Free topic

 Hey everyone!

Here we are again... This week has been very busy since we have had many projects and assignments to finish since we are approaching the end of this semester. 

In today's blog I want to talk about Kahoot!  I listened for it through a friend that was using it for her presentation.

Kahoot! is an educational platform that is based on games and questions. Through this tool, teachers can create questionnaires, discussions, or surveys that complement academic lessons. The material is projected in the classroom and questions are answered by students while playing and learning at the same time. Kahoot! promotes game-based learning, which increases student engagement and creates a dynamic, social, and fun educational environment.

Create

Create a fun learning game in minutes – we call these ‘kahoots’. The format and number of questions is up to you. Add videos, images and diagrams to your questions to amplify engagement.

Play

Kahoots are best played in a group setting. To join a game, you need a unique PIN. If you’re the game host, you need a big screen. Players answer on their own devices, while questions are displayed on a shared screen. In addition to live games, you can also send kahoot challenges that players complete at their own pace – for example, for homework or remote training.

Share

After a game, encourage players to create and share their own kahoots! With one of our premium plans for schools or business, you can co-create games with your colleagues and save time on finding relevant kahoots for your class or training session.

It seems very fun and interactive. Our duty as teachers is to make the class more interesting and what's better than some technology tools that give you the opportunity to do tons of things. Below I'm presenting some reviews that some teachers have done for this program.Reviews can be easily accessed in the review section when you go to download the app.

(sonya w Classroom teacher
Spring Valley Elementary
O'neals, United States)

I find this app to be truly intriguing. It gives off a hum of positive and creative energy, as it allows users to not only find quizzes on any topic imaginable, but gives them the opportunity to also create a quiz themselves. I find this to be a very useful tool, because I can create a quiz specifically for my students, and also give them assignments to do the same. My only concern about this app is that is tends to lean mostly towards the fun side of learning, and sometimes it can be distracting and actually take away from the overall goal as students turn it into a competition rather than a learning experience. I think that in moderation, this app can prove to be a very useful tool.

(Melissa Powers

Media specialist/librarian)

A quick pace, suspenseful music, and instant scoreboards keep competition lively and learners engaged. Students will definitely ask to play again, and many will love the challenge of creating their own Kahoots.

That's all for today! ^_^

Another free topic

 Hello everyone! 

For this week we have again a free topic. I wanted to share my experience of today. Me and my partner Redjona, had the presentation of our project, how to develop an hour of English class. 

During these weeks we have been preparing slowly for how to teach a class. We learned that we have to set objectives before each class and work during the hour to achieve them all in the end. We have also learned how to develop an outline of a class and a lesson plan too. They have been all useful for preparing and presenting this class today. 

During the last week we have done lot of preparation of how we are going to present it. It took us some weeks to agree on what to include or not, what activities to add and how to visually present it. All these conversations mixed with what we have learned directed us on the final work. 

We chose a topic related with our world problems like the pollution, wars, social disasters, economic issues etc. We thought of this topic because it has a lot of space to talk about. Although I have to admit, our students today needed a little push and I had to call names in order for them to speak. Anyways there were active during exercises and did very well on them. In the end we decided the homework activity to be a letter which I took from a blog I follow and together with my partner decided that it was great as homework. 

As for the feedback, I'm very happy and released now. We received a lot of positive response from our classmates and from the teacher too. Positive feedback and critiques are always welcomed and serve as a reminder for the future. Except from the terrible problem that we had with electricity and internet connection, I think everything went well. 

Of course, teaching a class requires a lot of work, but with passion and determination everything can be achieved. 

Free topic

 Hey everyone

Since we have a free topic I would like to talk about the subject in general. 

It is something new and for me a bit scary. I have to cope with all these tools that seem to get more and more everyday. And to be honest, I do not really like this much new things that get me more confused than ever. It is a nice thing that we learn something new, anyways this is not the only subject that we have. 

The time we have spent doing all requested works is too much and I hope it will be of great value for me, for me that I'm a bit scared from new things. 

I together with my partner have a project to present, including some tools that we have learned from this subject. In reality I feel a little nervous about this. We're going to be teachers for the first time which is a super exciting thing for us. 

All in all this subject has been nice, even though very demanding. New things are always  welcomed, but maybe ot is the way how we are learning them that makes me a bit anxious. We don't have that possibility to be physically in our classrooms and be more interactive there. It's harder this way and I think everyone can agree on this. 

I hope that by the end of the semester I will do great and the things I have learned here I hope to use them on my future class. 

See you!

My predictions for the future

 Hello everyone!

Okay so I see we're approaching the end of the semester. 

