The smartness of SMART Notebook

SMART Notebook 11 has been a revelation to discover when it comes to teaching. It has the best parts of PowerPoint presentation, mixed with innovative features that make it a delight to work with. After using both PowerPoint and Prezi Presentation, I was still looking for an ICT tool that I could use in lessons that also made it more interactive. SMART Notebook is a collaborative learning software. As the picture shows below, SMART Notebook contains a tool bar which offers the chance for teachers to write on their slides using an interactive whiteboard magic pen. The chance to write notes and students comments on the board as the lesson progressed was something which was not offered when using Microsoft PowerPoint.

The pen is an interactive magic pen and is easy to use; just make sure you remember to calibrate the whiteboard first. You are also able to save these changes during the lesson, and therefore enabling you to use notes as examples for other lessons or comparing answers of various groups. SMART Notebook has made me confident in using ICT in my teaching, mainly because once you know how to use the various functions, it is easy and accessible to use. It feels more modern and educationally-geared than PowerPoint. When it came to doing my assessed micro-teach lesson, I chose to use SMART Notebook.



What was really useful about using SMART Notebook 11 is how it contains activity builders, images from multiple subject areas that can be inserted into my slides and also the ability to erase words that I write using the toolbar eraser icon. I created a 'drag and drop' feature in my presentation that meant that students in my micro teach could come to the board and drag written sentences with their hands to the correct columns, which I had created. This interaction worked well and got all of the class involved. Using SMART Notebook has made ILT a fun integration in my lessons and it is not an intimidating software for the teacher or the student. Without a doubt I will use SMART Notebook when teaching in the future, and it has eliminated my reliance on PowerPoint. The smartness of SMART Notebook really does overwhelm the power on Microsoft PowerPoint.

Below, I have added a youtube clip of a user going through the features of SMART Notebook 11. It is a useful introduction into the amazing features that SMART Notebook can offer. Give it a go and it may just transform the way you teach:

References:

Youtube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XCr4fkMrQks [Accessed 29 December 2014].

Prezi Presentations

After using PowerPoint presentations in my classes, I researched elsewhere to see if there were presentations I could use that offered more. I came across a site called Prezi.com. The word prezi is the Hungarian short form of presentation. This presentation is different to the ordinary slide-based presentations. Prezi also offers an educational license for students and educators. Instantly, the site shows you how to use functions to create a professional and eye-catching presentation that makes my PowerPoint slides look rather bland. The site helps you create your presentation easily, and this is the link to view it:http://bit.ly/1gdiEJG

The tool palette allows users to pan and zoom, rotate, and edit an object. The user has a blank canvas to work on and can navigate between text, videos and other presentation objects. I found some really good examples of Prezi Presentation in the following link: http://blog.crazyegg.com/2012/10/29/example-presentations-using-prezi/

However, there is a lack of colour and font option with this device. Also, there is a drawback that it is more time-consuming to create a presentation as opposed to the Microsoft PowerPoint software. This could be a case of practice makes perfect, with more time a really exciting and personal presentation could be created. Therefore, I would have to have more practice to feel confident to use this device to teach and introduce to students.

References:

https://ballaratcrtnetwork.wikispaces.com/Web+2.0+tools+and+researchers [Accessed 14 November 2014].

http://blog.crazyegg.com/2012/10/29/example-presentations-using-prezi/ [Accessed 14 November 2014].

The power of PowerPoint

PowerPoint presentations were one of the first software devices that I was taught to use when I was a secondary school student. When interactive whiteboard's were installed in classrooms, one of the first features I noticed was how the teacher no longer needed to cram information all onto one board, or keep rubbing-out words in order to have space to write more. Through PowerPoint, multiple slides can be created and presented to pupils. Furthermore, these slides of information can be saved to use again and again in other lessons infinitely and can also be printed on paper for handouts. It is an easy tool to use and whilst presenting, you are able to forward features or slides by just touching the board. I was confident in using PowerPoint prior to the PGCE programme; therefore, it came as no surprise to me that I created a PowerPoint presentation when faced with my first class teaching students. This worked well and it was effective having slides up on the board for students to write notes from and also it allowed me to teach at the pace I wanted. PowerPoint offers sound, animation and many more features that can be effective to use when teaching. However, a frustrating part of using PowerPoint is the inability to write on the board whilst doing the presentation. I could not use the whiteboard pens to add notes or ideas from pupils, which would have made the presentation even more interactive.

