One of the advantages of assigning a project that incorporates web design is that students are truly learning something new. It's a skill that many people don't have or know about. It gives students an answer to that daily question at dinner, "So honey, what did you learn at school today?" Web design also allows for students to be artistic and express creativity in the colors, fonts, pictures, etc. they choose for their web design.
One of the pitfalls is having the time to teach the web design skills. At the high school level where I have to prep the kids for a Regents exam in June, I don't know if I can afford the time to teaching Dream Weaver. Another pitfall for some teachers is that they may not have such a program at their school or the school may not provide teachers and students server space.
I also think that using Dream Weaver is better suited for making a WebQuest and that the project Angel and I did could have easily been done on PowerPoint.
What makes the technology aspect of this more motivating than traditional teaching methods is that students can view one another's webpages, which is more interesting by far than sitting through a PowerPoint or going to posters and reading from them. Now does this foster more critical thinking? Only if you have a problem with the technology. I don't think the use of web design fosters deeper critical thinking than would students creating a poster board exhibit.
Tuesday, July 18, 2006
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2 comments:
I'm not a teacher, but I imagine test prep prevents teachers from doing a number of things they feel would be beneficial for their students. It's really a shame.
Marc,
Yes, time is a serious issue. I have seen skills that have media specialists who are able to work with the content specialists in order to develop lessons that supplement the content goals, which makes the classroom teacher's life easier.
I agree that technology does not foster critical thinking any more than does a project that is non-technology oriented, though I also think that you're right to say that it can provide greater motivation. The critical thinking is fostered by teacher and community support. Teachers can design activities using technology that do foster the development of those kinds of intellectual habits.
Finally, Dreamweaver isn't the only kind of application that we can use to get things on to the Web. You've already seen that we can create web pages with PowerPoint. You can also use Word or any number of applications to do it.
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