Using a Variety of Web Tools Week 2

After reading Science 2.0, I started looking at some of sources. I went to http://www.mywebspiration.com/ and created a concept map of the peripheral nervous system. I make a concept map like this with my students in the nervous system chapter on the whiteboard. This would allow me to show it in a presentation using a projector. The site was pretty simple to use and I can see me students being able to create their own concept map of our current topic.






http://www.mywebspiration.com/publish.php?i=469217a8646

I watched the TEDx talk from David Gallo-Underwater Astonishments. It was a very interesting vidoe showing how sea animals use camouflague. Finding a few talks that would fit with a few of my biology topics is something that I plan on doing for the school year.

Chapter 3 in the Technology in the Secondary Science Classroom discusses simulations and list several sites. I tried http://www.explorelearning.com/. The mice breeding for genetics was a good simulations that quickly shows the results of crosses including percentages. It allows the user to pick which mice to breed. The transcription and translation simulation used base pairing and codons to show the two processes. I have used a similar site in the past to show these two processes. The site was interesting, but there is a fee after the free 30 day trial. Another simulation was Atom Builder at www.pbs.org/wgbh/aso/tryit/atom/# The simulation allowed the user to create an atom. I would have to play around with this one more to see how it would be used in a chemistry class. Questions would need to be created to go with this simulation.


Screencasting was another tool that I tried this week. I used Jing to capture a picture and video on the screen. I was told at #scichat last night that screentoaster is another good one to use.
Here is a photosynthesis picture that I captured using Jing. I could use a screencast to add a video or picture to a presentation, blog, or an email.
http://www.screencast.com/t/MWQ0ODg3M. I did have a problem when I tried to use the code to embed the picture into this blog. Only a few characters copied and the picture would not appear. I plan on trying another screencasting site.

It definetly takes some practice to use these different sites and discover ways to use them in class.