For today's topic we are describing how we think our future class will be. If I start to work in my profession in the future I want to begin will early teens, like 8th or 9th graders. I want them to enjoy my class and have fun on it. With the techno tools that we have learned I want to make fund presentations and projects with them. 

After creating that useful experience in teaching I want to work also with high school students. The English language class will be fun for them. Many teens get bored in classes but I don't want them to get bored. The books will be worked in the best ways possible, not just reading and doing the exercises but creating a warm atmosphere in class. I also like to have a foreign language lab in the school where I'm going to work. In this way the students will have the possibility to do listening activities and put in practice what they will learn from classes. 

I like to have cooperative students, but there may be that kind of student that does not want to learn a foreign language or simply just does not like it. For these students I like to prepare some activities that will encourage them hard work and make them at least prepare for the class. Foreign language is more like a passion, but also a necessity nowadays. I want them to know this.

Most of the classes I'd like to start with useful presentations, or short videos related to the topic. So, they develop the listening & speaking skills, which for me are very important in the learning process of a foreign language. 

Now that you are a little familiar with my expectations for my class, I wanna show some expectations for me as a good teacher. This has always been my dream job and I'd always "use" my brother and sister as my students (don't laugh about this).

I like my students to trust me. I believe I've always had good communication skills and I value this because I want my students to feel free and talk with me freely. I don't want to be that dull teacher that just comes to class, gives the lesson and leaves. 

Patience! Most of the time you see me very calm and patient, and I know that working with students, especially teens, needs a lot of nerve. I want to stay like this in my class and not be "provoked" let's say by my students. The beginning is the hardest and for sure it needs a lot of patience. 

Another skill that I have and I wanna use the most is the organisation skill. My class will be the most organized, always on time and prepared. I like to think the day before what I will present for the next class, so I can be organized and prepared for the class. 

In conclusion, for me is very important to have a class that will have fun with me and will be collaborative. I also want to put in practice the skills that I already have and why not to learn new skills that will be useful for me.

I hope you like it and see you in the next class!

Outline of a class lesson

 Hi everyone! Welcome to the next blog!

In today's blog I want to talk about my experience on Widgets. The gadget I used is BookWidgets because the other platform that the teacher had suggested I couldn't access. 

First I want to paste the link of the outline I have made, supposing i will explain an English literature class. 

https://www.bookwidgets.com/play/WZIulo0D-iQAE6bG7vAAAA/FCGRMFV/outline-of-a-cl?teacher_id=5109632967114752

https://www.bookwidgets.com/play/t:O3lbX2i9BlNi9qSX9dO-YI2ATYXzK3rgTBuBcrLv509GQ0dSTUZW

Second, as for my experience I found it quite  easy to work with. BookWidgets was an easy platform to work with. At first as with every new thing that we access in this subject, I thought it would be hard and not understandable. 

Although, the platform made it very easy for me. It showed a how-to-start tutorial on how to use it. After watching the tutorial  I started to work on the  outline for which I shared the link. Doing the outline was easy, you just have to be prepared for what you are going to share with your students and let the platform do the rest. 

Out there are thousands of useful tools teachers world wide can use to make their classes more interesting and fun. Below I want to share some tools teachers can use and which are free.

Tools To Create Infographics For Teachers 

1. amCharts Visual Editor This editor allows you to use amCharts as a web service. This means that all you need to do is to configure the chart and paste the generated HTML code to your HTML page.
2. ChartsBin Create your own interactive map. It's free for now.
3. DipityCreate an interactive, visually engaging timeline in minutes. Use dynamic visualization tools to display photos, videos, news and blogs in chronological order.
4. Easel.ly Create and share visual ideas online. Vhemes are visual themes. Drag and drop a vheme onto your canvas for easy creation of your visual idea!
5. Gapminder Gapminder is used in classrooms around the world to build a fact-based world view.
6. Gliffy Gliffy.com is a free web-based diagram editor. Create and share flowcharts, network diagrams, floor plans, user interface designs and other drawings online.

Free Text To Speech Tools For Teachers

1. OdiogoOdiogo's media-shifting technology expands the reach of your content: It transforms news sites and blog posts into high fidelity, near human quality audio files ready to download and play anywhere, anytime, on any device.
2. PediaPhonLearning during jogging and driving! E-learning and m-learning with MP3 players and mobile phones! A podcast and a winamp play list will be generated too. MP3 files, play lists and podcast automatically generated from Wikipedia! Let your computer read out the Wikipedia for you!
3. PowerTalkPowerTalk is a free program that automatically speaks any presentation or slide show running in Microsoft PowerPoint for Windows. You just download and install PowerTalk and while you open and run the presentation as usual it speaks the text on your slides. The advantage over other generic 'Text To Speech' programs is that PowerTalk is able to speak text as it appears and can also speak hidden text attached to images.
4. QR voiceQR Code allows users to converts text-to-speech, generates QR Code for speech URL and Simplifies share text-to-speech files.

