Today we got the opportunity to hear from Rich McCue. Rich’s lesson was very informal and engaging; he shared lots of great strategies about how to integrate technology into classrooms in a positive and effective way. One big take away from this presentation was his insight on the benefit of including educational videos into classrooms. I’ve been thinking about different ways of integrating technology into elementary classrooms without having it take over; children tend to spend a lot of time on screens outside of school, so I think it is important to not rely on technology to teach too often. However, technology has become a huge part of society and has great benefits when it comes to learning. Educational videos can be more engaging and concise than a long lesson on a topic. It also creates an opportunity for students to feel comfortable giving both negative and positive feedback to the video, whereas they may not share their opinion if the information is coming from a teacher or peer. Rich gave us suggestions on reliable sources to find educational videos from such as Teachertube, Khan Academy, and YouTube. He also brought to our attention possible drawbacks of using YouTube. Teachers have to be aware of the advertisements, the suggested videos, and they must make sure that all of the content is appropriate for their target audience. I appreciated that he gave us names of commonly used sites because now I know where to look for inspiration for finding educational videos. I spent some time browsing each of these sources and I can see why they’ve become popular tools for teaching in classrooms. I have included the links to these sites below. I also included a link to my “Screencastify” video which we experimented with in class today.
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