For today’s class, we began by debriefing the field trip to Rebecca’s class last week and then moved into multimedia learning theory. Multimedia learning theory is about the process in which we remember things and how things are regulated into our working memory. In our EDCI 336 course, Rich encourages “learning by doing” and in class, we have many opportunities to try new technological things. When the class is over, we blog about our experiences to reaffirm our learning and understanding. That repetition of a skill helps the brain to be more likely to internalize the information and be able to recall it at a later date. One resource that is proven to be useful is “Sketchnotes”. While I have never used the program before, the concept is to draw pictures along with your written notes which will help with memory recall. Our class will be trying this program in the next couple of weeks and I am very interested to see how this might be implemented into the classroom. 

Moving on, our class began to discuss how educational videos can be utilized in the classroom. Three possible video platforms that teachers can use are “Youtube” “Khan Academy” and “TeacherTube”. Some reasons why using videos in the class is beneficial is that videos can be engaging, offer new perspectives, and help to show concepts or things that may not be accessible based on the school (ie. students do a project on Egypt and want to see the pyramids). However, there are some cons which come with videos is that not everyone has access to technology, students may not be engaged with the video, or students may choose to not watch the video. It is important to remember that if you are going to use videos in the classroom, make sure they are suitable and relevant to the lesson you are teaching. 

Afterwards, we practiced using “Screencastify” to screen record our computers to show students how to use the computer to look something up. In the video below, I used the example of sloths as my screen recording. If I were to make this into the inquiry project, I would have students initially watch a video of sloths in the Costa Rican jungle to illicit excitement into the subject. Then, I would have students do some primary introductory research to learn a base level about sloths. Once they know a bit of information, I would have the students develop an inquiry question about sloths. This could be like “what do sloths eat? where do sloths live? how do sloths climb?” and so on. 

– Ms. G 🙂