Week 4, Reflection 3

Welcome back everyone, this week is all about the different technologies that can be used in classrooms; specifically the use of images, podcasts and videos.
So for this week’s blog post I have uploaded a podcast to my wiki that takes you through all of the written work below (this week’s reflection), what each digital tool is, what they can be used for in a class environment and an elaboration of one of these tools and the pedagogical advantages of using this tool in music classes.


To start my reflection: images.  Personally, I like the use of images in classroom environments, relating to the class texts and getting students excited for up-coming topics.  Images can be used for so many different things, like engaging the students’ cognitive skills, influencing their emotions, supporting the students’ skill development.  Imagery can be used to advertise an up-coming topic, hinting at what the subject might be; engaging students in a topic before it even starts.

Using imagery in class environments will also open the student’s RAS’s and let their limbic system (amygdala) and pre-frontal cortex be engaged in the learning environment.  There are many things that teachers should be aware about when using imagery in classroom though.  First and foremost is confidentiality and consent; no parent wants their child’s face all over the internet, whether it was a class task or project where other students took photos or if consent was given but the identity of the child was blatant and any stranger could identify and find the child just from a photo online.


Digital Videoing is the topic of discussion next in line. So please click play and watch as I beautifully (cough cough) reflect on videos.

Reflection on using Windows Live Movie Maker:
 Making a movie was... interesting, to say the least. Recording everything was easy, I decided on what I wanted to say and made a script, I planned to be in different places around my house so that I could play around with the effects moving from one scene to the next and I added my dogs into the video to make it cute. All of this was easy, it didn’t take me long and the ease of it made me want to make the movie 50 minutes long.

Luckily I didn’t though because when it got to the stage of using the Movie Maker editing tools, I got lost. Like, very lost... It took me probably an hour of mucking around with the tools to get it to do what I wanted and then from there everything went pretty quickly, so trial and error for the win! YAY! In a class setting, I would recommend this, but space it out over lessons, so the students plan and film in one class. Learn how to use the editing tools in another and actually edit and complete their film in another class. Because otherwise it would take too long and everyone wouldn’t learn because they’d be too focused trying to figure out how to use the program.
Besides my technological incompetence, this whole movie making process was relatively easy, and I really enjoyed learning how to use the tools to make my own video.


I’m going to end my reflection of each of the tools with a podcast about podcasts as it will be the tool I will elaborate on.

listen to ‘My Podcast About Podcasts’ on audioBoom

Here is the podcast I found on AudioBoom about the benefits of musical education:
https://audioboom.com/boos/2677439-the-benefits-of-musical-education




Reflection on using Audacity to make my podcast: I think you can tell throughout my podcast, and my reflection on using Audacity to edit a song, but Audacity is super easy to use. I used Audacity to record my podcast, with the simplest click of a button (there on the left, the big red circle!) I then did some quick editing to make everything that little bit more perfect (it’s weird listening to your own voice over and over again) And then I exported the file, uploaded it to AudioBoom, and here we are! At the end of my reflection, beaming because AudioBoom, Audacity and podcasts are all easy tools to use and would benefit classrooms in an immense way.















Last but not least, I have created a table to elaborate on how podcasts fall into each category of the SAMR model, in the case of using them for musical education in schools:

Ok, so that’s my reflection this week. I hope you enjoyed reading/watching/listening and I’ll see you again next week for some technological fun!


References:



Cathcart, M (N/A) The Benefits of Musical Education, retrieved from: https://audioboom.com/boos/2677439-the-benefits-of-musical-education 

Holmes, Gary (2015) Digital Tools 4: Images, retrieved from: This week’s moodle material.

Stansbury, Meris (2008) Analysis: How Multimedia can Improve Learning, retrieved from: http://www.eschoolnews.com/2008/03/26/analysis-how-multimedia-can-improve-learning/

Willis, Judy (2010) How the Brain Learns Best: Strategies to Make Learning Stick, retrieved from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eMZnfFD1maU&feature=youtu.be 

Gordon Goodwin's Big Phat Band (2011) Rhapsody in Blue, Gordon Goodwin's That's How We Roll

Gordon Goodwin's Big Phat Band (2004) The Quiet Corner, Gordon Goodwin's Big Phat Band XXL

Gordon Goodwin's Big Phat Band (2001) Sing, Sang, Sung, Gordon Goodwin's Swingin' For the Fences

Week 3, Reflection 2

The Use of ICT’s in Education.

