Lauren Taylor's Portfolio

I wonder if I put a few words here?

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Group Inquiry Blog 2

February 6, 2020 / / 0 Comments

For this weeks blog, we have decided as a group to discuss our personal experiences and opinions on technology shortcuts. For this blog we have all posted our blogs separately.

Personally, I have used many different technology shortcuts like spellcheck, a dragon (headset that reads to you and writes what you say), and a software that reads to me. From Kindergarten to grade 4 I went to a Francophone school and was unable to read or write in English (my first language) so I transferred to a French Immersion school in grade 5. Unfortunately, I was very behind in English and was unable to do the assignments and activities that my peers were doing. I was then given different technology shortcut tools to help me succeed. When my peers were reading a novel, I would sit at the computer and have the computer read me the novel. When my peers were writing, I would sit at the computer and speak into my dragon and it would copy exactly what I said. I think these tools were very helpful for me when I was learning English because I was able to see and follow along while studying the proper grammar.

Now in life, I do use spellcheck frequently for my assignments as well as on my exams. I do not think I would be successful in university without the extra help; therefore, I strongly believe that technology shortcuts have there place in schools.

Free Inquiry Blog #4

February 4, 2020 / / 0 Comments

I continue to learn Spanish and personally, I believe it is going well. Today was my 13th day in a row of completing my daily goal on Duolingo. This process is definitely going way better than I thought. I was unsure about teaching myself Spanish at the beginning because languages can be challenging to learn and easy to give up on. I do think that the reminders on my phone and the motivation to continue my streak is why I continue to do it on a daily basis. I also know that if you do not use the language, you lose the language and I do not want to lose all the hard work I have already done.

On Duolingo, I am learning more words and complex sentences. When I do not know the meaning of a word or which word to choose, I try to figure it out by using my knowledge in other words to see what the sentence is trying to say. I am still not strong enough in Spanish to speak some simpler sentences but hopefully I will be soon. I find that I know what the words look like in Spanish when it is in a list right in front of me but I am unable to think of the word without seeing it. I believe this will change as I get stronger and more confident with the language. 

The more I learn Spanish the more I cannot wait to travel again. I hope someday (soon) to go to Spain and use the Spanish that I am learning.

Blog #1

February 4, 2020 / / 0 Comments

On January 27 we had our first working class where we learned the different notes on a sheet of music. I completely forgot how the notes on the line spell out Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge and the notes between the lines spell D following by FACE. This will certainly help me remember the notes and the order of the notes for future reference. I worked with others who are also playing the recorders on the first three notes (B, A, and G) and worked on the correct positioning of the tongue and lips while playing. I have a wooden recorder and I find it to be a lot quieter and harder to perform the notes that involve more holes being covered, for example the note G. A music professor came into the room and said that wooden recorders are actually better and that I needed to work on it to get better with getting the sound through. As a small group, we watched youtube videos to learn the notes and practiced along with the video. I found the video helpful because we could hear how the notes were supposed to sound compared to how we made them sound. We also took turns playing the recorder on the same note to hear the similarities and differences between our recorders. My goals that I will plan to obtain before the next class that we are working on our growth plan is to learn more notes and play the notes correctly.

February 4 Blog-Khan Academy

February 4, 2020 / / 0 Comments

Our group chose to research Khan Academy as our tech topic today.  Khan Academy is an online learning resource that creates lessons and videos on a wide range of subjects and topics. It was created in 2008 by Salman Khan, and aims to provide free education for students everywhere. The website states, “Our mission at Khan Academy is to provide a free, world-class education for anyone, anywhere.” The lessons are done in the form of videos, with an instructor drawing about and explaining the topic. There are also opportunities to be tested. The main courses offered are Math, Science and Engineering, Arts and Humanities, College, careers and more, and economics and finance. Within each of these topics there are more specific subjects.  

 

Educational technology such as Khan Academy helps make education and support accessible to all learners. When using this kind of tool, it is important to consider the pros and cons, as well as privacy issues that you may need to be aware of.

 

Pros:

– help teach students on their own

– easy to access

– wide range of topics/subjects

– you can learn at your own pace

– there are ways to test your learning

– many different questions to ensure you understand

– free, nonprofit

– when students need further explanation about a topic, if the teacher is not easily available for one on one help, Khan Academy can be a resource for that extra guidance.

