Notebook software and online teaching

My first online teaching experience went pretty well.  I did not rehearse what I was going to say much before so I spent a lot of time stumbling and say “uhh”.  It looked at the experience as a test experience before our March online teaching, so I can live with it.  Some things I have learned are:

1. I have problems following the chat and talking at the same time.  With more experience teaching online, I should get better at this.

2. I need to practice and plan more of what I am going to say so I do not stumble as much.

3. Rather then having people typing questions in the chat while I am talking I should ask people to put up their “elluminate hand” and address questions that way.  But with practice and more online teaching I may not have to worry about this because I should get better at reading the chat while talking.

During my portion of the elluminate session I use the recorder built into Notebook software to record my teaching.  I am quite happy with how it worked.  With the notebook recorder you have a few different options for recording.  You can record your entire desktop (which I did), a window, or draw a rectangle around a certain section of your screen you would like to record.  I will be using the recorder to make a screen cast of how to upload onto slideshare for Jordan and my collaborative project.  The recorder worked very well to record the desktop and the voice from my mic.  The only downfall I found was that it did not record the audio from the elluminate session.  In the last 45 seconds of my recording Dean is talking and I did not stop the recording because I wanted what he was saying in the recording.  His voice did not record so the video ends with 45 seconds of silence.  I do not know if I can change a setting or something to record the audio off the desktop; that is something I have to check into further.

There are two other uses for the notebook recorder.  One is to pre-record a lesson or video to play for student; either when a sub is in your class, or if you are in a split class you can play a recording for one grade while you work with the other grade.  Another use is to record your smartboard lesson while you are doing it.  This is a great option for reviewing or playing for students who missed the class.  This works much the same as recording the elluminate sessions.

In the making of my slides, I used shots of part of my screen (iTunes and my Google reader).  For this I used the capture tool in notebook.  Notebook screen capture tool can be used to capture an image of an entire screen, part of a screen, draw a box around something (which I used), or an irregular line around something (eg. someone’s face).  When the capture is made it is put into a slide in notebook, which you can copy and paste, and use like any other image.

Both the recorder and the capture tool are both tools which are bonus parts of the notebook software.  You can watch the recording of my online teaching below.

It makes no sense to me

Yesterday I was talking with a friend of mine about how stupid it was that the Canadian men’s hockey team beats Russia in a quarter final game and it was getting more press then actual medal winners.  Canada’s women’s bobsleigh team wins gold and silver medals and the short-track speed skaters take the silver, but they are not written about until section C Page 2.  But the big news in the hockey game, not only front page news of the A section but also the C (sports) section.  I just can not figure this out; it is just a quarter final game and not a medal win.  I guess I should state that I am not a sports fan.  I generally do not watch any sports other than Saskatchewan Roughrider games with my wife.  She is the sports fan in our family.

I went out to get the newspaper this morning and what do I find on the front cover…”One Gold one to go…”  Congratulations to the women’s hockey team on their gold medal.  The problem is not that the women won the hockey and it is front page news.  My problem in my mind is the headline; Canada has seven other gold medals already, this is not the first one.  Secondly, “one to go”, does only one other medal matters?  In the spirit of the Olympics all the medals matter not a certain sport’s medals.  I then look at the sub-headline which reads “Hockey: only sport that really matters”.  There it is the headline which confirms what I was thinking yesterday and been thinking for years.  Rob Vanstone says in the article “With all due respect of aficionados of bobsled, biathlon and snowboarding, the 2010 Olympics is now, in essence, a hockey tournament”.  Hockey is not the most important sport which is happening at the Olympics.  The Olympics are a celebration of sport and competition not just hockey.  After a quick scan of the sports section, which also has hockey on the front page of that section, I did not see anything about the bronze medal which was won in women’s figure skating.  Why is this?  Joannie Rochett deserves some attention for her win doesn’t she?

I never have figured out why watching sports is so important to some people, especially males.  I know that I am in the minority of men.  I can also state that I am abnormal in other respects as well.  I do not watch much TV at all (maybe one hour a week), I do not drink coffee, tea, pop,  or alcohol, usually water or apple juice, and I do not smoke.  So the questions I have are:   Why is watching sports so important to you?  Why are some sports, especially in the media, given so much more importance than others?

Spark

I listened to a few of the spark episodes which Dean suggested and found them to be interesting.  I have now subscribed to Spark and I will continue to listen in between my camping and kayaking podcasts.

The one I am going to write about today is the Episode 77. QWERTY and salvage old technology.  I found the discussion about how the QWERTY keyboard came into existence interesting because I did not know the history behind why our keyboards are the way they are.  The only thing I knew was the keys in the middle row are the keys which are the most used when writing words.  The episode then went on to discuss why people always want the newest technology which comes out.  I think there are two main reasons.  One reason is people like new things.  We buy new things because we like “shiny new” things to play with.  The other reason I would say is “keeping up with the Jone’s”.  My friend or neighbor got something new so now I have to get the same or better.  I too live this situation.  I want a new computer, but in reality I do not need a new computer.  I can make up all kinds of excuses as to why I need a new computer but in reality my computer will do me just fine for a couple more years.  I sure would like replace my pc with a new macbook though.  I can say the same thing about many other things as well.  My phone, my car, my camping gear, my kayaks, as well as others.  They are all thing I would like to upgrade but I really do not need to.  I just know there is something new and better out there.

