Comparison of Tele-collaborative Projects
DEAR SOLDIER
http://www.technospudprojects.com/Projects/dearsoldier/index.htm
Project Description
The Dear soldier project requires students to write postcards to encourage American Soldiers and also to thank them for protecting the country. The students get to write to soldiers in all the branches of the military. This activity helps the students become better writers as participate in creative writing activities. This project also involves students in patriotic acts for their country.
Requirements
The project doesn’t require students to personally know anyone in the military service. It enables them to write generic letters addressed to “Dear Soldier”: and give the project coordinators the distribution right. If the students want to address the letter to a soldier they know, they would need to have the name and correct address for the military personnel they want to mail the letter to.
Objectives
This project fulfills the objectives for the K-12 classroom. Since I am not in the classroom yet, I was looking for projects that would fulfill various requirements for the K-12 classrooms. The students will improve their writing skills as they are participating in “real time” events. This will definitely be a source of excitement for the kids and motivate them to put their best into the project activities. The class would need to go over how to write letters and how to use the templates provided by the coordinators. The technology present in the classroom is sufficient to participate in the project. The time required for the project would vary depending on the level of comfort of the students and where the computers are; in the classroom or the labs. As opposed to doing this on paper, the activity helps to format and make their work more presentable and appealing, and the cost of making mistakes aren’t much i.e. the students could just delete as opposed to requesting more paper.
This fulfills some language arts and technology requirements for K-12 class.
Welcome to Monster Motel!
http://kotn.ntu.ac.uk/motel/motel/welcome.html
Project Description
The “welcome to the monster motel” project has students go to the project site and by using their imaginations create monsters. They have to make up a monster image, monster name, what the monster eats, drinks, where the monster is from, what room in the motel their monster will stay in and why.
Requirements
The project requires the students to be able to navigate the project site, to view which rooms have been occupied, to see what other students have posted to the site. The computers have to have internet connections and email capabilities so that the students can send their postings to the project manager to be posted onto the site. The class also needs to know how to organize their information in a logical format and have basic idea of how to use email.
Objectives
This activity helps students think creatively and learn how to write with the use of adjectives. The students have to use their imaginations to create fiction. This is also a good lesson to help students understand the difference between fiction and truth. Since I am not in the classroom yet, I was looking for projects that would fulfill various requirements for the K-12 classrooms. The students will improve their ability to read and write using technology such as the browser and email. This project has the tendency to take up a lot of time since the students have great flexibility in creating their monsters, I would need to include some restrictions on the amount of information required on each monster. By doing this activity online, the students gain more use of creativity as opposed to doing it in the traditional format. They get to use graphics and tools present online to make their work look more presentable. The students also get to share their work instantly with other students around the world and view the postings from other students. This would still be possible without the use of the technology, but will take more time to accomplish.
Junie B. Jones Favorites: Book Review Project
http://www.mrsmcgowan.com/junie/index.html#Join
Project Description
The Junie B. Jones internet project has the class read a book from the author and writes a summary of the book. The book report is sent to the project managers to have it placed on the website. The project provides students with the opportunity to practice their reading and writing skills with a book that is well loved by students all over the world. Then as a class, all students have to get together. The teacher also has the freedom to include any special activities their class did to complete the project.
Requirements
The project requires that the class have access to the project website and access to the list of books approved for the project. The project could also be time consuming if done individually, but I would do this as a class project ensuring that all students participate in contributing to the project. The technical requirements needed are a browser and an email account.
Objectives
The project meets the state requirement for the K -12 curriculums. It meets the states language arts requirements also. The project will motivate students to do their best because it will be exiting for them to view other student’s responses and go back to the website to view their work. The interesting thing about this is that, wherever the students are as long as they have access to the internet, they will be able to view their work. The project will help my students improve their literary and written work. They have to understand the book being read and be able to formulate a summary that doesn’t give away the stories ending but provides a good description of the book. Hopefully this project will encourage my students to read more books and give them the skills to share the book with other without necessarily giving away the end of the book. Helps the students express themselves in different ways.
Fairy Tale / Folk Tale Cyber Dictionary
http://www.op97.org/instruct/ftcyber/
Project Description
The Fairy Tale project is a project that requires students to listen to a fairy tale that is being read by a teacher. Then the students are required to brainstorm for words related to the book / story by using each letter from the alphabet to create a “cyber dictionary”. The aim of the dictionary is to tell a story using specific letters i.e. the alphabet. The project recommends 3 periods to tell the story, retell the story and brainstorm words. The finished work is sent to
Requirements
I do agree with the timeframe recommended by the project coordinators, which is 3 periods to read, re-read and brainstorm for words. The class needs access to different fairy tale books, audio visual reinforcements of the fairy tale books such as movies, audio tapes, picture books etc. We also need access to the internet and need programs such as Kidpix or Apple works both of which are present in the labs of my school. The students have used these programs before so are quite familiar with the skills required to use them. There are email accounts provided by the school which is required to send the completed work to the project organizers.
Objectives
This project is in line with the State requirements for reading and writing for the K-12 classroom. The students will be able to read with understanding and fluency and be able to think of words, which describe ideas they have in mind. They will gain the ability to express themselves in different ways, actually in very concise ways (one word). They will learn new words. Since they will be able to view works from other students, they will be able to draw inspiration and motivations from the other postings to assist them with their own though process. This project has the tendency to take a long time and they students could get discouraged if they can’t find suitable words to fit the letter. I would make sure that whatever story the students are going to work on, has been worked on by me (preferably) or another class to ensure that I have an idea of a list of words that could fit the different letters.