Entry #1 - Team facilitation activity

To what extent did the team facilitation activity you and your team developed promote engagement? Promote higher order thinking? How do you know?

Our group decided on facilitating a debate for the Pros and Cons of Social Networking in the K-12 setting. Creating the activity was an interesting experience for us. We worked well together, which was very helpful in putting together an engaging activity. That said, we had to make many revisions and I sometimes felt as if we were going around in circles.

We felt that having our classmates simply answer discussion questions, was not the best method of promoting engagement. A debate would provide opportunities for the groups to become enmeshed in the conversation. By presenting ideas and rebuttal arguments, the teams were given the chance to utilize higher order thinking. I found it interesting that there wasn't much need for us to facilitate the discussion once it got started. The debate ran smoothly and the participants came up with some interesting points.

Which of the two activities developed by the other team was the most relevant and meaningful to you, and why?

I have not really had many opportunities to use podcasting or open source software, so they were both useful in expanding my knowledge base. That said, I felt that the activity on open source software was the most meaningful to me. I did not have that many resources to pull from during my first teaching experience, so I am always on the lookout for free opportunities! While I know not all open source programs are free, many are. I explored Edubuntu for their activity.

Edubuntu is based off of Ubuntu and is a Linux educational operating system. Edubuntu is a combination of all the best free education software and games as well as "desktop publishing applications, painting and 3D rendering software" You do not need to request a CD from the company anymore, the program can be downloaded from their website. I think this would be great in education because students love playing computer games and this way you are controlling what games they have access to and ensuring that they are all educational. If you don't want/can't download the program, Edubuntu now has a WebLive feature that allows users to log on for up to 2 hours at a time.

That activity was very useful!!