WPP Final

The issue was was in need of a solution was that a course needed to have an online platform on which students could work in teams and publish their research project.
The bigger issue was that these groups would swap every four weeks and their projects needed to be archived and the site needed to be made available for the next rotation.
This site needed to provide students a way to collaborate online as well as practice other 21st century skills.

The solution to this issue came in the form of Google Apps for Education, primarily the Google Sites feature. Google sites allowed me to manage a site on which students could work together and provide a creative way to publish their research findings. Google sites enabled both the students and teachers to engage in an online environment that could be available at any time, from any computer, home or school.

From a TPACK stanpoint, the technology made itself readily available to the teachers' pedagogy, as they were able to practice modeling and scaffold their content, and measured the students' understanding by the quality of work they published on their site as a team. It also lent itself to help teachers encourage collaboration with a dynamic group of students that would swap every four weeks.
The content and technology played very well together as students were able to use the web to research their topics. This made it very easy for the students to go by the questionnaire they were given and research from home or in the classroom. Since the topics covered varied, students had the freedom to use multiple media outlets, online and offline to compile what they found to be the best overview of their topic.
Teachers were able to put into play their pedagogy with the content as they asked questions while the students were working, such as "how is what you're doing right now possible for someone that would have the disability you are researching?" These questions re-enforced the content the students had been exposed to, and were able to create a relationship with the research.


Here is my presentation, it is an overview of the issue, the solution, what it took to put it into practice, and some of the things I learned along the way.

Thank you.

Group Leadership Project

The two major projects proposed to us in CEP812 have been wonderful learning experiences. The group leadership project was an incredible challenge that not only allowed me to think outside the box, but also work completely online, and across the world! My group consisted of Angelica Rocha in Guatemala, and myself in San Diego CA. This presented a whole new dimension in collaboration and group work. Our work together in this project is proof that with the help of video conferencing and other web technologies, it is possible to engage in great work no matter where in the world we are.

Our project was based on delivering information about Google Apps Scripts through a video medium. While we knew how we wanted to make our video available, we needed to work out what supporting technologies would make it possible. We used Skype, Google Chat, Vyew and email to communicate, PowerPoint to create slides and graphics, internet browsers to do our research and collect both static and dynamic images, Jing and ScreenFlow to create our screen capturing video walk through, and Vimeo to publish on the web. With the help of these technologies, we were able to assemble a creative and informative video.

Throughout this project I was able to learn much about team work through trial and error. While we kept in constant communication, Skype's audio, video, and screen sharing abilities proved to be the most efficient way to communicate and get much of our work done. Email, Google Docs and Sites allowed us to share slides and create our script and outline what we envisioned our video would look like, but it didn't match the level of communication and understanding that we could achieve through video conferencing.

It was challenging engaging a subject that I was not familiar with, but I am glad that I was able to be a part of it. It helped me put into practice my research and critical thinking skills. If I were to take on another project like this, I would probably like to do a series of videos. I'm proud of the video that we put together, but I think that dissecting it further and labeling it accordingly in shorter clips might be of more help to those interested in the subject. Perhaps having shorter clips could help those that are looking for specific information jump right to their section of interest. I did enjoy working on the website and having using it as a reference for our storyboard, but I would also like to develop it further and modify it so that it could be of more use to those outside of the project, and not just as reference text for those of us working on the project. It makes sense to us, because we know what direction and context we're interested in, but stray visitors might not catch on to the site right away.

Here is our video, enjoy.

GLP Google Scripts Presentation from Alex Gonzalez on Vimeo.

Professional Learning Plan

Reflecting on what I have accomplished through the knowledge acquired in these initial courses, and the experience I have gained by applying such principles at my work, is an incredible tale. I have been able to become more knowledgeable about what technologies are available and when or where they are appropriate for use in the classroom.

At the beginning of my learning at MSU, I was starting to implement Google Apps for Education at my school. In the previous months, after projects, lessons, and lectures, I have become much more comfortable and knowledgeable in the ways that these services can be better used in the classroom.
Along with that, implementing them with mobile technology has been a goal of mine. I have used some of these services on mobile devices in some classrooms, but not all. I would like to expand these practices to more classrooms, so teachers can take advantage of the technology that is already in the palms of their students.
 
As part my future plans in learning, I want to further explore the practices of TPACK. I found this to be one the most important aspects of merging technology and learning. I am very interested in putting these ideals into practice on the projects I take on with teachers. By doing so I hope to gain a better understanding of what works, and what doesn't work in the dynamic classrooms at my school. We have a very diverse population, and the students' needs differ from one another. With TPACK in mind at the planning stages, I hope to help suggest better technologies when teachers are planning their lessons. More research and practicing is needed on my part to achieve this. There are plenty of resources online that can help me understand this topic, but I think that most of my learning will come from in-classroom implementation.

