Natalie+Nelson

 Advanced Educational Psychology New, Emerging, & Innovative Technologies ** I am Natalie Nelson, and I would like to welcome you to the 21st Century!!! **
 * I deeply trust that you will find the most innovative and emerging technologies presented this day in time and the years to come. **

Daniel Pink’s book, //A Whole New Mind,// provides a complete and profound analysis of the most pressing personal and economic issue of the days ahead—how the vast changes shaped by technology and globalization are going to impact the way we live and work and imagine our world. Pink would most definitely say that Scratch is an emerging and much needed technology in our classrooms. It falls under the sense of //Design//. Design is a classic whole- minded aptitude. It is a combination of utility and significance. Design has become an essential gift for personal fulfillment and professional success for at least three reasons. 1.) Thanks to rising prosperity and advancing technology, good design is now, more accessible than ever, which allows more people to partake in its pleasures. 2.)  In an age of material abundance, design has become crucial for most modern businesses—as a means of differentiation and as a way to create new markets. 3.) As more people develop a design sensibility, we’ll increasingly be able to deploy design for its ultimate purpose: changing the world. ** References **
 * Pink, Daniel H. 2010. //A Whole New Mind: Moving from the Information Age to the Conceptual Age.// **

Scratch is a new programming language that makes it easy to create your own interactive stories, animations, games, music, and art -- and share your creations on the web. Scratch is designed to help young people (ages 8 and up) develop 21st century learning skills. As they create and share Scratch projects, young people learn important mathematical and computational ideas, while also learning to think creatively, reason systematically, and work collaboratively. People have access to an incredible variety of interactive games, stories, animations, simulations, and other types of **dynamic,** **interactive media** on their computers today. But, for the most part, these programs are a one-way street: you can only browse and click what others have created; you can’t design and create your own. The name **Scratch** comes from the **scratching** technique used by hip-hop disc jockeys, which spin vinyl records back and forth with their hands to mix music clips together in creative ways. You can do something similar with Scratch, mixing different types of media clips (graphics, photos, music, sounds) in creative ways. At the core of Scratch is a **graphical programming language** that lets you control the actions and interactions among different media. Coding in Scratch is much easier than in traditional programming languages: to create a script, you simply snap together graphical blocks, much like LEGO bricks or puzzle pieces. Once you’ve created a Scratch project, you can **share** it on the Scratch website, the same way you might share videos on YouTube or photos on Flickr. Or you can embed your Scratch project in any other webpage for example, embedding an interactive Scratch animation on your MySpace or Facebook homepage. You can get new ideas for Scratch projects by browsing through projects on the Scratch website. If you like one of the characters or images or scripts in another project, simply **download** the project and use parts of it in your own Scratch project. What do students **learn** as they create interactive stories, animations, games, music, and art with Scratch? For one thing, they learn **mathematical and computational ideas** that are built into the Scratch experience. They also gain an understanding of important mathematical concepts such as coordinates, variables, and random numbers. This project-design process combines many of themedia type="youtube" key="ix6Hlt8xL3E" height="285" width="340" align="right" **21st century learning skills** that will be critical to success in the future: thinking creatively, communicating clearly, analyzing systematically, collaborating effectively, designing iteratively, and learning continuously. **National Center for Women & Information Technology states that, "Scratch is effective as a learning tool because it incorporates several effective practices: it uses hands-on, active learning; it is visually appealing; it allows users to express their own creativity and to build on their own experiences; it gives immediate, understandable feedback; and it allows users to avoid syntax errors, freeing them to focus on processes and concepts."**
 * CREATING and LEARNING WITH [[image:20080704.png align="right"]] **
 * Scratch ** changes that, broadening the range of what you can design and create on the computer, making it easier to combine graphics, photos, music, and sound into **interactive creations**. By interaction, scientists mean a child's encounter with people, objects, events, or activities, and ideas. "Neuroscientists stress the fact that interaction with the environment is not simply an interesting feature of brain development; it is an absolute requirement" (Epstein, 2007; pg.17). With Scratch, you can create characters that dance, sing, and interact with one another. Or create images that whirl, spin, and animate in response to movements of the mouse. Or integrate images with sound effects and music clips to create an interactive birthday card for a friend, or an interactive report for school.
 * References **
 * Epstein, Ann S. (2007) //Essentials of Active Learning in Preschool. (p.17)// **
 * National Center for Women & Information Technology. ** ** [|http://www.ncwit.org] . Retrieved September 30, 2009. **

