Distance Learning

Virtual Schools

Michigan Virtual school

Lisa Magnusson

Identify and briefly discuss 5 advantages of distance education.

1) Offered for a trimester, semester, and/or summer sessions. Not all schools run on trimester or semesters. Having this feature of allowing it to match up with school they may already have will help them plan better and treat the course like any other one.

2) It goes along with the state standards learning target. Making sure that the class will count towards what you are needing credit wise is very important.

3) This web site also helps with career development and what steps you can take after high school. There is an entire project the students can do to help plan what they should do after they graduate. This can be a very confusing time for some, and having a little bit of input of the type of person they are may help steer them in the right direction.

4) It helps for students to be able to make up classes. I have heard of many cases where students have gotten mono or there is some kind of emergency that has them miss a lot of class. Distance learning allows for you to make up these credits while continuing school.

5) This allows for any type of student to take these classes, it is open to all. There are no restrictions on who can do distance learning!

Identify and briefly discuss 5 disadvantages of distance education.

1) There is no face to face interaction. I believe building a professional relationship with your professor or teacher is crucial because some teachers have a lot to teach you and that may not all be able to be taught through the internet.

2) As we have all experienced, sometimes web sites are very stubborn and just stop working. If an important paper is due by a certain time and the site is down students may become very frustrated that they are unable to post it.

3) I think we have started to take internet access for granted. Sometimes we assume everyone has internet when that is definitely not the case. As a distance teacher, you would need to be aware that not everyone has internet within their households.

4) Because this is done independently, it is extremely easy for students to get behind. They do not have a teacher reminding them everyday in class to complete their homework by the end of the week.

5) Students may not be able to get answers right away. Like our class discussion, some students went for weeks without hearing from their distance learning teacher. If students are confused they need answers quickly so they do not keep performing the task incorrect.

How you would determine the readiness of students to participate in distance education?

There are a couple qualities that the school of Michigan has identified as being a good candidate for distance learning. If student is: a self starter, independent, responsible, discipline and drive, ability to critically analyze and discuss issues through writing, superior writing skills.

What would you need to do to be ready to teach in an online environment?

There is one face to face meeting followed by four weeks of online training. This way the soon to be teachers can decide what teaching methods do and do not work over the internet. (Teachers need to be certified in the state of Michigan prior to applying)

Engaging Students with Concept Mapping Software

Concept mapping is a great technique in all subject areas of school. There are times when I would be sitting in school and taking notes, listening to the teacher talk. I would be understanding what the teacher was saying but not grasping the full concept. When I drew it out visually, for example in a concept map, it helped me learn processes of certain overall functions better. As new teachers going into the field we need to remember that many of our kids may be visual learners and we need to give them a learning tool that helps strengthen their understanding of topics that are taught.

Concept mapping might not be as prevalent in health and fitness, but there are definitely ways my students may use them. In the fitness portion of class we could have a fitness week. The students can make a goal that they want to reach by the end of the week and each bubble can represent what they will need to accomplish every day in order to reach that goal. They can also use it as a way to remember what lifts they need to do for the day. They can write the day of the week in the middle and then have what muscles they want to work on for that day in the bubbles.

I personally believe that concept mapping will be used more often when we are in the health portion of our class. Learning about the human body is extremely interesting, but it can be daunting on the amount of information that is required to memorize. A great concept map that I found on the website was a map about the skeletal system. They had the human skeleton in the middle, and then branches off of it were types of bones, organization of bones, and functions of bones. I believe this would be a great way for my students to learn about the body. I could also have them put a single organ in the middle of the web and list its functions and purposes in the bubbles. Another topic that concept mapping would be useful for is drugs and alcohol. I could assign each student a substance/drug and have them do some research on the effects that it has or consequences of taking it on the body. Once they found the information I could have them complete the web and turn it in, or even have them write a mini report using their webs.

Concept mapping is a great tool for students to organize information easily and visually see the information gathered. It also works for all ages of students in every classroom. I believe that concept mapping should be taught in the elementary school as a basic organization tool that they will be using throughout their school years.

Concept mapping will be great for my students to learn systems. There are many systems in the body, muscular, digestive, hormones, and many more. By using concept mapping for this the students will be able to look at each piece individually and see how they function. Then when put into the concept map see how systems work together for the end task of what the body needs to perform.

In order for my students to use a concept map, I would want to make sure that there are many elements that tie together and have something in common. I will decide whether the maps are necessary. I do not want to make them use the concept map if it only uses time and doesn't help them grasp a concept I am teaching. I also may have them do it when they begin a research project for a health topic. That way the students will decide which areas they want to focus on for their presentation.