– can be a good studying tool

-encourages UDL and individual pace of learning

 

Cons:

–  no real classrooms

– teachers are not present

– still very conventional (SAT MCAT prep)

– students must have access to an electronic device and internet connection

– innate differentiation between students

– sometimes you have to sort through many different examples to find one that suits your specific needs/learning style

– when learning from video examples, it can be difficult to replay the same video to go over a specific aspect of the video, as the system tries to move forward onto the next video, however if you access it from another source, the video will play.

– loss of collaboration

– only one teaching style

– the videos could be to fast for some students to follow

– cannot ask specific questions about a subject. The videos are good but if you are not sure about something explained there is no way to clarify

– Students can work ahead of where their class is if they have a strong interest in a subject and then when they are in class they are bored and can start causing disruptions 

 

Privacy Policies:

https://www.khanacademy.org/about/privacy-policy

By: Lauren T, Alison, Meghan, Kiya

Group Inquiry Blog 1

January 30, 2020 / / 0 Comments

Our group tech inquiry topic that we have chosen is “how to prevent student dependency on technology shortcuts such as auto-correct, talk to text, and text to talk.”  For some students, and in some situations, these are very helpful tools. However, in many cases, students rely on these tools for efficiency purposes which causes them to lose some basic literacy skills in the process. We believe this is a growing problem in schools today with the ever-increasing use of technology in classrooms starting at a younger age. As an example, the use of autocorrect and spell check is preventing students from learning valuable grammar skills.  Throughout this project, we would like to investigate the effects this has on student learning. We are curious if students reach a competent level of literacy and grammar skills, will they diminish with the increased use of shortcut tools? We will research studies online, talk with practicing educators, and speak with peers about their own experiences with these tools in school. 

 

This is a link to an older article we found which looks at the effect of technology on student writing:  file:///C:/Users/megha/AppData/Local/Temp/1661-Article%20Text-1790-1-10-20110511.pdf

By: Lauren T, Alison, Meghan

Free Inquiry Blog #3

January 28, 2020 / / 0 Comments

I believe my Free Inquiry project on learning Spanish is going well. I am doing exercises on my phone daily and I think I am learning at a good pace. I have reached a level where I am now being tested on my pronunciation, word choice, listening skills, and translating. My knowledge in French is really helping me chose and remember words. Later on, I believe I will be tested on my spelling and I am worried about that.

I have also been texting my brother in Spanish. My sentences are very basic like I am a girl, you are a boy, I drink milk, I drink water, etc but he responds in a few sentences. I find it challenging at times but I break up the sentence and use my knowledge in French to figure out what he is saying. I will attempt to translate it and send it back in English to see if I was correct. Overall, I have exceeded my expectations at this point in time.

My next steps are to continue doing my daily exercises on Duolingo. Every day these exercises become more and more challenging and work on different words/sentences for different situations. So far I have worked on introduction, simple phrases, and travel phrases. In my future exercises, I will be learning words that will help me in different situations. These situations include restaurants, family, shopping, school, and people.

January 28 blog

January 28, 2020 / / 0 Comments

Today we had the privilege of going on a field trip to Pacific School of Innovation and Inquiry. It was very interesting to see the differences in their school which is based around Inquiry and comparing it to the experiences I have had in a public school. I found it interesting that they have had 2800 visitors from all around the world to observe how their school functions. I really liked the idea of expanding their learning into the community by using the ice rink, YMCA, etc instead of keeping the learning within the school walls.

During my visit, I observed many differences from what I am used to, for example, the different classrooms and how/what the students were working on. I believe this school can help many students to have a better and more successful school experience by giving them a lot of freedom in their learning. Students will always be interested in what they are learning because they chose the topic. Students also set their own goals and time frames so they are able to work at their own pace, which I can also see as being a negative aspect.

Although I believe this school has many benefits, I also have some concerns. If a student always chooses to work in a quiet room, are they learning how to interact and communicate with others? If a student chooses not to work one day and on their daily plan they have nothing, is anyone making sure they do work? Another concern I have is how does this school environment prepare the students for university? I understand that these students will have the studying skill to do the homework that comes after class but these students will not be prepared to have a routine of going to lectures or labs every day.

