Educational Gaming

Educational Gaming could be used to teach students a wide variety of content.  There are several simple games out there that can be used to help students learn and/or review information.  For example, there is one game I found in which students have to land an airplane at a city in Europe.  Students are given points on how close they get to the city not only teaching them the names of different European cities and capitals but also their locations.  A strategy that I might use with my students is using the points in the game as motivation for students.  The points could correlate to a grade or another type of reward.  This would create intrinsic motivation in students to try to compete against themselves to reach an objective.  This is the characteristics of games that make them so addictive.  There is also immediate feedback through points received.  Electronic portfolios would probably be challenging to use.  It would require students to have computers with internet connection at their homes.  This is not always the case with students and some families can’t afford to have this.  This would be the same problem with any online experience that requires students to use the internet at home.

Wiki Post 2

I went to go back to the Wikipedia page I had already made and I found this:

What happened is that there was an online discussion about whether or not to delete the wiki page I had originally created.  People argued for both sides but ultimately it ended up being deleted.  So what I did instead was added the information from my originally wiki page to the Lansing School District page instead.  Here is what I added to that wiki page:

I added information about Forest G. Averill Elementary school as well as included links to Averill's home page.  I discussed Averill's Spanish immersion program and also linked to another wiki page that describes what language immersion programs are.

You can find the wiki page here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lansing_School_District

MERLOT Learning Resource Evaluation

MERLOT Material Link - http://pathways.thinkport.org/about/about1.cfm

Quality of Content:

1. Does the software present valid (correct) concepts, models, and skills?

Yes the software presents valid concepts, models, and skills.

2. Does the software present educationally significant concepts, models, and skills for the discipline?

Yes the software includes information in a variety of ways such as text, visual, audio as well as interactive media.

Potential Effectiveness as a Teaching-Learning Tool:

1. What stage(s) in the learning process/cycle could the materials be used?
1. Explanation or description of the topic/stating the problem
2. Demonstration of the curriculum/exploration of the problem
3. Practice using the curriculum/analysis of the outcomes from solving the problem
4. Applying the curriculum to "new" problems/application of the outcomes to other problems
2. What is(are) the learning objective(s)? What should students be able to do after successfully learning with the materials?

Students should be able to understand what the underground railroad was and how it worked.  They should know the different routes that slaves took as well as some of the signals and songs they used to communicate.

3. What are the characteristics of the target learner(s)

The target learners are students just starting to learn about the Underground Railroad.  This particular resource focuses on the underground railroad in Maryland so that could be the audience it was designed for.  Students will also need basic computer and webpage navigation skills.

4. Does the interactive/media-rich presentation of material improve faculty and students' abilities to teach and learn the materials?

It accomplishes this through pairing interactive presentation with explanations and visuals to help increase understanding and learning.  It also breaks the information down into small manageable parts to not overwhelm the learner.

5. Can the use of the software be readily integrated into current curriculum and pedagogy within the discipline?

Yes this software can be readily integrated into the current curriculum and pedagogy.  It provides information through the use of text as well as the use of music and visuals including maps.  Reading maps is another part of this discipline on top of learning about the Underground Railroad.

6. Can the software be used in a variety of ways to achieve teaching and learning goals?

Yes this software can be used in a variety of ways to achieve teaching and learning goals.  It presents information through text, visual, audio and interactive.  It can also be used as a reference material since it provides lots of information all in one place.

7. Are the teaching-learning goals easy to identify?

Yes the teaching-learning goals are easy to identify. The navigation sidebar on the website clearly outlines the different areas and topics that are covered and can be found in this resource.

8. Can good learning assignments for using the software application be written easily?

A learning assignment could be easily constructed since this website resource is laid out in a very clear and distinctive way.  Teachers would be able to use their goals and learning objectives to figure out what they want their students to focus on.

Ease of Use:

1. Are the labels, buttons, menus, text, and general layout of the computer interface consistent and visually distinct?

Yes this resource is visually very well done.  There is a navigation sidebar that is present on all the different pages making it easy for the user to navigate the site and get to the information they are looking for quickly and easily.  The only apparent shortcoming of this resource is with the interactive piece.  The way to use it isn’t apparently clear and it is also very small which could make it difficult for some students to see.

2. Does the user get trapped in the material?

No.  The navigation sidebar makes it very easy to get back to where you were before.

3. Can the user get lost easily in the material?

No.

4. Does the module provide feedback about the system status and the user's responses?

The resource does not provide any feedback.  It is designed more as an information hub than a resource to make sure the user is learning the information that is being provided.  There is no assessment or questions along the way for the user to test what they have learned.

5. Does the module provide appropriate flexibility in its use?

The module is very flexible.  One of the big advantages that this resource provides is that most long sections of text have the option for the user to listen to an audio file of the text instead of reading.  This would help students who struggle with reading to still learn the information and not fall behind.  Students could also read along with this audio file.

6. Does the learning material require a lot of documentation, technical support, and/or instruction for most students to successfully use the software?

No this is a stand-alone resource.  It does not require outside documentation or technical support.  It can also be used effectively with very minimal instruction.

7. Does the material present information in ways that are familiar for students?

Yes the material is presented in a way that is very similar to most other websites that students would be familiar with.

8. Does the material present information in ways that would be attractive to students?

The information is often accompanied with pictures or interactive media making the resource interesting and attractive to students.