After addressing the use of Socrative, I thought of trying a quiz that used ICT whilst also using traditional methods. I wrote questions on each slide, with multiple choice if needed, and encouraged students to write down their answers on paper. This saved me printing paper for the whole class and it was also an easier way to teach as I could go read-out each question as it was presented and to talk a little about what I wanted them to think about and remember. The students then did a peer assessment on one another and marked work by viewing the final slide, which contained numbered answers on it. Therefore, I would use PowerPoint again to conduct quizzes in class.

Finding Popplet

I was searching various mind-mapping resources online and I came across Popplet. Immediately, the site offers more colour and varioution than bubbl.us. I enjoyed discovering different formats and it was a great tool when wanting to see examples of mind-maps. There were numerous subject areas of mind-maps to view and to use as templates. Educational mind-maps included: 'Facts about the Earth,' 'Coming of the American Revolution,' and this useful example on teaching a lesson: successful lesson plan

Popplet helps students think and learn visually. You can insert images into the mind-map and to me; this meant it was more visually pleasing than the Bubbl.us mind-map that I had created. Popplet helps students capture facts, thoughts and images and correlates a relationship between them. I found this function appealing and easy to use and it made me realize how necessary it is to explore various versions of teaching methods. Just as we try out different practical methods of teaching, so we should keep researching different ICT versions. Through researching, I was able to find a method of mind-mapping that suited me even more. I won't just stick in my safe zone of doing mind-maps on bubbl.us, I will now use Popplet and especially in-class as it is a great tool for the students to use themselves. 

References
http://popplet.com/ [ Accessed 29 November, 2014].

Discovering Bubbl.us

I have to admit, I have always been one of those that use mind-maps during revision. Sorting through notes and simplifying them into mind-map format worked effectively for me. However, that was usually hand-drawn mind maps, which I could stick up onto walls and into files to add instant colour as opposed to all of my written notes. I only went so far as to dipping into my pencil case of felt-tip pens to create my mind-maps, I didn't venture into the world of computer-crafted mind-maps. That was until we looked at a site called Bubbl.us in our PGCE lesson. 

Bubbl.us is a software that is simple and quick and creates information in a neat and clear format. As quoted from Lifehacker.com, 'Don't let resistance to learning new software stop you from doing it. Bubbl.us is speedy, free, and requires less than a minute to learn.' Therefore, I thought I would ditch the felt tips and use a Bubbl.us mind-map in my English class. What I created can be seen below:

I found the software really easy to use, and it was nice to try something new to apply to my lessons. Admittedly, I do enjoy the creative part of drawing my own mind-map and it is an easy way of adding ideas to the mind-map as revision goes along. However, when it came to teaching, the bubbl.us methods looks more professional and it was a good site for me to suggest to students as it is quick, easy and also free. I would like to use computer-crafted mind-maps in the future when teaching. My next aim is to look for a mind-mapping software that offers more variation when formatting. This means more shapes, colour, background setting etc. Discovering bubbl.us was a great way of setting me up on my methodological adventure of finding new ways of resourcing material for teaching. 

References:

https://bubbl.us/ [Accessed 5 November 2014]

Lifehacker.com found at https://bubbl.us/ [Accessed 5 November 2014]

Is Socrative positive?

Socrative is an app that allows both teacher and student to interact electronically with educational activities on tablets, laptops and smartphones. Predominantly, socrative can be used through the means of questionnaires, which can produce instant results for the teacher and the whole class to visualise.

