A Technology Story

By, Robin D. Seamon

Kate is excited about 6th grade. She’s glad to see her friends again & she’s heard her Science teacher, Mrs. Seamon is really cool.

Kate

She’s been informed that TECHNOLOGY will be used in her class not only as a resource but as a tool for collaborative learning and production.

After visiting the Seamon Science Wiki, and viewing a pretty cool astronomy video download, she’s compelled to visit the page from home. What does she find? There’s a new project post from Mrs. S.

“More homework?” she thinks, “this class looks like a lot of work!” This project involves a thing called Skyping. “What is that?” she wonders.

The next morning, Kate discovers that Skyping is a really cool video-conferencing tool right there on the Internet. Through Skyping she gets to see and talk with a student from a sister school in Argentina! That’s not work! That’s…

fun?

Intrigued, Kate decides to locate the city of Rio Gallegos in Argentina on a neat Internet tool Mrs. S showed in class called Google Earth. With this tool she’s able to zoom in and see a satellite image of Andre’s apartment where he lives with his mom!

After Skyping with Andre’ in Argentina, she discovers that he and his family intend to go swimming at the beach this Christmas and New Years. THAT’s different!

Curiosity peaked, she accesses another Google Tool to check the current weather in Rio Gallegos.

Mrs. S said all she had to do was type “weather” followed by the city & state/country in the Google searchbar.

It turns out that now (September) in Advance its comfortably in the 70’s (°F), while it’s 41°F in Rio Gallegos!

In her Skype reflection post for Mrs. S’s Wiki, Kate presumes the seasons are drastically different in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres.

“Why?”, she posts?

The next class, Kate discovers that the purpose of a Wiki is to collaborate or work together to discuss issues, solve problems, and create projects. So guess what?Her last post has started a project idea.

“So, Wiki’s were fun, but there’s the catch-- more work,” Kate thinks. OK, Mrs. S wants her group to research this idea of opposing seasons in Earth’s two hemispheres.

Using the powerful Google Search Engine, the members of Kate’s group start to research the Web for answers.

As members locate informative websites, videos, & podcasts on the topic, they post the URL addresses on the Wiki so that they could share results with one another.

https://pantherfile.uwm.edu/kahl/www/CoVis/Seasons/

http://videos.howstuffworks.com/hsw/12886-spin-around-the-solar-system-the-earths-seasons-video.htm

http://www.windows2universe.org/earth/climate/cli_seasons.html

http://www.astronomy.org/programs/seasons/index.html

Then, the project started to get…

Fun?

Through use of the Wiki, flip cameras, Movie Maker, and Mrs. S’s sweet guidance, the kids were able to create their very own digital podcast explaining the scientific phenomenon of Earth’s seasons!

http://www.goodkarmaconsulting.com/services/karmacam/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/rs3art/421436869/

The finished collaborative project was published on the class Seamon Science Wiki for all to see. (Check it out as step 2 on the Wiki!)

Upon reflection, Kate & her classmates decided that TECHNOLOGY was a priceless tool for learning, not to mention that Mrs. S was going to be a REALLY cool teacher!

The End