Week 4: Creativity, Collaboration and Sharing

This week we have been looking at creativity, collaboration and sharing. This covers a wide range of software and projects available through websites, applications and programs. I shall look at two of them and discuss the uses in and outside of the classroom.

Wallwisher
I have discussed the uses of Wallwisher in a previous post after having a brief look at it in university. In this post I have added my own Wallwisher wall which we can interact with. If you have any ideas of how this tool could be utilised for educational benefit then let me know by leaving a sticky.




Project: iCanRead
We were shown this literacy development project in our class. It uses the iPod classic and microphone accessory to record the children reading and allows them to listen back to their reading and assess their own development. This style of learning in the classroom will appeal to the children as they will gain confidence as they are able to make mistakes and realise this on their own before reading aloud in front of their peers and their classteacher. This kind of practice also eliminates the "reading groups" scenario in which children gather in groups to read a page each. I have seen this in many classrooms and it is clear that children become disengaged and do not pay attention to the reading as they don't find it relevant as they are not reading at the time and they can find it difficult to listen to other children reading, especially if they are struggling with reading aloud. The recorded files also allow the children to archive their progress and listen back to see how they have progressed. This is a great idea as the children will be able to self assess their own reading and this will help to build confident individuals in the classroom.

 Dazzle 