Job on completing your Glogster Training!!!

I would love to hear your experiences, testimonials, and critiques about the use of Glogster in your classroom. Please comment at least once on this blog. Feel free to come back as time goes by to see what your peers have to say as well.

BP9_RILS Links to Cricket and Drew

Cricket's RILS

Drew's RILS

There are some great RILS that were created by my peers. I think that I could use some of these in my own classroom with a math twist on them. Click here to see what I posted on Cricket's great use of Sketchfu.com and here to see what I posted on Drew's amazing use of Gigapan and Mindomo.

BP8_RILS Publication

A Student's Project

Relevant and Innovative Learning Scenario

Jessica Kellogg

Brief Overview: Take your students on a ride through an M&M filled statistical journey. In groups they will analyze bags of M&Ms to see if the proportions that the company claims for each color are really true. Then they will present their fun findings using Glogster.

1. Target Audience- Ninth grade students ages 14-15 at Brush High School (18 total).
2. Materials–

·       Computer with Internet access

·       Medium sized bags of Original M&Ms (one bag for every 3 students)

·       Small bathroom paper cups (6 for each group)

·       Food serving disposable gloves (a pair per student)

·       Pencils

·       Calculators

·       M&Ms Worksheet for Students

·       M&Ms Fun Fact sheet for teacher

3. Objectives At the end of this fun activity, students will be able to…

·       Describe the probability of each color of a bag of plain M&Ms.

·       Convert fractions to percents.

·       Construct a visual representation using www.chartgizmo.com

·       Compare and contrast their findings with the M&M factory claims.

·       Create a Glog.

·       Explain their findings about their bag of M&Ms to the class.

·       Critique themselves in reflection about the whole process and the outcome.

4. Procedure–

a)      Opening Activity:

1.     Students will enter the room and draw a card from a deck of cards.

2.     Then students with the same number card will form groups of three.

3.     In each group will be a student with a card that is of the diamond suite. And that student will come collect a worksheet for their team and a bag of M&Ms.

4.     The person with a card that is of the club suite will get gloves for everyone and 6 cups for their team.

5.     The person with a card that is of the heart suite will be the scribe of the group.

6.     Each team will come up with a team name and put everyone’s names on the paper.

b)     Body of the Class:

1.     I will start by asking each team to put their supplies (except the worksheet) in the center of the group’s table so that nothing is a distraction.

2.     I will review Probability with the students as they have seen it before in Algebra class.

1.     We will use real data and find the probability that a boy or girl in our class would get called down to the office.

3.     Students will practice finding the probability and converting it to a fraction, decimal and percent.

4.     Then a student will read the M&M scenario

1.     “Today your team will be analyzing a bag of M&Ms. Recently there has been some complaints about the amount of each color that comes in a bag of regular M&Ms. People have been saying that the colors are unfairly proportioned. Your team has been called upon to research this claim in an unbiased manner. To do this your team must wear gloves while handling the evidence, not eat the evidence, and present the findings in a professional manner. Follow the steps below. Good Luck!!!”

5.     All students will wear their gloves before opening the M&Ms and they are not to eat anything until the activity is done.

6.     Students will follow the order of the steps on the worksheet that will take them through their M&M adventure.

1.     Step One: Students will each pick two colors to be in charge of and they will count how many there and then add them all to find out the total so that the scribe may record this.

2.     Step Two: Then students will create a pie chart of their data by going to www.chartgizmo.com It is a free account that they already would have made and only one person needs to log in while the other students help by reading aloud the data values. Then they will save and minimize that window.

3.     Step Three: Students will use their calculators to find the probability of getting each color. They will each find the probability of the same two colors they counted in the beginning. They can use the calculators to convert this into a percent so that the scribe may record them.

4.     Step Four: The students will go to www.glogster.com and open one of their Glogster accounts to create a virtual poster that has their team name, their pie chart, their findings, probabilities, and a final conclusion statement. This will be used to present to the whole class at the end of the activity. 

c)      Closure

1.     As each group is presenting their Glog I will be recording the values into a Google doc so that they can see all of them at once.

2.     After each group has presented their Glog I will put up the google doc and read aloud the M&Ms fun fact sheet, which gives the breakdown of the colors in each bag.

3.     Students will then add a paragraph to their Glog where they will compare their findings to the actual break down and their findings to the class’s findings. This will give them a chance to reflect on what their experiments gave them. They will have to include a reason for why the experiments were not all of the same and reflect on anything that they could have changed to get better results next time.

