Thank You NCBCE

December 14 - Final Exam

For the final exam, you have the opportunity to reflect on the content and activities of the class and in what ways they have affected you professionally. In preparation for this assignment, feel free to review the class readings, class notes, guest speaker comments, your blog entries as well as those of your classmates. You may find that you have already reflected on some aspects of the final exam in some of the blog entries you made over the semester. If this is the case, feel free to borrow from your blog entries as you construct your final exam essay. Your final exam is an essay with three parts, and you may organize your response according to the three-part structure.

As you reflect over your experience in ECI 546 this semester, write an essay that addresses the following components: 1) Analyze your development to date on the technology integration continuum. Describe how your knowledge and skills have evolved; 2) Explore your projected goals and development with respect to applications of digital literacy in your instruction. 3) Finally, provide a critical synthesis of concepts and digital literacy trends from our class readings, activities, and discussions. Another way to think about this section is to highlight the critical ideas and activities that have helped you move on the technology integration continuum.

Write six - eight pages double-spaced with 1-inch margins. The essay is worth 20 points (Part 1 is worth 5 points; Part 2 is worth 3 points; Part 3 is worth 9 points; Quality of writing is worth 3 points). The final exam is due to me by Friday, December 14, 12:00 midnight. Feel free to email it before the due date if you finish early.

December 3 & 10 - Inquiry Projects

Please post your Inquiry Project title, grade level, and url to the class blog. You can turn in a hard copy of your written report or post it to the blog as well. If you don't have a link to your project, please post your email address so class mates may contact you about your project if they are interested.

November 26, 2007 - WebQuest Presentations

Please post your Webquest title, grade level, and url to the class blog. If your Webquest is in a word document, please post your email address so classmates can contact you if they would like to receive a copy.

Middle Grade Teachers' Perspectives on New Literacies

Thank you for taking our quick 3 page survey about teachers' technology use.


We would appreciate any comments you have on question wording and the length of survey. Thanks for your help!

November 19, 2007 - Wikis in Plain English

November 19, 2007

21st Century Skills and Games - November 12, 2007

1)Reflect on the process and post your reflections on our class blog. How did you respond to the pressure to be creative? Did you feel that you adequately contributed to the group’s creative process? Was there a dominant leader in your group? How well did the group collaborate to achieve the goal? What did you learn about yourself and/or your colleagues? What, if any, educational value do you see in this type of process? How might you use it with your students?

2)After reading the two articles on gaming, take a pro or con position on the educational value of games from your point of view as a teacher. Give specific examples from the readings and your experiences to support your position.

3)Rate the videos from last weeks class on a scale from 1-4 with 4 being the best.

4) Remember to check out our MySpace blog and respond to any of our Chinese colleagues who posted new information.

Literacy, Media, & the Culture of Contests: Video 4

Literacy, Media, & the Culture of Contests: Video 3

Literacy, Media, & the Culture of Contests: Video 2

Literacy, Media, & the Culture of Contests: Video 1

New Media Literacies, November 5, 2007

In preparation for November 5th class, read 2 chapters in Media Literacy by James Potter. Then go to MySpace.com and log in. Click on Blog and go to ECI 546. You should see a prompt that we would like for you to respond to. Your Chinese colleagues will read the same material and will post their responses as well in English. Please respond to at least one post from our Chinese colleagues. If you have any trouble finding the prompt in MySpace please contact me.

Herny Jenkins's New Media Literacies Framework

As you read Jenkins's article, think about how you might incorporate New Media Literacies into your teaching and/or learning. Specifically, look at Jenkins's framework and provide some examples of how you can relate to these individual elements to your teaching and/or learning.

Dr. Degang Li's Response

About the articles I would like to express my opinions. Such articles are not new for me any more. In fact, these ideas and China is very closely associated with each other since China's economy became stronger and stronger. In general, I think, all reports from the western media are not beyond the frame, that is "Chinese threat theory". Not only American journalist but also the officials, even the scholars all hold such position on the rise of China. This theory believes that China's economy, China's trade, China's military power all threaten the western countries'
benefits. Without doubt, the development of China will change some rules established by developed countries certainly. But China actually doesn't want to change today's basic political structure in the world that America dominates the earth. What China needs is only to return its status in Asia in history. For one big country with huge population like China, such requirement is in the nature of things. So the worry about China's development is unnecessary.

On Chinese economic strength, I think, there are many exaggerated estimations in the western countries. As I know, some data of economic growth is adulterate. The reality of Chinese economy doesn't seem as dazzling as the government's statistic results. In my opinion, there are
so many problems in Chinese society to resolve today. Almost every problem can do lot harm to the sustaining growth if the government can not deal with it well. On the other hand, the majority of exports come from Multinational Companies that build factories in China with Chinese cheap labor and government's favorable policies in tax. Moreover, during the competition many Chinese local companies were dead or purchased by those "big crocodiles". From this view, we could find that money had been earned via exports mainly by the western companies not by Chinese. Therefore America's condemnation in this field is unfair to China.

