A4.5: Augmentative/Adaptive Technology Search
9/22/08
Search Engine #1. ERIC database, Dept. of Education
Search topic: Augmentative Devices
Hits: 179
This search lead me to find lots of articles about the AAC devices. The first few that showed up was how AAC devices can be used to help people gain more independence. The first article that was listed was about a 22 year old with cerebral palsy. It explained that she wanted to have independence, and how the AAC device would be able to help her. The second one I looked at discusses when AAC devices are appropriate with a child that has autism. The third one that I looked at discussed now that they parent knew that her child needed one what do they do next? It discussed that it depends on what the child needed and how fast they need to get the device. These articles and ones down the page were accurate to the topic and would help you out if you were looking at AAC devices. It would especially be good if you had a specific type that you wanted to find because it had several on autism, verbal AAC devices as well as many other specifics. The only huge downfall was that many of these articles did not have the full text that you could look at.
Search engine #2. Google
Search topic: Augmentative/Adaptive Technology
Hits: 19,400
Amazingly Sam’s weblog was the first thing listed and then if you looked at the third result you found Ginger’s weblog. This shows that it shows you that this search will show you anything by anyone on the topic and that it can not always be considered reliable. You have to look at the individual source that comes up to assess its reliability. Another link that showed up was a link to a company site called rehab tool. This one could be used for looking at the different types of devices that you could use. It may though contain several biases because it only shows their companies devices and they give you the information about them so that you will buy the devices. So overall this search engine gives you an overwhelming amount of information but it may not all be helpful for getting information for a report.
Search Engine #3: ASHA.org
Search Topic: AAC devices
Hits: 1714
When this page comes up it gives you several articles that they describe as “best bets” here I found a few that had information in them but probably not information that you would use in this assignment. It just gave information about ASHA’s division 12 that deals with Alternative and Augmentative devices. It did include some information that could be used but not very much. The search also came up with several other links that could help you in research for a project including information on specific types of devices, such as frametalker and webcrawler, and also had articles strategies on the best ways to use AAC devices. A downfall to these was that some of them were accessible and others you had to be a member of ASHA to access the article. These links and articles could help you with your project depending on where you want to go with your topic after narrowing it down.
Many of these sources could be used to find information on the topic in discussion, but you have to look at the sites individually to find the best information. Some of the sites also had limitations on how much of the articles and sites that you could see, because you had to subscribe or find the article somewhere else before being able to view the article. It will also help if you could narrow the search to a specific type of Alternative device because you may be able to get more information that would be helpful for the research if it was more specific. The ones that had the most hits also seemed to have more information that didn’t really apply to the specific topic, and the one that had he fewest seemed to have more that actually applied to the topic. All in all you can find information on the topic in any search engine but when you use the more scholarly databases you can find the most reliable information.
A4.2: Response to RSS Readings
9/21/08
Sources:
Richardson, W. (2009). Blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms (2nd ed.) Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press, Inc.
7 Things you should know about RSS (2007, April). Retrieved September 19, 2008, from http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ElI7024.pdf
Purpose:
The purpose of these two texts was to inform you about RSS, and to allow you to broaden your knowledge of how to use them.
Question:
How do I explain what a RSS is, how easy it is to use, and display the the many features that it allows you to engage in?
Information:
The text allows you to broaden your knowledge about the topic of RSS’s or Real Simple Syndication by explaining what it is, why people use it, who use it, and how it can be used in the classroom. It is used to bring information to you instead of going and searching several sites to see if there are updates. It can also allow you to receive information on topics that interest you all in one place which allows you to save time. It is also a good way to keep up with certain weblogs that you are interested in instead of going and searching all of the separate sites. You have to also know and understand that if you have a lot of information you will only see a few bits of information from a few sources and that it can not give you all of it on the RSS.
Conclusions/ Inferences:
The texts want you to use the RSS to bring information to you instead of looking at several individual site everyday which will save you time. It also tells you to watch because you can become overwhelmed with the amount of information and since there is a limit of information that is given you may not always be accessing the best information about that topic/subject.