Now let me look at schools.  New computers for the entire school system or every couple of years some new focus or better way to teach students.  Are the computers needed or the new focus/way to teach actually better or are they just “shiny new” things that administrators or bureaucrats want to try.  Funny “no proof” that they are better or needed.

I was in a discussion before the break with some classmates and the professor of my moral education class and my professor related students being hungry at school to smoking.  Odd comparison but here is how it was related.  Years ago the discussion was around if smoking was bad for us or not.  Many doctors said there was “no proof” that smoking was bad for us, so we can smoke all we want.  After many years of testing we now have “proof” that smoking is bad for us.  My professor said “look at a chimney”; we have to sweep chimneys, what is smoking doing to our lungs?  Now look at schools where kids do not have breakfast and come to school without lunch.  How can they learn if all they are thinking about is how hungry they are?  I know that when I am hungry food is all I can think about.  We know in our heart that students need to have food in their stomachs in order to learn, but there is “no proof”.  Why do bureaucrats need “proof” before they move on something that is so obvious yet on other things they just do it.  They will spend thousands of dollars replacing computers in an entire system every three or four year for “shinny new” ones but they will not spend money to feed students who need a lunch in order to learn on those “shinny new” computers.  I think community schools should be feeding kids the lunches they need and then in ten years the bureaucrats will have the proof they wanted that kids can not learn if they are hungry.

Stuck in the Past

We were asked to discuss university classes which are rooted in the past.  I have two of these classes this semester.  One is a Religious Studies class where the professor stands at the front of the class lecturing for the entire class.  He has his notes up on the smartboard to refer to, but only allows us to see two lines at a time.  At the end of each section he asks if anyone has any questions but rarely any questions are asked.  It is a daily struggle to stay awake during the class.  My other class is History.  This class consists of lectures as well.  He has thrown in some pictures, music and a couple of discussion periods but for the most part he just talks at us during the entire class.

For the most part I find education classes to be different.  Professors do not stand at the front the entire class and lecture.  They do lecture some times but there is generally half the class time spent in small group or whole class discussions.  The problem I find with some education classes are that they do not practice what they are preaching.

The professors who I find are the best at teaching are the ones who are still teaching in the school systems.  The downfall to this is they are all night classes because the professors are teaching all day.  Maybe all university professors, especially the education professors, should be teaching kids part time so they are still experiencing what is happening in schools.  This would allow them to relate their topics to what is actually happening in schools now.

Smart Training

Last week I attended SMART notebook software level one and two training in Calgary.  It was not the best time to go because I am so busy with school, but it was so worth it in the end.  Except, of course, for all the work I am trying to catch up on now.

I found myself amazed at how many things the software can do which I had not found or figured out yet.  I have spent some time working with notebook software both at the university and during my internship.  I had figured out the basics of how to create a presentation, but it was time consuming.  But then again creating any presentation is time consuming no matter what software you are using.  I have now learned many short cuts to doing things and many things that I did not know could be done.

In the course for level one there was a woman who had not spent any time working with the software.  I could tell that it was hard for her to comprehend the basics let alone the advanced ideas which the other two participants and myself were asking for and figuring out.  The good thing for her was she knew the other two people and they would be able to help her when they returned home to Yellowknife.  I would definitely suggest to anyone who is thinking about taking the training to get into the software and play around before going to the course.  You will get a whole lot more out of your time and money.

The level two course expanded on what were learned the previous day going into all the advanced features the software provides.  And boy does it have some advanced features which I did not have a clue about.  I only hope that I can remember them all.  We spent the entire day learning about a feature and then pushing the limits of the feature.  We experimented and figured things out which my instructor did not know were possible.  If there was something which we thought should be part of the software my instructor wrote it down to put in as a request for the next version of the software.  It was so wonderful that we were able to explore the software together rather then just being shown how it worked and lectured at.  By exploring I am sure we have learned more from the training then the course was originally meant to teach us.

Dean, my ECMP instructor, has asked me to use what I have learned for our teaching portion of the course.  I think it is a great idea to share what I now know with my classmates, but I do not know where to begin.  Before the training I had showed some people how to work the basics, but now I do not know where to begin or where to end.  I am struggling with the idea of either going through and showing all the possibilities quickly with no detail, or show the basic with some detail.  I guess the first thing I should ask is if anyone has any experience using notebook software.  Do you?  Please let me know so I can then decide how to teach it in less then fifteen minutes.

I like the thought of having a smartboard in my future classroom, but the reality is that it may not happen.  Option two for me is the wireless slate and a projector.  Before the training I was going to try to find the money to purchase my own slate because I could see the potential and if fits my teaching style.  Now that I am done my training, I realize that I definitely need to find the money to buy the slate.  The potential for teaching and student learning seems endless.

If you are at all interested in the use of smartboards or any other technologies which SMART offers I would highly recommend taking the software training so you can get the most out of the tools.