Weekly Report & Reflection Blog Post #11

Hello & welcome to week 11 fellow bloggers!

This weeks task was to explore the webcasting tools provided to create original podcasts or screencasts that reflect my own knowledge of digital citizenship. The webcasting tools I chose to create my original podcast with to reflect my knowledge of digital citizenship were Audacity and Soundcloud. Soundcloud is an online tool that allows you to create sounds or voice recordings and share them with anyone, anywhere. With Soundcloud you can you can upload and share your work with the public or keep it private, reply to comments on your creations on your computer or on the mobile phone app on the go which is very convenient. Soundcloud also includes features such as "likes" similar to Facebook and "repost" similar to a retweet on Twitter. For more information on how to set up a Soundcloud click on this link. Then for Audacity it is a free open source digital audio editor and recording software compatible with Mac and Windows computers. With Audacity you are able to easily edit your creations, import and export. For more information on the features Audacity provides click here. 

retrieved from http://mashable.com/2013/11/10/soundcloud-beginners-guide/#hXbGhlz4L5qS

I've been using Soundcloud for a few years now but I've never really thought to upload anything of my own. I usually use it for music mixes and to support my friends with their dreams of pursuing a music career. So getting the opportunity to create a voice recording with Audacity then uploading it to Soundcloud has been quite the experience. 

Aidoo, A. (CC) 2016

As for my PLE I would add Soundcloud to the social network tab however it is connected to the document sharing/ learning tab because of the sharing features on the site and the communication tab because it allows you to comment on your own and other peoples posts for feedback. I'm going to add Audacity to the the document/ learning tab of my PLE because it helped me learn about creating audio files for podcasts and screencasts.

An article that was suggested to me on my Feedly reader this week that I thought was a good thing to share with you guys is this one, a freetech4teachers article titled " Three TED-Ed Lessons About Stress " by Richard Byrne. This article features 3 videos about stress and what it does to our bodies. I thought it was good to share with you guys because our last exam season is slowly approaching and i was hoping this would help you to reduce your stress levels and remain calm until the year is done and we can relax.  

Lastly I'd like to thank all of you who have viewed my blog over the weeks and have used the online tools and tips for digital citizenship to better your educational careers and lives in general. Good luck to you and I wish you all the best! 

Cheers!

-A.A

Weekly Report & Reflection Post #10

Welcome to week 10 fellow bloggers! 

Only 2 more weeks until our final ADED 1P32 reflection post. Sad right?!?!

Anyways, the task of this week was to add another page to our blogs to broaden our digital blogging horizon. We were also introduced to a couple of online tools that allow us to picture presentations. I chose to register and use Animoto.

retrieved from: logos.wikia.com

In my opinion short videos are what is in right now. The very popular social media apps such as Vine and Instagram allow you to post short videos to your followers as well.   I'm always open to trying new things and such so using Animoto was a pleasure. Unlike Vine and Instagram I believe Animoto like MS Office's powerpoint are more appropriate for school work. Usually Powerpoint is the tool  you're geared towards using for presentations because it allows you to do collaborative projects with ease but now being introduced to Animoto if you need a picture oriented slideshow this is your go to tool. If you're doing independent work I would suggest Animoto because it doesn't have the collaborative component so it makes sense to use it without all the extra features. 

To get the slideshow started I reviewed some of the referred resources such as Handy4class and Copyright friendly for ideas and photos. After that everything came easy and was fairly simple. This experience was such a good one i plan on using Animoto for many more school related assignments if the opportunity arises. 

This week I've learned a bit more about being a good digital citizen in regards to copyright. Making the slideshow on Animoto about copyright make me realize how essential it is to give credit to the original idea holders. We've probably all gone through a time in our lives where someone has taken something that we have done and used it for their own. So, we should use the saying "two wrongs don't make a right" and give credit to those who deserve it!

Now for Feedly! The article i have chosen to share with all of you this week is "Three Tips for Planning Video Projects" because we used Animoto to create our slideshows!

Until week 11 everyone!

-A.A

Weekly Report & Reflection Post #9

Welcome to week 9 everyone!

This week was full of continuous learning about Digital Rights and Responsibilities but with a new online tool incorporated.

retrieved from: confluence.umassonline.net

VoiceThread is an online tool that is used by teachers and students for teaching and learning collaboratively. With VoiceThread you have to register then you are able to add images, videos,  and documents in which classmates, group members or even teachers can add their input through text, audio file, voice recording or video. Using VoiceThread will help me in building knowledge by allowing me to type my response or voice my response. I am not a fan of verbal presentations or discussions but I like to challenge myself sometimes. So utilizing VoiceThread I would be able to challenge myself by voicing my opinion in a post rather than taking the easy way out and making a text post.  


