Welcome to the CHRGIS Educational Tool Development blog
Please contribute suggestions to expand the interactive capabilities of the CHRGIS website.
We are looking for new ideas and technology that will:
1. Improve the teacher/student interface
How does the current teacher/ student interface address learner needs?
How could the teacher / student interface be improved?
Questions
1. How would you incorporate these concepts and website usage in the classroom.
We look forward to your comments that will make the CHRGIS more effective in the classroom.
This blog may be updated to request additional requests after the presentations April 27 and 28.
Thank you
Deidre Williams
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I like the information that this website holds because it gives local beach information. Something that I think would make it more kid-friendly is by adding pictures to the website that go along with the links. Possibly a homepage link at the top left corner with a picture.
ReplyDeleteThis site seems very well organized, and easy to access, once you know what you're looking at. I can see this being very useful in middle and/or high school levels. I recall my school having an oceanography class, and this seems like it would fit in with that class. For elementary age children, it seems quite advanced. It would be usable for the teacher to use to guide a unit, but not very usable for the students.
ReplyDeleteSince I have worked within the 4th grade science realm, I would love using this in the salt water ecosystem section and when we discuss Hurricanes. The data tends to be a little heavy for this grade leel, however, the explannation of how wind, wave, and current action acts to not only cause erosion, but also the build up of the beach area. The use of the areal views of the beaches allows for vivid visual representation. The definition of the words allows for the incorporation of high word skills for students.
ReplyDeleteI felt like the website was great especially for kids since this is where they live. I think many kids and adults would visit this website more often if it was more known. I think a few more pictures would help out but other then that I loved the website and learned many things from it.
ReplyDeleteThese concepts are very interesting and helpful. They can be used in the classroom in may different ways. For example, at a high school level you can go more depth with the tools as well as the questions you can ask the students. The inforamtion gives all the students the ability to see information that was already created. The information is very helpful because it allows the students to begin to see the information come alive, however, the information is a bit wordy, and there could use more "life" to it. For example, more color, pictures, and a little less linking.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Jessica as to making it more kid friendly for students to use in the classroom. It is a very informational site though with good information. That's nice to know that we can see which beaches have bacteria in the water.
ReplyDeleteI think this site would be great for the students to follow along while the teacher navigates through the site. I think younger students might have a hard time getting through the site on their own, but the informstion and visuals are easy to understand with some guidance and explanation of what they are looking at.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Jessica's comment about creating a more kid-friendly website. The first thought that came to my mind is the website seemed to be created for adults rather than students. By adding more kid-friendly tools and images, students will be able to relate to the various topics provided. Also, elementary and middle school students participate in the science fair and I think links or possible ideas for science projects/experiements would also be helpful.
ReplyDeleteThis website has a lot of great things to offer children. I like that the website talks about the local beaches as a whole, but can branch off into so much more. This would be great to have for students who are wanting to know more. No matter what you are teaching, there is always a student who wants to know more and can go through the information quickly. This website allows those children to dig deeper and find answers to questions they as an individual may have. This can branch off into projects, self modivation, etc. This is a wonderful website.
ReplyDeleteThis website has a alot of great information you can incorporate in your classroom. Maybe having more audio installed on the website can help with audiotory and visual learners. I would incorporate in my classroom by showing the students the data, and showing them other aspects of Texas beaches.
ReplyDeleteI like the information and the website. I have to agree it is very well organized. I dont see how I can incorpate this in an elementary class but I can see this website being used in middle school and High School. This can be very helpful to them in many ways. I think this is a good website for teachers to use and have their students follow. I think the students will like all the cool tools that the website has.
ReplyDeleteHaving a more kid-friendly website would be great. I think that voice threads are awsome. I do like to read information but to listen to it is much better and easier for kids. Video would be very informative and fun. It may be animated for better understanding by young students or any one for that matter.
ReplyDeleteThis is a great resource for the classroom. I really like it as a resource for me as the teacher but I am not sure if a kindergarten student would enjoy this as much unless there were more pictures or even a game or two. I think it is a great source for a student in high school as well.
ReplyDeleteThis website I feel would be great for upper level students. To incorporate the lower level students you might make a kid zone. A place that elementary level students could interact with the site on their own. I work with elementary students and this would be neat with a field trip tied into it as well as an easier site for the younger students. I also think that more audio could be put into the website so if you were doing it alone you could understand what is going on. This is a very informative website that I would use as a teaching tool in my classroom.
ReplyDeleteThe concepts found on this wensite can be used in various ways in all classroom grade levels. With younger students, it can be explored by the teacher and explained to the children. kids love the beach and, no doubt, learning about local beachers- beaches they might have been to- will be of great interest to young children. Older students, of course, will be able to really delve in to the website and seek information for themselves. In a math class I recently took, we were asked to get the central tendency of a set of data, present the mean, median, and mode, and exlain changes in the numbers over a period of years. The information found on this website could easily be used to do a similar project. Science and math could work hand-in-had, as students work on all sorts of amazing beach projects.
ReplyDeleteAs far as improving the site, I would say that it isn't very user friendly(particularly for first time users). There is a wealth of great information on this site, but who would know to un-check boxes or click refresh or go to the bottom of page to find an outline? My suggestion is to periodically have trainings on the website. Also, what we did today- a mini-training for education majors- is a great idea. I enjoyed the information and wish we had more time to learn about and discuss the site.
The usage of the information provided to us today was great...I jump on the bandwagon and started trending through each link finding as much picture image and anything eye appealing. Finding information was not difficult at all, and wanting to know more information was accessed immediately. These tools can be great to use when teaching erosion/barriers to my 3rd,4th,5th grade students in the Science Lab.
ReplyDeleteI would use this website when teaching a unit on beaches. I could get alot of information and open ended questions to discuss with my students. I could also get alot of vocabulary words to teach. There were some new vocabulary words I had never heard so that would really be a way to expand their vocabulary. I would also like to show the graphs.
ReplyDeletei think this whole webpage fits more for advance students in high school and middle school. I think maybe a page for younger students in elementary could be made, a page where they can explore more pictures, slidecasts explaining the information given. I think a page that could possibly keep them motivated to learn more about our beaches as they get older and are able to understand exactly what is going on with these beaches.
ReplyDeleteI like the website especially because everything is here in our "backyard" ^_^.
ReplyDeleteThis is great for students who are doing research on this topic. With all of this information available, it makes it easier for the educator to instruct in the classroom topics such as water quality or beach changes. I just thinks this is an awesome site.
I really thought the information presented was very encompassing of the changes that have occurred in an area that is familiar to the children. I do think that some of the information is better designed for older students and would be difficult for younger students to comprehend. I feel the website would be a valuable tool for the teacher of younger students and for independent use by the students, I think the suggestion about only have two screens available would make understanding easier for the younger group.
ReplyDeleteBlogging seems very easy for students of all ages, except for the younger students who may not be able to read very well. For the younger students, animation with voice threading would be ideal. You could even create a character, like the "Sand BloB!" to help navigate the students. I think this would draw the students into the educational information, as well as learning technology at the same time. This blog could be a really fun interactive blog.
ReplyDeleteHi All!
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for all your comments and suggestions! Please keep checking the site for updates and changes over the summer!
Deidre