**Facebook is a social utility that connects people with friends and others who work, study and live around them. In //A Whole New Mind,// Pink talks a lot about laughter, and "most importantly, laughter is a social activity- and the evidence is vast that people who have regular, satisfying connections to other people are healthier and happier" (Pink, 2006; p. 203). People use Facebook to keep up with friends, upload an unlimited number of photos, share links and videos, and learn more about the people they meet. Owing to the numerous abilities of this revolutionary web 2.0, educators can use this in their teaching and learning environment. **
 * Facebook is made of many networks. Teachers can very well establish their own classroom network, and join the entire class together. The educator is also able to monitor all student progress and determine the capabilities of students. Through this tool everyone can stay in touch contribute to the learning environment and social feature. Students can [[image:5626037df06711a0.jpg align="right"]]share both ideas and photos in a virtue world whereby everyone is granted the opportunity to contribute. For example, if the network is set up for a History class currently studying “The Vietnam War”, students can post images from their excursions or even multi-media videos they have found through searching the web. Student can set up a “wall” of their own choosing, and this can be used as the learning wall for example, where everyone adds comments, images, and multimedia or post- it-notes of a topic of their own choosing. **
 * References **
 * Pink, Daniel H. (2006). //A Whole New Mind: Moving from the Information Age to the Conceptual Age. (//p.203) **

** Students can also use Google Earth to explore topics like the progress of human civilization, the growth of cities, the impact of civilization on the natural environment, and the impact of natural disasters like Hurricane Katrina. Using Google SketchUp and historic overlays, students can recreate entire ancient cities. The only limit to Google Earth's classroom uses is your imagination. **
 * Google Earth, Google's satellite imagery-based mapping product puts the whole world on a student's computer. It enables users to "fly" from space to street level to find geographic information and explore places around the world. Like a video game and a search engine rolled into one, Earth is basically a 3D model of the entire planet that lets you grab, spin and zoom down into any place on Earth. As we know, students learn best when they have a good base of knowledge in the area they are studying (remember when we were looking at Africa on Google Earth). After seeing Africa on Google Earth, new material makes more sense, and there are many possible spots in the long- term memory network for introducing new information of Africa with actually seeing Africa (Woolfolk, 2010). **
 * [[image:4ef6ed00a710c88c.jpg width="165" height="132" align="right"]]From literature to environmental science, Google Earth can help you bring a world of information alive for your students. You can use Google Earth demos to get your students excited about geography, and use different Google Earth layers to study economics, demographics, and transportation in specific contexts. For instance: **
 * ** You can use real-time coordinates to demonstrate distance calculations and verify the results using our measurement tools; **
 * ** View tectonic plate-shift evidence by examining whole continents, mountain ranges and areas of volcanic activity; **
 * ** Study impact craters, dry lake beds and other major land forms. **
 * Don't limit your imagination to our lonely planet, though, launch your student's imagination with Sky in Google Earth **** . And if you prefer to explore the night sky from your browser, you can now try Google Sky **** on the web. Whether you stargaze, explore Hubble telescope images, or check out current astronomical events, you'll capture the wonder of the universe without leaving your classroom. [[image:ae2d8a1e2ecc820a.jpg width="173" height="132" align="left"]] **
 * Here are some other ideas for using Google Earth in your classroom: **
 * ** Biology: Track routes of chimpanzees in Tanzania's Gombe Forest. **
 * ** Ecology: Create a short quizzes. **
 * ** Environmental Science: Have students check Alaska's global warming problems.[[image:bs_poster.gif align="right"]] **
 * ** Geology: Find images, links, and descriptions, with information about thousands of volcanoes around the globe. **
 * ** Global Awareness: Study the Crisis in Darfur **** with the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum's unprecedented project. **
 * ** History: Explore Tutankhamun's Tomb. **
 * ** Humanities: Have your students scout film shoot locations with //The Golden Compass//. **
 * ** Literature: Bring class or contemporary tales to life with Google LitTrips. **
 * ** Math: Explore distance, velocity, and wave properties of tsunamis. **
 * References **
 * Woolfolk, Anita. (2010) //Educational Psychology//. 11th ed. **

