Creating A Video using Movie Maker

This video was based on substance abuse. The purpose of the video was to bring awareness as to harmful effects of substance abuse and the methods used in creating some of these drugs; the different types of drugs were also highlighted. Adolescents are the individuals who are most widely affected by substance and drug abuse. As a result of this, the video was created with the intention of targeting students (adolescents).

Videos can be used to improve classroom instructions by catering to different learning styles. It also serves as a creative tool in bringing across a lesson. The teacher can incorporate different elements such as audio, music and even insert other relevant videos making it more interesting and fun for the students to learn.

This video on substance abused was produced as an instructional and informative tool to bring awareness to students about the harm and danger in using illegal substances/drugs. As a result of this piece being a group project, it was difficult for the members to collaborate and put the piece together; however, in the end we all were delegated roles and saw the successful completion of the video. The piece was well put together, however a smoother outro of the audio before the insertion of the additional video clip would have enhanced the overall quality and production of the video.

Creating A Wiki

 Hi All,

I have created a wiki pertaining to library skills. You can view for information or share your information with us @ https://libraryskillstutor.wikispaces.com

Wikis can be used to improve classroom instructions by enabling students to collaborate in a space that is immediately updated and serve as a computer supported collaborative environment. Wikis can also be used to encourage collaboration among students by allowing them to read and edit each others' work. Collaborative writing assignments with wikis encourage students to review each others' pieces and truly reflect on and critique what is being put together instead of just pasting separate components together. Each time a wiki is edited, a separate tracking feature makes note of what changes were made and who made those changes. Wiki users can also create signatures to accompany any edits they make .Wikis can be used to facilitate ongoing, thought-provoking discussions about many topics over the course of semesters or academic years.

The wiki produced covers the subject area of library skills. This piece was a group project that posed some challenges in terms of time management and group meetings. Additionally, it was difficult to maneuver the wiki page so as to make it unique and original.  However, the group members were able to use emails and phone calls as communication mediums, for the successful completion of this piece. More photos and additional applicable videos would have improved the overall function and presentation of the wiki piece.

Creating a Podcast

A podcast is an essential teaching tool because it is a new, original and dynamic to make a lesson interesting. You can record your own voice or conduct interviews with resource persons etc. and then group them all together to make a complete lesson. One can also incorporate music and other interesting sounds to make the lesson unique, interesting and attractive for the students. A podcast pertaining to the issue of student teachers being overloaded with assignments was produced. Now at the latter part of the first semester, student teachers have been giving most of their graded assignments at the same time; this has caused stress and frustration for both student teachers and lecturers, hence the reason for producing the podcast. The podcast prepared had interviews with both student teachers and lecturers giving their opinion on the overload of assignments and coming up with recommendation to ease the burden. A podcast can be used as a teaching tool if a teacher is absent or wants to use a different teaching method and as mentioned earlier it can be used as tool to bring across information from interviews with resource persons etc. This piece will be used as an informative and recommendation tool to find solutions in minimizing the workload being presently experienced by the student teachers. As a result of the podcast piece being a group work assignment it posed a challenge in regards to timing for us to conduct our interviews; however, we all took personal time to make sure that our presentation (podcast) was successful. Due to lack of timing the interviews were a little bit sketchy but it all worked out. If we had more time, the audio quality for the interviews could’ve been a little better to enhance the overall audio for the podcast.