Free Podcast Tools For Teachers

1. PodbeanPodbean.com is an easy and powerful way to start podcasting. Easy to publish your podcast in 3 steps. No tech to learn. Powerful promoting tools, iTunes Preview, Statistics. Wonderful income chances with ads, paid subscriptions.
2. PodOmaticRecord video and audio podcasts. Receive in-line calls from listeners.
3. SoundCloudShare Your Sounds. Capture a voice, moment or music in seconds or upload audio you’ve already created. Everyone has sounds to share. Now you can share yours. Publish to social networks or embed your sounds on your site.
4. StudioRackStudioRack is a modular live audio and video production system for the Windows O.S., intended for the more demanding podcaster, audio and video producers, DJ’s, radio stations, tv stations etc.

Free Survey, Polls, and Quizzes Tools For Teachers

1. addpollThe easiest way to create polls, surveys and html forms... on the web. Find out why we're the greatest online survey and poll software in the world with integrated form builder.
2. AnswerGardenAnswerGarden is a new minimalistic feedback tool. Use it as a tool for online brainstorming or embed it on your website or blog as a poll or guestbook.
3. Google Forms (part of Google Drive)Collect RSVPs, run a survey, or quickly create a team roster with a simple online form. Then check out the results, neatly organized in a spreadsheet.
4. Surveys EngineSurveys Engine is lightwheight online surveys server software. This tool enables you create various surveys and questionaires, from small and simple to large and complex. Surveys are hosted in our site so you and survey respondents don't need any software or server, just Internet browser.
5. SurvsCreate online surveys with simplicity and elegance. Survs lets you create, distribute, and analyze online surveys and questionnaires with a friendly interface and powerful features. Survs gives you everything you need to gather feedback.
6. Vizzual FormsVizzualforms is a web based service that will let you create forms and surveys, publish them online and see the results!
7. Web Form FactoryWeb Form Factory is an open source web form generator which automatically generates the necessary backend code to tie your form to a database. By generating the backend code for you, WFF saves you time... time you could spend doing more interesting stuff.

Free Testing and Quizzing Tool For Teachers

1. ClassMarkerClassMarker's secure, professional web-based testing service is an easy-to-use, customizable online test maker for business, training & educational assessment with tests and quizzes graded instantly - saving hours of paperwork!
2. ClassToolsCreate free games, quizzes, activities and diagrams in seconds! Host them on your own blog, website or intranet! No signup, no passwords, no charge!
3. Easy Test MakerEasyTestMaker is a free online test generator to help you create your tests. You can create multiple-choice, fill-in-the-blank, matching, short answer and true and false questions all on the same test. You can also insert instructions and divide your test into multiple sections.
4. Hot Potatoes You can choose from the following six types of questions to create your interactive quiz: crossword, multiple-choice, short-answer, gap-fill, matching/ordering and jumbled-sentence.
5. Quiz RevolutionMake Free Facebook Quizzes and Free Online Quizzes. Interactive Multimedia Quizzes That Can Be Embedded On Any Site.
6. YacapacaIf you are a teacher you can use 15,000 quizzes in every subject or you can create quizzes, surveys, tests, eportfolios and more.

There are many more helpful tools for teachers everywhere. Being a teacher has its difficulties, but with the help of technology there are a million ways to make it easier.

Thank you!!! ☺

Questions to answer

 Hello everyone

Welcome to the new post for this week. 

As we already know we have to answer two questions regarding technology tools we can use in our future classes. 

1. What technology tools are important for your students to know how to use? 

2. What technology tools will best enhance your students project work and presentation of the results? 

So as for the first question, one of the tools I consider important is blog. It is a fun and interesting way to keep in control your students wile they learb new things and prepare for the assignments. Differently from the others, I was kind of familiar with using blogs for assignments and ever since my first contact I wanted to include it as a way of helping me teach in my class. Different blog addressees include Blogger, Tumbrl, WordPress etc. Some of them are really familiar to me because I use them as a social network to keep contact with my followers. It is easy to control if one of your students has posted the assignment on time, or if they have enough creativity in their work and so on. Also it is kind of fun. You can post writings, videos, articles, different links, everything that is necessary for the topic. 

