Gaming Presentation Again

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 This is the link: Gaming Presentation

Final Project: Gaming

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Gaming Presentation

Please click the link to view the Concept Map. http://edswork.wikispaces.com/file/view/ConceptMapSpencerK.docx

In understanding static and dynamic technologies I found it difficult to identify technologies that fell into only one category. This difficulty came mostly because identifying technologies as static or dynamic is determined by the user. All technologies have the possibilities of being dynamic if utilized that way.  As instructors think of utilizing technologies, they must also take full advantage of these technologies. Instructors should use the community of Inquiry model to not only form community but also provide dynamic experiences for students.  I identified the following as static because the user can use these technologies just to gather information: Hand held wireless devices, RSS and atom feeds, wikis, instant messaging, blogs, web conferencing, steaming multimedia, and file sharing. However, these same technologies can be dynamic. The two technologies that I consider to only be dynamic is virtual worlds and digital gaming. These two technologies require the user to take a more active part in the experience and without being part of the experience not content,  communication, or collaboration will take place, nor will the participant be successful in the virtual world or the digital game.

Engaging Learners with New Strategies and Tools

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Assessing Collaborative Efforts

Assessments are a topic that has many views in the field of education. The argument for or against standardized testing or the inclusion of performance tasks as a means of assessments as an answer to this debate has not been solved. Now there is an added means of assessment: Collaboration.  Why? Because that is how the working world works. So, as a teacher, how do I plan to  assess collaboration?  In the primary grades assessing collaboration requires training and understanding of both the teacher and students. My first experience with collaboration was literature circles. In these groups, students have assigned task. Each task contributes to the outcome of the circles product.  In science, primary teachers use a similar setup however the names of the task are different, utilizing scientific language.  By utilizing these groups teachers provide the students with a participation card. These cards have the task names and students add the names of their teammates under each task. At the end, of the collaboration either each interaction or at the end students use a color code (green: good participation, Yellow: Ok participation, and Red: did not participate with the group), faces (happy face: good participation, straight face: ok participation, and sad face: did not participate with the group), or lastly written comments (students share how they felt in the group with each person and how it impacted the group). George Siemens (2008) called this model students assess their peers. This model works well in primary grades because students know that the teacher will not be the only means of assessment.

Equitable assessments for learners brings about some difficulty for the instructor. The best means of allowing equity is to provide rubrics for performance tasks. By providing an expectation (a model is useful) for students helps those that aren’t as prepared an understanding of what is being asked of them, and those students that are capable of the completion of the task can look at the highest level on the rubric to see if there is any aspect of the task they can make better.  It also helps to utilize more than one means of assessment, or utilizing the principle of diversity (providing students choices to demonstrate their understanding (Silver, Harvey, Strong, Richard, Perini, Matthew, 200)).

For students that are not accustom to collaboration, the instructor may need to modify the involvement of the student. This modification is not to isolate the student, but have the student become more comfortable with working with others. In the primary grades teachers make these arrangements with students and parents to ensure that the student is not forced into unfamiliar territory which may limit or hinder the learning process for the student. The goal of primary teachers is to have students experience collaboration and become comfortable with working with others before they get into the intermediate, middle, and high school grades, because we have found that it is easier to train a child early. Teachers do this because we know that collaboration will be a requirement later.

Laureate Education, Inc. (Producer) (2008). Principles of Distance Education [DVD]. Assessment of Collaboration. Baltimore: Author

Silver, Harvey, Strong, Richard, Perini, Matthew. (2000). So Each May Learn: Integrating Learning Styles and Multiple Intelligences. Alexandria, VA: ASCD

Storyboard for Gaming Presentation

Storyboard for Gaming Presentation

What Has More Impact on Distance Education?

As I reflected on the presentations of Dr. Simonson and George Siemens; along with the Heather Kanuka and Nancy Parker writings and focused my attention to global diversity, communication, and collaborative interaction; I find that the most influential component to distance education is communication.

Communication is important to distance learning; it provides the vehicle for distance education. For this reason the improvements of communication bring about improvements to distance education. Siemens stated that with communication improvements and the increase use of multimedia, games, and simulation; distance education will continue to become more and more accepted by the masses (Laureate, 2008).  There are many tools that continue to help expand the reach of distance education, such as: edmodo (education version of Facebook), free websites for teachers with the ability to download or link or embed material, skype, email, and blogging. All of these new innovative ways to communicate with students are helping the spread of distance education.

Laureate Education, Inc. (2008). Principles of Distance Education [DVD]. The Future of Distance Education. Baltimore: Author.

Learning Theories for Distance Learning

I have been a practicing constructivist for the past 3 years. As I read the articles I found that my the lessons I have learned these past 3 years in trying to implement technology in my classroom have been strides in the right direction. As I continue this process of implementing more technology into my classroom and lessons; I can now find ways to utilize technology more effectively in the field of education. As a primary teacher I am not sure exactly how much I can implement, but I can say that our youth are more tech savy than we think.

Paper in progress: Impact of games on distance learning

This project is posing some challeges in the fact that research is in this area is limited. However, I have found some research from manufactuers on the subject. However difficult, I am finding the research I have found to be interesting in regards to the impact of educational games.