PE_Final Project: Glogster

MY RILS PLAN

TARGET AUDIENCE: Students in my Spanish I class.

MATERIALS: Laptops, “Expresate” textbook, Chapter 5 Vocabulary 2 list, personal notes.

FOREIGN LANGUAGE STANDARDS:  Students will:

1.3.2 present information on different topics in a variety of formats.

1.3.3 write a personal communication e.g. note, letter,etc.

1.3.4 present familiar topics enhanced will multimedia

2.2.3 identify and produce artworks, crafts, or graphic representations of the target culture.

  ISTE STANDARDS (NETS for students):  Students demonstrate creative thinking, construct knowledge, and develop innovative products and processes using technology.

OBJECTIVES:   Students will talk and write about where they live or would like to live, describe houses with the help on the new vocabulary words learned in chapter 5 and create a multimedia poster online in which they will describe their own house or the house of their dreams in Spanish with the support of the new vocabulary in chapter 5. 

WEB 2.0 TOOL: EDU Glogster (www.edu.glogster.com An innovative web 2.0 tool utilized by thousands of students all over the world to create multimedia posters online or "glogs" in different content areas and languages.  

 PROCEDURE:  Students  will:

·      upload the pictures they took over the weekend  in their “My Pictures” file of their “H” drives.

·      Type their paragraph about their house (or house of their dreams) in Word.

·      Go to the EDU Glogster website and will log into their accounts.

·      Create a new glog.

·      Upload their pics to the Glogsters file.

·      Choose a background and begin crafting their online poster based on their preferences.

·      After all posters are created, a presentation or portfolio will be created. 

SOCIAL PARTICIPATION/LEARNING:   After posters are created, the students will be organized in groups of four and will write their feedback  and opinion on their teammates' posters. They will state what they like best and explain why they like it. (To be written in the “Comments” section under each poster).

MAKING CONNECTIONS:  When writing their descriptive paragraph, the students will take into consideration all grammatical rules studied and useful expressions when creating their sentences in Spanish. They will also be connecting with what they consider home or personal ideas of what they want their home to be.

CREATE/PRODUCE: A multimedia poster online in Spanish called MI CASA or MI CASA IDEAL, describing  a house or ideal house in Spanish, enriched with pictures or an Animoto video or PhotoStory.

REFLECTION:  Students will evaluate their own posters by writing a short reflection under the “Comments” section of their teammates' poster. Teacher: So far this has been a very enjoyable class, sharing with my students about where they live, listening to their ideas on what they want their posters to be like and helping them with the tool when issues arise.

ASSESSMENT METHOD: Rubric provided.

DUE DATE: April 6, 11.

PE5_EDU Glogster (Part 2)

Good, good Saturday morning! Here I am again with more on Glogster. I've spent some very valuable  time "playing" with this tool and I love it! I'm sure my middle school students will love it too! Creating an online poster seems to be easier than I thought. After signing up for a free basic account, I started creating my first glog. The first thing I had to do was get rid of the predetermined glog that shows up when you hit "create new glog". It was really easy, just to move the icons to the trash can, and there I was ready to pick the background or "wall" I wanted.

Then I started exploring all the other tools that show on the menu: "graphics", for adding decorative icons to your poster; "text" for creating any type of textboxes, bubbles and titles; "image", for uploading your own pics from your files and adding colorful frames to them; "video", for uploading  video clips from School Tube or your own files; "audio", for adding your sound of preference. Also, there are "draw" and "data" tools, but they are part of the Premium accounts, and allow any user to draw or upload any Word, Excel, Power Point, PDF or wrapped file as an attachment to the glog.

Something important to remind Glogster users is not to hit the "Go back" button on the web browser. If the poster has not been saved all what has been created will be lost (It just happened to me, see the pic on the left?). Another  feature of this tool is the " Tips" section that shows at the end of the glog you are creating. It gives you suggestions and ideas on what to do to improve the quality and presentation of your multimedia poster online. I think my students are going to have a good time with this new tool, it will let their creativity and imagination "fly" beyond the classroom... Below you can see, what my first glog looks like, since I am teaching about Holidays in Spanish-speaking countries this week, I decided to start my class with this glog...
 

