Podcast

Module 10 Blog

At first, I did not notice that the first video link was the answers. I ended up copying the video titles in to You Tube in order to watch them. It wasn't until I opened the next link that I saw it was the answers, so I had already read their fair use. It seems that "intent" is the key to not violating copyright.

Here is the image I chose from compfight:


Argalia, Luca. "Ammasso delle Pleiadi." Photo. Flickr December 5, 2008 http://www.flickr.com/photos/7321165@N03/3118030471/.


The license can be found at this site: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/deed.en

I also have an instrumental mix that could be used as background to a lesson, or often times, I will play music in my class when students are writing or working independently.
http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Jonah_Dempcy/Syncretic_Beliefs/jonah_dempcy_-_01_-_azurescent

The license for this can be found at the following link http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/

This is the link to my class wordle



In regards to the fair use of copyright material, I refer to my podcast in the next post. This is fair use of the material because, although the stories are copyrighted, but I am reading them to aid students in learning themes. The podcast sampling was created to allow students to work on an individual level with their ipads, allowing me to differentiate learning and allowing students to work at their own pace. It is an alternative to doing a read aloud with the students, and would not
be used anywhere but in the classroom.

Module 8 blog

This is the link to my pinterest account. I am new to "pinning", but have used this site in the past to get ideas for lessons. https://pinterest.com/ahickma0/ I have added it to my website so that parents could easily follow any websites I like to support their child education. Having interactive elements in a website allows for involvement and feedback for the studens and the parents. A blog allows students to communicate and share ideas. Facebook allows for ease of sharing information. My school does not allow us to have class facebook accounts, and I think that is unfortunate. While I have seen the down side of it, if it is a "like" only that does not allow commments, but does allow messages to be sent to me, I think that would be a great tool for teachers, and parents (and students) are already on it. Blogs allow for comments to be made, altough that could lead to problems and would have to be monitored well. With parent conferences in my school this week, communication is one of the biggest obstacles. As a 4th grade teacher, we are trying to teach them responsibility, and that can lead to them learning how to manipulate information that goes to the parents. If there were easily accessible ways for parents and teachers to communicate, I think we could see an improvement in performance. A downside, I feel like that could lead to me being more "on call", needing to monitor blogs/facebook/etc. for questions, or assitance, and time is a hot commodity in education right now!

Module 7 Blog

Module 7 Blog What information will you put in your page header? My header will have a logo/link back to my home page, tabs that will direct people to the information they are on the site to obtain, a link to my external CSS file, Will you be incorporating scan columns? If so, what specifically will be included? I will be incorporating scan columns for links to various sites for students and parents to access, as well as links to the school site that I work at. How will you organize the content on your page? I will be organizing my content based on the needs of different people. On my home page, I would like to have upcoming events. I would like to have a tab for students, where they can access educational web sites, a tab for parents with links to educational information, school test results, etc. I would also like a tab that will host photos of what is going on on the class, and one that shares apps and their descriptions, since I have a class set of iPads. What will you include in your page footer? I will have a link at the bottom of the page sighting me as the author, as well as a link to my schools web site. In regards to the survey form, things I found that I would change are: asking for your name twice, maybe ask for email and/or phone and not requiring that unless I needed to talk to the survey participants, I would not make additional comments required, especially without further directions, and the like/dislike question had yes and no as answers, and both could be selected at the same time.

Module 6 Blog

Things changed on my blogger page: 1. H3 header font 1.35em to 1.45em, enlarging it from original 2. Header and body change to font Arial 3. Changed body line height to 2.0 4. Unvisted links changed to color #3300cc 5. Background template changed to dandelions 6. Changed width of blog and navigation bar Final Project site: What is the site structure for your website?

I haven't decided how I will design an over all website hierarchy. I could use an Index page and use the iframe tag to display my other pages from the main page. I could also have individual pages with a master css file. Both choices have there benefits. The second one gives me entire control over each website allowing me to better cascade my css files on to each page that need special items. The first choice is nice because the navigation and non-content area will be the same no matter what page they are on and there is less chance of human error affecting the navigation on indivual pages of my site.

2. how will you name files/post to make sure they are easy to organize and maintain?

I will be using a plain english naming convention, along with underscore spacing for ease of reading, or camel casing of words in a file name or div name. Using plain english naming convention will help in the fact that I will not be trying to remember the file name of everything.If my name for all links is "Links" That will make things easier to do.

what could you include in your page to make it easy to find in a search engine?

The 2 thing I plan to start with for Search engine Optimization would be using metatag and em, or strong tags for keywords in the html. Also I will be sure to name each page easily which will serve as a description of the site. Having Alt=text on embedded files will also help with search engine being able to find the page and rank it better.