In this week’s post I will be discussing the use of specific ICT’s in classrooms. This week we learnt about Wikis, Blogs and Websites.
The activity we are tasked with is to reflect on one of these ICTs. For this, I have chosen to create a ‘Weebly’ which will contain my reflection on Blogs.
So without further delay, please redirect yourself to the Weebly link below and continue reading.

http://ictsineverydayeducation.weebly.com/

I had a few technical difficulties uploading Paul onto Weebly. So the “Blog Features” section of my website, will instead be here. So without further adieu:

Blog Features:

Now we move on to the technical features of a blog. To take you through some of the technical features I have created a Voki, click on his play button and read along as Paul talks you through the second half of this post:


When creating a blog there are many things that you look forward to doing and many things that you really don't want to do. When I constructed my blog, the set up was easy. Blog spot gave me templates, fonts, ways to arrange my page and more. Everything was set up for me, I just had to choose what I liked.

What I like most about my blog spot, is even though it has been set up and I have posted numerously, I can still customise and change the design if I wish to, as easy as pie.
Blog spot has many technical features that you can change to individualize, so that the blog is your own.



You can change the writings font, colour, size and location on the page as well as add images, videos and links. You can add Voki's like myself, wordle's and gifs - images that can be either animated or static. In some blogs, you can view how many people have seen your page in a day, who has subscribed to follow you and you can also follow other peoples blogs as well.

You can comment on other peoples blogs. I like to comment on other blogs because they have helped me understand something further, or I want to know more information. I can connect with these people through blogs.


Now that you have read my reflection on blogs please continue your viewing to my Wiki space to read my reflection of the pedagogical advantages of using blogs in classrooms.

https://icts0228156.wikispaces.com

So you’ve finished visiting my Weebly and Wiki.

Congratulations. That means you’ve finished this week’s blog post!!


References:

CelebQuote (2013) Ray Charles, retrieved from: http://www.celebquote.com/16603

Localadz (2014) Web Design Quotes, retrieved from: http://localadz.com-get-more.net/web-design-prices/web-design-quotes/

No author (N/A) Critical Thinking Ideas, retrieved from: http://weblearn.weebly.com/critical-thinking-ideas.html

Picture of Computers and I blog, You Blog: Google Images

Picture of web in world: Begg, J (2013) Computing and ICT, retrieved from: http://www.sec-ed.co.uk/best-practice/free-online-tools-for-education

Reynard, R (2008) Avoiding the 5 Most Common Mistakes in Using Blogs with Students, retrieved from: http://campustechnology.com/Articles/2008/10/Avoiding-the-5-Most-Common-Mistakes-in-Using-Blogs-with-Students.aspx?Page=1

Schrock, K (2014) SAMR and Bloom's, retrieved from: http://www.schrockguide.net/samr.html

Week 2, Reflection 1.5: De Bono's Thinking Hats

I told you to stay tuned!

In this reflection I will be talking about this week’s activity which was a mobile phone discussion in WikiSpaces using De Bono’s Thinking Hats, but before we get started on my thoughts and reflections how about a little bit of an introduction for those of you who may not be familiar with the concept. And to do so, why not a short video?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rwu1YlveU_4 

Well I did say it was a short video…

In the Wiki activity that was completed this week we needed to get into groups and put on our “thinking hats” to discuss mobile phone use within classroom settings. The scaffolding used for this exercise (De Bono’s) was an ingenious way to create collaboration between peers because for each hat we had to put ourselves in different mind sets to answer the relevant questions. The easiest way I found to put on each colour hat for the discussion, was to continually check back in on this picture:

While completing the Wiki activity, the learning theories came up, and more specifically if I thought any of the learning theories reflected in the activity.  And personally, I can only see two of the learning theories being reflected in this activity; Social Cognitivism and Connectivism. Social cognitivism is present in this activity because we bounce ideas off of each other, read other peoples point of views and write our own point of view based on what has been collaboratively said and discussed and my own knowledge of the problem. Connectivism in this activity is pretty self-explanatory as we are using an online forum to collaborate ideas with peers from around Australia and even Tasmania (I think) and the discussion of mobile phone falls under connectivism because students are using phones in their classes for work and to connect with other students. 

The wiki was set up so that a few people could put their ideas into each hats box, in different colours so we knew what view belonged to which person. The layout of the wiki space was a good idea, however getting to the finished product was a lot harder than I originally thought it would be. Changing the colour, font and size of the text proved to be quite the challenge, as well as being cautious not to type over anyone else’s views.

