Conclusion: 

Technology has many pitfalls. Not only in becoming to attach to it that you forget basic skills but also in assuming you know the technology.  In truth we only know it as far as the ways we have used it in the past. No more and no less. 

Today was in class LAB where we worked on finishing all of our assignments.  We also went over how to make PDF and put them into one PDF file.  PDF, a software by Adobe is becoming an industry standard for the Academic community for working with documents submissions.   Most of us have heard of the Adobe Reader that allows one to read or view PDF’s.  Free versions like CutePDF and NitroPDF exist, just to name a few. These versions are by other companies that simulate the Adobe PDF.  I think PDFs are the wave of the future and will look more into them.  

Conclusion:

My documents like ms excel and ms word can be changed into PDF’s.  This makes sending documents easy since PDF files are small and in this form can be viewed only.  It is the future of document submission.

<<<<<>>>>>

Week 14, April 15, 2008 Class 13

This week is class begins the discussion about the final presentation and documents. It has been a work intensive class so far in terms of writing and critical thinking and presentation of ideas.   The class schedule for the final weeks of class is as follows.

Class schedule

Week 14 Class 13 = Power Point & Audacity

Week 15 Class 14 = PDF portfolios = Room 815

Week16 Class 15= Open LAB

Week17 Class 16 = Presentations & Final Grades

The Presentation for the what we have learn and gotten out of the class so far is going to be particularly interesting because I am sure every students has a particular view about Technology and Education and what they have learned

Class 16 = 10 min presentation (3 min setup, 7 min presentation)

I think that a 7 min presentation is long.  It will require an in depth discussion rather than just an overview.                     

Type of presentation

My past experience with presentation has been with Power Point.  However power point does not have much sound capability.  The Audacity + PDF combination seems more my style.  This offers you both sound and slides.  The teacher seems to be promoting the the Movie Maker presentation which automates everything.  Basically it is a movie of slides with voice.  It is the most intimidating of the three forms of presentation mainly because most students are not accustomed to this technology use in presentation. 

= Power Point == You can talk & show slides

= Audacity + PDF == You can & recorded voice & PDF

= Movie Maker === You can show slides and run recorded voice

The content of the presentation covers several topics.  Basically this gives us structure to build our presentation around which was sorely needed since we covered a lot of information and had many discussions on topics in class.  Hopefully this gives us our 7 minutes worth of presentation time.  Personally, I think the 7 minute number is too long.  I think if week cover the information and say what we want to say in less than 7 minutes that should be enough.  In the past the 7 minute time would not be set in concrete but because we now have the technology to with Audacity and Movie Maker to time ourselves students can have a better sense of how much time their presentations will actually take.

Content for Presentation

= This is how I define Education

= This is how I define Technology

= This is what I have learned about Technology in the Classroom

=What is good about T.I.T.C (Technology in The Classroom) Good or Bad

= One topic this semester that was very useful & why

==== This Assignment made me think about EDU

==== This Assignment made me think about Tech

In the final weeks of class I still have many things to do.  I find because of the different technology that I must use it is actually intimidating and taking me longer to finish things. Most the technology is new to much or requires me to use it in ways I have not experience.   There is a learning curve with any new technology and because of have so many different technology we must now integrate the learning curve is steep.

Things to Do

= Web Quest save – as HTML

= Blogs – Separate Entity

            Presentation

            = 1) Time

            = 2) Address all topics

            = 3) Maintain our attention

            = 4) Completed assignments

For example I have used power point before but not with Screen Captures or with Transition slides.  This is makes power point presentation more interesting and I wish I had known how to do them in the past. However this does not make a power point presentation more informative. This is true with most presentation technology.  New things are make presentations more fun and easy but do not make it more instructive. However, an important part of a presentation is holding the interest of an audience. After all, you can not inform them if you bore them to sleep.

Power Point

= Slide Transition

= Screen Capture

Audacity is by far one of the most important technology finds for me.  Sound and voice recording is not a new technology.  It comes standard on most computers.  What is amazing is that I learn I can use it in combo with Movie Maker. Movie Maker takes the slides and sound and runs it like a movie.  I think this makes timing a presentation easier because of the timing devices built in.  However, I feel a presentation is about the presenter and audience inter action.  I love to ask questions and these technologies leave little room for questioning except after the presentation.  Of course, you can “pause” but this will throw off the timing.  There is no editing on the fly capability built into theses software.