Being introduced to VoiceThread was a great experience. I like the fact that you can respond to a slide in a powerpoint in many different ways and that is why I would put it in my PLE. I would use it to work on collaborative assignments in my classes that I would want feedback on my presentation or even just to have a discussion about a topic like we did in ADED 1P32. This tool is very accessible because it can be used on a mobile device and/or laptop so its always at your fingertips. It's also very secure allowing online privacy and it can also be integrated into Google Chrome for those who use it. 

Overall VoiceThread is a great online tool that should be used by all.
                                                                               

                                                                             

Feedly this week suggested an article from Edutopia about "Positive strategies to avoid stress and burnout" that I thought was relevant at this time where classes are finishing up midterms and getting ready for exams.

Another Feedly article suggest to me was "Brock students respond to budget announcements..  ". This was suggested a couple weeks ago but I figured everyone should be informed about this so I chose to share it now.

Until next week bloggers!

Technology Use Scenario

Scenario 11.

Mrs. Smith considers herself to be a pretty savvy computer user. She has been working with computers for five years and uses them regularly in class. Mrs. Smith gets an email from someone she does not know but opens the email anyway. When she opens it, the message has some advertisement for a free gift, so she deletes the email. Several days later she is working on her computer and notices that her internet browser is working very slowly. She decides to check the computer with an antivirus program and discovers that she has a virus on her computer. She determines that the virus came from the email she received several days previously. How do we protect ourselves from online dangers?

retrieved from: https://www.consumerhighfive.com/protecting-against-email-viruses/

In this scenario Mrs. Smith is using technology appropriately overall. However her unknown sender is using technology inappropriately. When Mrs. Smith opened the email from the unknown sender and notices the advertisement about a free gift and proceeded to delete it she was being digitally smart. Most people would see the free gift and automatically click it because they want the free reward but with clicking it could come with many consequences. Some of the consequences could be the sender getting her information such as passwords and access to her social media and/or online banking information. The only thing Mrs. Smith could of done differently to be using the internet in a smart and safe way was to delete the email as soon as she noticed she didn't recognize the sender. After reading this scenario I wanted to find some tips on how to prevent virus emails so I found a post on "Chicalogic" about How to Prevent E-mail Viruses and it gives you tips such as ..

• Use common sense. If something looks suspicious or if you get an attachment from someone you don’t know, don’t open it.
• Use your new anti-virus program to scan your attachments before you open them.
• Schedule regular scans with your anti-virus software.

After reading these tips I can wholeheartedly say Mrs. Smith was using technology appropriately and I hope she does that last tip and regularly scans her computer with the anti-software. 

How do you protect yourself from online dangers? Do you believe Mrs. Smith was using technology appropriately? Let me know in the comments section!

Weekly Report & Reflection Post #8

Welcome to week 8 fellow bloggers!

This week we were focusing on wikis and concept maps. A wiki is a website that allows for collaborative editing of its content and structure by its users. Using wikis is a great strategy for students who need to do group work.  

1. 
   

One of the ways we can use wikis to support learning are for student use when there are group projects.  When group members need to contribute their ideas and research at various times of the week from different locations it comes in handy. For example our collaborative project on Google Slides had every group member at different geographical locations able to contribute to our presentation at any time. Another one of the ways we can use wikis to support learning is to promote creativity. With the wikis people can customize it to be their own and show the information they want us to know about how they want to.

Responsibility to report bullying, harassing, sexting, or identity theft  & right to freedom of expression

1. I believe that being respectful of others online is an important right and responsibility because the internet is there for everyone's use. if one person is being disrespectful and is using the internet to shame someone else it is a form of bullying (cyber bullying) which is a serious issue and isn't acceptable. With that is where people would lose the right to access the digital world for being irresponsible. 

Responsibility to cite works used for resources and researching & right to credit for personal works

2. Another important right & responsibility all digital citizens need to understand is plagiarism. In school as we go higher up in our education level this topic  is taken more and more seriously. when we take someone else's work as our own and don't give them the proper credit for it is a very serious crime. Doing this abuses our right to use the digital world. In order to minimize plagiarism there are websites such as "citation machine" to help. 

Responsibility to download music, videos, and other material legally & right to access 

3. Lastly copyright of music, tv shows and movies is another component the can jeopardize your rights to the digital world. Getting music, movies and such for free is nice and convenient however it is stealing. Downloading illegally gives 0 credit and money to the artists, producers and actors for their work. Not many people think of it this way which would be considered irresponsible. If you caught it would result in you losing the right to use the digital world for downloading and other worse consequences.

Aidoo, A. CC (2016)

This week my reader suggested 2 articles that I would like to share with you. The first one was a Wikihow of "How to write an Email asking for an Internship" which I thought would be useful. The next one i thought was good because the weather is changing and the people I am around day to day are getting sick. This link is a Wikihow to "Prevent a Cold or the Flu".

Until next week blogger!