With the state of budgeting for schools these days, I find it that I will be challenged further in accomplishing more with less. Thankfully, with the tools and knowledge I have been equipped with from taking these courses, I am confident that along with the teachers I support, will be able to provide incredible learning environments infused with varying technologies.

CEP 812 Personal Learning Plan from Alex Gonzalez on Vimeo.

PART D - Findings and Implications

A solution is sometimes perceived as the piece that is missing to complete something, the last few words in a crossword puzzle or perhaps the missing sock from the last load of laundry. We cannot help but feel complete and have a sense of achievement when we finally put it all together. This is the feeling I am experiencing with my WPP. After much planning, trial, error, and countless sessions in front of a computer, I have been able to design, create and deploy a website solution for the health course that required a web presence for students to work on. Along with the help in direction, vision and suggestions of the wonderful teachers and administrators I work with, we were able to create a place where students could not only carry out their research and publish it, but also develop and challenge their technical skills. We approached this solution with focus on students gaining knowledge about their mental health and wellness topics through research compiled within their groups. With collaboration in mind, we saw the web as a great opportunity to further expand their communication skills, to present them a digital canvas on which they could play around with and display their findings.

Implementing this platform was both challenging and inspiring. The first order of business was to find a tool that would be able to support multiple groups of students at various times, and different paces. Once I decided Google Sites would be able to offer us a flexible and reliable platform, we began designing how the site would work, and what it would look like. All the while we maintained a focus on how the students would be able to approach the site with familiarity and intrigue. As we took a look at the hard copy, the traditional form, of their research assignment, we worked on how these prompts would translate onto our digital canvas. Creating the structure from which the students would build upon was very important from the start. I found that creating the table of contents links with the prompts allowed the students to have an easy way to navigate through their sections and find the right place for their information and multimedia. Having this as a standard for each page made it very easy and convenient to work with and for the different groups of students. Even when there were absent students from groups, they could reconvene to where they had left off and follow along their progress with the familiar look and feel of the site. Adding and removing students from the project site was very easy and made it possible for me to efficiently manage who had write permissions. It also gave me the ability to maintain accountability for the work that was being done, and what modifications had been made. This is a feature the teachers really appreciated because they could monitor who had done what, and when they had done it.
As the project progressed, Google Sites offered a great level of scalability by allowing growth to be possible in both content and group rotations. The implementation of this project would have been possible with another web tool, but I found that using Google Sites gave us the ability to manage, deploy, and create with great functionality.

The success of this project can be measured in multiple forms, how engaged the students were with their topic, how well they used the tools provided, and what skills they developed and practiced throughout their work together. While the dynamics of each group vary by personalities and character, each one showed a level of interaction and engagement with each other and the content, that made using this platform a great example as to why , well planned and implemented, web technologies can augment to the importance and success of a well structured lesson. The foundation to a great experience with technology is rooted at the heart of a great lesson plan. Was it not for the great work that the group of teachers put into their lesson, I would not have been able to help transfer their incredible vision onto a digital version of their efforts. As students worked together, asked questions, and maintained a high level on interest in learning about their topics and the technology they were using, we felt that this had become a wonderful alternative and solution. Some students took advantage of the tool outside of class and asked if they could also work on their site from home, of course they could and did!

In our approach to this project we took a look at the lesson first, the objective, and what we wanted the students to walk away with. These were achieved as the project progressed, but one hurtle we met halfway was how to archive these projects or how to roll over with ease and efficiency. At first I had thought that templates would be the best solution, but what about the work created by previous rotations? Copying and transferring sites became a solution for this. If we were to create a similar project for another class, this is something I would need to keep in mind to address it accordingly. The rotations in this course are fairly common, so it would be unusual to see such a quick turn around in other courses, but it is still something that would need to be addressed from the start.
Working with multimedia, embedded or attached, is something that I might need to plan ahead for as well. While we wanted to have students add media to their projects, we also needed to allow them access to sites that are usually filtered by our content filter schedule. This was not a big issue, but it is something I will keep in mind to modify our filter properly to allow students access to YouTube or image hosts for them to access content.

For a different afternoon course I had to add another section that did not have similar structure to the previously created pages. This project is different from the morning course because at this point the teacher wants to allow the students to create brochures and post them instead of in form of a research questionnaire. This presented a great opportunity to use the platform differently, just as Glogster acts as a platform to create digital posters, I plan on using this Google site as a place where the students can upload or embed their brochures. While at this moment the brochures are not yet done, I look forward to blending these multiple technologies, desktop publishing and web technologies, to help create their web-brochures. This is yet another great example of how flexible and scalable this platform has been for this course, something that I will keep in mind the next time a teacher needs to do something similar.

