Facts about Digital Storytelling

Facts of Digital Storytelling

• Use of computer-based tools to tell stories
• Centered around one theme
  
• Enables students to be creative
• Improves technology skills

Cooperative and Collaborative Learning

I had always thought cooperative learning and collaborative learning were homophones, but have since learned that they are two dimensions of the same thing. They have these five similar elements and are beneficial to students because it:

• has children learn to work with all types of people
• exposes students to differences and similarities
• builds social skills such as listening skills and how to give and appropriately respond to constructive feedback
• has students actively involved in learning
• allows for more personal feedback since students have the opportunity to make more exchanges in a small group

These elements are valuable skills for students to obtain to meet success inside and outside of the classroom. The only drawbacks to collaborative and cooperative learning are student’s conflict can interfere with learning and in mixed ability groups stronger students are often left to teach weaker students, which can be burdensome. This can be a bit burdensome, but I also see teaching peers as valuable be because the best way to learn something is to be able to teach it.

I since learned that collaborative learning is more open ended and complex as students team to explore a question or create a meaningful project. As they work towards their goal there is an equal distribution of the work and everyone contributes so everyone grows and matures. The students particularly grow as they receive feedback from their peers. Cooperative learning is more structured and teacher driven as the students have specific roles and are individually accountable for their part of the task. Cooperative learning prepares students for collaboration as they learn how to complete a task and how to contribute to a group.

Grading made as easy as 1, 2, 3

There were several things I liked about Engrade.com. First, it is free, which allows all teachers to use it despite their district’s economic condition. The self explanatory tool is an easy and efficient way to manage grades, assignments and attendance. It only took me minutes to set up my class and it would save teachers time since they would not have to manually calculate student averages. I was pleased that I was able to quickly enter grades into the program by being able to use the up and down arrows to go between students opposed to reaching and clicking the mouse each time.

Another benefit is that it is an online program so teachers have the availability to enter grades from home or school. Also with this system parents and students can view grades and upcoming assignments online with individual access codes. This would enable them to monitor a student’s progress and be informed about upcoming assignment. A disadvantage to this is teachers have to stay on top of their grading and update the system assignments regularly, which could become burdensome. Also parents and students could not benefit from this tool if they did not have internet access readily available.

A drawback to this program is teachers have to manually input an identification number for each student and if you change a student's number after entering assignment scores, the student's grade will be reset and you will have to re-enter each score. Also it would be helpful if you could sort students by grade for a specific assignment and not just by overall average, ID number and name. This would enable feedback at a glance of how students performed on a specific skill and alert the teacher which students needed remediation.

I always wanted to be a film producer