ISTE 2 Connecting Students Globally

ISTE 2 discusses communication and collaboration "Students use digital media and environments to communicate and work collaboratively, including at a distance, to support individual learning and contribute to the learning of others."

The subsection that I focuses on in this standard is "Develop cultural understanding and global awareness by engaging with learners of other cultures". I was originally attracted to because I really believe that the best way to become gain more knowledge of other cultures is from experiences with individuals from those cultures. I questioned myself to look for ways to engage my future kindergartners with others across the globe in a way that is safe and appropriate. Through my investigation I found kidblog.org ( https://kidblog.org/home/ ). This is a site that you can pay for (one of my peers discovered that it is $44 a year or $9 a month) and have access to interactive portfolios and blogs for your students. What drew me to this site is that it can be used from kindergarten to high school. Student can create an avatar and can personalize their portfolio, even make vidoes. This site makes it easy to connect to other classes that use kidblog by following another class or entering in your search criteria.
https://kidblog.zendesk.com/hc/en-us This link to the left is a link to their help page. I am posting it because it helps you understand the site more providing links to classroom examples, FAQ, tutorials and webinars.
Another site that one of my peers help me find is http://www.epals.com/#/connections . This site is different from kidblog because you are connecting individual students to individual students, rather than whole classes collaborating on a project. This could be a great way to create unique and genuine friendships between students on your class to other in different cultures. What I like about this site is that you can select an age range, the youngest age is 3!

I appreciated this section of researching because it is so important to connect students to other students who are different from them. I was not aware that there are SO MANY sites out there that make this possible for even our kindergartners (or preschoolers). I hope to utilize both of these sites with my future students. I know they will benefit from it and so would I!

ISTE 1 Module Creativity and Innovation

Triggering Event

How can students demonstrate creative thinking, construct knowledge, and develop innovation products and processes using technology?

My Personalized Triggering Event Question

With so many apps and technological resources to choose from, how do I figure out which apps are effective and which apps are not before implementing them into my curriculum?


There are millions of apps available for mobile devices that I really wanted to spend time figuring out how I can choose an app that is appropriate and effective for an instructional aide. In an article written by Min Wook Ok, Min Kyung Kim, Eun Young Kang, and Brian R. Bryant titled How to Find Good Apps: An Evaluation Rubric for Instructional Apps for Teaching Students With Learning Disabilities I learned how to find effective apps.

When evaluating an app you want to look at objective, strategy, examples, practice, error correction and feedback, item error analysis, progress monitoring, motivation, navigation, font, customized settings and lastly, content area and bias. Below I have created a table the describes the qualities of the highest ranking apps according to Wook Ok, Kyung Kim, Young Kang, and Bryan. The authors go into greater detail in each area and I do recommend reading the article to better understand the information below.

Evaluating Apps Tips from Min Wook Ok, Min Kyung Kim, Eun Young Kang, and Brian R. Bryan
Objective	Clear and concise Easy to find
Strategy	Broke down into manageable and connected chunks Encourage, reinforce, and assess
Examples	Provides 3-4 examples for each concept or skill that make connections between instructional skills Examples model the concept or skill
Practice	Consistent and regular practice opportunities At least 5 opportunities to practice the concept or skill before moving on to the next step
Error Correction and Feedback	Notifies the student of correct/incorrect responses and are given the correct answer
Item Error Analysis	Keeps records of the types of errors that the student is making and provides a report
Progress Monitoring	Total point are provided Progress alerts are detected by a tracking system
Motivation	Constantly maintains student engagement during the entire learning process
Navigation	Easy and simple Students can easily get assistance Accessible (meaning simple, consistent and straight forward)
Font	Font size is sufficient and modifiable Font is easy to read
Customized Settings	Available customization settings to individualize for each student
Content Area and Bias	Content is free of errors and up to date Free from bias (like race or gender)

The main idea with this article and finding apps that are of good quality is to research it! Do not just blindly allow your students to use apps that do not meet the standards in the table above. Something that I noticed, and perhaps you agree or disagree, that many of these areas to evaluate seem to mirror types of good instructional strategies. I do think that this is the key to choosing an effective app.