Hello everyone. Yesterday I had the opportunity to create a podcast with Mrs. Brenda Crosetto, one of our business teachers here at my high school. Crosetto was a great resources because she uses computers everyday in her classes and really utilizes a lot of tools between different lessons. What was meant to be a 15 minute visit turned into nearly a 2 hour conversation, because after the podcast I was able to explore some of the tools she uses. One of the neatest tools she mentioned is Aplia, this is a paid web 2.0 tool where you pay for a course for students to enroll in. This course allows students to engage with the material and when they are stuck, Crosetto is able to open up the page they are at on her computer, no matter where the student is. She embraces Remind and Google Voice to provide communication and students can then message her if they are stuck on something at night and then she can get online and look at where they are at. Crosetto’s biggest recommendation for using Web 2.0 tools is that you should only use 1 or 2 to start, work them into your curriculum and expand each year thereafter. She emphasizes quality in the tool as opposed to quantity.
Working through this podcast and seeing other podcasts that are done, I probably would make some introduction music or create an intro theme for consistency. In addition, breaking up the interview and throwing in some other inputs as we go along might be a great addition. It was a neat first experience and I could see how I could be “roped” in to making one podcast by all the edits, etc.
Jeff, as your peers mention, the tone of the interview was very engaging and informal. Mrs. Crosetto obviously has spent a lot of time thinking about how technology has affected her teaching and learning and it was nice to see how easily she was able to talk about that. I thought her comment about using a variety of tools to engage students was an interesting approach, and also how she is using technology to provide more individual help to students who need it, and afford some independence to those students who can manage their own learning. Thanks for a very interesting podcast!
Hi Jeff,
Mrs. Crosetto points important fact that students in this generation are more visual learners. They are influenced a lot by seeing. Technology definitely helps them to engage in learning by visualization. Also, I love her opinion that technology helps students go their own pace. The teacher becomes a facilitator. The teacher can interact with students one by one rather than whole group handling. I think that this is really good insight that students can practice while the teacher can observe how students do and how much they understand about the contents. Your interview is so great.:)
I found her insight on visual learners to be pretty interesting to think about and is such a valid reason to consider web 2.0 tools over other items due to the natural visuals that are provided. She says she really relies on the fact that some students will thrive and others will not. Like most schools, teachers are getting more students for the same class period and would have a hard time getting around to everyone if they didn’t have a way to let some students fly because they can handle it. This allows her to focus more on students that struggle. What a great idea, the only extension I could see is that the teacher could then have the students that are ahead assist other students from time to time as well. Students teaching students.
Hi Jeff,
Your interview was very engaging. I like your reflection about adding intro music and an introduction. I think those two ideas would help all of us in future Podcasting! Thanks for pointing that out. I also found in my interview that there were points where I would like to edit out long pauses or awkward silences. This would also help to tighten up the Podcast and keep it briskly moving. Your guest mentioned a couple of ideas that really sparked my thinking. She discussed the importance of immediate feedback. This all the research I have read on the matter really stresses the importance of immediate and corrective feedback. One of the reasons tests are generally unhelpful in supporting students in their learning is that feedback is delayed and so often just marked as incorrect with no answer explaining WHY the answer was wrong to help students reshape their learning. Many WEB 2.0 technologies help narrow that gap between error and corrective response (aka feedback). I hadn’t really thought too much about that – but the right tool for the assignment could be helpful. The other point that sparked my thinking was her comments about how she mixes up the tech to keep it fresh for the purposes of student engagement. I can certainly understand that reasoning. My only concern with that, and this comes from being a mom with kids who have SLDs, is that too much shifting of tools and strategies can lose those kiddos who rely on consistency in order to manage their disabilities. Your guest mentioned a huge range of tools she uses in her classroom with this task posted here and that task posted somewhere else. For my son right now in Middle School, he is getting lost in the switching of this tool to that tool and missing assignments because he can’t keep it all straight in his head and organization style. As a teacher it makes me want to know how Mrs. Crosetto manages her assignments to ensure that kids don’t slip through the cracks. I noticed she uses Remind – I’m wondering if this helps her with management of so many juggled balls for both her own needs and for those of the kids.
Cori
Hi Cori,
Mrs. Crosetto also discussed about how down the road students will ask if they can use a certain tech over another one, she finds this really neat that they are thinking about which ones they know and which would be best for their situation. She uses remind to provide information to students and due dates. As far as keeping in mind the juggle, she can log into the website she uses and it lets her know exactly where each student is at so she can flag the students that appear to be struggling and dropping the ball with their assignments.