This
week we have reviewed multimedia tools: images, audio (podcasting) and video.
I
felt on slightly more stable ground this week, because as an ESL teacher in
Japan for the better part of a decade, I produced a monthly podcast and
newsletter for my class of grade 10 students and helped my grade 12 students
each year to learn about the use of passive voice in English by creating their
own nightly newscast. I’ve even got my own workaround for resizing images (you
can do it in Microsoft Publisher).
So
I thought I’d have a handle on things. Until I discovered that in the ensuing 6
years since I left ESL teaching, MovieMaker has been completely overhauled and
is basically a totally different product, the copies of Ulead VideoStudio and
MovieTheatre (a Japanese program) that I own are for Vista and don’t work with
Windows 7 and the NCH software that I used for recording and editing audio also
needed upgrading. My first lesson was right there: we will have to constantly
be updating our ICT repertoire if we are to stay on top of what’s available and
stay relevant to our students and their learning!
It
took me quite a few hours, but I now have updated versions and I’m on my way to
becoming proficient in their use again.
I
have quite a lot of experience with podcast creation for language learning, so I
thought I’d try something new. I decided to make a video for use in the science
classroom. As it happens, I was taking a trip to Uluru with my husband, and it was
the perfect chance to get a bit of work done while I was there. I planned an
elaborate video explaining the formation of Uluru and Kata Tjuta (The Olgas),
in line with the Grade 8 science curriculum about rock formation. It took me
hours just to plan it. After that, I sat down to read this week’s materials and
discovered that I was totally off base:
People are not just
viewing and engaging with the Web but using and producing their own versions of
texts and/or participating in the texts of others. They are designing, creating
and authoring their own work on the web in various ways. This is the digital environment
that students of today are able to access and participate in.
(Walsh, 2009)
After
reading this, I realised that the key would be not to just present information
via video but to have the students create a video that demonstrated their
understanding of the material. And after all the talk of how
real-world problems are vital in the classroom, I developed a new plan.
My Video
I
produced a short video intended as the introduction of an assignment task for
students – as a substitute for the standard rubric. My plan was to use the
video as a hook, to provide the assessment task and hints as to how to go about
it. Then the students would go away to research the real-world problem in
groups and produce their own video to present their findings.
Here
is what I came up with:
Uluru: World’s
Largest Monolith?
In
making this video and planning how I would use it in a unit of work, I feel
that I have a much better understanding of the benefits and possible pitfalls of
using video with students. I have listed these in the SWOT analysis below.
Scaffolding the Use of Video
Making
a video myself helped me to see what kind of guidance students would need to
tackle such a complex project successfully. This type of assessment involves
complex, higher order thinking skills such as planning, collaboration and a
range of different skills from recording and editing video to making music,
presenting narration or making scientific models. It might be quite daunting
for students to be given such a large project to work on. A clear timetable
with due dates for each step might be required to keep students on track. And for
all students to have a chance to contribute and attain success, scaffolding
would be vital. Below is a diagram explaining the type of scaffolding that
could be used for these lessons.
Video and the SAMR Model
Finally, as an example of how video
could be used at each of the levels of the SAMR model, I investigated my own
lesson plan design.
Here is a summary of the different ways
video could be used in my Uluru lesson to achieve enhancement and then
transformation:
Adapted from: http://www.hippasus.com/rrpweblog/
But
it was a bit more challenging this week to consider how to use these tools in a
science classroom. In general I feel that science at high school is often
taught as a “memorise this list” kind of subject.
I have occasionally seen some excellent
examples of ICT use in science such as when I was a first year university student
and our professor created his own program with interactive videos, quizzes, and
links to help us study oxidative phosphorylation. That was quite some time ago,
so we each had to bring our own blank CD and he burned us a copy. It’s
eye-opening to realise how quickly ICTs have changed and to start to appreciate
just what we can achieve for and with our students. This week, I think I
managed to make a start on creating content and mapping ideas for how to use
ICTs effectively in the science classroom. It’s also been a pleasure over the
past three weeks to read the blogs of others who will be teaching and maths and
science and to see what ideas they have for the use of ICTs. By the end of this
course, I might have the start of a professional ICT library (and some software
that will actually run on my Windows 7 laptop)!
References
Walsh,
M. 2009. Pedagogic Potentials of
Multimodal Literacies. Chapter 3, p10. http://www.acu.edu.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0007/195676/Chapter_3_Multimodal_Literacy_M_Walsh.pdf
Retrieved
March 28, 2015.
CQU
Moodle coursework Pedagogic Content Knowledge Week 3 Study Guide
Retrieved
March 20, 2015
Retrieved
March 14, 2015
Australian
Copyright Council, 2012. Music: Use in
Student Films & Videos
Retrieved April 1, 2015
Retrieved April 1, 2015
References
for Video
Retrieved
March 28, 2015
Retrieved
April 2, 2015
Retrieved March 28, 2015
Fantastic blog, I love the movie you made, it was a great hook to a topic. Your newspaper article is the best I've read and is spot on! Great work!
ReplyDeleteGreat job Jamie. Movie Maker has changed a bit, but it is still a great tool for creating videos, and you can't argue over the cost. Nice use of images to show your SAMR and SWOT models.
ReplyDeleteRegards Katrina