Concepts:
They want you to know that the information comes to you, and that an aggregator is a feed collector. They also want you to know that it takes less time to look at the information that you have as well as knowing what one is, the pros and cons, and what they are used for.
Assumptions:
They assume that you know what Google and Yahoo is and that you may want to use these first to get a RSS. They also assume that you want one and that you want to get information everyday on a topic. It also mentions about buying less magazines and newspapers so it assumes that you will buy less which in turn that it will save you money.
Implicaitons:
Following the test will allow you to broaden your knowledge about RSS’s by learning what they are and how to use them. This in turn will allow you to create a learning environment in which it will allow students to use this application in thier work making it easier for them to access information. This can in turn allow them to learn more about their topics or subjects.You may also not receive the best information that there is on the topic/subject. This can in turn allow them to learn more about their topics or subjects. If the text is not followed you will learn about RSS, but you will not receive your information this way and it could make it more difficult for you. By doing your own research in other ways you may be able to get the best information for what ever you are trying to accomplish.
Point of view:
The author’s want you to start using it immediately because they feel that it is very beneficial for you to save time and money. They also state that they love it and that they believe that it can help everyone more than hurt them.
A4.1: Response to Wiki Readings
9/21/08
Sources:
Richardson, W. (2009). Blogs, wikkis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms (2nded.). In H. Perigo (Eds.), Wikis: Easy collaboration for all (pp.55-69). Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.
7 things you should know about wikipedia (2007, April). Retrieved Sept. 21, 2008, from http://connect.educause.edu/Library/ELI/7ThingsYouShouldKnowAbout/44397. pdf
Purpose:
The purpose of both ot the texts was to inform the reader about what wiki’s are, how you use them, and show them the many ways that they can be benificial in the classroom.
Question:
How can I tell them about wiki’s, their pros and cons, and also make them want to use them in their classroom?
Information:
Both articles tells that wiki’s are a free encyclopedia and that anyone can add or edit the information. It also states that many people do not like it especially schools because you never know if the information is accurate or not. It also examens and explains that there are many people that want to help edit and make the information correct than there are people that want to harm the site. Another way that it says that you can help keep the sites accurate is by editing them yourself, because as it states in the book many people are better then just one person alone. It also has many uses you can look up lyrics, recipes, join a math wiki, or science wiki, and you can even have discussions about the topics on the discussion board. This allows students to not only have access to this information but also learn more by talking to other people that are interested in the same topic.
Inference/ Conclusion:
The authors of both of the texts want you know what the wiki is and how to use it but they also want you to use it in the classrooms. There are a variety of topics that you can engage in on the wiki, but you also have to take into consideration that anyone can edit the pages and they may not always know what they are talking about jeopardizing the reliability of the information.
Concepts:
They want you to know what it is, how to use it, that it can be inaccurate, it should be used as an information source, but not he primary one, and that there are many types of wiki’s that you can use.
Assumptions:
The authors assume that you do not know what a wiki is and that you want to know, that you use the Internet and you want to learn new ways that you can use it, and that you think that it is not a good idea to use the wiki, because they are trying to convince you that it can be reliable and that it should be used to enhance the learning experiences.
Implications:
Following the information in these texts will allow you to become more competent in the area of the wiki, and will allow you to engage students in a classroom using a wiki. It also will allow, according to the text, students to learn how to work together to get things accomplished, and how to work with the group in a growing technological word. If you do follow the information from the text you could also find yourself getting inaccurate information, because of how hard it is to see if the information is reliable or not. Not following the information will still result in you becoming more competent about the wiki, but will also not allow the students or you to experience the benefits of the wiki. It may also lead you to still find accurate information in other places on the web, but it may actually may be more accurate if it is written by authors/sites that are creditable.
Point of view:
The first line of this chapter says the point of view exactly sayint that if you did not use the wiki then you should start now because it is that important, and it is also stressed several times that the author loves this feature and the authors are sure you could use the information. The other article is more based off of giving you a more unbiased view of the information about the wiki.