Some points to note about the capability and use of the technology for the presentations.

Audacity is free

= File

= Export as mp3

= Title Presentation

= Take Note

= Write everything down

= Read

= in speech say “go to slide 1, 2 or 3.”

= Download Audacity from Web, its free, Audacity Download = 1.2

Movie Maker

= Movie Task   = How long each clip will play

= Save movie wizard

            = Best Quality

            = Other setting

                        = Video large seems smaller size file

Power Point

= Custom Animation

            = Add effect

= Insert

            = Text Box

=No Pixilation = We can not have pixilation in our presentations or we should avoid it when ever possible.

=Animation = Transitions

Do use Transition Sound

<ctl> <prt-screen>  = Capture Screen

Power point = save as other formats = jpeg

= Window movie maker

Power Point

            = view

                        = Ruler

http://www.vtc.com/

Conclusion:  I am happy to be introduced to new ways and forms of presentation. However, I find the more things change the more they stay the same.  Presenters have all ways been concerned about the best way to inform their audience and increase their understanding.  What all these technologies offer are easier ways to present information but the real work of organizing, gauging the audience understanding, and finding the best ways to use the technology is still left to the presenter.  Maybe the next software upgrades will have ways to measure an audiences understanding, point of view and interest in a topic. 

<<<<<>>>>>

Week 13, April 8, 2008 Class 12

This week we talked about making web pages. I have had some experience in this but it has been a long time ago and for a specific purpose. I am no expert.  However, my long standing belief is that the process will one day be totally automated where by the user how has to answer a few questions and fill in the blank.  Some software is trying to get to that point but since this software usually cost more than I am willing to pay I never use it. 

Some key points to note about HTML.

Hyper Text Markup Language

Uses ==           HTML

Can Use ==     Java Script

Can Use ==     CSS = Cascading Style Sheets

This provide info about the creator of the web page.

www.echo == who is = search providers

                        = Domain Name

                                    = Domain Name

                                    = NIC Hardware

                                    = IP_Address

Some software you can use to create your webpage

=Dreamweaver

=Composer

Word

            = save as = single file web page

            = open with explorer

            = free html editor

= Some software that makes it easier for users to publish info on the web.

            Black Board = this what our educational system mainly uses.

            = This the students in class mainly use

                        = Blog = wordpress = regular text or HTML text         

                        =MS Word= save = Frank Loyd Wright Paper > save as HTML

Conclusion: I think HTML should eventually be automated completely.  There are too many technologies add-ons, too many drivers and too many bells and whistles for a user to keep track off. I think the process is heading towards this goal. The web is the most informative place on the planet write now.  Even libraries are online. So, it only makes sense that the user has a more stable and inclusive software to work with without having to dealing with competing technologies with their learning curves and capabilities to master.  In fact, I think it defeats the purpose of the web by making it hard for the average non-technology inclined person to publish to the web by employing all of its capabilities to present information in the best way. This is clearly a case where less competing software would be more useful to the consumer.

Week 12, April 1, 2008 Class 11

This week was about research and finding information.  There is a lot of information to be found on line.  Even libraries, new papers and magazines are put their periodicals and books online.  Some websites of educational merit have an online presence.  Not to mentions Colleges and Universities who publish on line.  The trick is finds credible authors in the crowd of entertain, opinion and spin.

At the different levels of College students have different research needs and informational needs on a specific topic. PhD candidates must know a particular very specific topic very well.  AA candidates usually must know many basic topics well.

Research

            = OWL Internet Research Presentation

                        = Research And the Internet

            =Area Covered =

AA       ============

Bach    =========

Master ======

PhD     ===

Researching for a paper for examples involves a process of picking a topic , do research to understand the topic then to doing more research on a specific aspect  of the topic as you narrow you focus and pick you point of view or determine the type of research you need do to accomplish you goal of informing.