Having had a demonstration in my PGCE class of this app, I can see that it is a teaching technique that sparks debate. The positives of using such a device in the classroom is that it involves the entire classroom. In order to participate, all of the class need to be involved, with the knowledge that they are entering their results anonymously. Perhaps, this technique can break down the embarrassment students can feel when they are participating in class quizzes. It also may make cheating in quizzes less, as it is anonymous and each of the students needs their own device to participate. Another positive was the fact that the teacher can instantly gain feedback from questions and gauge the whole class' current level of understanding. This saves the teacher time on marking and also the time the teacher would take trying to grasp the statistics of learning and what areas of learning that need more attention. However, like many new teaching techniques, devices such as socrative are going to come with some criticisms.

The negatives of using such a device became clear when using socrative in the PGCE classroom. Firstly, every student would need access to a smart phone or laptop in order to take part in the quiz. This immediately made me raise my eyebrows as who's to say that every pupil can afford smart phones. It is the same as the continual arguments you hear over the prices of school uniforms. Not every child can afford to have the best and newest kit out there and surely a socrative quiz is only going to make those that haven't got the phone even more aware and could cause them embarrassment in the class. One of a teacher's primary areas to focus on when teaching to to make sure that the pupils well-being is ensured. Therefore, does using a device such as socrative guarantee whole-class participation? How can I guarantee if I used this teaching technique in class that all of my pupils would be able to do the quiz? If one or two pupils cannot, then surely the quiz has to be withdrawn from use.

Another critique would be the fact that anonymity of participants in the quiz means that yes the teacher gets a statistic of class knowledge, but they do not gain awareness of individual weaknesses. The teacher is unaware of which pupils in the overall statistic failed in some questions, and who the ones are that had questions correct. The teacher would have to rely on the fact that pupils gain knowledge when they can see the answers at the end on the whiteboard screen. Also, interaction between teacher and student is limited as there is a device in the way (be it a mobile phone or a laptop). Personally, when I am teaching, the less I see mobile phones displayed out in class the better!

Maybe it will be one of those teaching techniques that really grow and is used seamlessly in lessons. However, if it is to be used, this method needs to be backed-up with a teaching technique that undergoes knowledge of individual pupils' knowledge in class. To rely on socrative would not be beneficial for individual students, as they are being lost in an overall statistic.

Therefore, it is not so much on whether the use of Socrative is positive or not, but on how the sole use of such a quiz technique could have a negative effect on learner and teacher knowledge.

References:

http://www.socrative.com/ [Accessed 20 October 2014].

Teaching an English class for the first time

My name is Christina Morgan. I am 22, and last year I graduated from Cardiff University with a Masters in Creative Writing. I am currently enrolled onto the first year of the PGCE programme in Pembrokeshire College, where I am also doing my teaching placement. Yesterday I taught my first GCSE English lesson. Now, looking back at the lesson with a less stressed-out head, I can say that it went better than I thought. In fact, I actually really enjoyed teaching the class. Finding resources and back-up activities was a challenge leading up to the week; I kept on thinking: 'Is this material right for a GCSE class?' And: 'Am I setting too much for a one hour class?' I guess this was all part of the learning process. My topic to teach was 'Dialogue', and I tried thinking outside of the box to teach the class in an interesting and new way. This, I discovered, was easier said than done and after trawling through ideas online I came up with four key activities I wanted to approach with the class. The first, was to start off with a short quiz on what pupils already knew about the rules of dialogue. From this quiz, I taught the class the aims of dialogue and rules of punctuation from a PowerPoint presentation. Even with not having much experience with SMART Boards, this did not prove to be a disaster. It worked, although, at some points I felt like I was conducting a lecture more than a class. To get the pupils involved, I paired students up to work on their own dialogue and to use all of the tips they had learnt from the day's lesson. We went through each pair's work and they got to try out some drama skills by performing what they has written. All in all, the lesson proved to run much more smoothly than I had anticipated. Teaching isn't as scary after all! First lesson: DONE. I look forward to reporting back on more teaching experiences and my use of technology with learning.