My Final Thoughts !!!!

From this course I understood many  useful things, which really will help me in my future teaching. The most important thing that I understood it was the meaning of student centered learning; I found that I had to be a facilitator and the resource person during the teaching process but not an information presenter. Also, I had to help the students to build their personality, their knowledge and to be interdependent. After these understandings of the meaning of SCL and its benefits, I tried to use some teaching strategies which are helped me to apply the SCL like, teaching by projects, by group work,  by discussions, practical practices and activities. One of these new strategies is the Inquiry based learning which is  an information-processing model that allows students to discover certain information through a series of steps that lead to a conclusion or reflection on the newly attained knowledge.

Also, I understood the different roles of the computer inside my classroom, as a tutor, tutee and as a tool. After this course and for example I can use the computer as a tutor by using games or simulations in my teaching lessons to motivated my students. In addition I can use it as a  mind tool by using programs and software that help my student to connect their information together in a logical and organized way.

Finally, I would to thank you Dr. for all useful information you presented to us and I promiss you to apply it as much as I can in my future teaching.

ICT as a tutor !!!

The computer inside my classroom is playing three major roles; I used it as a tutor, tool and tutee. I will focus here in the computer as a tutor, when I provide for them online educational software to educate and play, and when I give them tutorials software to present some subjects material, to solve different related questions and response and then the computer "tutor" evaluate these responses. From the result the students can determine their levels and what to do next. Also, there are many other software to use as a tutor for many other purposes. For example using games or simulations in my teaching lessons. And that motivate the student too much, it help them to understand and analysis the information easily.

I was always trying to use different games and simulations with my students in the class to teach them certain information. And they were very interesting during the whole lesson. I gave them thinking games, logic puzzles and memory games. There are some modified games that I tried to give to my students, but they are not interested on them as much as the puzzles games. About the simulation, I tried to find an online education simulation to let my students register in and play. The games help me to break from the usual and make my lesson more attractive.

ICT as mind tools !!!

The computer inside my classroom is playing three major roles; I used it as a tutor, tool and tutee. Using it as a tool is the most use of it inside the classroom; I used it in preparing and presenting the teaching presentations by using Microsoft office applications. The students are using it as a tool also by using the same applications as me to work in their projects. We used it also, as a mind tool, especially when we communicate with each other through the Face book, twitter and other celebration networks. Not only these uses, recently I discovered new use of it as a mind tool and it is the mind mapping or concept map. It is a visual thinking and learning approach, which help me in teaching and help my students in learning.

Before, I was always drawing maps and divided any information related to me personality and tried to connect all the ideas with each other and I followed this technique with my students. All the information I taught them I drew them on the board and connected to each other because i knew that it is the easiest way for my students to remember and understand. But after, when I know more about the visual concept map, I will use it more and more inside my classroom because it is useful for my students in many ways, It provide structure for thinking, writing, focus thoughts and ideas which leading to understanding and interpretation and connect between the previous knowledge and the new concepts.

WebQuest!!!!

One of the most interesting kind of activities which help our student to achieve the global learning; the critical thinking and the problem solving learning is the Web Quest. It is one of the Inquiry based earning examples which based on searching on different sources on the NET certain information which help in solving certain problem. I applied it on my students and they really interested and benefited from it. I chose an interesting topic to them; I asked them to design a poster under some rubrics which contain information related to the main topic. After that, my students conclude with many things like they reached high level of thinking, explore many new information, their knowledge was extended, worked in teams and learn by project based.

I followed the five basic steps of the Web Quest. I started it with an introduction contained a problem for a student in their age and face a real life problem which most of them were faced it too. Then I asked them to solve it by working in groups. Then I asked each group certain tasks to do, after in the process step I gave each member in the group a task to do like one of them search the information and the other collected them and organized them ect…..  Then in the evaluation step I put the rubric that I will evaluated them by it. At the end I concluded with some smile faces which congratulated them.

I was chosen the web quest activity in learning, because of many reasons; it is easy to create, it would let my students work in their space by themselves or with team, search about in depth about certain information and at the end I would to help my students to become creative researchers rather than simply surfing from one site to another.

Cyber safety!!!!

