Middle School Technology Course Outline/Syllabus

I have been assigned the task of teaching an "advanced technology" course this year to 8th graders (the irony here is that I have never taught a "basic technology" course). As I have found out the hard way, no one in the school district has taught this course either. So...

Can anyone point me in the direction of a course outline/syllabus that I could borrow heavily from so that I can have a blueprint for the trimester/semester/year. I am planning on addressing blogs, wikis, podcasting, and videocasting (?). I would like to use the students cell phones as well as the new PC computers that are coming with all of the bells and whistles. I have some basic ideas on where I want to go but I would love some ideas on how to get there.

Oh, yeah, maybe a rubric or two would be helpful as well...

Thanks!

Any of your thoughts or ideas would be greatly appreciated.

Tags: 2.0, 8th, blog, cellphone, course, grade, middle, outline, podcast, rubric, More…school, syllabus, technology, web, wiki

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Permalink Reply by Shuchi Grover on July 23, 2008 at 10:02pm

Hi Peter,

I'd posted an outline for a Middle School Technology Curriculum on this discussion board a few months ago. There may be some useful ideas there you could use.

-Shuchi Grover
http://shuchi-edblog.blogpost.com
http://educatorslog,in

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Permalink Reply by Marie Wilkins Walker on September 11, 2008 at 10:37am

Sorry for the delay in responding. There is a great project called "Digital Miracles" developed in Pennsylvania as a service learning project. It has lots of resources you can download, check it out.
http://www.paservicelearning.org/Initiatives/digital/miracles/resou...
Enjoy
Marie

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Permalink Reply by Peter Lane on September 11, 2008 at 8:24pm

Thanks for the link... I will look into it.

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Permalink Reply by TeachTech2 on March 5, 2009 at 6:49am

I realize that this blog is old, but this is exactly what I've been looking for. I teach technology literacy (business application software) in New Jersey, but I also teach a core extension class where I have a little more wiggle room to give the students more in depth experiences with technology. The problem is that many don't have computers at home. Another issue I'm finding is that most students can't stay after school, mainly due to transportation issues. From what I can tell, I am expected to fund this type of project through a grant. I have no experience writing grants, but I'm on the hunt for something that will help in this capacity. If anyone has any ideas, please let me know.

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Permalink Reply by Nancy Bosch on September 11, 2008 at 6:51pm

There was a massive discussion about computer classes last year, I think this was it. If I remember correctly, people were giving up great curriculum ideas. You may have to slog through a lot of responses. Good Luck, N.

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Permalink Reply by Peter Lane on September 11, 2008 at 8:25pm

Thanks for the help Nancy, I am willing to slog to find some answers.

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Permalink Reply by Peter Lane on September 11, 2008 at 8:35pm

Hmmm... Excellent question. I am looking into teaching students how to sucessfully, and safely, use Web 2.0. Having watched most of them, without any thought, steal from others to create PowerPoints in the past week I know I am going to start with learning the legal aspect of using what you find on the Internet. This, I have a feeling, may take some time; however, I am willing to work at their speed so that when we begin creating individual blogs & a school wiki everything is done with legality in mind. I hope to help them use what we learn in other classes but as I am the only teacher on campus using a blog or wiki I am unsure how this will take place -- hopefully, the students will direct me on how to proceed on this issue.

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Permalink Reply by Peter Lane on September 11, 2008 at 9:41pm

You are giving me way too much credit with your offer allowing me to ping you... I understand ping as in ping-pong but I am such a novice when it comes to 2.0 technology that I truly have no idea what that means (I do recognize the verbiage though). Same goes for "LMS systems". For a point of reference, I am a reading teacher that began utilizing a blog in my classroom last January.

I agree that blogs are me-centered but as I am teaching middle-school students that is something that they can get into. The ultimate plan is to split them into groups and create an online newspaper for the school in which they use podcasts to deliver content. This, in turn, pulls the rest of the school into the process.

While I am familiar with Creative Commons and I had seen some information on copyleft... well, let's just say that your link was extremely helpful. We will be moving in this direction shortly so I am excited that I can plug this in right away.

Our IT department.... Proficient cannot be used in the same sentence unless it is "they are not... ." To the best of my knowledge I am one of maybe ten or so in the district (which is not small) that is using a blog or wiki. The IT department was willing to buy gaggle accounts for the students so they could use wikis.

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Permalink Reply by Maddie Peca on September 12, 2008 at 12:52pm

You should check your state standards and get some ideas from that.
I work in PA and I can go to the state web site to get the standards. Do you have Intermediate Units or some technology source to get information.

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Permalink Reply by Peter Lane on September 13, 2008 at 9:03pm

The state standards are a bit vague as I am looking specifically at Web 2.0 technology.

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Permalink Reply by TeachTech2 on March 5, 2009 at 6:55am

My experience is similar as I am a first year tech teacher. I have been using Wikispaces for the different grade levels I teach. While I could do without the constant emails, I can see where a student has made a change and exactly what was changed. I have had students post projects and questions, create pages and even write some code. I'm trying to get them to do some podcast journals, but I like the newspaper idea better because it does seem to pull in more of the school. So far, its working out pretty well. How is your class coming?

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Permalink Reply by Maddie Peca on March 6, 2009 at 12:12pm

My classes are doing well. We have some creating podcast, but it is a slow process for some of them.
I bought a book that gave subject ideas for doing podcast. Right now they are doing the systems of the body.
Then I have a lot of classes doing a game program. It is very simplistic in that it is like lego pieces and them have objects (sprites) that they have to control the movement. The kids are really liking it because they do not have to write the code. They can just drag commands over to a script board. It is called SCRATCH a program developed by MIT similar to logo; and it is free to download. I even got brave enough to post a few as examples for the students. If you go to scratch and look in the galleries check out mpeca.