I believe this school can work for some students but not all. Personally, I would not function in a school like this one. I need structure and routine… the two main things this school does not have. I like to be told what to learn, when to learn it by, and the assignments I am to do. I also do not believe I would be as motivated to work as I have the capability of setting my own daily goals.

January 21 class

January 21, 2020 / / 0 Comments

In class today we watched the movie “Rip! A Remix Manifesto” by Brett Gaylor. This movie surprised me the entire time. I knew copyright was strictly based on the intolerance of plagiarism in school but I did not realize the complexity of copyright. This movie has made me wonder… am I allowed to sing songs with my friends?… When you are using an artist’s work but changing it, why does it depend on the situation if this is considered plagiarism?… If 52 million people were copyright criminals, shouldn’t the laws be changed?… What makes specific people a target to the RIAA because I think there are way more people that have copyrighted than they can target… Why can you not just cite and reference a song at the end of your video like you do for other people’s writing/words… Everything comes from something, artists are inspired by nature so are they copyrighting nature?… If an artist creates a song with two notes the same in the same order, is that considered copyright? I found it very interesting that you are allowed to use 10% of a song for commercial uses without paying for it but this movie has made me think back and reconsider all the music, short films, and videos I have created for past school projects and if I was copyrighting. I also did not realize that I could have been fined for singing “Happy Birthday” in public before last year. I still do not fully understand copyright and all the rules that come with it but I strongly believe copyright has created a world full of criminals.

https://www.nfb.ca/film/rip_a_remix_manifesto/

 

I believe the resources that were shown in class today in regards to Open Educational Resources will be helpful in the future. I will use some of them to ensure I am not copyrighting in my future classrooms. The con that comes with these resources is that there may not be as many options, some of them may not work, and they are not as fast and convenient. 

Free Inquiry Blog #2

January 21, 2020 / / 0 Comments

I have just started to learn Spanish and it is going well so far. I believe this is a good topic for my Free Inquiry project because I am passionate and motivated to learn. I have downloaded a language app called “Duolingo” and it is very simple to use. I am using the app to get a beginning knowledge of the language because it has different levels and becomes more challenging as I progress. I have set up to receive notifications every day as a reminder to work on it for 10 minutes. Setting a small amount of time aside every day to work on Spanish is a more realistic goal for me with my busy schedule. It is more likely for me to keep going with this daily goal when I can do it anywhere at any time.

So far I have enjoyed the app. It reads the sentences to me so I can hear the proper pronunciation and tests me on my translation from Spanish to English and English to Spanish. In today’s lesson I learned how to say “I am a woman,” “I am a man,” “I am a girl,” “I am a boy,” and “I eat apples.” Thinking back to the lesson I know what the words look like but if I was tested right now I would not succeed. Hopefully, with more practice, I will remember more of the words and sentences I learned that day/lesson. The only concern I have about this app that may change in the future is that it does not test my pronunciation/speaking skills. If the app does not have the ability to test my speaking in future lessons, I may have to download another app.

I have learned one lesson already from this app. This lesson is not to pick my answer based on the picture or character they provide. I was tricked many times for example it was asking me what is “nina” in English (which is a girl)  but there is a boy character that read the word to me. This will help me actually learn the words and not rely heavily on the characters and pictures. I have hopefully learned my lesson and will not proceed to fall for their tricks.

January 14th class

January 14, 2020 / / 0 Comments

Today in class we set up Trello. I have to admit, it was one of the simpler software to set up that I have experienced. The instructions provided were easy to follow and the site seems easy to function (of what I did today). Trello is a computer software that allows you to make lists, share the lists, and add attachments such as pictures, videos, links, etc. I see this website as an online calendar.

Depending on the person there are pros and cons to this computer software. In my opinion, this computer software is good to keep everything organized and together. It is beneficial to be able to add links, pictures, videos, etc into your calendar. It is also nice that it is online; therefore, you can reach it on any device. On the other hand, relying on the use of technology can bring some cons. If you do not have internet at home (I grew up without internet or a computer) it can become challenging to find your schedule. Also I and some others struggle with technology because I find it to cause a lot of unnecessary stress while I am trying to figure out my way around the site. I think I will enjoy this site whence I know how to work it.

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