I personally liked the engagement of the wiki activity, and didn’t find it too hard to participate as the scaffolding made it easier to answer the questions and voice my opinions. I think that if it was an online activity for students to participate in, students would be engaged and have quite a lot of opinions, and would happily take their studies home with them because they are still interacting with their friends in an educational way. 

However, in saying that there are a lot of bad things about the wiki space that would be an issue in a school environment and would hinder students from learning. The first is cyber-bullying. Although a teacher would monitor the wiki space, students still have the capabilities and ruthlessness to bully others over the internet and will use any means possible. Another drawback of the wiki is the editing design which I said before I found hard to use, time consuming, and sometimes confusing. This will hinder students learning as they will get discouraged if the software is hard to use or takes to long, and will give up before the task is started.

To end this week blogging, I want to leave you with this colourful little picture, because to teach students content, you need to have a belt of effective pedagogies, and technology is one pedagogical method that will help a lot in this modern age to get the content of lessons across to students. 

Have a wonderful week everybody, until next time :D

References:
TheBegtangan (2012) Six Thinking Hats.wmv,  retrieved from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rwu1YlveU_4%C2%A0

FAHE11001 (2015) De Bono's Six Hats Activity, retrieved from: http://debonoshats.wikispaces.com/

Google Images

Week 2, Reflection 1

Well hello again, it’s good to see you all.

This week we will be discussing a few topics.  The first is good pedagogy, my understanding and an example of good pedagogy from my experience.  To make this section more interesting, I created a short video using a 3D program called ‘Alice’, I hope you enjoy!  The second item on the agenda is Bloom’s Taxonomy, SAMR and more specifically what links them together to create a deeper understanding of effective teaching methods.

In the video above you will have noticed a lot of different ideas on what good pedagogies are.  There is just one problem. All of the things that make good pedagogical content can make bad pedagogy as well; it all depends on the learners. Let me give you a for instance:

I currently teach in primary schools, and I have this group of boys learning trumpet and they just don’t seem to understand the saying ‘Practice makes Perfect’. It has been a very trying few weeks for me, repeating the same information and the same exercises week in, week out. I tried re arranging where they sat in the classroom. I did theory with them, teaching them ‘FACE’ and ‘EveryGoodBoyDeservesFruit’, but it seemed to no avail. I set them a homework task last week. I sent them home with a piece of sheet music filled with notes, all over the page and their task was to write the note names underneath and bring it back, using the mnemonics that I taught them over and over again.

And the result?

Majority of the notes were named correctly, they had even placed the mnemonics underneath the homework so they had something to relate to. I had them chanting the sayings in class numerous times and in this class where they gave me their homework, it seems that I actually had gotten through to them, I just hadn’t given them a chance to show me what they can do!

In that same lesson, the boys started learning pieces of music in their ‘Tradition of Excellence’ books. I hadn’t started them in the book because they didn’t seem to be grasping what I was teaching, but when we opened to the first page and I quizzed them on what the notes were they had almost no trouble answering me. And when I had them play, their rhythms were correct and their notes were too!! I had only gone through rhythm with them as a theory on the whiteboard but they knew. They had remembered what I had been teaching them through mnemonics, repetition, chanting, written tasks and practice. I was teaching using good pedagogies, but I wasn’t seeing them as good, making teaching lessons harder and learning even harder.


Ok, now that effective pedagogy is out of the way let’s dive into the fun world of Bloom’s taxonomy and SAMR. Blooms taxonomy is a way to promote higher forms of thinking in classrooms through activities where analysing and evaluating concepts, principles, processes and procedures are used to help students have a deeper understanding of the subject content they are taught. This helps student’s move away from rote learning (just remembering the facts) so that their knowledge of the content grows and their understanding develops at a higher level.  Blooms’ taxonomy began with three domains of educational activities to enhance students understanding, but through continuous research has developed and grown, using technologies and more modern concepts to enhance the student learning.

http://www.nwlink.com/~donclark/hrd/bloom.html#cognitive

The SAMR model works in the same way as Blooms taxonomy does. SAMR is a way to enhance and transform students learning so that they have a deeper understanding of the subject being taught and I have included a short video below explaining SAMR further, using technology in classrooms as an example: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=us0w823KY0g

As you can see from the SAMR video and the brief explanation of Blooms taxonomy, there is not much that differs between the two pedagogical methods. Blooms taxonomy can be used to break down the SAMR model further and when used together will create the best learning environment for students, where their knowledge and understanding of subjects enhance and transform and their cognitive vortex is engaged and retaining the information discussed through activities and different pedagogical methods. This link between the SAMR model and Blooms Taxonomy is demonstrated perfectly in the image below as it shows what skills and activities will enhance and transform students understandings.

