I Think Therefore iMovie

picture from apple.com

For a group project I had this week, I used iMovie for the first time to edit something shot on an iPad. 

First things first, Apple's products amaze me! 

The movie was filmed by simply selecting the video option in the camera on the iPad. This will be great for students because the screen is massive (to an elementary school student) and there are less buttons to press, unlike the video cameras from years before.
Now to iMovie: 
To get the movie on my macbook, I just had to plug the iPad into the USB port. Then the products did the rest. Your mac identifies the iPad immediately then you can select what is imported into iMovie. After the movie is downloaded, then editing can happen. The screen you work with looks like this:

picture from apple.com 

Here is a picture of the same screen with labels: 

picture from  sentra.ischool.utexas.edu 

The Help menu takes you through everything from importing to adding themes and background music. 
At first, editing is a little challenging and frustrating because you have to be exact. I suggest watching your movie a few times so you can see precisely where you may want to cut scenes. If you do cut something you didn't want to, selecting Edit then Undo puts it back for you. The original import is still available. When you pick what is to be cut out, a yellow box will appear around each frame (or section of a frame) and can be moved until all to be cut is selected. Then you select Delete and that part of your movie is gone. The scenes that are left seamlessly come together and your product looks amazing. 

The bottom line: iMovie is pretty awesome! Once you get the hang of things, it is very easy to use. I have a feeling we are going to see it more in schools and students using it to work on projects. What a way to differentiate an assignment for different types of learners!

America, we need to step up our game

Last week,  Dr. Curtis Bonk  came to  Meredith College  (my school) to speak to us educators, or future educators in my case, about technology and his 2009 book, The World is Open. This is one of our textbooks in the course I'm blogging for. The talk was a little on the long side, but I did learn something about our country's relationship with technology in the classroom.

America is behind on technology legislation in education.

When Dr. Bonk said this, I wasn't entirely sure it was true. When reading his book, I came across a quote he used from an article by  Wallis and Steptoe:

"American schools aren't exactly frozen in time, but considering the pace of change in other areas of life, our public schools tend to feel like throwbacks. Kids spend too much of the day as their great-grandparents once did: sitting in rows, listening to teachers lecture, scribbling out notes by hand, reading from textbooks that are out of date by the time they are printed. A yawning chasm (with emphasis on yawning) separates the world inside the schoolhouse from the world outside." (Bonk, 2009).

As harsh as that sounds, there is some truth to it. Here we are, the United States, the place where people flock to have better lives, and we are behind in something that will definitely be needed in the future. Something that is needed by the most important and valuable people who inhabit this country, our children. We have to prepare students for the world and its many changes. Effective technology in the classroom is a way for us to do that. Technology in the classroom will help us all develop into 21st century learners.

As I thought about the classrooms I have been in recently, I noticed that the quote is not completely accurate. The students actually sit in groups and learn from each other, not just the teacher. The students work and learn cooperatively, no longer is learning passive. Then I thought about access and how only having a class set of iPads for an entire school is not enough. This may be why we are behind in technology compared to other places. We are a country wanting equality for our students and maybe we won't advance until we can provide the same technological educational opportunities for ALL students. We also have these little things called laws, but I digress.

The bottom line: I’m not taking a side, I just see where both Dr. Bonk and our education system are coming from. We all want what is best for every student and to provide them with the education and technology they need to function in the 21st century. It's not going to be easy, but in order for us (teachers and the public) to do that, give our students the winning education they deserve, we have to step up our game.


You might want to read these:

http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejournals/JOTS/Winter-Spring-1999/wright.html

http://www.edweek.org/ew/issues/technology-in-education/

21 is more than a card game

21 is a very important number for lots of reasons. In education today, it's all about students learning 21st century skills. The Partnership for 21st Century Skills  is the initiative that is giving students the knowledge and skills they need to be successful in our constantly changing digital society. The Partnership for 21st Century Skills advocates for integration of core subjects with the interdisciplinary themes of: global awareness; financial, economic, business, and entrepreneurial literacy; civic literacy; health literacy; and environmental literacy. It also includes the learning and innovation skills of: creativity and innovation; critical thinking and problem solving; communication and collaboration. Through the Partnership for 21st Century Skills, students increase their skills with information, media, and technology along with the life and career skills they will use long after completing their K-12 education.

picture from: www.tpack.org 

This idea of 21st century skills is seen in other education models and standards, such as TPACK and NETS.

First, let's talk about TPACK. This acronym stands for Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge and is about what knowledge teachers need to have to teach with technology effectively. The model shows that a teacher's technological, content, and pedagogical knowledge have to come together to successfully prepare students for the 21st century. Basically, if we want students to have 21st century skills, teachers need to have them too.

picture from www.iste.org

picture from www.iste.org

Now onto NETS or National Educational Technology Standards. For teachers (left), the standards are similar to TPACK but more about evaluating the skills and knowledge educators need to teach, work, and learn. For students (right), some of the standards are familiar because they are seen in the Partnership for 21st Century Skills.

The bottom line: the world is changing to be more technological. As teachers, we have to do all we can to prepare students for what they will encounter in their lives and careers when they leave the classroom.

Newbie

Ok...I've never created a blog before in my life, so this is an attempt at something new. In a graduate course I am taking, we are learning about technology in the K-12 classroom, and of course blogging is something we are learning about. I'll be posting (hopefully frequently) about what we're doing in class to prepare for our future classrooms. So, come along as I wade through the web in this blog!