=Understanding the process of Research

=Attempt to do research

However, research on the internet is full of many dangerous because anyone can publish to the internet.

==Internet research==

1) Virtually any person can publish almost anything on the Internet

2) The publish pages do not have to be professionally edited

======

The focus of the class was how to recognize these dangers and how to avoid them and find useful information.

1) Use search engines to your advantage

2) Identify the web site

3) Examine for credibility

4) Determine depth & scope of info.

5) Assess the date

=======

Types of WEB pages

1) Informative page = News

2) Personal WEB page = Your own domain

3) Political Interest

4) Marketing – oriented or infomercial

5) Entertainment

=======

Most people do research on line by using a search engine.  My personal favorite is google. I use MSN the most because it is all over internet explorer.   However, only about 15-16 percent of the information online is accessed by doing a search. Dogpile is a search engine I will try to make more use of because it searches using several search engines.

Search engines

Yahoo and Alta Vista

www.Owl.english.purdue.edu

A lot exist but most are protected areas

Google, Northern Light and Snap = Access 15-16 percent

Dogpile = search through several search engines

Listed bellow are things you should always try to do below in the course of doing research online.

Always try to identify Homepage

==Identify the Website

            = Who is the creator of the site?

            = What is the purpose of the site?

            = Who is the audience of the site?

            = Can you purchase product?

== examine for credibility

            = Purpose

            = Who is author

            = Type in Author’s name, do search

            = Agenda = Personal or business

            = Info. About sponsors of the site

            = cited works

= sometimes web sources might not be the best source of information

= locate the date

Conclusion: The internet has a lot of useful information but you must avoid the information that has an agenda that is not conducive to academic research.  Luckily there are many sources for doing academic research.  One of our assignments this week was to long on to the schools Library online and do research.  However, the only draw back to this type of access to academic sources is that you must have membership and this usually involves payment.  Most people would rather get their information for free and online leads people to think information should be free.  Some free resources are the Chicago public library. Something to note when you are doing research is that now many periodicals have citations information which makes it easier to list and keep track of sources.  Maybe one day all information will be free online paid for by advertisement. But we are not their yet and advertisements have a cost being “eye garbage” you have to look through.  So, only draw back to online research is avoiding the trouble spots of misinformation, bias and agendas.

=====

Below are some bullet points to help in doing research on line at the school.

Week11 Assignment 10

1) Establish Username & password

2) Research a topic of chice trealted to our study of technology & Education

3) Submit a written report of your research top – Present facts obtained from a minimum of 4 topics, articles, sources

=== hwc.ccc.edu

            =Library = hwclibrary.info

                                    = online catalog

This is the Chicago public Library

            =www.chpublib.org

hwclibrary… info

            = search proQuest all Modules

Cite the Option – cut & paste

This is how you help in doing a google search.

Google help == cheat sheet

http://hwclibrary.info/library/students/mylib.php

 <<<<<<<>>>>>>>

Week 11, March 25, 2008 Class 10

This week we went over how to do a Web Quest and its usefulness.  I had an ideal of how I would do a Web Quest but I did not know there were specific guidelines. These guidelines are neither good nor bad they just provide sort of a standard for how a Web Quest should be created and what it should do.

WEB Quest should have a particular age group in mind. Our web quest will be part of our electronic portfolios.

1- Classroom setting = Elementary = k -8 or HS = 9 -12  > have a specific classroom Environment in mind, Software, Why you need it.

2-WEB Quest

3-Portfolio (Electronic)

=====

Web Quest and how to use and create them can help one towards meeting the Technology stardards for all IL Teachers. It requires teacher to be proficient in some technology.. 

Technology Standards for All IL. Teachers

1) Standard 1 = Basic Computer  Technology Operations & Concepts

2) Standard 2 = Personal and Professional Use of Technology

3) Standard 3 = Application of Technology in Instruction

4) Standard 4 = Productivity Tools

My Technology Proposal will be specific to High School  student and I will be – Teaching Auto Cad Subject Matter.

Below is a place that gives information on how to do electronic portfolios.

Portfolio

==http://electronicportfolios.org/

=====NT E-portfolio Templates

Some points to notes when creating a web quest.