Another important tool for me is Google+ Hangout. You can have virtual meetings with your students and also communicate easily. Multiple participants can interact with each other and with the teacher also share their assigned works, videos etc. You can trach attendance, can check if every homework is done and hand in in time and so on. Especially in times like this, it is a very helpful way to keep doing your work but also protecting yourselves. 

I did a research of mine in the most used technology tools in 2020 and one of those that liked me was trello.

Trello

Technology integration requires multiple teams and people to coordinate and collaborate across a district on various initiatives and projects. Trello is a classroom technology tool that has revolutionized project management and communication and can be applied directly to education. The app allows you to create boards, cards, and tasks that solidify timelines and communication plans, allowing you to assign specific tasks to people in your district. Not only will it help you communicate more effectively, but it will also save time.

If it is going to be necessary I would use one of these apps and the one that I like mos is blog. It's just my favourite but it doesn't mean the all the other million tools that exist out there are not important or necessary. Technology is always advancing so with the development maybe my preferences will develop too.  

As for the second question, I sad with technology changing the helpful tools also change and improve. I would dissociate prezi as one important and easily usable tool. It is great for the students to free their imagination and create everything they like. 

Also in another research of mine for best presentation tools in 2021 that can be used I found out seven tools.

Google Slides for collaborating on presentations

Canva for a free presentation app

Ludus for creative presentations

Beautiful.ai for AI-powered presentations

Prezi for non-linear, conversational presentations

Powtoon for video presentations

Genially for interactive, presenter-less presentations

PowerPoint for Microsoft users

To conclude, technology will always be around us so introducing it to our students helps both sides reach their goals. The development counties and it will bring more and more inovative tools for us to use. Until then, the abovementioned as my favourite tools, I would love to include in my classroom in the near future.

Cooperative Learning

 

In human societies the individuals who are most likely to survive are those who are best enabled to do so by their group. 

Reading different articles and doing some research, I discovered that the focus of most teachers is in relating the students with the materials they give. Until mid sixties cooperative learning was unknown or just ignored by the teachers. This is such a pity now that I know how many benefits has cooperative learning in students

Cooperation is working together to accomplish shared goals.  Within cooperative situations, individuals seek outcomes that are beneficial to themselves and beneficial to all other group members. Cooperative learning is the instructional use of small groups so that students work together to maximize their own and each other’s learning.

In cooperative learning, students work together in small groups to complete a structured task or goal.

Types Of Cooperative Learning

1. Formal Cooperative Learning

2. Informal Cooperative Learning

3. Cooperative Base Groups

4. Integrated Use Of All Three Types Of Cooperative Learning

One example of cooperative learning

Jigsaw

An example of a very popular cooperative learning activity that teachers use is jigsaw, where each student is required to research one section of the material and then teach it to the other members of the group. Just like a jigsaw puzzle, each piece or section is put together at the end, and only then does the entire picture make sense.

For example, imagine you've been placed in a group that has been tasked with researching the life of a famous scientist. In jigsaw, you and the members of your group would each be responsible for researching certain periods of his life. Let's say there are four members of your group. You are responsible for researching his childhood, and the other members of your group are responsible for other periods of his life. When you are finished with your individual research, you report what you've learned to the other members of your group. Once everyone is finished with their reports, you have a complete picture of his entire life.

In this way, jigsaw activities are specifically structured so that the only access any member has to all of the information is through the work of other members. So, if you don't listen to someone in your group, you won't know the information and won't do well on the test that follows.

As a cooperative learning activity, jigsaw provides a very efficient way for students to learn. Cooperative learning also has a number of other advantages. For example, as they work together, students learn how to socialize, solve problems, and handle conflict. Additionally, learning to cooperate with others is vital for success later in life. Almost every company that a student will work for is likely to require them to work in a group at some point.

Basic Elements of Cooperation

The first and most important element is positive interdependence.

The second essential element of cooperative learning is individual and group accountability.

The third essential component of cooperative learning is promotive interaction, preferably face-to-face.

The fourth essential element of cooperative learning is teaching students the required interpersonal and small group skills.

The fifth essential component of cooperative learning is group processing.

Research shows cooperative learning helps to produce:

Higher achievement.

Increased retention.

More positive relationships and a wider circle of friends.

Greater intrinsic motivation.

Higher self-esteem.

Greater social support.

More on-task behavior.

Better attitudes toward teachers.

Better attitudes toward school.

To conclude, I am very happy that we had such a topic for this week's blog. Searching for one thing led to another related with cooperative learning and I really like to use this way of studying in my classes. After all, the students not just socialize but they learn so much from each other in a way that will help them for the future.

Multiple intelligences

 Hello everyone, this is my second blog. 

