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Technology Integration Academy

Last updated Saturday, January 8, 2005

Summer 2001: Past Class Photos, Bios, and Creations!

March 2003: Class Work

Academy Outline (schedule available)

  1. Welcome and Overview
  2. Brainstorming our Goals: Intro to Inspiration (Lesson Option I)
  3. Technology Integration Lesson Examples
  4. Tips for locating websites
  5. Copy and Paste Skills
  6. Internet Hotlist (Idea II)
  7. Student Center Activities (Idea III)
  8. Creating / Using Template Files
  9. Scavenger Hunt (Idea IV)
  10. Brochure (Idea V)
  11. Multimedia Presentation (Idea VI)
  12. Creating webpages the simple way
  13. Create Together! Software
  14. Intermediate Internet Skills
  15. Multimedia Madness
  16. Other Resources

1. Welcome and Overview

File Saving: The Foundation of Computer Use. Why should we talk about something this basic in an integration workshop? Because it is so important! This information is available as:

2. Intro to Inspiration

Inspiration Resources:

Assignment: (for whole class and individual completion)

  1. Brainstorm "stuff that bugs and challenges us with classroom technology"
  2. Brainstorm a "I wish I could do that in my classroom with technology" list
  3. Organize our lists into categories
  4. Vote on which challenges/wishes we most want to focus on this week
  5. Create an "All About Me" Inspiration diagram using a provided template.
  6. Brainstorm research topics for "Freedom Week"

Additional Assignment: If you are not already familiar with creating PowerPoint presentations, resolve to take several PowerPoint classes and practice your skills by creating slideshows for students and/or parents!

3. Technology Integration Lesson Examples

4. Tips for Locating Websites

Information and tips about quickly locating internet websites is available as:

Best Search Tools:

  • Copernic  (basic free version download link)
  • Sherlock (information link: included with OS 8.5+)

Recommended Search Sites:

  1. Yahooligans: www.yahooligans.com
  2. Google: www.google.com
  3. The Library Spot: www.libraryspot.com
  4. Kathy Schrock's Guide: http://school.discovery.com/schrockguide
  5. Blue Web'n www.kn.pacbell.com/wired/bluewebn
  6. AltaVista Advanced: www.altavista.com/web/adv
  7. Fast Search: www.ussc.alltheweb.com
  8. Hotbot Advanced: http://hotbot.lycos.com
  9. Vivisimo Metasearch: http://vivisimo.com

Even more teacher websites are located on www.wtvi.com/teks/integrate/strategies/quickfind.html.

5. Copy and Paste Skills

- with the Clipboard (separate handout available)

All computers have a short term memory bank called the "clipboard." Unless you install special software, the clipboard will remember one thing at a time that you copy. This can be a bunch of text, an image file, or a sound file.

Multitasking: Using more than one software application at a time.
When we copy and paste text or multimedia elements, usually we need to multitask. This means that more than one application is open at the same time.

Copy and Paste Instructions (Mac/Windows)

  1. Open a web browser (Netscape or Internet Explorer, also called "IE") and a word processor (ClarisWorks or Word.)
  2. To show the desktop, go to the upper right corner:
    • MacMAC: Hide a program by clicking on the corner icon and choosing "hide application"
    • WinWIN: Minimize a program by clicking the button in the corner of the window on the minimize icon: the flat line. ()
  3. To switch to another application already running/launched:
    • MacMAC: Click on the corner icon and select the application you want to make "active"
    • WinWIN: Click on the minimized icon at the bottom of the screen to make a different application "active"

TO COPY AND PASTE TEXT:

  1. Go to the webpage in Netscape/IE which contains the info you want.
  2. Highlight the text you want to copy by clicking and dragging.
  3. From the EDIT menu, choose COPY. (or right click and choose copy)
  4. Switch into your Word Processor (make it "active")
  5. Click where you want to put the text
  6. From the EDIT menu, choose PASTE.

TO COPY AND PASTE PICTURES/GRAPHICS: (On a Windows computer, this only works with IE)

  1. Go to the webpage in Internet Explorer which contains the picture/graphic you want.
  2. Move your mouse over the graphic you want to copy
  3. Copy the picture by:
    • MacMAC: Click the mouse button and hold it down till you see a popup menu, then choose to "COPY IMAGE"
    • WinWIN: Click with the RIGHT MOUSE BUTTON on the picture, and from the popup menu choose to "COPY."
  4. Switch into your word processor (make it "active")
  5. Click where you want to put the text
  6. From the EDIT menu, choose PASTE.