media type="youtube" key="WvCIv5KCbeE" height="340" width="560"
 * The focus of the Moodle project is always on giving educators the best tools to manage and promote learning, but there are many ways to use Moodle:[[image:news.gif width="131" height="108" align="right" caption="About Moodle"]] **
 * ** Moodle has features that allow it to scale to very large deployments and hundreds of thousands of students, yet it can also be used for a primary school or an education hobbyist. **
 * ** Many institutions use it as their platform to conduct fully online courses, while some use it simply to augment face-to-face courses (known as blended learning). **
 * Cooperative learning takes place when children work and play together. Children can be resources for one another and expand one another’s awareness and knowledge as they play together. Cooperation and shared learning are important lifelong skills that young children learn by being actively engaged with others in the learning process. Children gain social skills as they find the need to share both materials and space with others and strengthen their communications skills as well (Browne, 2009; p. 114). **
 * Reference **
 * Browne, Kathryn Williams. //To Teach Well: An Early Childhood Practicum Guide//. 1st. Ed. (p.114) **

media type="youtube" key="Co9sEO776J4" height="285" width="340" align="right" ** Reference Browne, Kathryn Williams. //To Teach Well: An Early Childhood Practicum Guide//. 1st. Ed. (p.114)
 * The goal of TeacherTube is to provide an online community for sharing instructional videos. We seek to fill a need for a more educationally focused, safe venue for teachers, schools, and home learners. It is a site to provide anytime, anywhere professional development with teachers teaching teachers. As well, it is a site where teachers can post videos designed for students to view in order to learn a concept or skill. **
 * It is important for students to have opportunities to view a variety of media formats including visuals (e.g., photographs, political cartoons, graphs, charts, maps, and art), drama (e.g., role play, reader’s theatre, live theatre) and other media (e.g., videos, television documentaries, CD-ROM). Each interaction between viewer and text differs because of students’ varying prior knowledge and cultural perspectives (Browne, 2009).

** Reference Browne, Kathryn Williams. //To Teach Well: An Early Childhood Practicum Guide//. 1st. Ed. (p. 122)
 * Podcasting[[image:gnome-mime-audio20.jpg width="104" height="104"]] **
 * // Podcasting is a term used to describe a collection of technologies for automatically distributing audio and video programs over the internet ...Podcasting enables independent producers to create self-[[image:microphone.jpg align="right"]]published, syndicated "radio shows," and gives broadcast radio or television programs a new distribution method. //**
 * // Any digital audio player or computer with audio-playing software can play podcasts....The term "podcast", however, still refers largely to audio content distribution. //**
 * // A podcast is not the same as a webcast, which normally refers to a show distributed by streaming media. You can listen to the shows online, or subscribe to our podcast using [|RSS] or [|iTunes]. //**
 * Auditory learners succeed when directions are read aloud, speeches are required, or information is presented and requested verbally. The auditory learner listens to others to learn and talks to other about what they learn (Browne, 2009; p. 122).

**<span style="color: red; font-family: 'Australian Sunrise'; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 150%; mso-ansi-language: EN;">Arcademic Skill Builders are online educational video games that offer a powerful approach to learning basic math, language arts, vocabulary, and thinking skills. Our philosophy is inspired by the intense engagement arcade and video games foster between the player and the game. The Arcademic goal is to make aspects of classroom instruction as effective in creating persistence and involvement as observed in video game players. Our games are a result of blending video game features into instructional research in order to achieve a high rate of student learning through increased time-on-task and increased engagement. Students must employ strategy under exciting circumstances to make rapid responses while being given immediate feedback on their decisions. These educational games provide fun and focused repetition practice that enables automaticity and fluency to be achieved more quickly. With what we now know about automaticity and fluency in academic performance, we can help students achieve masterful levels performance faster than ever before! ** "[Video games] operate with good principles of learning, principles that are better than those in many of our skill- and - drill, back- to- basics, test- them- until- they- drop schools" (Pink, 2010). ** References **
 * "ARCADEMIC SKILL BUILDER **"<span style="color: red; font-family: 'Australian Sunrise'; font-size: 18pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"> [[image:success_smeltz2.jpg width="669" height="136"]]
 * <span style="color: red; font-family: 'Australian Sunrise'; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 150%; mso-ansi-language: EN;">Teachers can bring this website into their classrooms with the confidence that their curriculum is being strengthened in regards to state standards. Addressing these standards, in turn, prepares students for the high-stakes, standardized tests that are ever present in elementary education. **
 * Pink, Daniel H. 2006 //A Whole New Mind: Moving from the Information Age to the Conceptual Age.// **