=======

= Clicking Mouse Middle – Wheel – Opens New Page

========

Webquest have a certain order:

==Intro

==Task

==Links

==Question

======Intro  – Learn about the sky

======Task – Why is it blue?

======Links – No Wikis just web pages of academic merit.

==========At the end of web quest Reflect Here’s what I have learned about Webquest

 Bloom’s Taxonomy is of interest about how to people learn.

============ knowledge

============ apprehend

== Cognitive === analysis

============ evaluation

concepts and definition

http://www.nwlink.com/~donclark/hrd/bloom.html

http://webquest.org/index-resources.php

Below is a place to go for information about Web Quest.

Some Thought Abouts WebQuests

http://webquest.sdsu.edu/about _webquests.html

 Conclusion:  Web Quest have their usefulness.  They take students on a learning jouryney helping them learn in an interesting way.  However Web Quest are limited in that they are not good for all subject matter. For example, web quest are not good for teaching students how to do auto CAD projects.  WEB Quest are good for relaying factual reading and picture information.  I am not convince a WEB Quest would be of interest to age groups at the college level or higher.  People taking the WEB Quest journey have to have patience to search through information to find the information they are looking for.  I am not sure at the college level finding a little bit of information after searching through a lot of information in WEB Quest form would be of interest to college students.  That being said I , I believe it depends a lot on the subject matter and if students have had an intensived learning experience and need a break with an interesting fun Web Quest that still fosters the relaying of information for the purpose of teaching.  So, teachers and people who employe  WEB Quest in their lesson plan should keep this in mind.

==

Conclusion: WebQuest is one of those ideas you think is easy to understand until look at the definition of WebQuest and try to do one.   I will change my WebQuest topic.

Conclusion:  Most of the software we think we know, we really only know as it as far as the task were are performing. It is not until we are given a new different task than we are use to and start trying to complete do we discover how much we don’t know. 

(C) Stan (picture of World Map, with North America the central view, March 4, 2008) <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> 

Today we talk about Digital Photos.  More specifically we talked about Raster and Vector images. The assignment was to take a picture, resize it and post it to the blog. We also talked about Copyright Law.

The Digital Millennium Copyright Act Says and does the following:1) Crime to circumvent Software anti-piracy measures built into most commercial software2) Outlaw code cracking devices3) Outlaw password encryption breaking4) Protect minors against certain materials on the internet 5) Protect person privacy6) Allows security testing 7) Limits service provider’s liability Requires webcasters to pay fees to the music creators for playing their music.Taken from: http://www.copyright.gov/legislation/dmca.pdf and http://www.gseis.ucla.edu/iclp/dmca1.htm

Photos & information on Websites are copyrighted. In academic situations you must give credit or sight source. Anything you write is automatically copy righted. Two ways for the Poor Man’s copyright: 1) Send mail to yourself, Keep it sealed and  another way for the 2) Write on document © Stan Gates (FirstName, LastName) 2008

Free Works (Books, Music, writing and so on) = work you do not have to give credit reference to the creator. 1) They are public domain, Free and have no copyright 2) 50ty plus years old you have to renew copyright. A fair(y) use Tale = Video on internet, using Disney cartoons to tell about copyrights can be found in U-tube. The stuff you write in chat room could by copyrighted. Star wars = George Lucas gave up movie rights but kept toy rights which turned out to be a very lucrative aspect of the movie business.    

Some Points to note about Copyrights:            1) Copyright laws help the individual get credit/payment for his work/creativity. A person must have an agreement with the owner of the movie in order to charge for the movie (sale it) because making money on the movie requires the owner also receive payment/compensation under whatever agreement he has made with the person.   10% of a book can be copied for education purposes.    It is against the law if you are copying more than 10% of the pages from a book and distribute it to others. It is against the law if you are copying the book and selling it without an agreement with the owner.  According to copyright law you can make a copy of friends CD, Book and so on if the friend is the owner of the CD or item, gives you permission and doing so is not piracy of commercial material like software and music.     It is not permitted to make a copy of my friend’s CD if the CD represents your friend’s original work and he did not give you permission to copy it.  If the CD is represents software or music your friend purchased and the owner of the music states( usually on the package or licensing agreement) it not to be reproduced and distributed without certain conditions being met.  It is wrong to share MP3 files if  the music in the form of MP3 belongs to the creators and record companies and sharing the files without the compensation to the above mentioned. This violates copyright law.   It is illegal to install software that one did not purchase because most software states package or during purchase in their licensing agreement that the software is not to be distributed without compensation back to the owner or that another license must be purchased.   Most commercial software is only leased to individuals while the copyrights for the software remains with the commercial owner or company or individual who created it.  The people who benefit the most form  copyright laws are creators of the work benefits because they receive credit for the work and possible payment for the use of the work. The creators are also protected from someone stealing his idea. 

