Reading Assignment (book): Chapter 3 in Grabe and Grabe.
Productivity tools may seem old hat to many with technology interests. However, our take on these tools may be new to you. Jonassen's (1995) concept of mindtools was the basis for our original conceptualization of integrating technology. Technology integration became a popular "buzzword". Jonassen's concept of a mindtool proposes that the benefits of tools might be understood on at least two levels. There is the intended benefit that makes tasks easier to accomplish, but there may also be secondary educational benefits. Arguing for the broader application of productivity tools in this second way across the curriculum is what we decided to describe as technology integration in the first edition of our textbook. Aside from productivity benefits, the use of productivity tools to encourage the processing of information (data) argues that working with information (manipulation) generates understanding.
Writing and a multimedia expansion of writing we have labeled authoring to learn make one example of the use of a productivity tool. I want you to have some background for and against what I will describe as "authoring to learn" (perhaps related to writing across the curriculum for old timers). This is the idea that students can learn from the activities involved in authoring content to reflect what they have learned. The question you should be asking yourself, me, and anyone proposing that students create multimedia content as a component of classroom learning activities is "why do students benefit from spending time creating content". Here is some background, pro and con, on this topic:
The idea of generative processes - authoring to learn. (in addition to the first page, read the linked page "writing to learn" and the information on "processing learning by writing").
The negative position you read last week - this was the argument that tasks that require externalization (writing, creation of multimedia content) may not be efficient uses of valuable time.
The writing process benefits from editorial review. Peer editing provides an efficient way for student authors to obtain feedback. Google docs is suited to an efficient peer editing process in that docs offers an efficient way to share documents and make comments (suggestions). Review this description of the
Other required reading for the productivity chapter: - An example of a data probe activity. I have one observation on data probes. I don't understand why you don't see greater interest in this category of technology. Data collection is key to authentic science and probes offer a way for students to collect data for analysis. Be a scientist.
Skill demonstration for the week:
Note that we are making use of some of the features of Google Docs in this course. You have already been asked to add information to a shared document. I have added a sentence to the top of this document so you can try out the docs comment feature. Your task is to use the comment feature of docs to comment on this first sentence. Send me a screen capture showing that you can open the commenting tool and make a suggestion. Don't actually make a change to the existing text, but add a suggestion. This task simulates how a teacher might make a suggestion for how a student might modify a document they have written in docs. Email me the screen capture.