5. Web 2.0 Tool– My students will be using Glogster to make online posters to present their findings. This program is great for having students work together to create an exciting and unique presentation piece that they can all access from anywhere since it is on the Internet. If you would like to see how amazing it is for yourself visit here: www.glogster.com
6. Social Participation/Social Learning– The students will be working in small groups of three. Each person has a job to do in order to have the group run smoothly. They are all participating in the whole process of the activity. After they collect data, the students will be working together to create their Glog. In their groups they will be creating a visual representation of the breakdown of each color in the M&M bag. As a team they must come up with unique ways to present their findings and combine their ideas into one professional Glog to present to the class.
7. Making Connections– This activity is made to bring together a variety of knowledge and connections. The point is to use what they know to make real life connections that will go well beyond the classroom.

a) Previous Knowledge: Students have already worked with percents, fractions and decimals. They were able to use this when they were finding the probability of each color and converting it into a percent.

b) Relevance: This is relevant because a lot of companies, including M&Ms, give their data in percents. If the students did not know what it meant or how to compare the data that was given, they would not be able to interpret it or use it in any meaningful way.

c) Local/Global: Students will know be able to interpret what a certain statistic means when they read it on a label. They will be able to make the mental connection with the experiment that they did today and realize how the probability was found. They will also get a real feel for theoretical versus experimental probability.  This will be of great value when they outside of the classroom analyzing a situation on their own.

8. Create/Produce – Each group will have a Glog that will document their whole experimenting process. It will also include multiple representations of data such as a pie chart, tables, and calculations. The final part of it will be their reflection so that anybody looking at their Glog can get a full picture of what they learned.
9. Assessment:

Making A Poster : Glogster M&Ms
Teacher Name: Mrs. Kellogg
Student Name:     ________________________________________
CATEGORY	6			4		2			0
Collecting Data	Used time well during class. Got all of the M&Ms counted and divided in a timely manner. Never distracted others.			Used time well during class. Got most of the M&Ms counted and divided in a timely manner. Never distracted others.		Used some of the time well during class. Only some of the M&Ms were counted and divided in a timely manner. Occasionally distracted others.			Did not use class time to focus OR often distracted others.
ChartGizmo Pie Chart	Pie Chart included all of the M&M colors and labels. Chart was made in ChartGizmo.			Pie Chart included most of the M&M colors and labels. Chart was made in ChartGizmo.		Pie Chart included some of the M&M colors and labels. Chart was made in ChartGizmo.			Pie Chart did not include M&M colors and labels OR Pie Chart was not made.
Probability of the Colors	The probability of all 6 colors has been found and converted to percent form.			The probability of at least 4 colors has been found and converted to percent form.		The probability of at least 2 colors has been found and converted to percent form.			None of the probabilities were found OR none of them were converted to percent form.
Create a Glog	Create a Glog that presents what you found about the M&M claims. Include your pie chart and any comparisons.			Create a Glog that presents what you found about the M&M claims. Includes your pie chart but no comparisons.		Create a Glog that presents what you found about the M&M claims. Does not include your pie chart or comparisons.			Did not create a Glog.
Creativity on the Glog	Several of the graphics used on the poster reflect a exceptional degree of group creativity in their creation and/or display.			One or two of the graphics used on the poster reflect group creativity in their creation and/or display.		The graphics are made by the group, but are based on the designs or ideas of others.			No graphics made by the group are included.
Presenting to the Class	Group can accurately answer all questions related to facts in the Glog and present their findings to the class.			Group can accurately answer most questions related to facts in the Glog and present their findings to the class.		Group can accurately answer about 75% of questions related to facts in the Glog and present their findings to the class.			Group appears to have insufficient knowledge about the facts or findings used in the Glog.
Grammar	There are no grammatical mistakes on the Glog.			There is 1 grammatical mistake on the Glog.		There are 2 grammatical mistakes on the Glog.			There are more than 2 grammatical mistakes on the Glog.
Reflection	Group was fully able to reflect on the process and compare and contrast with the whole class' findings. This was written in a paragraph at the end of the glog.			Group was mostly able to reflect on the process and compare and contrast with the whole class' findings. This was written in a few sentences at the end of the glog.		Group was barely able to reflect on the process and compare and contrast with the whole class' findings. This was written in a sentence at the end of the glog.			Group was not able to reflect on the process and compare and contrast with the whole class' findings OR did not write at the end of their Glog.

10. Reflection:

a.     Learner Reflection: The students will reflect in their groups. They will discuss what their overall results were and compare them to the company’s claims. Then they will add a blurb on their Glog explaining what they found through the overall process. They will also write about what they felt while using the Web 2.0 tool Glogster.

b.     Educator Reflection: The teacher will look over the Glogs from each group. After grading and assessing them the teacher will consider if Glogster really enriched the lesson or if it was just used for technology sake? The teacher will compare how well the students got the concepts by reading their reflections as well. Finally the teacher will journal about what could be changed and what went well.

