Assignments

Software Assignment #1: Setting Up Your Blog

In this assignment you will set up and maintain your very own blog using a domain that I’ve set up especially for this class.  This blog will serve as a public journal of your experiences as we work through the class and experiment with various educational technology tools and techniques.

Here’s how you can get started!

  1. Visit http://www.connectspace.org
  2. Find your name on the list and click through to your blog
  3. Check out your new space!  Pretty boring, right?  Click the “Login” link on the left to make some changes to the site.
  4. I’ve set up administrator usernames & passwords for each of you – for security reasons I won’t type them out here.  I’ll give them to you in class.

The first thing you will want to do once you’re blog has been established is to log in and begin to jazz it up. The blogging software that we are using in class this year is called “Wordpress” and it has a number of really great features, including the ability to completely redesign the entire look and feel of your blog.

Once you have logged into your blog you will be at a screen called the “Dashboard” – from here you can make changes to any aspect of your site.  For example, if you would like to change the layout and design of your blog, click on the “Design” link at the top of the screen. Go ahead and choose a theme that fits your personality, and click the ‘View Site’ link to see your new design in action.

Blogs always contain “posts” which are akin to public journal entries.  You can create new posts by clicking on the “Write” link at the top of the screen.  From here click on “Post” and start typing!  If you’d like to make changes to any posts that you have written you can do so by clicking on the “Manage” link at the top of the screen.  Posts will appear on your blog in reverse chronological order, with the most recent post always showing up as the first thing people see when they visit your blog.  You can view your blog by clicking the “View Site” button at the top of the Dashboard.

If during the course of your experimentation you ever lose the “Login” link and can’t get to your dashboard you can always go there directly by typing in the full address of your blog with “/wp-admin.php” added at the end.  For example, Heidi’s login page is located at “http://heidi.connectspace.org/wp-login.php”.

Your assignment with this blog is to experiment with this new medium and decide for yourself how useful this kind of structure would be in your teacher / administrator / student role(s). You should post at least one entry per day per class to your blog, resulting in at least 8 total postings. You are also encouraged to visit your classmate’s blogs and to comment on their postings.

PS:  You’re going to want to update your administrator password & contact information once you log into your blog.  You can do this by clicking on “Users” and then on “Admin”

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Final Project: School Technology Analysis

Part I: School Reflection

In this assignment you will be asked to compose a paper and presentation that outlines the current level of computer use and integration at your school. You should try and include information regarding:

  1. How many computers your school owns
  2. Types of machines (PCs, Macs, etc)
  3. Network connectivity status
  4. School website
  5. How is IT supported?
  6. How is Instructional Technology supported?
  7. How does your staff develop and maintain their technology skills?
  8. … etc …

Part II: Suggestions for Improvement

Based upon information gleaned from your reflection, identify some challenges that could be addressed to improve the use of technology at your school. Using resources you find on the Internet or through the TCNJ library online databases and compose an action plan that could be used to help address some of the issues that you’ve described.

Your paper should be between 3-5 pages in length, and your presentation to the class should be at least 15 minutes long. The presentation should use some technology element (your blog, wiki, Power Point – this is a computer class, after all!) – keep in mind that if you do use a web-based tool that you should require a password before you allow people to view it. Our wiki is, by default, a private space.

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Web 2.0 Exploration Project

In this assignment you will be exploring Web 2.0 technologies and how they can be incorporated into your blog.

Part I: RSS Feeds

Using the ‘RSS Feed’ widget (under “Design” -> “Widgets), incorporate at least one RSS feed from an external source into your blog. Write a new blog posting that references this feed and describe why it interests you and any challenges you may have had in incorporating it into your site.

Part II: Google Maps

Use Google Maps (http://maps.google.com) to create a customized map of a favorite place of yours.  It could be here on the island or anywhere – I’ll leave it up to you!  Add at least three or four placemarks and upload photos or descriptions of the places that you are marking.  When you’re done you can use the “Link to this page” tool to get some embeddable code – put this code on your blog as a new post.  Here’s a little video about Google Maps to help get you started:

Free Project

Explore at least one other Web 2.0 application and incorporate it into your blog. This can be as simple as providing a hyperlink to the project (it doesn’t have to appear in a widget if there isn’t an appropriate widget available.) Write a posting describing the application and why you feel (or don’t feel) that it’s a useful tool.  Refer to the lecture from today for some ideas that may interest you – also feel free to refer back to the readings on SOCS for some useful links to Web 2.0 sites.

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Scratch

As we have discovered in class, Scratch is a very versatile tool which can be used to create many different types of interactive multimedia projects.  In this exercise you will explore Scratch on your own and create a project that can be showcased on your blog.  Before you get started, please visit http://scratch.mit.edu and sign up for a free account so at the end of the exercise we can “publish” your work to the Scratch server.

For this project you should think

Some ideas could be:

  1. A digital story that walks you through a series of “scenes” (perhaps you click a button and a new “scene” appears along with music or narration)
  2. An exploration exercise where you can click or move around a scene with a character and learn more about it (i.e. moving a mini spaceship through the solar system to learn about the planets)
  3. A true “game” that allows you to move a character and earn points (i.e. collect all the apples while avoiding a bear that is chasing towards you)

… or anything else!  Explore Scratch and see what it has to offer.  When you’re done, save your work and then click the “Share!” button inside Scratch.  Provide your username and password and then visit your Scratch page to view your project.  Use the Embed link and copy it to your blog to show off your work to the rest of the class.