Some “Ideas to Inspire”

April 21, 2014 by vian

After reading Sanna’s post on Ideas to Inspire, it does not only help me in finding resources for my unit plan but also reminded me of what inspired me earlier ago by the name of it!

I noticed that when I browse through my Facebook timeline, many of my friends often share posts about articles, webpages or even videos that inspired them, read-worthy and also the things that worth a laugh. I guess this is how certain things managed to go viral in the Internet world with just a ‘share’ button.

Here are some ‘ideas to inspire’ links I saw over the weekend that is definitely worth a view definitely!

Hope you will enjoy the links above because I did ! :)

Assignment 2 Curriculum

April 14, 2014 by vian

Below will be my unit plan’s curriculum for Assignment 2 and I will be using the Australian Curriculum, ACARA as my main curriculum framework.

I chose Science as my subject area because I think that the combination of Science and ICTs does not only able to enhance children’s understandings but also able to make lessons more interesting.

Unit Plan Objectives

Science Understanding

Earth and space sciences: Observable changes occur in the sky and landscape (ACSSU019)

Science Inquiry Skills

Questioning and predicting: Respond to and pose questions, and make predictions about familiar objects and events (ACSIS024)
Planning and conducting: Use informal measurements in the collection and recording of observations, with the assistance of digital technologies as appropriate (ACSIS026)
Processing and analysing data and information: Use a range of methods to sort information, including drawings and provided tables (ACSIS027)

(SCIENCE YEAR 1 – ACARA LINK)

Unit Plan Criteria

Formative:
Formal and informal discussions in class and also written feedback.
Summative:
Students will be creating an individual journal using digital technologies.

I hope I am on the right track. Feel free to send me a comment! Thank you!

ICTs & Special Needs Students Part2

April 5, 2014 by vian

In regards to my previous post about ICTs and students with special needs, here I would like to follow up and further discuss about the idea. In today’s post I would like to share some ideas and programs about how the inclusion can be done to address the needs of these students in class.

The following ideas are adapted from – Zorigian and Job (n.d.) on their article on: How do special education students benefit from technology?

UNC’s Center for Literacy and Disability Studies uses technology in their mission to promote literacy and communication for individuals of all ages with disabilities. The Center has developed a three-part video on reading assessment and assistive technology that explains evidence-based practices of improving literacy through technology. Additionally, the Center has developed “alternative pencils” for students with disabilities who cannot hold a traditional pencil or see a page, including children with deaf-blindness. These technologies include alphabet eye gaze frames allowing children to “point” to letters with their eyes, onscreen keyboards that are controlled by switches, and electronic flipcharts.
LEARN NC offers an extensive set of resources to help teachers meet the needs of all learners, including “Reaching Every Learner: Differentiating Instruction in Theory and Practice,” a series of articles and web conferences about differentiation. In addition, LEARN NC’s technology integration page provides links to web resources, lesson plans, articles, and online courses designed to help educators incorporate technology into their teaching
VoiceThread is a free software program that captures student voices and photos in order to collaborate on a topic. It is a technological substitute for written papers and allows students freedom to narrate their own projects.
Sounding Board is an iPad/iPod Touch app that lets a student turn their device into a story board communicator. Students with writing disabilities and communication disorders can use the symbols to create their own messages in the same way that traditional symbol boards work, but easily and with a limitless supply of symbols.
TechMatrix offers consumer guides and links to software and assistive technology devices for students with disabilities. The site is sponsored by the National Center for Technology Innovation and the Center for Implementing Technology in Education. TechMatrix gives information and links to resources for teaching science, math, reading, and writing using technology with special education students.

Here I had also attached a video I found from YouTube about ‘How ICT benefits students with disabilities in the classroom’. Although this is just a simple video, it does not only explain about what ICTs can offer to students with disabilities but it also showed a different perception of looking at the matter. The video did enlighten me and also help me to understand about the world of students with disabilities better.

References:

Barron, K. (2013). How ict benefits students with disabilities in the classroom [Video]. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AzWHaiFDhFk

Zorigian, K., & Job, J. (n.d.). How do special education students benefit from technology? Retrieved April 5, 2014, from http://www.learnnc.org/lp/pages/6917?ref=popular

ICTs & Special Needs Students

April 2, 2014 by vian

Clearly, ICT integration in education is vital in today’s classroom. It does not play an important role because of the emerging world these days but it could also improve education in many ways.

In today’s post, I will share some ideas about how ICTs can help students with special needs such as students with physical disabilities, visual impairments and students with hearing impairment.

Below are some ideas I obtained from the article, Computers help special needs people become a part of mainstream life by Dyes.

Student with physical disability
“Information and communication technology (ICT) resources can include computer access devices such as switches, adapted mice and key guards, communication aids and specialized software” (Dyes, 2010).

Student with visual impairment
“ICT resources should include talking word processors, screen magnifiers, screen readers, electronic braillers and big pointer utilities” (Dyes, 2010).