Mobile Learning

Analyzing my use of Poll Everywhere and navigating through the discussions in Classroom 2.0 have offered me more insight into what is possible in a classroom with the use of mobile technologies. In a post at Classroom 2.0, I found a resource that I could use with smart phones to deliver tests. The resource Mobile Study provides a way to create and distribute tests tailored for mobile devices using web technologies. This stood out to me because I have been working with one of the teachers at my school in creating paperless quizzes. We have been using Google Forms to offer students a way to take these quizzes on a computer or on their mobile phones. This method has proved to be a hit with the students. They enjoy taking the quizzes online and being able to utilize their own devices if they want to. As my interest in Mobile Study grows, I want to see how flexible it is and in what other ways it can be used. Perhaps it will only work on certain web browsers, or maybe not work on all phones, I have yet to sift through those issues.

In using Poll Everywhere I found that it is limited in how versatile it can be without paying a premium. Although I can definitely appreciate the ability to use it in a live conversation during class. Engaging students with this audience response type of system can be an effective way to get everyone involved and think about what everyone else is expressing.

In my experience you can never have too many resources, especially in technology. Being able to pick and choose from all the different platforms available makes it easier to provide students an effective and engaging learning experience. With newer mobile technologies coming out one right after the other, it is interesting to see how we in education can take advantage of them without losing focus on the objective of a well structured lesson.


Here is a screen capture of my reply in Classroom 2.0

Poll Everywhere Experience

I have used this tool in the past with both teachers and some groups of students. With teachers, I have used it during PD sessions to gain some insight on how they feel about technology. It is also a tool that I have presented as a way to engage their students with multiple hardware platforms. With the rise in availability and affordability of various technologies, it has become common for students to own a mobile device that can provide great functionality.

At our school we encourage the use of student owned technology in the classroom. We see this as a positive opportunity to teach students to view the use and responsibility of technology. In order to help them appreciate the power these devices can have, we often suggest that they may use them to do research, create multimedia projects, and at times use it to engage in conversations like Poll Everywhere. In the past few weeks I have been working with a ninth grade English teacher and her class in converting the students in using Google Docs as an alternative to MS Office. I used Poll Everywhere to ask a few students what they liked best about Google Docs. Here's a chart with the results.

 

This tool offers the students to use their mobile devices to answer the question. This is a great use of technology that can come in handy if there is ever a situation where there are not enough computers, but some students have smart phones that can access the poll. It is also a neat way to help them focus on the content being taught, and preferably deter from the distractions the phone might offer form being idle. The only challenge I can foresee is having different phones that work differently. While many phones now have an operating system that is fairly standard in the way that it works and presents functions, it can be time consuming to support different platforms for a single activity.

Here's my brief survey:

http://www.polleverywhere.com/multiple_choice_polls/MjEwOTg0ODYwMg/web

PART B - Storyboard and Script

Angelica and I have made some serious progress in our Group Leadership Project, with collaborating on a storyboard and script for the video we will be creating. When we first talked about the topic we would be covering, Google Apps Scripts, I knew very little about it and felt unfamiliar with the platform. Throughout research and help from Angelica, I finally came to appreciate our tool. I needed to know what I was facing and how I could suggest and teach it to those I support at my school. In addition to our research, brainstorming what our video would look like in the storyboard and scripting stages helped to further understand not only what we were showcasing, but also how to present it from the learner point of view. This was very valuable because as we were learning, we took into account what worked and how we could improve it when presenting it.

We began the scripting portion on Google Docs, with a shared document that Angelica and I collaborated on to get the ball rolling. In it we sectioned off what areas we would each cover, she would take care of application of the tool, where as I would write the theory and ideas behind the tool. She was practical, I was theoretical, a neat combination. I wrote on what technologies power the tool, and explained them, as well as made an effort to set familiar comparisons for learners. Angelica and I began to go back and forth near the end of our scripting when we got to the practice portion of the lesson. At this point, you can say, we shared the stage in presenting in tandem during the overview of how to get scripting started for first time users.

Once we had a base for our script, we began to story board using a Google Site that Angelica created, which by the way looked great in both aesthetics and function! We had six main storyboard sections. Each covering a different aspect of the video that one of us would cover with our script, slides, and sound effects. It is on this site that we conveyed our intentions for the look and feel of the video, in a static representation of course. The sections were divided like so: Angelica and I both open up the presentation, I take sections two and three, she takes four and five, and we join back up on the sixth section to deliver an example.

Creating a storyboard on Google Sites is a great and creative idea, I owe Angelica all the credit for thinking about that. It not only offers us an easy and familiar platform to collaborate on, but it is also a very flexible vessel to convey our information and ideas through. It could also be used as together with, or as an alternative to the video.

The visual and sound ques are listed and described above each graphic, which represents a slide or section of the video. Where there are transitions, sound effects, and speaking or animations, there are text ques for us to remember what goes where.

Here is a link to our Google Site storyboard:


https://sites.google.com/site/groupleadershipproject2011/home