Web 2.0 Education
Dvolver Moviemaker
http://www.dvolver.com/moviemaker/index.html
Dvolver Moviemaker is a great website that can be used for creating your own mini movies. With this website, you can create your own little movies that allow you to choose the setting, characters, actions, and dialogue. It’s very easy to use and a fun website! The movies can also be easily sent to anyone else, making it great for sharing.
Dvolver Moviemaker could be used in a number of ways for education. Say for example, I was teaching an English class and students were assigned to summarize a chapter from a book their reading, or the scene from a play. Instead of assigning all students to do a more traditional write-up, students can chose a form of delivery that is best suited for them. This website could be a great alternative for the assignment that a student who is more visual could benefit from. Teachers could also use Dvolver to make movies to present material. If I was trying to explain a complicated scene from Shakespeare, I could make a movie with simplified dialogue to show to the students as an alternative way of presenting the information.
Although the terms of service does not specify an age, and its user friendliness can make it usable for even younger children, there are few characters you can chose from for the movies that are more PG than G, therefore I would use this website for high school students if the students themselves were the ones making the video. If I’m the only one making the video to show to the students, all age groups can benefit.
Read the Words
Read the Words is another great website that can be used in the classroom. It converts any document with text, including webpages and RSS feeds into a speech recording. This can be a great tool for students who struggle with reading, or for ESL learners who find it easier to listen to English rather than reading it. Students who are deaf could also benefit from this website. They can type a message into the program which will convert it to audio speech which allows breaks down communication barriers.
An example of how I could use this in the classroom could be for class presentations. If I assigned student groups to give a short presentation on their favourite animal, a student who has speaking difficulties could type his or her response into this website which will convert it for the class. Another example could be converting books or handouts to an audio recording which students can listen to in addition to a printed format. This way, students who are more audio or struggle with reading can concentrate on the material more.
The terms of service does not specify an age group, but a teacher can use this website for any learner.
Creately
Creately has a lot of great uses for both students and teachers. Creately is a user-friendly graphic organizer tool that lets you create your own graphic organizers, from flow charts to Venn diagrams, or your own unique system. The website lets you create different bubbles, boxes, arrows, text, etc. and move and color code them any way you want. The website also converts your graphic organizer into the format you want which makes it easy to share on different platforms, print them, or share them. It also has a collaboration feature which is great for group projects.
I really enjoy this website and would use it a lot in the classroom. It allows me to present information in an alternative format for students who enjoy graphic organizers. I could also use it to lay out the steps involved in an assignment so students have a clear idea of what is expected of them and can easily navigate complex assignments in simple, broken down manner. Students can also use this tool themselves for developing an essay outline, brainstorming with a group, as a study aid, etc.
Creating graphic organizers are great for all types of students. Students who are visual, have reading struggles, or do not speak English as their first language will benefit from having information presented to them in a non-literary format. Using this website to create a clear breakdown of the steps needed to complete an assignment also reduces barriers for students who feel overwhelmed with multi-step assignments. If they are given a flow chart of each step, they can concentrate on the material and not get frustrated by complex steps.
The terms of service on the website specifies that users must be over the age of the 13 to use its service. It can still be useful for children under 13 if the teacher is making the graphic organizers, but creating them is limited to older students.
Brainingcamp
http://www.brainingcamp.com/content/index.php
Brainingcamp is a website to help students who are struggling with math. It provides a variety of lesson, questions, interactive videos and problems to solve for grades 6-8, covering all the major math areas.
This is a website that I wish was available for me when I was in school. Students can access lessons at home so they can go over difficult concepts or to help them with their homework. The interactive elements also provide a great way for students who are kinesthetic to manipulate different math features which brings a more real-life element to math.
This website could very much reduce barriers for students who struggle with math. I personally found math extremely challenging and one of my problems was, once I got home and tried to work on my math homework, I couldn’t remember how the teacher solved the problems .With this website, I could easily refer back to a lesson as many times as I need. The option to let you explore interactively and manipulate features such as how weight affects how a paper plane flies through the air, is great for providing context to math and showing how it relates to real life. This engages students much more and provides a great context for how math relates to real-life.
For terms of service, anyone is allowed to use the website but you need to pay for an account to use it so students would not have access unless a parent or teacher set it up for them.