Me as a teacher has to teach my students and informed them about their safety while using the NET. Most of the teachers now a day asked their students to search and browsing the NET to discover and explore information but they have not advice them to be careful while connect to the internet or give  them advices in how to be safe in the Net. I am always advising my students to be careful while they connected to the NET; first, they have to be sure that their anti viruses updated and on, second they have to discard  any an wanted information and collect only the useful one, be sure that the source of info is legal, don’t trust any stranger and be away from the plagiarism. By these advices I can sure that my students will be in the safe side online.

Inquiry based learning !!!!

Student centered learning, is a term reflect the new style in teaching and it is giving the teachers and the students many and different responsibilities. One of these responsibilities which the new learning style asked the teachers to do is using the modern teaching strategies like; the problem based learning, Project based learning, Authentic learning, active learning and Inquiry based learning ( IBL ). Today I will focus on IBL because it is the most interesting strategy that I liked and applied on my students.

First let me mention the meaning of IBL as I understood; it is an information-processing model that allows students to discover certain information through a series of steps that lead to a conclusion or reflection on the newly attained knowledge. So, my students have to look at questions or problems, search for answers, reflect on what they find and integrate the information they find with their knowledge of the problem. After that, and in my point view I think that my students will conclude with many benefits like, they will reach them to the high thinking, how to reflect themselves, how to build a new knowledge based on their previous knowledge, how to analyze problems and how to solve it.

  

I think that the most interesting thing that help the teacher in follow this strategy in learning that it there are many examples of IBL for different levels of students. Super 3 and Big 6 are the same they are both asked the student to analyze a problem and solve it by follow series steps but the different between them that the Super 3 is using for children because it has only three steps to solve any problem. Also there is another example of IBL and it is Web Quest and this I will discussed on the next blog.

At the end I think that I have to know more about IBL, about its examples and how to use them in my teaching. Also, I have to help my students to reach all benefits of this strategy in learning because I want them to be able to understand the world around them, analyst, reflect and solve its problems.

The roles of ICT in classroom

Eight years ago, when I finished my secondary school's years, my parents gave me the complete freedom of choice in the selection of university specialization. And, because I was very interest in computers and the new technologies appeared that time, I choose the Computer engineering major. I was very interest in computer and other new technologies because I was thinking that IT is the future and I have to belong to this future and be one of its developing members. Then, I worked hard and got the bachelor's degree and worked as a teacher after few months from the graduating. From this step of my life, I can develop the future and be part of it by developing myself in teaching and IT then developing my student's computing skills.  

Now a day, computers and other technologies are playing major roles in teaching and educations, this is because we are in the 21^st century and every thing around us is changing very fast and we have to build students whose can follow this changing without any basic challenges. Also, we have to help them to implement their personalities and knowledge depends on the meaning of the globalization and its effects on our life.  To help these students, as a teacher, I have to use new strategies and technologies to teach them, I have to use student-centered learning ( SCL ), group work, projects and many other strategies. Also, I have to use the ICT in teaching and this is the important thing which I will take about in a while. In addition, this use of ICT will help me and my students to achieve the new style of learning which is help us to access the global information by Internet, learning in a collaborative environment, communicate with each other by using new technologies and exchange the authentic experiences.

The computer inside my classroom is playing three major roles; I used it as a tutor, tool and tutee. As a tutor, when I provide for them online educational software to educate and play, and when I give them tutorials software to present some subjects material, to solve different related questions and response and then the computer "tutor" evaluate these responses. From the result the students can determine their levels and what to do next. But, using it as a tool is the most use of it inside the classroom; I used it in preparing and presenting the teaching presentations by using Microsoft office applications. The students are using it as a tool also by using the same applications as me to work in their projects. We used it also, as a mind tool, especially when we communicate with each other through the Facebook, twitter and other celebration networks. In addition, only me_ the teacher_ is using the computer as a tutee. I was using it to create different tutorials to my students using the different programming languages same as Java.

Finally, I think I have to increase my using of the computer inside the classroom and let it play its three roles in different ways. I promise to work hard for that.

Refrences:

Taylor, R. P. (1980). Introduction. In R. P. Taylor (Ed.), The computer in school: Tutor, tool, tutee (pp. 1-10). New York: Teachers College Press.

Reprinted by permission of the publisher from Taylor, R., Ed., The Computer in School: Tutor, Tool, Tutee, (New York: Teachers College Press, © 1980 by Teachers College, Columbia University. All rights reserved.), pp. 1-10. To order copies, please contact www.teacherscollegepress.com. All rights reserved.