Stay tuned, because up next is my reflection on ‘De Bono’s Hats’!!

References:
Good Pedagogies - Made by me, using: www.alice.org

Google Images

Donald Clark (1999-2015) Bloom's Taxonomy on Learning Domains, retrieved from: http://www.nwlink.com/~donclark/hrd/bloom.html#cognitive

Candace M (2013) SAMR in 120 Seconds, retrieved from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=us0w823KY0g

Week 1: The Learning Theories

Hello again J

This is also week 1’s tasks but I have decided to split the information into two posts so you don’t get bored with me and close your RAS’s (:P) The task set for this blog post is to reflect on the 3 learning theories which are: behaviourism; cognitivism; and social cognitivism and add in what I think about connectivism – which isn’t one of the three learning theories but plays a major role in using ICT’s in modern classrooms to advance students learning.  I will start by explaining what each of the learning theories are in relation to my teaching area.

Behaviourism is where as you teach a student their behaviours change around what you have taught them. In the case of instrumental teaching, as I teach a trumpet player to sit with his/her back up straight, feet flat on the floor, with the correct embouchure and to hold the trumpet up and not let it drop, and I continue to reiterate that this is the correct way to play the trumpet, the students behaviour will change around this information and he/she will automatically sit with feet flat, back straight and correct embouchure before playing.

Cognitivism in instrumental music is the knowledge of notes, scales, correct fingering, all of the theory behind playing an instrument being repeated until the information is stored in the students long term memory.  If I didn’t repeat the information that I taught a student regarding the theory behind performance, the information would only barely make it to the students short term memory and they will eventually forget.

In Instrumental Music, and orchestras more importantly, social cognitivism is where the students learn from each other and discuss what they have learnt in lessons, furthering their knowledge and engraining it into their memories further.

Connectivism would help instrumentalists as they could advertise if there are upcoming performances on Facebook, Google, twitter, any social media sites so their audiences will grow and they will get more coverage for the events they do.  Students who study music could also get in contact with professional performers and learn from their experiences; create a blog and talk through the pros and cons that they have come across during their learning experiences and even find music that they would like to perform and bring it to bands, making their learning more self-directed.

From my experiences teaching these past few weeks and learning since grade 5, there is no one learning theory that informs successful learning approaches. All of the learning theories are important to music education and how students learn.

Week 1: Know your Learner

This week’s tasks started with a webinar by psychologist and teacher Judy Willis.  The Key features she talked about in “How the Brain Learns Best” was what causes stress in classrooms; how to de-stress students so they learn better and ideas to get the course materials through students ‘RAS’, into the Limbic System and finally into the Pre-Frontal Cortex or “Thinking Brain”.

Ok, so I know all of that sounds a little scary.  And it is.  Until it gets broken down into sections, so here goes:

First with stress. I found the stress part of the webinar interesting because –although she went into stress only briefly – she talked about ways to de-stress situations and related back to simple human nature.  Or should I say, Mother Nature.  Judy Willis used the analogy that students are like baby foxes. A fox will pop its head out of its home to discover if anything has changed. It smells sees and feels danger. The same goes for students. If something is different, they will immediately begin to stress.  

When the RAS closes because a student gets stressed, it has been recorded that students react in three main ways.  They fight back with the teacher, they flee from the stressful situation or they freeze completely.  In the webinar, Judy Willis provides ways to prevent the Fight, Flight or Freeze reactions with easy steps that any teacher can do periodically within a class. The de-stressing prevention methods that I would use in a classroom to keep stress levels low would be to include individual whiteboards in my classes. This way, when you ask a question, all of the students write the answer on their whiteboard and hold it up so only I can see what they have said. The students aren’t worrying about being wrong or being embarrassed to talk in front of their classmates and stress levels are already significantly lower. 

I will also use frequent feedback as a way to prevent stress because the students will have a chance to discuss amongst themselves and with me what they are struggling with, what they want to know more of and they will be able to help each other understand the content from the lessons, further ingraining the knowledge in their own brain.  As a teacher I will also use the student’s strengths to help them combat fear.  If a student is very tech-savvy I will request for them to find additional information online to share with the class.  If they are very artistic, I will ask them to create a poster/diagram/sculpture/etc. to do with the topic that will be engaging for the whole class.

