The Power of Words: April 2016

Interactive Learning Using Online Social Media Applications

Nowadays, in the globalization era, there are many development in many aspects, including the education. The teaching learning process is not only taken in class, but teacher can arrange the teaching learning process also by using these awesome application.

Edublog

An edublog is a blog created for educational purposes. Edublogs archive and support student and teacher learning by facilitating reflection, questioning by self and others, collaboration and by providing contexts for engaging in higher-order thinking. Edublogs proliferated when blogging architecture became more simplified and teachers perceived the instructional potential of blogs as an online resource. The use of blogs has become popular in education institutions including public schools and colleges. Blogs can be useful tools for sharing information and tips among co-workers, providing information for students, or keeping in contact with parents. Common examples include blogs written by or for teachers, blogs maintained for the purpose of classroom instruction, or blogs written about educational policy. Educators who blog are sometimes called edubloggers.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edublog

Edmodo

Edmodo is an educational technology company offering communication, collaboration, and coaching tools to K-12 schools and teachers. The Edmodo network enables teachers to share content, distribute quizzes, assignments, and manage communication with students, colleagues, and parents.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edmodo

Moodle is a free and open-source software learning management system written in PHP and distributed under the GNU General Public License.^[3][4] Developed on pedagogical principles, Moodle is used for blended learning, distance education, flipped classroom and other e-learning projects in schools, universities, workplaces and other sectors.

With customizable management features, it is used to create private websites with online courses for educators and trainers to achieve learning goals. Moodle (acronym for modular object-oriented dynamic learning environment) allows for extending and tailoring learning environments using community sourced plugins.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moodle

Animoto

Animoto is a cloud-based video creation service that produces video from photos, video clips, and music into video slideshows. Animoto is based in New York City with an office in San Francisco.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animoto

All of those application is in function to make the teaching learning process easier. The application also make the teaching learning process interesting and students will not boring.

You can also these following application to make the teaching learning process more interesting:

For teaching students how to present, create and code
TED-Ed
More than 250,000 teachers use TED education tools to spark student curiosity and explore presentation literacy skills. “TED-Ed is an outstanding resource in my classroom,” says TED-Ed Innovative Educator Jennifer Hesseltine. “I use the online platform to add engaging content to topics that we are studying. I have also given students the opportunities to help in the process of creating TED-Ed Lessons by choosing videos and creating questions to include.”
Haikudeck
Students can create beautiful presentations with this app. “It’s great for pairing short poems and images,” says TED-Ed community member Jessica Dawn Kaiser.
Duolingo
If the benefits of a bilingual brain motivate your students, try this app. “Duolingo revolutionized the way people learn languages,” says TED-Ed community member Dhruv G. Menon.
Draw and Tell
This app can increase creative confidence in kids of all ages. Just draw something, tell a story about it and share your creation. For TED-Ed community member Ginnie Harvin Pitler, this app is a classroom favorite. “I’m an elementary teacher and believe in creation apps over consumption apps,” she says.
Animoto
Students can easily create and share their own beautiful videos with Animoto. “I’m a huge fan of this simple yet powerful digital storytelling tool for iPad and the web,” writes TED-Ed Innovative Educator Jennifer L. Scheffer in an this ed tech roundup. “The app allows students to select a theme, music, images or videos, add captions and/or two lines of text, and within minutes a slick video is created. The finished product can be shared via social media, uploaded to YouTube, or embedded in a student’s e-portfolio. For a great introduction to Animoto, with a built-in lesson in digital citizenship, have students create an ‘About Me’ or ‘Year in Review’ Animoto.”
iMovie
This popular app is another teacher-recommended choice for student video creation. “My students enjoy using iMovie for group projects,” says TED-Ed community member Chris Gilley Callaway. Check out the Apple apps for educators, too.
Instructables
From science experiments to merit badges, this app offers instructions for more than 100,000 DIY projects. Looking for a classroom maker project? You’ll find it here. Did your students create something awesome? Encourage them to upload their instructions and share their ideas.
Hopscotch
Students can learn computer science fundamentals — via game design — using this app. For more ways to teach core coding concepts, check out Scratch.
Tinkercad
After students get inspired by the open-source wonderland at Thingaverse, turn them loose to start designing their own 3D objects with this app.