Module 5 Blog

In your journal, answer the following questions...
1. How does this page violate the Perceivable category? How do you know?
One of the perceivability issues for me was the blue background and blue font. It made it difficult for me to read the  text, and distinguish between the text and background. Also, the title was fuzzy, and the mission possible title was also difficult to read.

2. How does this page violate the Operable category? How do you know?
The operability could be a challenge to people who do not have a mouse, or a laptop with a pad, because there are 2 links on the page. Without those tools, they would not be able to follow the links.

Another issue I found was that when I opened the page in Internet Explorer, there was the sound track of the mission impossible movie. When I had it open in Mozilla Firefox, there was no sound. People with different web browsers would not have the same access to information on the site. However, on Internet Explorer, when you access the video, the theme song does not turn off, so it was hard to hear the video.

3. How does this page violate the Understandable category? How do you know?
 I think the sound issue could also fall under the understandable category. It was hard to understand the video in Internet Explorer because of the background music.

4. How does this page violate the Robust category? How do you know?
Again, this site worked differently in Internet Explore than Mozilla. Although I am a veteran IE user, with computer problems I have had, we have been using Firefox more.Trying this site in both browsers opened my eyes to the reality that not all sites work the same in different browsers.

After running the site through the WAVE analysis, I also learned that there was not a heading, there was an unidentified element in the top left corner, a table without cells, text that is written badly, without alternate text.

Adjusted coding
<p align="center"><img SRC="images/title.gif" WIDTH="622" HEIGHT="51" alt="EDU 558: Website Accessibility"/></p>

<p><embed width="128" src="http://patmw.tripod.com/music/missionimp.mid" style="height: 47px"/>&nbsp;</p>



<tr>
     <th>4 layers of accessibility</th>
        <td>Perceivable </td>
        <td>Understandable </td>
        <td></td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
        <td></td>
        <td>Operable </td>
        <td>Robust</td>
    </tr>
    </table>

<p align="center"><img alt="" src="images/Image2.gif" width="366" height="87" alt="Mission Impossible"/></p>


<marquee bgcolor="#000080" scrollamount=2
direction="up" loop="true" width="35%" onmouseover="this.stop();" onmouseout="this.start();" > <center>
<font color="#ffffff" size="+1"><strong> Your mission,
<br> if you choose to <br>accept it,<br>is to find as many<br>
accessibility <br>mistakes <br>as possible <br> on this site</strong></font> </center></marquee></p>

<img alt="warning" src="images/warning_1.gif" width="300" height="186" />&nbsp; </p>

<p align="center">&nbsp;<img alt="some of the problem may not be obvious!!!"src="images/img23.jpg" height="21" />&nbsp;</p>

<img  src="images/link2.jpg" width="476" height="142"></a><a href="http://webaim.org/resources/cynthiasays/"><img alt="click here to check site with Wave" src="images/link3.jpg" width="476" height="142" class="style1" /></a></p>
<p>

For my schools website, the main issue I found was using java script and missin structure elements.For my personal site, I need to make sure it is useable on multiple browsers, as that is something I was not even aware of was an issue. I need to make sure the plug ins to use embedded multi-media is kept to a minimum. I need to think about concerns for slower internet connections.

Module 4 Blog

I think our school web site meets most of the criteria for an effective website. We are a K-12 school, and the district website has links to both the elementary and middle/high schools. I like that all the sites follow the same format, so if a parent has a student in elementary and middle/high, they would follow the same links. I also think they fit into the less is more category. They have links to different things, but do not overwhelm those accessing the site. One thing I feel they do not always do is keep the site up to date. I know that reports I have looked for have often been dated, but I also know that with so much going on, it can be difficult to remember those things.

I will be using Weebly to create my website. One of the reasons is that I have a lot on my plate right now, and I am already familiar with the set up based on the design I made for this class. I feel that it is will be more beneficial to me, at this time, to work on learning that tool more, and develop my proficiency with that, as opposed to trying to learn another site. My goal is to learn how to add to the site information for my parents and students, while still making the website easily accessible and user friendly.

I plan to design my site to include resources for students and parents as individual tabs, links that will be useful, and contact info. My site would be arranged categorically, as I feel that is the best way to organize educational information. Based on experience, I would say it will be hierarchical in nature, most likely the hub and spoke format, with a main page with links from there with quick return to home options on succeeding pages. I am not a visual person, so I think sketching out ideas for layout will be how I think about things. As I see options available, I would have to "play" with the formatting, but I would begin with a general drawn layout.