Concept+Mapping

Concept Mapping tools

Brad and Matt

Timelines
 * 1) Create an operational definition for the tool. ﻿Timelines.com is a place to view important people, events, or topics in history. You can search information by topics, names, states, etc. You can add information about people, add entire topics, or add to information already added. You have to record the source where you received the inforamtion too.
 * 2) Does the technology promote student engagement or merely entertainment? This site is very much a tool to help student engagement.
 * 3) Analyze whether this technology adds some demonstrable pedagogical value to traditional instruction. The students can access the inforamtion at home and school. Information can be reorganized by person, event, or year to access what information is important to the questions being answered. Overall, it helps to develop a 21st century student where they can access knowledge and change knowledge online.
 * 4) Assess the use of this particular technology to aid students in the acquisition of knowledge and not just information. This site helps students see information in a cronogical order from beginning to end. If students are doing research on a particular time in a event or a person's life they can look at specific information insetead of just guessing what is relevant for the project. If students find information in other locaitons that could be relevant to the situation, they could include it in the timeline for others to see.
 * 5) Suggest some educational uses for this tool in the K-12 classroom. Research reports, cronoligical activities, current event projects, "This day in history" items, etc.
 * 6) Discuss the pluses and minuses of using this tool with students. Pluses: Need to add sources of where informaiton came from. Items ordered cronogically. Video also included in reports for those that cannot just use written information to understand research. Topics show related searches as well to further informational seraches. Minuses: Some sources are not reliable (wikipedia, etc.). People can comment on topics and resources, and some people are too candid with comments. Not all topics or inforamtion shared might be age appropiate.

[|Wordle]
 * 1) Create an operational definition for the tool. Wordle is a site that allows you to make "word clouds" out of a collection of words of your choice. The words can be mix matched in a variety of styles varying from text, background colors, text colors, and even the layout of the words. It is free to use and post your word clouds on the public site.
 * 2) Does the technology promote student engagement or merely entertainment? To me this appears to be more entertainment and does not hold a lot of educational value. I could see how this could be used as a vocabulary lesson perhaps where the spelling of the words correctly is the assignment, and the students must create their own word cloud out of the words given for that vocabulary unit.
 * 3) Analyze whether this technology adds some demonstrable pedagogical value to traditional instruction. This site can be accessed from anywhere with an internet connection. I could again, see how this ties into a vocabulary lesson where the teacher introduces the words to the students through the use of their word clouds. It is a method of introducing vocabulary I think best suited for 21st century learners through the use of digital technologies, and not pencil and paper format.
 * 4) Assess the use of this particular technology to aid students in the acquisition of knowledge and not just information. As far as the acquisition of knowledge goes, this would go about as far as learning how to correctly spell these words, or perhaps spark interest in knowing more about their particular meaning. It is another way of introducing the vocabulary, or perhaps introducing a particular lesson where that set of words hold a strong value to the lesson.
 * 5) Suggest some educational uses for this tool in the K-12 classroom. This tool would be great with all ages I think from K-8. I'm not sure how well it would go over in a high school setting, but it could be done. I think it's something more for the instructor to use. It could be used to introduce a number of things from vocab words, lesson topics, or course outlines perhaps.
 * 6) Discuss the pluses and minuses of using this tool with students. I really think that some of the pluses of this tool are that it is another way of introducing technology into your classroom and that it can take some pretty boring things and perhaps give them a little bit of a kick such as words, lessons, or course outlines and descriptions. I think a minus is that it doesn't necessarily hold a lot of educational value to it. It isn't exactly something that someone is going to gain knowledge just by accessing the tool. It can be done depending on how the teacher utilizes it. Another drawback I feel is that it is another sign that paper and pencil are slowly making its way out and I feel that paper and pencil are important in many cases still in our classrooms.