For everyday classroom needs
Evernote
Teachers love this notetaking app — for good reason. “Evernote has allowed me to get rid of handouts. I just don’t make them anymore,” writes TED-Ed Innovative Educator Nicholas Provenzano in this blog post. “All of my projects are shared with my students through our shared notebooks, and all assignments are posted on the Assignment shared notebook that is available for parents on my website. Traditionally, these handouts would be viewed by students then trashed. Now they can view them on Evernote and trees can be saved.” To learn more from Nick about how to use Evernote in the classroom, read The Epic Evernote Experiment.
Explain Everything
Basically, it’s an interactive whiteboard. “It’s one of the most versatile apps you can have in your toolbox,” says TED-Ed community member Caroline Taylor-Levey.
Educreations
This app makes it easy to create new videos for learning. For example, “it’s a great tool for explaining math strategies with voice, pen and screen recorder,” says TED-Ed community member Melissa Julian. ”It also lets students make learning resources for other children to use.”
Oxford Dictionaries
Every classroom needs a good dictionary or two. For TED-Ed community member Nuria Carballal, Oxford Dictionary works well. Meanwhile, TED-Ed community member Chie Sipin Bjarenas recommends Dictionary.com. “It’s a quick way to answer ‘what does [insert unfamiliar word] mean?’” she says.

For collaborating on school projects
Slack
Whether you’re collaborating with other teachers or assigning group project work to students, this app can make communication easier for teams in a variety of settings. “I’ve experimented quite a lot lately with Slack,” says TED-Ed Innovative Educator Dylan Ferniany. “It has the benefits of a Facebook group, plus wonderful integration with Google Docs and Google Hangouts.”
Google Apps for Education
If you see the acronym GAFE on any education blog, it probably refers to this suite of Google apps. Among teachers, Hangouts gets a thumbs up for video-based conversations. Here’s one example of how that can work well in the classroom, from TED-Ed Innovative Educator Jimmy Juliano: “In an AP Environment class at my high school, students used Google Hangouts on Air to have climate change conversations with friends and family members. Harnessing the power of two-way video has really opened up new pathways to learning opportunities.”
Schoology
This cloud-based platform is “similar to Facebook, only it includes the needed security features for school use,” says TED-Ed community member Jessica Dawn Kaiser. “I use Schoology for a class page, so my students and I can post assignments, videos, completed work and links.”
Mindmeister
This app makes it easy to map out the relationships between ideas. For complex group projects, it can also provide a way to quickly visualize and create a project outline, together.
Wikispaces
Sometimes what you really want is a wiki. For those moments, teachers recommend this app.

For communicating with students (and their families)
Remind
This digital communication tool is in a league of its own, according to TED-Ed Innovative Educator Jennifer L. Scheffer. “The privacy (no personal phone numbers are required) and message scheduling features are top-notch. For a high school teacher, Remind is an essential digital tool, since most teens have cell phones with texting capabilities.” Read Jenn’s full review here.
Edublogs
A WordPress blogging platform designed with teachers in mind. “I love my Edublog app for a.m. documentation and communication,” says TED-Ed community member Louise Sciulli MacKinnon. “It’s user friendly and makes uploading and sharing images simple.”
ClassDojo
This option provides multiple ways to engage students and their families. “I love it as a classroom management tool and motivator,” says TED-Ed community member Heidi Cooley, who built a reward system for her students based on points earned in class.

For giving (and receiving) student feedback
Edmodo
For providing clear feedback, many teachers like this learning management system. “The app makes it possible to give students constructive feedback in a 1:1 manner,” says TED-Ed Innovative Educator Jennifer Hesseltine. It’s also easy for students to respond.
Socrative
This learning assessment tool simplifies grading and reports. One recommendation: try out the quiz feature to enhance student understanding of classroom content, says TED-Ed community member Noor Alhoda.
Moodle
This open-source learning management platform “has a questionnaire option that I really like,” says TED-Ed Innovative Educator Mitzi Stover. “I have students complete this anonymously to give me feedback on my online class.”
Google Forms
Many teachers recommend this app for gathering feedback from students. “It’s a great way to receive feedback from the whole class at the end of a semester,” says TED-Ed Innovative Educator Sharon Hadar.

