Final Concept Map

Website

I still haven't received and invitation to be able to work on the website. And we need to make sure we are still utilizing the blog as we are getting graded on it. I am pretty sure I posted every week but one and I got an E for the 1st half of class blog usage. Does it count if I comment on one of your posts or do I have to create a whole new post for it to count? Let me know please. I am also available next Sunday just let me know what time. Thanks ladies

Storyboard

Hey girls!
Our storyboard is due tonight, I emailed you both what Katie and I started so lets work together to get it finished on time.
Stacey

Digital Stories

Hey Girls!
I am going to make my digital story on how to create a book.

Modified Concept Map

concept map #2

We need to update our concept map for a grade this week!

Podcast Grade

Great job ladies! I am so thankful the music part was right. It was really hard to do because of the different volumes we recorded our parts at. I love the audacity program and plan to use it in the future.

Podcast script

The topic of our project is local history, and our main goal is for students to gain knowledge of the history and local culture of Kalamazoo Michigan using project based learning methods. They will then share this information with the local community and will even have the chance to share information they research with other students on a global scale. To begin this project, we planned for students to research the history of Kalamazoo using various sources. They then came together to share what they have learned with students from Moonta, South Australia. They compared the history and culture of their home city to that of the city of the students in Australia. Next they learned about the book writing and publishing process, since their final goal of the project is to create a book and share it with their local community. To gain the knowledge to create this book, students will learn about the interviewing process and they will use this new information to interview members of their community that they will feature in their book.

Podcast

I am going to talk about the interview process for my part of the podcast.

Audacity

So I have audacity downloaded and it is fairly simple to use. Text me if you have any questions since it was a little confusing at first, but I think I have it down now. This will be such a cool resource to use in and out of the classroom.

Podcast

Hey girls,
For the podcast I am going to discuss project-based learning and why it is important.
Here is my script for it:

Project-based learning is very important in education. Students learn by engaging in projects that actually relate to the real-world, and this is exactly what project based learning is; allowing students to engage in activities that they can then relate to their lives and use in the real world. By having a classroom that uses project based learning, it allows the traditional classroom to become a more efficient, hands on learning experience.
Technology also plays a huge role in creating a project based classroom. It is integrated as a tool for discovery, collaboration, and communication. Technology allows students to go further into depth in what they are learning, while without it, they could only reach a certain point. It also allows teachers to collaborate and work together more easily. Teachers can share their technological resources with one another as well. So, not only does technology benefit the students, but the teachers as well.
Technology and project-based learning are becoming more essential in the classroom. By combining them both together, they give students an understanding of inquiry, develop good communication skills, they learn to be flexible with their working hours, are held responsible for meeting deadlines, they develop a better understanding of how the world works, and they also grasp an understanding that they can change the world, as well.

Help!

Have you figured out where the template is on task stream?

Hey girls, So, we each have to do a seperate lesson plan of something the students would need to know for our project. I was thinking about doing mine on interview techniques. Which area would you guys like to do ?

Google docs link

This is the link to our Google Doc for part 1.
https://docs.google.com/a/wmich.edu/document/d/16Vm_GSHse0T62b6JuVV2LgHVGEf65Ry77D1kzzaRcIk/edit

idea

What if we make the assumption that our pen pals are doing the same research project as we are, that way we could collaborate with them throughout the whole process.

Google Maps

This is a map that shows Kalamazoo, MI and Moonta, South Australia. It shows the distance between one another, which is important for students to see; to understand just how far away they are from their pen pals.

Map

What do you guys think we should do for our map?  We should show the locations of kalamazoo and the town of the other students, but should we add anything else to it?

Ok, so we have to decide what type of assignment we are going to do for this weeks assignment.  I am not entirely sure what we should do, maybe we could create an assignment in which students would find out about the history of how their city started or something to do with local culture and compare and contrast with students from another part of the world who learned about the same thing about their city?? What do you guys think?  That was just the only type of idea that came to mind, so let me know if you have any different ideas.  I will create the google doc and invite you both to it so we can get started on it whenever you have time.  Also, I don't mind creating the map once we get going on the first part and posting it for us if you want.  But, I don't have any idea what kind of map to create yet, hopefully it will be easier once we get going on creating the assignment.

Concern

I am wondering after completing the web evaluations if you found any websites that had references and could be used as a scholarly source. The websites I evaluated could be used for our project but did not seem like they would qualify as a scholarly source.

Website Evaluations

These are the three websites that I am going to evaluate. We need to collaborate our evaluations onto one sheet to turn in so we aren't turning in three separate sheets.

http://www.downtownkalamazoo.org/About-Downtown/About-the-D-s/History.aspx

www.mikvgs.org/historical_records/historical_records.aspx

http://www.kalamazoomanufacturingco.net/history.htm

Website Evaluations

The websites I am going to evaluate are

www.kalamazoomuseum.org/

http://www.mifamilyhistory.org/counties/kalamazoo.aspx

http://www.kalamazoocity.org/history?showall=1&limitstart=

There seem to be plenty of resources available. Now we just have to evaluate them to see
 how reliable they are.

Ok, so I was not really sure what kinds of websites we might want to look for since our project is local history but we are doing a book of interviews of current people..  Here are some sites I found that I might review on Kalamazoo Local History.  If you haven't found any yet, maybe you could find sites about the other things the students would need to know that are on our map?  Such as information on publishing a book, a site about how to conduct interviews, or about advertising or putting on a presentation for the community.

Here are the ones I am going to do,

http://www.kpl.gov/local-history/all-about-kalamazoo/

http://www.swmidirectory.org/History_of_Kalamazoo_County.html

http://www.kalamazoomi.com/hisf.htm

Website Evaluations

Hi Girls,
We need to decide on what types of websites we should use to evaluate this week. Any ideas?

Map

Hey girls, let me know what you think of the concept map.  I think that this is what we were supposed to do, but I may have forgotten some things.  It is just a draft so we can add more things later if they come to us.

Collaborative Concept Map Draft

Project Topic

Katie and Stacey,

I am working on our concept map right now, do you two think we should do a book of community interviews or a live museum??