A listing of web resources for internet graphics, sounds, movies, and other media is available in the "Multimedia Madness" workshop curriculum.

Assignment: Practice your copy/paste skills by completing The Texas Heritage Cut & Paste Scavenger Hunt on www.wtvi.com/teks/hunt.html. Use a word processor and Internet Explorer to complete this assignment. Alternatively

6. Internet Hotlist

A hotlist is a "linked" electronic document included websites about a specific topic. An example hotlist about "Freedom Week" internet resources is available on www.wtvi.com/teks/freedom.

Information and tips are available about how to:

  1. minimize wasted student time online
  2. streamline student internet access
  3. create hotlists in MS Word

Access these materials as:

Assignment: Create an internet hotlist using "Freedom Week" internet resources on www.wtvi.com/teks/freedom. Choose one topic from the "Freedom Week" law for your hotlist.

7. Student Center Activities (SCAs)

Student Center Activities utilizing technology resources are often online assignments that students can complete individually or in small groups. One of the best resources for finding existing online student center activities, or creating your own, is:

Sample online SCAs about "Freedom Week" topics using quia.com and other resources include:

  1. US History - Colonial Challenge! Try to reach $1,000,000! Answer a range of easy to difficult questions and test your knowledge of early US history! - http://www.quia.com/rr/4049.html
  2. Quia.com activity about the Declaration of Independence, using the "Jumbled Words" activity structure. - http://www.quia.com/jw/20823.html
  3. Trackstar activity: Women's Rights in the 1800's - http://trackstar.hprtec.org:80/main/display.php3?track_id=48737
  4. Trackstar activity: The Bill of Rights is for Us Today - http://trackstar.hprtec.org:80/main/display.php3?track_id=24051
  5. Loyalty or Liberty? An online role playing activity - http://www.history.org/History/teaching/revolution/a1.html

Assignment: Complete one of the online SCAs above. Then create your own Quia.com account (www.quia.com/newuser.html) and create an original SCA about a Freedom Week topic of your choice.

8. Creating / Using Template Files

A template file is a partially created student document, ready for students to insert their own ideas/information into it, or use for internet access as a hotlist.

Why use templates?

  1. Helps lessons on the computer proceed much faster
  2. Allows students and teachers to focus more on the content of the lesson than the technology mechanics
  3. Streamlines internet access / minimizes wasted time

Information and tips are available about how to create template files in both MS Word and AppleWorks 5. Access these materials as:

Assignment: Save the hotlist file you created earlier as a template file. Do this by:

  1. Opening the orginal file
  2. Following the directions on your handout for creating a template file
  3. Choose your folder on the desktop as the destination for your new template file
  4. After creating the file, quit all programs and double click your template file to verify it works. It should be named "Document 1" or "Untitled" when it opens.

9. Scavenger Hunt (Idea IV)

A scavenger hunt is an internet activity requring students to visit different websites

Scavenger hunt examples relating to "Freedom Week" topics include:

  1. "Searching Through Our Historical Documents" - http://scavengerhunt.lee.k12.nc.us/historicaldocs/index.htm
  2. "Hunt for our African American Legacy: an Internet Treasure Hunt on The Legacy of Slavery" - http://www.kn.pacbell.com/wired/fil/pages/huntlegacyomr.html.
  3. Albemarle High School's Government Scavenger Hunt - http://k12.albemarle.org/ss/ahsgov/scavenger.htm.

Assignment: Create your own scavenger hunt about a "Freedom Week" topic of your choice. Include 5 to 10 questions, and direct links to websites containing the answers. Refer to the Texas Heritage Scavenger Hunt as an example if needed.

10. Brochure (Idea V)

Rather than a simple essay, students can be required to create a brochure incorporating graphics as well as text.

Sample student projects involving brochure creation include:

  1. State Research Project
  2. Texas Symbols Project
  3. Egypt Project (uses a "poster" rather than brochure)

Step by step instructions for creating a brochure in either AppleWorks or MS Word are available on:

Assignment: Create a template file in MS Word for one of the project examples above. Include live hyperlinks if appropriate. Then use the template to create an example of a finished student product.

