Cognitive Learning

Cognitive Learning

I have seen technologies and different software applications help students access their prior knowledge and better organize their new information. Microsoft Excel and Inspiration are applications that students in middle school can learn very quickly and then use to organize and analyze their information. I do a Food Labeling Nutrition Project in collaboration with the Home and Careers teacher that uses video, the Internet and Excel. The object of this lesson is for students to learn how to read labels on food products and then to analyze the nutritional value of that food product based on the label. The students choose 5 different foods that they like and bring into class the food labels. They use a form provided by the teacher to fill out information from each of their labels. The information is total calories, fats, carbohydrates, proteins and sodium. The students watch a short video from an online educational site on Nutritional food labels. In class a lesson is taught on what nutrients make up calories and how to analyze the label to see what percentage of fat, proteins and carbohydrates make up the calories. Prior to entering their information into excel the students have a period in the computer lab using an Interactive website to understand the Food Pyramid. The next day the students then come into the computer lab to learn how to enter their data into the spreadsheet. While they do this they can see why excel is used for data entry and calculations. They were previously taught in class that fats, proteins and carbohydrates are in grams on the food labels and must be converted to grams. The students learn how to convert them to calories using a formula in excel. By doing this the students learn how to do simple calculations in excel. After the students have entered their data and have done the calculations to go from grams to calories, they then check their total calories against what the label has for total calories. This helps the students see immediately if they did something wrong in entering or interpreting their data on the nutritional label. The students are then shown where on excel to create graphs from their information that they have entered. They create both a bar chart comparing all their foods and they do individual pie charts. The visual of the graphs reinforce how important the nutritional label is to see what foods are good for you. They incorporate pictures of their foods into the charts. When that part of the project is done, they write a few sentences on each of their products explaining the nutrients of each product why the food may or may not be good for you based on the food pyramid.

Blogs for Teachers

This is the link for classroom presentation on Blogs for Teachers
http://eev3.liu.edu/toh/jsu/blogging.html

Constructivist Learning

1. How could software applications and/or other technologies help you provide develop a constructivist learning environment for your students? Describe the lesson/learning environment you would be interested in creating and describe what technologies you might use. In your discussion, try to organize the tools using either Jonassen’s model (CLEs) or the Hannafin et al. model above (OLEs) opportunities for your students to access their prior knowledge and better organize new information?

I think that software applications that are available on the web today (commonly know as Web 2.0 tools) can be used to support a constructivist learning environment. In the classroom a teacher would try to create an environment where the student becomes an active participant in the learning process. The teacher would be a facilitator of the learning experience. The teacher would assign a project for the students that would start out as a question or a problem for the students to solve. The students would be working collaboratively in groups which supports what Jonassen’s said that “Learning most naturally occurs not in isolation but by teams of people working together to solve problems”. The students would interact with one another through blogs and wikis. In the blogs the students could post the information they have found and the other members of the group would add to it. By collaborating like this the students will build on each others contribution to the project. During this process the teacher would be making suggestions to the students and coaching the students. This could be done through chats or comments added to the blogs by the teacher. This would be the collaborative process. The students could also use blogs as personal journals to reflect what they are learning from this experience. The group could then create deliverables of their choice to best present their findings. They could work together through products like Google Doc or as in my school, cooperative file sharing that is setup in our network. The students would create deliverables and then share them using products, ie. Slideshare, where presentations like PowerPoint t can be put on the web for all to see. By publishing their findings the students will take pride and ownership of what they have learned. The students could then critique the findings of each group also through the blogs. Rubrics would have been created for both the students in the group to evaluate themselves and for the teacher to see if the students have met the expectations of the project. While working on the project there are many ways for the students to organize their information with Web 2.0 tools such as backpack, bubbleshare, and del.ic.ous. While the students are gathering information from the web they can use RSS for immediate updates to their blog from other websites.

Web 2.0 is certainly getting my attention. I finally figured that most of our classes are being modeled to what we should be doing in the classroom with the students. I can't wait to teach my teachers PhotoStory that I learned at the last workshop I took. It is so much fun. Some one is already using it to show his 11th grade English classes witchcraft from Salem Mass. All the workshops so far have been great. I like the collaboration (team) we do in class and enjoy working with the rest of team. I am sure by the end the 2nd year we will all know one another very well. Also I can now say constructivism without messing it up. Oct. 24, 2007

Heckscher Park Exhibit - Embracing Differences

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First weeks of class

I was very nervous coming to class the first night but three teachers from Cold Spring Harbor made me very welcomed and my fears of being in a class with all young teachers disappeared. Even though I have worked in technology for 12 years, I have learned so much in the last 4 weeks. The Web 2.0 workshop was great and I am already to teach my teachers about the Web 2.0 tools I learned. The collaboration with the others in class have been interesting and to hear the ideas of others is fun. I am usually the one teaching teachers and it is different being on the other end.