Evaluating, Selecting,and Maximizing Software in a Blended Learning Environment

Video Transcription

Today we're going to be looking at evaluating, selecting, and maximizing software choices, specifically when we look at blended learning environments. For today's quote, I've chosen something by Theodore Roosevelt which states "In any moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing. The worst thing you can do is nothing." By the end of today's lesson, you are going to be able to use one of the provided tools to do an environmental scan of the available software within teaching environments for a blended learning approach.

First, I want to show you an absolutely wonderful tool offered by the group at Project Red. This is a tool that lets us look at cost comparisons of various choices when we're looking at new hardware and software that we want to implement in our classrooms.

When you go to the address that I have listed there on the screen, you will find a wonderfully helpful cost comparison spreadsheet. This looks at the traditional classroom as opposed to the one to one classroom, and focuses in on the various costs needed with those two types of classrooms.

You'll notice here the part that we want to focus on today is the annualized software costs as well as the servers router firewall and related software costs. You want to make sure that as you are making decisions related to software choices for your students use, you review the initial costs and the ongoing costs that are related to each device solution. You want to make sure that you take all of that into account before you go into such a big and ideally long term solution for your classroom.

When we look at the software and the app solutions that are available to maximize student learning, there are a number of elements that you want to look at. First, you want to select the software based on your objective and not the other way around. You want to make sure that the software that you choose is best for your content and your level of teaching. You want to make sure you remember that sometimes extra functions within software are a negative because that can distract students from the work that you want them to do.

Also, it's important to consider the software from the perspective of the four C's. This is from the P21 framework, which says first what do I want my kids to do in communication? What do I want my kids to do in collaboration? What do I want my students to do in critical thinking and problem solving? And finally, what do I want my kids to do in terms of creativity? And will the software or the app that I have developed help my students do that?

Another really wonderful thing to remember is the use of open source educational resources. So first let's define what open source is. Open source is free software that leaves the code and the source of that information open, so the end user is able to redefine and customize it as they choose. Now this has a lot of advantages, but also a couple of limitations. So let's go through those.

First, the advantages. Open source educational resources allow for complete customization. So you can edit and change and alter to really fit your needs. Also, you can leave the software as it is. So it can be very easy if you don't want to mess with it. Finally, there is no need to pay for upgrades. And this is a very long term benefit here. That can be a huge financial cost as you go through. So it's really nice to know that there are no major fiscal expenses coming down the line, which in turn means you have some serious fiscal savings. Finally, students can learn with AMD from the software if you so choose. Having students able to interact with that code can be really beneficial in your classroom.

Now let's take a look at some of the limitations of open source educational resources. First, there is often little or no customer support. So that can make it really difficult to answer questions that you have. That being said, there are plenty of forums available for more popular options of open source, such as Linux or Moodle that can help you get at some of the answers to your problems. So if you are using a popular open source resource, then you're probably going to be fine.

Also, it's important to know that the end user, which is usually you must understand the code in order to correct bugs. Sometimes this can be a problem. And when you don't have an overarching body overseeing that code, then it's very easy to get bugs. And you're going to have to be the one to help kind of fix it or mess around with it.

Let's take a look at a wonderful website that really focuses in on what open source resources are available and which ones will be best to use in your classroom. If you type this website into your browser, you are going to see this wonderful page right here. First, it starts out explaining why open source software should be used in schools.

So this is a wonderful tool to use if you encounter any other teachers or parents or administrators who are concerned with this. Also, what I love is they have some wonderful resources sections that really help show you the new and beneficial open source tools you can use in your classroom. So if you scroll down through, it kind of takes you through each one and gives you a little bit of information about each tool.

I really find Moodle as a wonderful good example of open source LMS, also known as learning management systems. It differs from other LMS like Schoolology because the end users can actually change its functionality through the writing of code. So you can really optimize it to what you need that website to do for you and your educational plans.

Finally, there are some serious questions that you want to ask yourself when planning. It's really good to note that there are no right or wrong answers, but these are some things you want to consider. First, you want to consider if your solution is a tablet. What free apps and what paid apps are you going to need? And then how will you manage those apps? Will you be paying for them? Will the student be paying for them? How are you going to manage that every student has it, can access it, and is accessing it properly? And are there any potential conflicts with those apps with your school's acceptable use policy?

If your solution is a Chromebook, you want to make sure that you're asking yourself, what software is needed, and how am I going to prepare students to move to a Google Apps environment if my school hasn't already been using that? Finally, it's really important to note is your district a Google domain district? If not, there are some elements that you're going to want to check into at the district level to make sure that this is a good solution.

If your solution is a laptop other than a Chromebook, you're going to want to look, again, at what software you need to make available to all students. How are you going to purchase that software? How expensive is that going to be and who's going to cover it? You're also going to want to look what is your storage solution? The benefit of a Chromebook is that it stores everything in the cloud. But if you use another sort of laptop or tablet, what is the storage solution going to be there for each student?

Finally, if your solution is a BYOD, or to have your students bring their own devices, don't forget that you will need to select software solutions that are what we call device agnostic, meaning that the software you choose is going to fit with every type of device that a student could potentially bring in.

Now that we've reached the end of our lesson today, you are able to use one of the provided tools that we looked at to do an environmental scan of the available software within teaching environments for a blended learning approach.

Now we want to take just a moment for reflection. Now that you have finished the learning tutorial on evaluating, selecting, and maximizing software, what do you think would be the first step you would take as you begin scanning all of the available software for your blended learning approach? Feel free to pause the video for a moment as you think about your response to this question.

For more information on how to apply what you learned in this video, please view the Additional Resources section that accompanies this video's presentation. The Additional Resources section includes hyperlinks useful for applications of the course material, including a brief description of each resource.