Hello again! This week’s session was about multimodality, a concept which we have briefly met in another module. Before we discuss further I would like to mention that I feel a little more confident as the weeks go on when writing my blog. I feel like I am getting used to the website as well as discovering the new widgets which are available to use. This, for me, is an achievement as I have always been interested about blogging.
If a text is multimodal, there is one or more of the semiotic systems used, these include: linguistic, visual, audio, gestural or spatial. In terms of this week’s session we had the task of using ActivInspire; something which we can use to encourage cooperation and collaboration on interactive whiteboards. At first I thought that this task would have been simple to do since I usually pick things up quite quickly when it comes to technology. However, I struggled to figure out how to use each widget at first and did not quite know how to start creating something which would be beneficial in a classroom environment. For myself, I feel as though this is something which I would need a little time to get used to but after knowing what to do, would find it fairly straight forward to use in the future as by the end of the session I was able to create an interactive activity on coordinates. Below is what my partner and I created:
Even though our finished product would have great value within a classroom, it did take some time to get to this stage. In my opinion, once we figured it out, we found it much more enjoyable to work with AcivInspire and still managed to succeed within this lesson. The activity which we created included the following experiences and outcomes:
- Using technology and other methods, I can display data simply, clearly and accurately by creating tables, charts and diagrams, using simple labelling and scale. MTH 1-21a
When we present in a classroom we should make sure that it is captivating, motivating and engaging the pupils who we are teaching. An advantage of ActivInspire is that you were able to have characters and noise as well as colour. All of these factors are our semiotic systems which can enhance the children’s learning due to the variety in which you can present; meaning it can help with pupils understanding (Beauchamp, 2012). Even though interactive whiteboards can be very advantageous within a classroom there are consequences to just using them all the time.
“Other technologies will need consideration to meet individual needs across the range of diversity found among learners” (Deubel, 2010, p.4). It is important that we do not fall into the trap of only using interactive whiteboards because there is much more advanced technology being used within the society today and is still evolving regularly. This means that we can still have ActivInspire within our learning processes but must always remember that it isn’t the only thing out there. If we use them in moderation and integrate other devices, this will prevent the children from not knowing the technology which is surrounding them. In the future I would like to be able to use ActivInspire since it had so much to offer, this may take time though and depending how well my next attempt goes, I will then make a final decision on how often I will use it.
References
• Beauchamp, G. (2012) ICT in the Primary School: From Pedagogy to Practice. Pearson.
• Deubel, P. (2010) Interactive Whiteboards: Truths and Consequences.[Online]
https://thejournal.com/Articles/2010/08/04/Interactive-Whiteboards-Truths-and-Consequences.aspx?Page=5 [Accessed: 28th January 2019]