Student with hearing impairment
“ICT resources should include symbol generating software, word processors, overlay keyboards, word lists, clipart to illustrate writing, spell checkers and grammar checkers” (Dyes, 2010).

Reference:

Dyes, R. A. (2010). Computers help special needs people become a part of mainstream life. Retrieved April 2, 2014, from http://www.emirates247.com/eb247/companies-markets/technology/computers-help-special-needs-people-become-a-part-of-mainstream-life-2010-03-01-1.62700

My artefact for Assignment 1

March 31, 2014 by vian

Hello there,

Come and have a look at my artefact for assignment 1 :), you may click on this LINK.

I used Prezi as my only media in creating this artefact. Personally I enjoy using Prezi as it is very user friendly.

The objective of this artefact was to convince my viewers about the importance of ICT integration. In this artefact, I used ACARA as the main curriculum framework. I gave some examples and three main reasons of integrating ICTs into classroom through English as the main subject based on my classroom context.

Feel free to drop me a comment or share your opinions with me regarding my artefact.

Thank you!

Prezi

March 27, 2014 by vian

When I took a break from creating my online artifact for Assignment 1, I came across Charmaine’s blog post on ‘Discovering with Prezi’.

In her blog post, she mentioned that she had fun discovering Prezi by clicking various buttons available. Well, I have to say I had fun exploring the Prezi webpage too! As I am new to the program, every click gave me surprises and helped me explore further. In the beginning, I admit I was frustrated with the program when I could not create and deliver the ideas I had through the program. As time passed, I became more familiar with the program and slowly manage to grasp how the program works now!

Based on my experience, I strongly believe that through ‘trial and error’ method, learning could be further enhanced. Therefore, this applies to students in our classroom as well! We could encourage them to explore and discover by themselves through ‘trial and error’ method so they could learn better.

In other words,

Stay tuned for my next post on my Online Artefact !

ICTs & Crime

March 24, 2014 by vian

With the advancement of ICTs in this century, it is undeniable that ICTs is very important regardless in education, medicine field or even crime related issues. In this post, I will share about the relationship between ICTs and crime investigation/ prevention.

Let me share some common examples of how ICT can prevent crime,

Security tags on clothes
Security tags are often attached on clothing and are used in various kinds of shops to avoid theft. The tags act as a protection and it will create signals when you exit the shop through the security towers.

CCTV cameras
CCTV cameras are frequently used and can be found in various locations such as shops, houses and airport (just to name a few). It is used to prevent crimes and acts as a resource to identify criminals if there is any.

In crime investigations, ICTs works closely with forensics. Here is a video I found on YouTube about – Digital forensics, an ICT forensic science

Reference:

Arrirang TV (2014). Digital forensics, an ICT forensic science ICT [Video]. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O9PwnUfcVs4

ICTs & E-Commerce

March 24, 2014 by vian

Clearly, it is evident that E-Commerce relies a lot on ICTs. In fact most of us had been using and practicing ‘E-Commerce’ without realising what is it all about. Therefore, I would like to take this opportunity to explain about ICTs and E-Commerce through this blog post.

So… What is E-Commerce?

E-Commerce is the abbreviation of ‘Electronic Commerce’. According to Hom (2013), “E-commerce refers to the purchase and sale of goods and/or services via electronic channels, such as the Internet”. It is the business conducted via the Internet connection through emails, webpages, apps and many more. E-commerce can also “be between two businesses transmitting funds, goods, services and/or data or between a business and a customer” (Webopedia, n.d.).

What is the relationship with ICTs?

In the process of ‘E-Commerce’, it requires various ICTs involvement such as software to create and design the webpage to display goods and Internet banking processes for example.

There are several categories for E-Commerce such as:

B2B (Business to Business) — this kind of e-commerce involves companies doing business with each other. One example is manufacturers selling to distributors and wholesalers selling to retailers.

B2C (Business to Consumer) — This is what most people think of when they hear “e-commerce.” B2C consists of businesses selling to the general public through shopping cart software, without needing any human interaction. An example of this would be Amazon.

C2B (Consumer to Business) — In this scenario, a consumer would post a project with a set budget online, and companies bid on the project. The consumer reviews the bids and selects the company — Elance is an example of this.

C2C (Consumer to Consumer) — this type of e-commerce is made up of online classifieds or forums where individuals can buy and sell their goods, thanks to systems like PayPal. An example of this would be eBay or etsy.

[Source: Hom (2013) on the article: What is E-Commerce?]

Hope this post helps.

References:

Hom, E. J. (2013). What is e-commerce? Retrieved March 24, 2014, from http://www.businessnewsdaily.com/4872-what-is-e-commerce.html

Webopedia (n.d.). What is electronic commerce (ecommerce)? Retrieved March 24, 2014, from http://www.webopedia.com/TERM/E/electronic_commerce.html