PE4_EDU Glogster (Part 1)

This week I continued evaluating Web 2.0 tools and it was Glogster's turn. This "cool" tool can be found under two different web addresses:  www.glogster.com, for personal use and social networking, and the one I will talk about in this blog, www.edu.glogster.com, especially designed for school use. 

The EDU Glogster is an educational website for creating very colorful multimedia posters online called "glogs". It's a new way for students to show their learning creatively. It is also a collaborative learning platform where students and teachers can interact and "voice" their thoughts on anybody's "glog". There are three different account levels with different features designed according to your needs: Basic,  Premium Teacher and Premium School.

One of the most important characteristics of this online tool is the fact that it fits any content area or school subject since its main purpose is to show students' creative expression of knowledge,  and it meets and exceeds national technology standards, a very important feature for educators that look for original ways to integrate technology in their lessons.

The "Premium" account for educators allows teachers to set up their classes and set up individual student accounts and online portfolios. Also,  once the "glogs" are created, they can be shared in multiple ways, kept private or available  to your set  classes only,  or you can post them for public view and feedback. Educators can also create presentations with all their students posters or embed the presentations in their school webpages.

 

Well, I guess that's all for now. I can't wait to start my first glog. I'll be back soon with more on this Web 2.0 tool!

BP7_Livemocha (The Commercial)

Here's my commercial on one of the Web 2.0 tools, I evaluated. Hope you like it!



(Some images taken from www.freedigitalphotos.net)

BP6_Link to Catherine's Blog

Hello, again! Just wanted to invite you to visit Catherine's blog.  Follow this link and enjoy it...

BP5_Link to Kris Knof 's Blog

Hey, guys! Follow this link to my comments on Kris Knof's blog...

BP4_Ediscio

Discovering Web 2.0 tools...

One of the tips I used to give the students in my Spanish classes was  to create flashcards  to memorize new vocabulary. However, I noticed that this technique didn't work very well with all my students. For the ones that were organized, it was easy to number their flashcards, color-code them by topics, and keep them handy in a Ziploc bag, ready to use, ready to study them. But for those who struggled keeping their belongings and school tools in place, flashcards were never found when  needed. They could have been left at home, in the lockers, or even on the hall floors. So ... when I  heard about Quizlet, I started using it right away. I was able to create flashcards online, to provide my classes with the file names, to  add audio and images, and most important of all: they help me differentiate in my classes. No matter what type of learner I had,  Quizlet could fit their needs.  This is my second year with Quizlet and I noticed that my students are getting tired of the same every time they get a new vocabulary list. But thanks to the  http://www.onlinedegree.net/100-essential-2-0-tools-for-teachers/ website, I discovered a new powerful tool: http://www.ediscio.com/. It's time to bring something new to my classes and give my students the opportunity to choose the online flashcard tool that best fits their needs. 

There are so many different and cool things about  Ediscio. Besides all the features that Quizlet provided, and that Ediscio has, it offers its users the opportunity to organize the flashcards by topics, keywords, or in folders known as cardboxes. Let's take a look at its main menus:

On the left side menu you can access your home page (image above), your mail, your profile, your "chums" (friends), the classes you've set up, your cardboxes (where the flashcards are located) and your "stats", which allows you to check your students' progress, the hardest words in your cardbox, and word clouds. It's an easy way to track learning without wasting too much time, and it's there, ready to use. 

 Besides having the choice of creating flashcards one by one, there's the "multi tab" that allows you to create as many cards as you need all at once. Unfortunately, there's no "Import" option as Quizlet has, but it does have the symbols menu, essential when the flashcards are created in different languages. A discussion board tab is also located in the top menu for students to interact and comment on the topic studied, their classes, their progress, etc. 

And... here's my favorite thing about Ediscio...

For those students that usually say that they weren't home and couldn't access a computer to study their flashcards, there's "Ediscio Mobile".

I'm sure my middle school students can't live without their smartphones, mp3s, iPods, etc. There's no excuse for not studying their vocabulary. Even when they're away from home...there's Ediscio...waiting for them!