This will be more of a rant then a blog.
My wife is currently taking two college classes that require collaboration via technology. They are basically emailing files back and forth. My wife's laptop is falling apart and we are working on moving all her files over to my old one that is in better shape. (I got a new Macbook Pro about 2 months ago) She is in charge of taking all the documents and putting them together into one file. They are not using google docs like I would but I digress.
My wife, for both classes, has made it abundantly clear that she does not own MS Office 2008 and that all files must be saved as the older version or .rtf. These "kids" in her class refuse to listen to her. She has received many .docx and .pptx files. Her laptop does not have enough memory to even download converters so she can't open them on her laptop. When asked why they can't save in the correct file format they tell her that they don't know how. How can you make it to college and not know how to save in a different file format? File>save as> click file format>scroll down to the correct format. DONE!
Her solution has been to get on my Macbook Pro and log in and convert on that computer. Once we get all her info over to the other laptop she won't have to do this.
Recently she encountered a .odp file. She had no clue what it was and asked me for help. I googled it and found out it was an Openoffice.org file. So, being the techie that I am I downloaded Openoffice and low and behold you can save your files in Openoffice as MS docs!
This has led to an interest in Openoffice. I will probably do some work in it to see how it does.
If you are a college student please learn how to save file formats!
Saturday, November 28, 2009
Friday, November 20, 2009
Rubrics
Rubrics are a useful assessment tool for teachers. They allow for the students to know what is expected of them. In my classroom I have never used a rubric to grade with but I plan to start soon.
Designing a rubric is quite easy. Basically you have columns that are the levels of achievement and rows for different categories. I have found that rubrics can be cumbersome when first starting to make one. It is important to know what objectives you want to cover when you put in the different categories. It is also a good idea to use a schools grading scale that already exists.
I used a web tool to create a rubric. I liked using it because I can share it with other teachers that might be working on the same project. I also liked how it set everything up for me and I just had to input data.
I will probably be using rubrics in my classroom more due to this assignment.
You can view my rubric here. It can also be viewed below.
Designing a rubric is quite easy. Basically you have columns that are the levels of achievement and rows for different categories. I have found that rubrics can be cumbersome when first starting to make one. It is important to know what objectives you want to cover when you put in the different categories. It is also a good idea to use a schools grading scale that already exists.
I used a web tool to create a rubric. I liked using it because I can share it with other teachers that might be working on the same project. I also liked how it set everything up for me and I just had to input data.
I will probably be using rubrics in my classroom more due to this assignment.
You can view my rubric here. It can also be viewed below.
Friday, November 13, 2009
Evaluating Educational Technology
While taking my EME 5050 course we discussed evaluating educational technology. I wanted to take a moment to discuss ways of doing that.
The textbook gave us an example rubric to use for websites. It had 9 categories and 4 levels to rate the categories. I would like to develop a quick version of this rubric for people that might be in a hurry. I would probably use authority, objectivity, audience, and currency as my four categories. These four seem to be the most important if someone is in a hurry. These types of rubrics are valuable to teachers and students so that they can determine if they are using a website that is going to benefit their particular project.
Another type of evaluation discussed was software. Software is a key component to education everyday. If the software doesn't function correctly the class could be hindered from learning at the highest level. Software has always been one of my concerns in my classroom. I don't like the idea of just putting my students in front of a computer and hoping for the best. The evaluation given in the book is a good way for me to determine if I should use the program or not. The evaluation includes an abilities section so that I can determine if the software is appropriate for my student's abilities. I find this rubric very useful.
The textbook gave us an example rubric to use for websites. It had 9 categories and 4 levels to rate the categories. I would like to develop a quick version of this rubric for people that might be in a hurry. I would probably use authority, objectivity, audience, and currency as my four categories. These four seem to be the most important if someone is in a hurry. These types of rubrics are valuable to teachers and students so that they can determine if they are using a website that is going to benefit their particular project.
Another type of evaluation discussed was software. Software is a key component to education everyday. If the software doesn't function correctly the class could be hindered from learning at the highest level. Software has always been one of my concerns in my classroom. I don't like the idea of just putting my students in front of a computer and hoping for the best. The evaluation given in the book is a good way for me to determine if I should use the program or not. The evaluation includes an abilities section so that I can determine if the software is appropriate for my student's abilities. I find this rubric very useful.
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