Week 1

Week 1: Inspiration Reflections

Today was our first Learning Technology workshop, and we were introduced to 'blogging' and to mind-mapping through the computer program Inspiration. I have never blogged before, so was incredibly interested in setting up and managing my blog. I was really struck by just how easy blogging is! It could easily be managed by Grade 3 students and older, and provides a wonderful alternative to the traditional 'pen and paper' tasks. I am looking forward to learning more about the features, uses and application of blogging in the classroom as I continue to complete weekly blogs for this assessment task.

Inspiration is a program used to make visual maps. These can be made incredibly detailed to include pictures, audio clips, videos, additional information, hyperlinks. "Inspiration encourages deeper, more critical thinking that improves creativity, comprehension and retention" (http://www.inspiration.com/).

I really enjoyed learning about and 'playing with' Inspiration. You can see the two maps I created in this blog. The first map, "Places in the World", I created with the 'diagram tool'. I used the 'arrange' button to line up the items - using the option 'tree'. I can see the diagram tool being useful for students to create many maps, including family trees, and as perhaps an introduction to more complex mind mapping.

The second map I created with the 'mind map tool'. Here I used a more complex idea "The 5 Food Groups", and mapped these based on numerous levels spanning from the 5 groups to individual food item. This map is more complex to look at, but the graduated lines and the different colours make it easy to comprehend. I see this type of map useful for students to organise ideas around more complicated concepts where in depth information is required.

Through spending some time in the workshop exploring this program and learning about its features, as well as completing the readings around the topic, and briefly exploring other online mind-mapping tools, such as http://www.mindmeister.com/ and www.mindomo.com , I am able to clearly see the benefit of its use in the classroom.

The thing that immediately struck me about the program was how fantastic it is for visual and spatial learners (Gardner, 1993). School students are required to absorb "an overwhelming amount of information" from a variety of different sources, and therefore need a variety of ways to organise, represent and synthesise information, in a way that is meaningful to them (i.e. that complies with their learning style). This ensures the best chance that the information will be retained and understood. Inspiration provides students with a way to do this via mind mapping, whilst removing the need for students to spend their time and energy manually 'making the map' as the program does this for them. Therefore the student is free to concentrate on the information/facts/relationships - allowing them to employ their higher order thinking skills (Rogers, 1995 as cited in www.inspiration.com/sites/default/files/documents/How_Digital_Tools_Prepare_Students_for_the_21st_Century.pdf).

I was also struck by how widely applicable the program is across the curriculum. I previously considered diagrams and mindmaps to be mainly used in science, or other factual type topic areas. However from reading more about mind mapping, I am able to see that it is absolutely applicable to other areas such as English - e.g. essay writing or exploring the development of a novel. This is a way of engaging the left-brain' or 'logic' thinkers who may have previously struggled with English - again demonstrating the benefit of the use of the program in the classroom.

Overall, I see Inspiration as a program that I will integrate in my teaching. It is widely applicable, employs visual learning technology that has been shown to improve many areas of student learning and allows students to develop higher order thinking skills (www.inspiration.com/sites/default/files/documents/How_Digital_Tools_Prepare_Students_for_the_21st_Century.pdf).

References

Gardner, H. (1993). Multiple intelligences: The theory in practice. NY: Basic Books.

A CollinsConsults White Paper Prepared for Inspiration Software, Inc. White Paper: How Digital tools prepare students for the 21st century: www.inspiration.com/sites/default/files/documents/How_Digital_Tools_Prepare_Students_for_the_2ast_Century.pdf. Accessed 30/07/10.