Another technique that I would use is individualisation of the students, whether they are falling behind or getting bored because they already know the content. I would let the students falling behind know that the expectations I have for them isn’t to understand all of the information right away because they will pick up key words and pieces of information and I will discuss with them later in the class the topics that they are struggling with. I would individualise the students who are excelling and getting bored by informing them that they can go on in the textbooks or go online and do some extra research or give them activities to engage them in learning while I teach the rest of the students.

Now onto the “thinking brain”.  Judy Willis highlighted that this was where all of the conscious thought takes place and that information needs to travel through the RAS, into the amygdala which then passes information onto the pre-frontal cortex allowing the students to learn and develop their knowledge on course topics. A few techniques I will be using – that was mentioned in the webinar – to gain the attention of my students and to stimulate curiosity (allowing information through the RAS) will be to surprise the students. Whether this is by dressing up as Johann Sebastion Bach (can you imagine a 20 year old female in that costume – yikes!!), or advertising future lessons in a fun way that makes the students guess what is to come.  

I will use movement, if I dance around the class or have the students repeat specific movements that relate to a certain topic or idea that has just been said, or I could use colour, maybe I’d have the kids paint all of the keywords they hear during a lesson on a big canvas to be hung in the classroom.  I could also use different technologies to keep their brains engaged, have them create a blog and write reflections on each weeks classes (:P) or have them discover the meaning of words as I teach them the topic so that they can share extra content that they have found by themselves.

No matter what techniques I use or what topic I teach, I will make sure that the information gets through to the students in a fun way, so they never feel like they are learning, but that they feel involved and so that they show up to the next class with bright smiles, their pre-frontal cortex wide awake, open for business and ready to receive information, and their stress levels are down so that they welcome learning as if it was play time.

With all of the above in mind I have come to the conclusion that the shortcomings of traditional classrooms and the way curriculum was taught before the age of modern technologies brought a negative effect on students learning and information retention as they were given one chance to take in all of the information in topics. This shortcoming differs today as the materials for learning is online, giving students multiple opportunities to catch up on things they might have missed or to clarify what they didn't understand. Because of this digital age, instead of students being forced to learn at the same speed, a students learning can be self-paced and self-directed so that they are involving themselves in their learning more than if they were i a classroom setting.

References:
Google Images

Introducing Trumpet Take Over

Hello Everyone, 
My name is Monique Pearce, and over the next few weeks you will be getting to know me through reflections of what I am learning in my Post Graduate of Learning and Teaching.  More Specifically, my ICT's for Learning Design classes.  I completed my Bachelor in Jazz and Popular Music (specializing on Trumpet) in 2014 and have been fortunate in landing teaching jobs in primary schools in Gladstone and the surrounding towns.  I hope to put all of my learnings into practice as I get ready for the practicums to come within the Graduate Diploma at these schools and look forward to testing different strategies to find what helps students learn best.
Before I start reflecting on each weeks topics, I'll provide a bit of a background about myself. 

I am a born and bred Gladstone-ite and didn't want to be a music teacher until grade 9/10 of high school.  No, I wanted to be an actor.  And yes I mean actor, I see no reason why we label silver screen workers in gender specified classifications.  That's like splitting doctors into doctors and doctoress's. It doesn't make sense to me.  Anyway, realization hit me in the face one day when I was telling some friends what I wanted to be my career choice and got shot down (hard).  I started to re-evaluate my life choices, and the only constant that I kept going back to was music.  Music was my everything.  It had the ability to change my moods, to make me happy or sad or angry or empowered.  I could turn to music in my times of need and forget the world.  My best moments in high school (besides drama) was when I was surrounded by music, whether I was in band, or class or lessons.  It was music that made me smile.  

And so the path to music teacher began.  It consumed me, it was all I wanted.  I didn't have the drive to be a constant performer.  But I could teach.  I love helping others, whether it's my sister with her TAFE work, or my friends with their UNI assignments.  I was a student mentor at the University last year, and helping students with their assignments (which 90% of the time I didn't understand the content) made me feel good.  Seeing them happy that they received good marks for their assignments and kept on track every week so they weren't behind in their studies.  I feel good knowing that I'm helping another open their brain to more information; helping them succeed at what they want to do.  

And music does that!  There has been so much research into music and the brain, experiments with people who have Parkinson's disease.  Autistic children.  Students from all backgrounds.  Music is something that connects people from so many different ethnic backgrounds because it's a non-verbal form of communication that forces the emotion that you feel from it bring you closer to others.  It doesn't matter if your Spanish or German or Indian.  If a good song comes on that is full of happiness, everyone will be dancing and smiling.  

Music is that powerful.  And I want to rally behind that power and teach others to experience the life that music can give you, that so many other things cannot.