March+ISTE+Video+Reflections


 * __MARCH-__**

1. Simple Ideas for Powersharing: Wesly Fryer- It took my computer a long time to load this presentation for some reason (with lots of choppiness), but once I had it loaded, I was pleasantly surprised. I have heard quite a bit about Posterous, although we are a Moodle school, but I loved the explanations of how to add various elements to a Posterous page. Most of it was pretty self-explanatory, but it would be a great thing for teachers who are not as comfortable with technology to learn how to use it. The rest of the presentation dealt with web 2.0 tools that I had not used before. IPadio looks like a neat tool I would probably make use of in my classroom. AudioBoo and StoryRobe are definitely sites that I will share with elementary teachers in my district, as they both support the type of technology learning that their principal has been wanting them to delve into. His presentation was pretty straight-forward and gave good examples of uses in the classroom and how to make the most of them in sharing with others.

2. Formative Assessment: Technology-Enhanced Approaches to Increased Student Achievement:Vivian Johnson- WOW! That's one word that can sum up what I got from this presentation. While formative assessment is nothing new to me, the presentation broke down the concept into the simplest of sections that any teacher could benefit from. It started with basic descriptions and explanations, but quickly moved onto the fact that formative assessment is not a test, but a process for learning for both teachers and students. The presentation went on to explain how and why a teacher should change his/her teaching to match the pieces of information found during the formative assessments that take place along the way. Through GoogleForms and other quick online quizzes, polls, and rubrics, a teacher can get a very good idea of who is learning what, what questions they still have, and what higher order thinking is going on in his/her classroom. The key attributes of formative assessment were provided and things were explained well. What I loved most about this presentation is the fact that there was a wiki that summed it all up (so my chaotic note-taking was a little unnecessary). I have already added that wiki to my list of necessary components of our 1:1 site next year. This was a top-notch presentation!