“ICT supports knowledge building among teams and enables team members to collaborate, inquire, interact and integrate prior knowledge with new understanding”
I would like to describe one of my ICT classes that I conducted during my placement and it very much relates to the above statement taken from VELS IT section.
- Use of complex ICT tools, peripherals and manipulation techniques to explore and represent the relationship between components ( VELS 5.25, 2nd Paragraph, ICT for visualizing thinking).
- Use of complex ICT tools, peripherals and manipulation techniques to explore and represent the relationship between components ( VELS 5.25, 2nd Paragraph, ICT for visualizing thinking).
Lesson Description: This was a lesson related to digital photography and this lesson had two parts, the first part of the lesson was a group activity where I divided the students into groups of four. Each group had to go outdoors and capture the following types of images: landscape, portrait and abstract images. The students were asked about their understanding of above mentioned types of images and I explained further and built on their existing knowledge. The groups were given digital cameras and I questioned the students if they knew how to use the cameras and then explained the operation of the cameras. The students then went outdoors to shoot the photographs in groups; the group activity encouraged cooperative learning. Students learning cooperatively capitalize on one another’s resources and skills. The students were given a time limit to work on their photo-shoot and they returned to the class after the shoot, and they saved the work.
The second part of the lesson was where all students had to create a collage using adobe Photoshop this was an individual task. I used multimodal instructions (verbal instructions, visual demonstration and written instruction sheet with images) to demonstrate how to go about creating a collage. According to the cognitive theory of multimedia learning (Mayer 1997) there are two information processing conduits which are visual and auditory, using dual mode of instructions instead of single mode enhances the performance of the working memory as the workload is distributed on both channels. And this also caters for different learners in the classroom.
The students were encouraged to take the help of peers if they had problems before calling me for help; this was leading to peer learning.
At the end of the lesson the students printed the collage created using colour printers. This lesson was a very successful lesson where the students enjoyed the entire experience.
References
Ø Richard E Mayer, RM 1997, ' A cognitive theory of multimedia learning: Implications for design'.