11. Multimedia Presentation (Idea VI)

Multimedia Slideshows, particularly PowerPoint presentations, are increasingly popular ways for students to demonstrate mastery of a concept or unit and share it with others. Examples of student projects involving multimedia presentations include:

  1. Author/Illustrator Multimedia Project
  2. BioSketch Project
  3. Fraction Slideshow
  4. Geometry Slide Show Project

Some suggestions for helping student presentations be successful include:

  1. STRUCTURE THE ASSIGNMENT: Give students guidelines that encourage them to research and write the textual content of their product FIRST, and focus on the fonts, colors, sounds, transitions, animations, etc. SECOND. Without proper guidelines, students will often attend to these tasks in the reverse order.
  2. REQUIRE NOTE TAKING: Require that students take notes first on paper, and then compose sentences / paragraphs from those notes (and not directly from copied/pasted internet information). This can encourage students to process information and also reduce temptations/opportunities for plagiarism.
  3. REQUIRE A STORYBOARD: Provide students with worksheets to "storyboard" their presentation first, making a visual diagram of their slides including planned content and presentation order. Students should focus on chunking their ideas into digestible pieces. An example of a storyboard is included on page 2 of the article, "Y2K: A Teachable Moment" on www.wtvi.com/teks/99_00_articles/y2k.html.
  4. CONTENT FIRST, THEN MULTIMEDIA: After text is keyboarded in, students should begin locating photos and other graphics to complement their included text. Consider requiring students to use a particular font, size, and color scheme, otherwise you may end up with very small "Old English" fonts used everywhere. Teach students to use contrast: light on dark or dark on light when working with colored fonts and backgrounds. Multimedia should enhance the presentation, not distract or dominate it inappropriately.
  5. CITE PROPERLY: Teach students at the start of the project how to properly document bibliographic sources, and insist this documentation take place continually as students perform research and find multimedia elements to include in their product. Suggested formats for proper citation are available on "Internet Citation Guides" from the University of Wisconsin-Madison on www.library.wisc.edu/libraries/Memorial/citing.htm. Consider using a tool like Hyperfolio to help students properly document researched text and saved multimedia.

Examples of Multimedia grading rubrics include:

  1. Author / Illustrator Project Rubric
  2. Dust Bowl Project Rubric

Assignment: Create a storyboard for a multimedia presentation about a "Freedom Week" topic using Inspiration.

12. Creating webpages the simple way

By creating a webpage, you are able to communicate with other people anywhere in the world who have internet access. That is a rather mind boggling fact.

Free services are available that allow teachers to create webpages without using any special software or having advanced technical knowledge. Some of these services include:

  1. schoolnotes.com
  2. bigchalk.com
  3. Filamentality
Each of these webpage creation options has limitations, but their ease of use is remarkable given the skills needed only a few years ago to create webpages.

Resources are also available about creating webpages with visual software:

Assignment: Create a Schoolnotes.com account and create a classroom webpage including information about the classes you expect to teach in the coming school year.

13. Create Together! Software

Although some webpage creation tools do exist making the process of putting information online easier, more complicated software tools have generally been required to publish student projects or engage in online collaborative projects. "Create Together" software promises to change this:

A trial CD of this software can be requested online, downloadable demos are not presently available. This software is currently available only for Windows, a Macintosh version is "in the works."

14. Intermediate Internet Skills

  • Workshop Objective: This class will familiarize participants with the software tools and techniques needed to download and install a variety of software and file types from the internet. Participants will also learn how to compress one or multiple files as a single "zip" file and email it as an attachment to someone else.
  • www.wtvi.com/teks/ii

15. Multimedia Madness

  • Workshop Objective: This hands-on session will teach the basics of capturing graphics, video, and audio from the web and CDs. We will also practice inserting captured files into a multimedia presentation.
  • www.wtvi.com/teks/mm

16. Other Resources

  1. Americaslibrary.gov - From the Library of Congress
  2. Awesomelibrary.org
  3. Technology Idea Exchange
  4. Copyright 101 for Educators: Winter 2003
  5. Digital Dishonesty Workshop Resources
  6. TA TEKS Snapshots
  7. Computer Lab Management Software options
  8. If You Don't Have the Vision, You Can't See the Picture
  9. Educational Telecomputing Projects (a K-12 workshop)
  10. Rubistar - Online Tool for Creating Rubrics
  11. Technology Tutorials found on the Web
  12. Advice: Top 10 Ways to Increase Your Computer Literacy

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Tools for the TEKS home | Article Archive | Technology Workshops
Mailing List | Feedback | Tools and Techniques | Technology Idea Exchange

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Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

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