I THINK THAT THE RILS SCENARIO WENT AMAZING. MY STUDENTS LOVED IT EVEN THOUGH WE WERE WORKING IN A CLASSROOM DURING THE SUMMER WITH NO AIR CONDITIONING. 

PE5_Glogster

In Cleveland today we hit the highest temperature that we have had in the past 15 years-98 degrees but with the heat index it feels like 113 degrees. Needless to say, I was not hanging out in my backyard today. This gave me a chance to play around with Glogster more today.

After getting a chance to step back from the program, I enjoyed what it offered much more and I felt less frustrated with the advertising. I was able to create a rough sketch of what the students could do when they create their Glog for my RILS.

I was easily able to insert images and text which is all that they will need to be able to complete for this scenario. I was able to explore all of the backgrounds and different text options. There are so many that it was hard to choose just a couple of them. My students are going to love the chance to have so much freedom in their creativity. Saving and publishing it was very simple as well. I now know the process in which I will have them save them so that I can grade them in an efficient manner.

Once things are uploaded to the Glogster website, it saves them for the account holder. This makes it easy to reuse an item. Because of this, I think that I am going to give the students extra time to complete this RILS so that they can explore Glogster, upload materials, and have time to do what they really want to for their finished project. This will turn my scenario into a two day project, which is going to be just right.

I think that this is a Web 2.0 resource that will prove to be very helpful in my classroom. The only snag that I have run into so far is that I had to ask for permission to unblock the website. Can't wait for the students to complete this RILS.

PE4_Glogster

Forgive me world for it has been six days since my last post. I know that you missed me and so I have returned. I started playing around with Glogster today since this is what my students are going to use for my RILS Plan.

I really do love what Glogster has to offer, but I felt frustrated that there was so much advertising and pushing to get me to buy the next level of membership.

I was able to create a glog of my own. But again I was not able to upload data files or draw on the glog because I did not have the higher membership. This means that I am going to have to recreate how I have the students enter their chart into Glogster. I will probably have them take a screen capture of their screen and upload it as an image.

Here is what I have made so far, don't laugh. I am going to play around with the program some more tomorrow. It really is great that they offer so many graphics and fun add-ons to the original poster.

BP7_One Minute Commercial

If you are a teacher and hate competing with Facebook, Twitter, or any other social media site...look no further. Edmodo.com is your answer. If you don't believe me, watch for yourself.

PE3_iMovie

My mom would be so proud!!

I was dreading having to do homework tonight but then my brother went to the hospital for kidney stones and I figured that I didn't have it that bad.

I must say that when I was watching the tutorials on editing the video, using transitions, voiceovers, and inserting music I felt pretty good about myself. All of my playing around in the last three months has really paid off. While I was jimmy rigging a lot of my videos I really knew the basics. These last couple of tutorials really helped me fine tune what I was doing. If anything it really explained to me what and how the different tools worked together.

A cool new thing that I learned was the sound wave button. I have never used or even really noticed this button before. It makes me feel so powerful when I can adjust and see all of the sound waves in real time. It really helped when I was adding sound effects and music to my video. When I was working on my video I was able to put in some background music and lower the volumes of different audio in each clip. I was also very excited about editing to a beat. I just finished summer school today and I can't wait to put all of those pictures to a cool song. My director asked me to publish something to the website and thanks to these tutorials it is going to be great!

Unfortunately, I felt like the last chapter was very redundant. It was all about sharing through iMovie. Most of the formats looked exactly the same, especially the ones that had to do with social media sites. I feel as though that could have been condensed or explained that they were so similar.

Overall I feel like I learned a lot through this experience and I can't wait to use all that I have learned to advance my skills to the Final Cut level. If I forget anything I have 5 pages of notes to look at. Stop laughing at me...and watch the video I made. I had to just stop because I spent forever playing around with the program.

PE2_iMovie

It was 91 degrees here today. For those of you making fun of me, that is really hot to teach summer school in Ohio with no air conditioning. So afterwards, I treated myself to ice cream and a nap; it was glorious. So amazing in fact that I figured I should get some homework done when I woke up. I watched the iMovie tutorials for Chapters 4, 5, and half of 6.

In my spare time today

Again, I am blown out of the water. There are so many things that I learned today. I actually took the time to download the other exercise files and I did everything along with the narrator. In the last blog I mentioned that I couldn't wait to learn how to use the buttons in the center of the interface. You bet your bottom dollar that I learned, and I took notes on it today.

