This week we spent all in-class time creating an iMovie "Digital Story." I decided that I would not use something like this in my classroom, so I created a completely random movie about making my lunch dreams come true. It was fun creating it, and iMovie '09 worked like a charm for me. It was very intuitive and easy to use. I don't see a use in the choral classroom, but now I know I can do it if I have to. Plus, it was pretty fun to make up a song on the spot for the background. The above video is the product of this week's work!

Inspiration, Shminspiration

This week we utilized a tool that is very teacher-specific, Inspiration. This tool is apparently a tried and true too that is used to create diagrams easily by teachers. I use the term "easily" very loosely. This tool was very clumsy for me to use, and there were plenty of shortcomings that I encountered. For instance, it is impossible to use bullet points in any part of the diagram. Seriously? Also, there is no "Fit to page" option, so you have to manually resize EVERY box until it is large enough to fit on a standard piece of paper. Ridiculous.

Aside from the shortcomings, the program can create clear, good-looking diagrams. But I won't use it again.

Texture Pictures

Thursday, we did group work to create a Picasa slide show of pictures we took on a scavenger hunt. My group decided to look at textures on campus, and I was the photographer. My pictures came out surprisingly well, which was surprising because I've never taken a good picture in my life. Once again, I really enjoyed the collaboration using GoogleDocs. It really makes collaboration with others incredibly easy, and it makes completing these projects easy.

I'm not sure that I am ever going to use Picasa to share photos because I hardly ever take photos, let alone ones that I want to share with students or colleagues. But, after using it for a second time, I'm much more comfortable using it. This is a useful tool, but not a tool that I plan on using in my teaching career.

This slide show is the product of my work this week in TPTE 486. It is a guitar-themed image collection that has pictures from the internet, a program called Big Box of Art, and personal photographs I have taken. I created the slideshow using the Picassa program from the Google Suite. This was the least enjoyable product I've used of the Google Suite of products. The intuitive nature of most Google products was not present in this program, especially for embedding the slideshow into this blog. I will probably play some more with this product, but I don't have high hopes for it. It was a good experience, though, and I feel that I could use this program to embed a picture collection in a teacher website if I needed to.

GoogleDocs Collaboration

This week we spent a significant amount of time using the GoogleDocs tool to collaborate on a cross-content area lesson plan. Patrick and I did a pretty good job on the collaboration, though we used it more as a tool to delegate tasks and subsequently edit each other's work. I really liked the reliability (especially the fact that it automatically saves so often), and the easy availability that allows each collaborator to access and edit easily. Though we did work so independently, I think doing this activity helped me get a feel for how useful GoogleDocs can be, and I believe that I will definitely use this for group work later in college and in professional situations.

The Webquest Experience

In the most recent class period, we spent a significant amount of time exploring a tool I had never used before. The Webquest was an interesting idea to me, but after evaluating and seeing the uses for one I don't believe that I will use one in my classroom. The kinds of activities that a Webquest lends itself to are not the kinds of activities that I want my students to do. In a general core class, I might have used one, but I think I would rather my students do their own research and find their own appropriate websites and resources for a project like the ones we examined. If I were going to be out of the classroom for a while, I might give this to students for a substitute to oversee. Otherwise, I'll keep 'em singing!

Week 1 of TPTE

This has been an interesting week in TPTE 486. A lot of it has been spent doing housekeeping items, like setting up accounts and getting all of the profiles set up with our general information.

The two things we worked with or encountered this week that I had not used or known about before were the GoogleDocs tool, and the Wiki tool. I really like the portability and accessibility of both of these tools, and I believe that it will be very useful for me to utilize these pretty heavily in the rest of my collegiate career and especially my professional career. The Wiki tool especially has many great things it could be used for in instruction. It could be very helpful to use it as a logistical information source for a choir or school group that I will teach, and it could also be a cool project for the students to build their own Wiki on a subject.

The main theme of the course, judging by the web tools used, is how to use the web and the (often free!) services it has to offer to become a more collaborative and effective instructor. This is a very important thing for me and all teachers to understand and utilize, and that will make this course quite beneficial for me, despite my prior computer-savvy state.

Site Credibility

When a teacher thinks about bringing an internet site to augment a lesson in the classroom or for the students to explore on their own time, it is very important to evaluate the credibility, reliability, and safety of the site to ensure that it is a good idea to share it with students. Cornell has a great website that has Five Criteria for Evaluating Web Pages that has very clear guidelines and qualifications for websites in general. November Learning also has a short list of great sites that illustrate and exemplify what to use and what not to use.

Safe Surfing!

Welcome!

My name is Zack Liston, and welcome to my blog! Here, I will be talking about my experience in TPTE which may include jokes, horror stories, sarcasm, or touching reflection.
The first precious hours of this TPTE 486 class have been fairly low-key, and not very demanding for me because I am fairly technology savvy. I look forward to the rest of the summer when we will hopefully begin to explore things I don't know how to do, and I will be able to grow to become a teacher that effectively uses technology in the classroom.