Even though Chinese military power is increasing, it still drops far-forth behind US. The Chinese Liberation Army's main motive is to end the civil war and finish the country's unity. Taiwan is the biggest obstacle between US and China. So I believe the relationship between China and US will be absolutely better than now if there is no "Taiwan Problem". China could become one good partner of America and ideology will not also be one gulf between two countries.

On the whole, in my opinion, this reporter from *The Economist *stands on the position of western countries. Even though some facts are right, it is not objective actually. Finally, I must admit, it is obvious that China's democracy and people right still have many problems comparing with western countries. And Chinese government is also not one modern establishment according to your norms. But one perfect system needs a long time, especially for China, because the caesarean history and culture had dominated Chinese for several thousand years. This kind of culture has become custom and burden that rest on today's China.

I hope I have answered your question and it is helpful to your discussion.

All the best.
Degang

Class Cancellation on October 22nd

We will not meet for class on Monday, October 22nd. Please use this time to work on your Inquiry Projects. The rubric for your Inquiry Projects can now be found on the home page in Vista. Contact me if you have any questions.

Additionally, Dr. Degang Li has provided me with his reaction to the article on China that we read a few week ago. I have posted this response and would like for you to add your comments. Please do so before class on the 29th.

For class on October 29th, Brad and Adam will lead our discussion on Henry Jenkins's article. I have posted a prompt for you to blog about the reading before class on the 29th.

See you October 29th.
Hiller

Graveyard Narrative

Here is the Voicethread I did on the Graveyard Narrative for those of you that requested it. Thank you Adam for showing me how to put it on our class blog.

Exploring Online Reading Comprehension

As you read the articles by Coiro and Coiro & Dobler, reflect on the differences in your processing approaches when you read print text vs. online text. Note differences in specific strategies that you use. Also, note specific ideas from the articles that you could use to support your students online reading. Remember to prepare a question for Dr. Coiro for next class period and post it at the end of your blog entry.

New book on innovation and globalization

A new book came out this month titled, Innovation Nation. It sounds like it would be a good companion piece to Friedman's The World is Flat. While Friedman's book gave a general outline of how globalization is flattening our world, this book, written by John Kao, gives the specifics of how the U.S. is not the leader in innovation anymore. Given our recent discussion on China and their impact on our educational system, I thought some of you may be interested in giving this book a look.

Amazon link for Innovation Nation

I learned about this book after seeing author John Kao on The Colbert Report. Below is the interview if you want a more brief understanding of what the book is about.

A Periodic Table of Visualization Methods

A colleague of mine recently sent me this link. It is a periodic table which shows all the ways that you can visually represent information (i.e. pie chart, histogram, etc.) When you roll your mouse over the visualization method, a window will pop up to visually show you an example of the method. I thought about this table after reading Warlick talk about how to present information in a compelling manner. A lot of the examples in the table may not be applicable to grade school, but I think it might be helpful to many of you nontheless.

A Periodic Table of Visualization Methods

Redefining Literacy for the 21st Century (Chapter 4-5)

How does Warlick's definition of a "learning literacy" (page 94) apply to
how you design your instruction in your class? Warlick asserts that a
"learning literacy" is the ability to expose information, employ
information, express ideas compellingly as well as integrate an ethical
code into your use of information.

Thomas Friedman interview

If you're interested, here's an interview with Thomas Friedman from The Colbert Report. The interview isn't entirely on education, but it's does allow you to hear a little bit more about what his book, The World is Flat is about and where our world is heading.

Monday, October 1, 2007

As you read Redefining Literacy for the 21st Century by David Warlick what is one point that resonates with what you are currently doing in the classroom and/or what new awareness did you discover through reading this text?

China, Globalization & 21st Century Skills

As you consider the changing economic and educational trends globally (including China), what are the implications for education in the US? Do you see a need for teaching 21st century skills? If so, how might you promote 21st century skills within your classroom?

21st Century Learners

Interview a student or a group of students to learn about the 21st century learner and prepare a 400 word response on what you have learned. Post your response on the class Blog Here are sample questions to use for the interview.

• How do you learn best in school? Describe a time that you were excited about learning. What was happening in the class?
• What would make learning more interesting for you at school?
• Do you think using technology makes school more interesting? If so, how?
  

Web Search Reflection

Reflect on the process that you and your group experienced in the Web Search Activity. Did this activity Will this activity change the way you do research in the future?

Pink's A Whole New Mind

Do you agree with Pink's assertion that we have moved from the Information Age to the Conceptual Age? Explain your answer by providing examples from your life (including your teaching experiences).

Please feel free to pose any questions for clarification.

Welcome to ECI-546

We will use this Blog to discuss, in advance of class, the weekly readings. In addition, this blog will be used to share some of your class assignments. This will allow you to read and learn from your classmates’ work.