The Instructor’s teaching philosophy

1)      I am more of a guide and a vacillator

2)      To study are history is to study all history

3)      I do no criticize but I am critical of your answer

4)      I encourage dialogue

5)      I discourage “Passive Learning” (oxymoron)

6)      Read and read some more

7)      Participation = attendance, discussion, & reflective writing

      I encourage creativity in assignments

9)      I do not give a grade, you earn a grade

10)   You can not have an A in this class if it is only week 7

11)   I promote critical thinking for you and me

12)   Together we create a demonstrative learning environment

My thoughts on the philosophy is that it is pretty much standard for all teachers. However, it has been my experience that how much of it is followed and to what degree depends on the class and the material.

The Following is basically what I learned about Graphic files: Raster and Vector.

<<<<< Graphics >>>>>>

 <<<Raster>>>

Raster is also know as bitmaps.  Raster is composed of Invisible grids and/or pixels  (tiny dots of individual color). Images are flat or 2D images. Most images scanned or taken with a digital camera are raster. You have to used software to convert them to vector. Raster images can do overlay (transparentcy) but in most software image programs I have encountered it is not as straight forward to do. It is best to use raster images have subtle or little shading. Raster images are also usefull for a images you are not going to expand too much because raster images are not scalable. If you expand a raster image too much it will start to look blurred and/or pixelated. Vector images are scalable.

Points to Note:

Raster images are Individual dots or pixels,  Paint Brush = 5 x 6 pixels,  16 X 16 at 1 inch you have 16 pixels,  Jpeg = raster based, a file  96 X96 = ( Width = 485, Height = 700, 487/96 = 5, 700/96=7, 5” X 7” = size of image),  The higher the mega pixel camera you buy the higher resolution the picture you can get

<<<Vector>>> 

Vector images are made up of one or more individual scalable objects. More specifically vector images are composed of paths ( land and angles) with Start point, end point, and degree angle with girps you can graband use to adjust the image.  Vector uses math mathtical relationships  between points and the paths.  You used when you have a lot of shading or you want to expand an image greatly and still want a sharp crisp picture.  Vector images are scalable raster images are not.  If you greatly expand  a raster image it will start to look more and more pixelated.

Points to Note: Vector images are Scalable graphics so you can zoom in and image remains sharp. 

<<<Similarities and Differences>>>

There are many similarities between a raster and a vector file. Both raster and vector files represent 2D graphic types.  Depending on the type of software program used, one can convert from raster to vector and vice versa.  Each file types can be used to reduce amount of pixels or pixels per inch (p.p.i) thereby reducing how much space is used on hard disk and download and upload time.

More specifically, with raster the more you zoom into a raster file the more pixelated (dot like, blurred) the picture becomes. So, you can not expand raster files without it looking less sharp and crisp.  Relatively speaking raster uses less disk space than a similar sized vector image of the same size. With respect to vector, the more you zoom into vector it keeps its sharpness and crispness. So, the picture integrity is maintained. 

The major software available for working with images is as follows:

Raster <<<<<<Adobe>>>>>> Vector

Photoshop                                  Illustrator

Raster <<<<<<Corel>>>>>> Vector

Corel Paint                                 Corel Draw

Open Office 2.0 = Draw Portable

Portable applications are for flash drive

I also learned that Journeyed.com = where students can buy software at reduce prices

Our assignment for the week is to use vector base software to submit the cover sheet (Name, Date, Course #)