This weeks topic went over how using games in the classroom can be beneficial to the learning outcomes for students. I find that from personal experience to be true, from playing games of Kahoot, Jeopardy, Bingo, or Drawing I was able to better understand the topic as well as make the learning more enjoyable. From these experiences I can firmly say that gamifying learning material is something that should be incorporated in the classroom to a certain degree.
While I do think that gamifying learning materials are beneficial to a students learning, if its done incorrectly or is to frequently done the learning is instead harmed. I feel that there needs to be a balance between letting students interact with the gamified learning material and how often its used. This is because without balance, what was once an experience different from normal becomes common where the same skills are being used over and over. This can also lead to there being a deficit in new skills being learned as to much time is dedicated to letting students interact with the gamified material.
The main differences between the two models SAMR and Sections is that, SAMR focuses on categorizing and evaluating four different levels of technology integration in the classroom. Whereas, SECTIONS revolves around determining the appropriateness of technology in the teaching capacity. Another big difference is how much is covered by each model. I feel that while both models are strong in what they do, that the SECTIONS model is better for its intended purpose as it has a lot more steps involved to properly evaluate technologies appropriateness for the teaching capacity. For example SAMR has four degrees of evaluation: Substitution, Augmentation, Modification, and Redefinition which is further split into Enhancement and Transformation. Which I feel could be broken up into more terms to further specify each point. But as it is now it seems to be more umbrella terms which leave room for error and confusion. I feel that the SECTIONS model is stronger for what its purpose is because its divided into 8 parts which are each individually evaluated which can better prove its integrity for how it grades the appropriateness of tech in the teaching capacity.
Understand and describe the 3 main reasons for why there are limited plant-based alternatives at bakeries.
Understand and communicate the health benefits of plant-based alternatives in baking.
Identify and describe a variety of plant-based alternatives in baking, including eggs, milk, cream, and butter.
Plan and integrate plant-based baking knowledge into home baking by converting recipes with appropriate alternatives.
Introduction
We have often found ourselves discussing our shared passion of baking, which inspired us to create a podcast for this assignment. This lesson will demystify plant-based baking and provide practical tools for the audience to incorporate in their own baking at home. Additionally, it will explain what health-benefits plant-based diets provide and why most food retailers do not carry plant-based goods.
Design Processes
The project was initiated with a research phase, however we soon realized we wanted to apply the dual-coding theory into our lesson. Therefore, we decided to make an additional infographic guide, presentation, and interactive quiz to help support the effectiveness of information transfer from the podcast. The applications we used to create the original multimedia elements included Canva, Google Slides, Kahoot, and a Google Chrome extension called Screenio.
Discussion:
As for theories we followed for this project, we focused on the Dual-Code theory mainly as we provide multiple channels of information transfer through audible and visual representation. We also focused on following the Cognitive Load Theory, where we ensured that in the presentation we kept each slide to one topic and had a maximum of 6 objects to chunk the information on each slide.
Infographic
The infographic was designed to be used as a guide for learners to reference throughout the duration of the lesson and to have afterwards. It directly follows the coherence principle by reducing the information to images and symbols. The infographic is a guide that allows learners to make connections through the placement of text and images, it therefore follows the Multimedia and Spatial Contiguity Principles. The Signalling Principle has been applied as each topic is highlighted by images, titles, and dividers.
Presentation
For the presentation we closely followed the principles of modality and multimedia by trying to keep as minimal information on each slide as we could while providing extra narration to further our points. Additionally, our presentation aims to adhere to the segmenting principle through “chunking” the information we are presenting on each slide so it is easier to digest. The animation principle was also applied here as we relied on static images and screens rather than using animations to keep the focus on the information we are presenting.
Kahoot
We incorporated a game of kahoot into our blog post to test the users understanding of the concept we presented in a fun manner. While not enforcing the game-based learning approach we learned about in previous weeks, we still wanted to incorporate a way where the viewer is able to play around and test their understanding of what they just learned through a fun quiz.
Podcast
Part of the intrigue for learning through podcasts is from the casual delivery in the form of a conversation between peers. This aligns with the Personalization Principle as the concepts are casually discussed instead of a formal presentation delivery. An example of this is how the podcast flows with comments and questions from each party, which demonstrates the realistic conversation aspect and expertise in the subject.
Pitfalls
One of the pitfalls that we encountered was not following our initial plan of a podcast since it would not meet a variety of the multimedia principles. This was because only providing the information through an auditory format would hinder the effectiveness of the lesson. Unfortunately, this design choice caused a repetition of a majority of the content. Since the content to meet the learning objectives was displayed through multiple facets, we had to sacrifice meeting the Redundancy Principle.
Conclusion
To develop a lesson optimized to teach learners about the benefits and practical skills for plant-based baking, we applied numerous multimedia theories and principles in all elements. Through these elements we aimed to provide the listeners with an experience which was not only engaging but effective for information retention. A successful participant should be able to use the tools provided to understand what hinders plant-based options from being available and how they can make their own. This can be measured by the the amount of participants who were inspired after to use the replacements or to explore more plant-based foods.
Britt. (2020, May 28). Vegan Baking 101. The Banana Diaries. https://thebananadiaries.com/vegan-baking-made-easy/.