Source links: http://blog.ed.ted.com/2015/09/19/25-awesome-apps-for-teachers-recommended-by-teachers/

BLENDED LEARNING

Blended Learning Definition

The definition of blended learning is a formal education program in which a student learns:

(1) at least in part through online learning, with some element of student control over time, place, path, and/or pace;

(2) at least in part in a supervised brick-and-mortar location away from home;

(3) and the modalities along each student’s learning path within a course or subject are connected to provide an integrated learning experience.

The majority of blended-learning programs resemble one of four models: Rotation, Flex, A La Carte, and Enriched Virtual. The Rotation model includes four sub-models: Station Rotation, Lab Rotation, Flipped Classroom, and Individual Rotation.

1. Rotation model — a course or subject in which students rotate on a ﬁxed schedule or at the teacher’s discretion between learning modalities, at least one of which is online learning. Other modalities might include activities such as small-group or full-class instruction, group projects, individual tutoring, and pencil-and-paper assignments. The students learn mostly on the brick-and-mortar campus, except for any homework assignments.

a. Station Rotation — a course or subject in which students experience the Rotation model within a contained classroom or group of classrooms. The Station Rotation model differs from the Individual Rotation model because students rotate through all of the stations, not only those on their custom schedules.

b. Lab Rotation — a course or subject in which students rotate to a computer lab for the online-learning station.

c. Flipped Classroom — a course or subject in which students participate in online learning off-site in place of traditional homework and then attend the brick-and-mortar school for face-to-face, teacher-guided practice or projects. The primary delivery of content and instruction is online, which differentiates a Flipped Classroom from students who are merely doing homework practice online at night.

d. Individual Rotation — a course or subject in which each student has an individualized playlist and does not necessarily rotate to each available station or modality. An algorithm or teacher(s) sets individual student schedules.

2. Flex model — a course or subject in which online learning is the backbone of student learning, even if it directs students to offline activities at times. Students move on an individually customized, ﬂuid schedule among learning modalities. The teacher of record is on-site, and students learn mostly on the brick-and-mortar campus, except for any homework assignments. The teacher of record or other adults provide face-to-face support on a flexible and adaptive as-needed basis through activities such as small-group instruction, group projects, and individual tutoring. Some implementations have substantial face-to-face support, whereas others have minimal support. For example, some Flex models may have face-to-face certified teachers who supplement the online learning on a daily basis, whereas others may provide little face-to-face enrichment. Still others may have different staffing combinations. These variations are useful modifiers to describe a particular Flex model.

3. A La Carte model — a course that a student takes entirely online to accompany other experiences that the student is having at a brick-and-mortar school or learning center. The teacher of record for the A La Carte course is the online teacher. Students may take the A La Carte course either on the brick-and-mortar campus or oﬀ-site. This differs from full-time online learning because it is not a whole-school experience. Students take some courses A La Carte and others face-to-face at a brick-and-mortar campus.

4. Enriched Virtual model — a course or subject in which students have required face-to-face learning sessions with their teacher of record and then are free to complete their remaining coursework remote from the face-to-face teacher. Online learning is the backbone of student learning when the students are located remotely. The same person generally serves as both the online and face-to-face teacher. Many Enriched Virtual programs began as full-time online schools and then developed blended programs to provide students with brick-and-mortar school experiences. The Enriched Virtual model differs from the Flipped Classroom because in Enriched Virtual programs, students seldom meet face-to-face with their teachers every weekday. It differs from a fully online course because face-to-face learning sessions are more than optional office hours or social events; they are required.

Source: Michael B. Horn and Heather Staker, Blended: Using Disruptive Innovation to Improve Schools (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2014).