Reflection 8: Building Connections and Branching Out
I
found this chapter to be very interesting. This chapter first talks about ways
to build connections and branch out beyond the classroom. With the ability of
digital tools available to us all it makes this concept easier to accomplish.
Some ways that this goal is made possible, creating a blog and also a digital
story. Blogs allow for students to write what they are thinking and also to
express how a project is going or also what we are doing in this class, which
is writing a reflection, based on questions that are from the reading. Blogs
are easy for individuals all around the world to access and read and also
provide responses. Digital stories can be used to tell a story, it can be of
anything, a project you’re doing, your life, etc.
The
EAST Initiative Model was very interesting to read about. The EAST initiative
model stands for Environmental and Spatial Technologies. This started in 1996
in a rural area in Arkansas and has now grown to include more than 260 schools
in seven states. This model demonstrates the benefits of using technology for a
real reason. For example, the book
mentions it helps to solve problems and make improvements in communities. Some
applications that’s are used in this model is, GIS, GPS, and CAD. In 2001, EAST
became a nonprofit organization and today it works with public and private
partners. There are four essential ideas when using this model. The first one
is student-driven learning, the second one is authentic project-based learning,
the third one is technology as tools and lastly there is collaboration.
Student-driven learning is just like it sounds, students choose what they
learn. Authentic project-based learning is getting students engaged in solving
problems in their communities. Technology as tools; students need access to
technology to do research. Collaboration, students need to communicate with one
another and ask each other questions and help each other out. When teachers use
the EAST model, they need to go through training and they take on a new title
as a facilitator.
The
last section this chapter talks about is letting students lead. It talks about
Instead of having the teacher assign a topic for the whole class to research
on, students are allowed to pick their own area of research. This way it makes
student more engaged and more excited about completing a project. With allowing
students to choose their own topic, it allows them to provide a goal for
themselves about what they want to learn about, students are in charge on how
they want to do their project.
I
think there are two concepts that relate to our project and that is this
project is student lead and also we have the ability to build connections
outside and beyond the classroom. When we first started this project, we were
given options about what we could choose for our topic, but once we got into
our groups, we each were able to decide what we wanted to research within that
topic. We also have the ability to build connections outside and beyond the
classroom, because our blogs are public and people can read about our
reflections. Also when we create our digital story that will be public for
people to check out. Although the digital story will not be about ourselves, it
will be about our project, and if anyone wanted to view them, they will learn
something new about popular places in downtown Kalamazoo.
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