Technology In The Classroom
Paul Laurence Dunbar High School
Lexington, Kentucky
Creating Online Lessons

 

 

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When designing a lesson for online use, the basic elements of lesson design are the same whether you are creating a lesson that will be enhanced by lecture, discussion, textbook or classroom activities or by a computer and interactive online activities.  You still must have a clear purpose, objective, awareness of audience and evaluation method in mind.  The only real difference in an online lesson is that it is probably going to be more student centered because you will not be there to offer immediate direction and feedback if the lesson is to be completed outside of class.  The initial direction will be provided by you by guiding the student through the lesson and holding him accountable for the concept or information you want him to grasp, but the student also will have the opportunity to explore and find out things on his own that he might not have been able to do in the traditional classroom format. It all depends on how you set up the lesson.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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When you find a site you like, create a Word document, copy the URL and paste it into the Word document.  Then give a brief description of the site, so you will remember why you were so impressed with it in the first place! This will also solve any problems with mistyping the address later on.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Planning

You will need to do some serious planning before your create your lesson.

First you will need to decide what the objective of the lesson is to be.  Is it to:

  • enlighten or gain general background information?
  • learn a process?
  • perfect a skill?
  • provide remediation?
  • solve a problem?

Next you must decide how you want to structure your lesson.  Will it be:

  • totally teacher generated such as through the replication of a lecture?

  • teacher guided such as through online activities and/or visitation of teacher selected web sites?

Finally, you must determine the means of evaluation of student progress towards your objective. Will it be:

  • an online quiz?

  • a culminating and independent project?

  • a reflection that delineates the student's assimilation of the information? 

 

Resources

With your initial planning completed, you now must begin designing the lesson.

If you are going to have your students visit web sites or participate in online activities as part of your lesson, you must first find them. If you have no idea where to begin looking, try some respected General Educational Resources before you head for your favorite search engine.  Search engines are an excellent source, but many times you will be overwhelmed with sites  all of which take time to go through before you find just the right ones.  Try starting with one of the following:

Online Courses, Textbooks, and Lessons

If you are looking for specific online courses, texts, and lessons, you might find the following helpful:

  • Guide to Grammar and Writing:  Like an online textbook with quizzes students can take. (http://ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/) 
    World Lecture Hall:   Links to pages created by faculty worldwide who are using the web to deliver university-level academic courses in any language.  You can browse any of the courses.  An excellent site! Most academic disciplines covered and some you might not have thought of.
    (http://www.utexas.edu/world/lecture/)
  • MIT Biology Hypertextbook: "This hypertextbook is designed to supplement the course materials of 7.01 (MIT Introductory Biology) and give you additional tools to learn introductory molecular biology."  Materials are from the Experimental Study Group, an alternative Freshman program at MIT. (http://esg-www.mit.edu:8001/esgbio/7001main.html)
  • bioSurf:  Prentice Hall Curriculum support in biology.  Click through some of the chapters.  There are some great links to interactive sites! (http://www.phschool.com/science/biosurf/)
  • Online Chemistry Tutorials: Over 30 chemistry topics covered
    (http://www.chemistrycoach.com/tutorial.htm#tutorials)
  • Annenberg/CPB Exhibits: A Must Visit Site!  Excellent Online activities in a variety of academic areas.
    (www.learner.org/exhibits)
  • Lesson Plans: Lesson plans from School Discovery. Com provides a multitude of curriculum areas including: Ancient History, Animals, Astronomy/Space Science, Earth Science, Ecology, Economics, Geography, Health, Human Body, Literature, the Microscopic World, Physical Science, Plants, Technology, U.S. History/Government, and World History.
    (www.school.discovery.com/lessonsplans/9-12.html)
  • Virtual Economics Web Companion: A range of materials for economics lessons from the Federal Reserve Banks can be read or acquired via this web page. (http://ecedweb.unomaha.edu/ve.htm#high)
  • Internet Resources for Teaching Economics An especially useful page. Includes webquests and virtual economics classes, interactive links, etc. (www.soe.purdue.edu/vanfoss/519page.html)
  • Algebra Online:  includes free private tutoring, live chat, and message board (http://www.algebra-online.com)
  • Online Classes:  Free.  Create or join already created classes, post announcements, threaded discussions, online testing and automatic grading http://universalclass.com/index.htm?fw)
  • Paragraph Punch: guided writing program (http://www.paragraphpunch.com)

 

If you are creating a lesson without web sites or interactive activities, you must simply  put the information you want the student to learn onto a web page.  You will probably want to include pictures or some kind of graphics to go along with your instruction; you want to make the instruction as engaging as possible  To get an idea you might want to check out: 

 

Evaluation

You are going to need some way to evaluate the student's understanding of the lesson.  There are a variety of ways that you can measure comprehension:

  • use one of the online quiz services
  • hold discussions through e-mail
  • use one of the online message boards
  • have the student produce a product
  • have specific tasks that the student must complete and e-mail to you

Some online sources that you might find helpful:

Quiz and Activity Sites/Generators:

Generators:
Online tools for you to use to create your own quizzes and activities.

  • Quiz Center, Puzzlemaker, Worksheet Generator, and Vocabulary Quiz Whiz all can be found at:
    http://www.school.discovery.com/teachingtools/
    teachingtools.html
    An excellent site. You can construct true/false, fill in the blank, multiple choice, and essay questions. Quizzes will be automatically  graded and the individual scores sent to you. Students also can receive immediate feedback. You must join custom classroom first. It  is free.
  • Quia!: http://www.quia.com You can create quizzes and the following games: matching, flashcard, concentration, word search, pop-up, jumbled words, hangman, challenge board, and rags-to-riches. Tracking of student scores is also available. You must set up an account, but it is free.
  • QuizBuilder: http://quizbox.com/builder Create quizzes for which students get immediate feedback. You may post the quiz on their server or your own web page. Very easy to use. You must register, but it is free.
  • Hot Potatoes: http://web.uvic.ca/hrd/halfbaked Free downloadable software from the University of Victoria Language Centre that allows you to create interactive quizzes and activities. You can put these activities on your web page or on your hard drive. This program does not email grades to the teacher, but students can get immediate feedback.

Pre-made Quizzes and Activities:

 

Web Page

Now that the content of your lesson has been created, it is time to put it in a format that can be viewed on the web.  Your can create your web page in Word, FrontPage Express, FrontPage, Publisher or any other web production software.  To learn how to use FrontPage Express, or FrontPage, click on:  FrontPage Express or Front Page 2000

Posting

To post your newly created web page, click on Ws_ftp.

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