Plant-based Protein: Baking Ingredients. BAKERpedia. (2021, January 13). https://bakerpedia.com/ingredients/plant-based-protein/.
MD Anderson Cancer Center, & Alexander, H. (2020, November 4). 5 benefits of a plant-based diet. MD Anderson Cancer Center. https://www.mdanderson.org/publications/focused-on-health/5-benefits-of-a-plant-based-diet.h20-1592991.html.
Mayer, R. (Ed.). (2014). The Cambridge Handbook of Multimedia Learning (2nd ed., Cambridge Handbooks in Psychology). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/CBO9781139547369
Mayer, Richard E., and Logan Fiorella. “Principles for Reducing Extraneous Processing in Multimedia Learning: Coherence, Signaling, Redundancy, Spatial Contiguity, and Temporal Contiguity Principles.” The Cambridge Handbook of Multimedia Learning.Ed. Richard E. Mayer. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2014. 279-315. Print. Cambridge Handbooks in Psychology.
Yuen, J. (2020). Person Holding Stainless Steel Fork. Unsplash. https://unsplash.com/photos/pHCazCPGvPw.
Once again you have created another astounding blog post. You’re creative use of media content in combination with you’re writing help to make this post enjoyable and easy to follow. I also quite liked how you were able to reference personal experience with dealing with online school due to COVID-19 and have made me wish some of my professors from other semesters had done similar to your POLI400 professor did.
Your use of real life experiences made reading about this topic easier to read and promotes the relevancy of the topic you’re writing on. I was just wondering, if in addition to what you have already written, you could strengthen the post by adding some media content or images. Other than this, I think this is an absolutely STELLAR post!
I’m a big fan of how you laid out all of your information here and “chunked” the information into easy to digest sizes. it made it really easy to follow and understand what you had to say. I also quite liked the image you used to convey your point of where teachers should aim to keep their lessons above of.
I loved what you had to say about incorporating game-based learning in the classroom and I strongly agree with what you had to say! The way you were able to incorporate personal experience into the subject made reading it so much more relatable and enjoyable to read.
I strongly agree with what you had to say about Jeopardy as an educational tool in the classroom. I could really feel your passion for playing Jeopardy and can tell you have a lot of experience with it. One thing I have to wonder though is, if in addition to the text you provided, it would be helpful to add some images or media content to strengthen your point.
List some possibilities you see for digital story telling or screencasting in education
I believe that the potential for digital storytelling and screencasting is directly related to the progression of technology, where its adoption and use increases at the same rate that technology improves.
In terms of possibilities for how digital storytelling can be incorporated into education, I can see digital storytelling being used as a tool to help provide students with a visual and audible representation for the material they are learning. The use of digital storytelling in this manner would help to adhere to the dual coding theory and improve the amount of information that is retained. An example of this is an infographic designed to incorporate the key points of a topic handed out before an accompanying video which dives into further detail is played would help to solidify the main concepts.
Infographic with key points on “Play in the Classroom”
As for possibilities for how screencasting can be used in education is through providing students with a quick reference for how to go about completing or beginning certain class activities. Another possibility is providing a platform for online students to be able to complete presentations where they can not only show what they have completed but also incorporate their own voice in their presentation.
For this assignment, I decided to create a screencast presentation to add on to my infographic which I had made for a previous blog post. The purpose of the screencast presentation in addition to the infographic was to provide both an audible and visual representation of the material that the viewer can digest to increase the amount of information that is retained. I chose to make the verbal component of the presentation slightly more in depth and when speaking on each section and only kept the relevant section of the infographic visible to help solidify each key point and to reduce extraneous information from being on the screen as I moved through the presentation.
Before
After
I found that the principles I had overlooked when I developed this infographic for Blog Post #3 originally were the coherence and signaling principles for reducing extraneous load. I decided that in order to adhere to the coherence principle, I took out all extraneous information from the infographic and made sure to only keep the key information for getting the point across. Whereas, for the signaling principle, I highlighted the word “play” with quotations to emphasize its importance to the infographic which I had originally neglected to do for Blog Post #3.
I felt that with just the infographic alone, there were aspects of what I wanted to convey that may not have as much impact as I originally intended. So to ensure that the information is retained, I added narration in the screencast which covered the same key points as the infographic but added more detail to each section. By doing this, I reinforced the dual code theory because the infographic, while not being as detailed as the verbal presentation, still hits on the key points of what I am intending to provide, increasing the amount of information that is retained from viewing the screencast.
References: Mead, S. (n.d.). How Do Children Learn Through Play? Whitby School. https://www.whitbyschool.org/passionforlearning/how-do-children-learn-through-play. O’Leary, W. (2021, April 21). Play-Based Learning: What It Is and Why It Should Be a Part of Every Classroom. Edmentum Blog. https://blog.edmentum.com/play-based-learning-what-it-and-why-it-should-be-part-every-classroom. Mayer, R. (2011, July 4). Cognitive Theory of Multimedia Learning. Cognitive Theory of Multimedia Learning – ETEC 510. http://etec.ctlt.ubc.ca/510wiki/Cognitive_Theory_of_Multimedia_Learning.
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