One of the best things that iMovie offers is the ability to organize your clips. I love that I can tag and mark things as my favorite. It is similar to iPhoto. This is great because then I can find exactly what I am looking for, especially when I am doing projects for homework. I also didn't realize that when I was clicking delete on a clip that it was just going to a different file instead of leaving my hard drive. Now I know how to correctly dispose and organize my materials.

 

 

All of my rejected clips

Since I had being doing a lot of things through trial and error, it was cool to learn some of the more sophisticated tools. I am so proud of myself for learning how to use the precision editor, clip trimmer, and, inspector window. These helped me take the knowledge that I had one step further. I was able to shift my clips without changing the length of them and I was able to correct small overlaps or unnecessary clips.

Mom would be so proud of my editing!!!

My favorite part that I learned today was how to incorporate pictures into my videos. This was something that I personally struggled with last month while I was making videos. A lot of my peers were very kind in giving me directions on how to utilize them, but watching the videos today made it much clearer to me. While I am still making mistakes on my practice videos, it is good to know more than I did before and with more practice I will land it just right. I feel like I am well on my way to being an expert. Watch out Hollywood, here I come!

BP4_Edmodo

Well I finally took the time to see what all of the fuss is all about. Many people have told me how great this tool is in the classroom, so I had to check it out myself. I find that I am looking for a Web 2.0 tool where I can do many things at once. I want it to be a place where students can communicate, see calendars, assignments, and be social. I want to have an online class feel that stretches farther than the 49 minutes a day that I get with my students.

Edmodo is that tool. My last post I talked about Moodle which was impressive, but this tops that for sure.  With Edmodo I will instantly have my students' attention because it is setup like Facebook. I was unsure of what exactly it had to offer, so I just spent the last hour reading the whole user guide. I know what you are thinking...get a life!!! But I had some time to kill before going to a baseball game later tonight.

Anyways, the interface is very recognizable and I love that I can do so many things in one place. Here are some of the great features. I can set up a group for each one of my classes where we can talk, post files, post links, have polls, and assignments. All of this can be done in the privacy of the page unless we want to make it public. Since each student will have their own page, they can also speak privately with each other. Another thing is that I can grade everything right on the spot and the students can see the feedback and the grade. They get notifications as in Facebook which allow them to keep up with all current events.

This is something that I would like to incorporate in my classroom because it would really represent a 21st century classroom. I think that this is something that would not only be helpful for students, but also for parents. Each parent would get their own account. This would allow me to have parental involvement and communication in a consistent manner.

So far I have connected with some communities and teachers. I set up groups for my three preps this year. I am hoping that I can inch them in little by little and maybe by second semester use it full time. For the beginning of the school year I am going to post some intro comments and perhaps some scavenger hunt activities around edmodo. 

My all time favorite aspect is that emodo also has an app for their program. I just downloaded it to my iPhone. This way students can have it on the go like all of their other social media apps. I can't wait to see where this goes. I even connected with Greg Havens as another teacher to collaborate with. You all should give it a try: www.edmodo.com

BP5_Drew's Blog

Drew is an excellent photographer and he found a great resource. Click here to see my comment on his blog.

BP6_Chris' Blog

Today I got to read Chris' blog on Eduslide. He had some good ideas. Click here to see my comment on his blog.

PE1_iMovie

So... Today I decided to start watching the Lynda tutorials on iMovie. I just want to take this moment to point out that the new tutorial is 3hours and 28 minutes as opposed to the 2 hours and 22 minutes. :)

I must say that it is really impressive to have a place to go and watch these tutorials. When I first started working with iMovie I would just toggle back and forth between my project and the help screen. Even though it has been a couple of months since I started this masters program, I am by no means an expert on iMovie. At least once a project something happens and I have no idea how I got it to do what it did. I am very excited to learn how to make my future movies look professional and high-tech so that I may engage my students with good media in the classroom.

I completed the first three chapters today in Lynda and I am already learning so much. In the beginning it is just the basic interface and setup explanations. I thought it would be boring but I learned some new shortcuts today. Also, there is a toolbar in the middle of the Project and Event area that I never really learned. Today the narrator discussed what some of them are and I am excited to learn how to use them in my editing.

Some specific things I learned include: switching the event library and project area for my room (pictured above), changing the frame time, previewing clip selections and muting audio while skimming. All of these are going to make such a huge difference when it comes to project area and minimizing distractions.

I can't wait to get to the heart of editing a new video. Stay posted to see what else I can learn. The sky is the limit!!!