In lecture two we talked about many things, among them multiple intelligences. Most of the time we generalize people and call them in one field where they do not shine and do their best. People tend to compare everything, for example someone would say who is smarter Albert Einstein or Cristiano Ronaldo, indicating that playing sports is easier. But they forget that Einstein can not score goals like Ronaldo does and Ronaldo cannot invent rockets. That is why multiple intelligences exist. 

There are different fields of intellegencies such as naturalist, logical/mathematical, visual/spatial, musical/rythmic, verbal/ linguistic and so on. In general there are nine, even though the existencial one has caused contradictions amongst studies.

Howard Gardner is one of the most recognised authors regarding multiple intelligences and he is the one who basically mentioned the ninth aspect, existencial intelligence. I found this part of lecture intriguing; it made me listen more carefully about this part because controversies always get me involved.

After I did some research of mine, nowadays there are school based on Garner's multiple intelligences, where they value each student for what they are and together with them, the school helps in discovering the true abilities of one student. It is a very good idea, differently from our schools where for years students learn every possible subject that for some reason they won't need in their future.

In general the lecture is very interesting and gives us opportunity for discussion in our seminar. Thanks for reading and see you in our class! 

Impact of technology in education, my expectations on the course

Technology sorrounds us at every moment in our life. We wake up beacuse of a clock alarm, listen to the latest news on TV, attend meetings because our phones remind us of them, use the computers or phones to create documents and presentations, use highest tech cooking pots to make our meals ready without getting tired and so on. In these last decades our society has experienced a massive technology development. The phones and personal computers are being updated every day with more and more functions to ease our lifes. We are the generation of people who were born in a period when technology was being developed rapidly changing and growing more and more. I have to admit, it has changed our lives for the better. 

It is easier to wake up with your favourite ringtone as an alarm, or to go to work/school driving a nice economic car, to use the computer to finish all your assignments that would have taken you a good amount of time to write them by hand. It is nice when you come home tired and you just press some buttons and you have the meal cooked in a moment. It is very relaxing to listen to your favourite songs at every moment that you need or watch the next episode of your tv series that you missed because of work. Personally, I cannot think my day would be a good day without technology in it. Internet is the greatest technology development that could have happened to us. We get the latest updates from all around the world, we communicate with people that live abroad or with our old grannies that find it hard to move from one city to another. We upload pictures in our social medias and get to know new people. We attend our classes in this difficult period of time and have the commodity of working from home.  So, we interact in many ways, all this because of that technology that sorrounds us. 

As, I mentioned in our place this development happened in a rapid way and I would say it has had to much impact in our lives. All the activities that I have mentioned happen because they are helped by the use of technology. And we want to adapt with this development. We take courses to learn on how to use computers, or we search the web for a specific technological gadget and so on. We require more and more every day, and this has led to creation of different teaching subjects related with technology. As a new generation we clearly have adapted very well. Although, this development has had its negative effects. We have become more dependent on technology and more lazy as people. All this time we spend in front of our phones has created health problems like: obesity, back pain, or problems with our eyes. We stay connected with our phones all day and forget that there is a beautiful day outside that is waiting for us to enjoy it. 

The pandemic situation put us in positions where we had to abandon our classes and follow them through our pc-s. Everywhere it is like this now. We do not have to run to go to school anymore, we just wake up open our phones and check in for the classes of the day. And we can achieve all this because technology allows us to.  It is easier and faster. It is enough for you to have a smartphone or a laptop and you can easily access your classes. You are not going to be late or miss anything. Through technology development you can take online classes every where, even if you are not registered to a school or  a faculty. There are a milion opportunities offered online and you get certified for the courses you take. It is great, isn't it? 

In our job as future teachers, technology will be the key to everything. Nowadays kids are even more familiar with new teaching methods depending on technology. We are getting more familiar too, and will get even more for the future. Personally, I think that we are a bit lucky. We are having a subject related to technology that will help with our work in the future and we are having it for free without spending months to follow a course elsewhere. I find the subject quite helpful and a very good way to approach the standards of the future. 

Of course there are some difficulties. Not everyone one has stable internet connection, or not everyone leaves in areas where electricity runs 24/7. Also, not everyone one has the opportunity to have gadgets at home. Anyway, as they say, every bad side has a good one. There are centers where with a click you can access everything, even though you have to spend an amount of money for this. 

To conclude this first post, I really think that technology is everywhere around us and it helps us in every way possible. We keep being connected with everyone we need, we learn everything we need through it and it definitely makes or life easier. It has helped education system in many aspects and keeps doing it.  Technology certainly has a great impact in our lives.