Is PowerPoint Evil?

      A PowerPoint presentation of endless slides means that you can add as much information, with visual support, as you want for your discussion. However, these presentations with these Power Point slides or with other software can be less than helpful for many reasons. First, they leave the audience reading rather than listening to your message. Second, presenters may use too many effects and transactions and end up distracting rather than engaging the audience. Third, the technical troubles that the presenter may face can hamper the presentation and lead to an awkward delay. Fourth, having many slides and especially if with no purpose can confuse the audience rather than helping them. Sometimes, speakers can get so wrapped up in delivering their presentations that they forget about the needs of their audience. Finally, the long duration of the presentation can alienate the audience and lose their attention.

Actually, considering the characteristics that serve to make presentations with PowerPoint or other software less than helpful can diminish the negative impact on the presentation. Also, it can help to put different suggestions in order to use the technology more effectively. First, try to put yourself in people's shoes, so that to get a clearer idea about their needs and motivations. Next, start strong with a compelling hook that makes the audience want to know more. Then, start the presentation by telling the audience what to expect. After that, encourage audience participation for increased engagement and that can be done by making a discussion and ask questions for example. This will help you to get a feel for their level of knowledge, to personalize your presentation and to make a connection with each person in your audience, so that they'll be more attentive to what you say. Moreover, don't try to cram too much information into your slides because short and concise presentations are often more powerful than verbose ones. In addition, don’t put every word you intend to speak on your PowerPoint slide; instead, keep information displayed in short chunks that are easily read and comprehended. Furthermore, use good and effective presentation visuals that are concise and consistent like high-quality images, diagrams, and chart designs while integrating them with attention-grabbing animations. At last, we can end up with this important idea which is to remember to be always on your toes and to keep the door open for questions, feedbacks and comments.

General Tips For Preparing a Test

      

    When a person is scared, angry or is experiencing any strong emotion, language will instinctively revert to what is most natural for that person. Do what you can to relieve as much of your students’ stress as possible by writing good test questions so that you are testing their knowledge at its best, not its worst. Here, some of the general tips for preparing a test. 

1. From easier to harder questions: Start your test with the easiest questions and move toward those that are more difficult. That’s because if students start with difficult ones, this will strike them and they won’t have the ability to concentrate. So, going from easier to harder questions alleviates stress for your students and makes for a better testing experience.

 2. Test multiple learning levels: Make sure to target multi learning levels in your test. The majority of your questions should target the lower learning levels of recall, comprehension and application, and the higher levels of learning like analysis, synthesis and evaluation. That’s to give chance for the students who are not able to analyze to at least reach the passing grade. 

3.  Practice: You should train the students to practice the quiz/test with similar structure, so you can test the content and not the form. 

4. Structure and content: The structure must be very well organized and it is not accepted to give a student an exam that is not organized. It does not hurt you as a teacher or skew your test results to give your students a heads up about the type of questions that will be on the test. Also, give them some idea what content will be covered on the test though you do not have to give specifics. 

5.  Include the points each section is worth: This way students can budget their time to be most impactful for them. Let them have full knowledge of what is weightiest as they take the test so they can prioritize as they take it. So, make sure to include the points that students will get on each section. That’s really important because if they are struggling in a question, they know for example that the question doesn’t have lots of points, so they can move on. 

6.  Classify the questions according to what skills they require of the students: information recall, translation, interpretation, application of principles, analysis of concepts, synthesis of ideas, or evaluation. 

7. Ensure the validity in the test: In order to be valid, to answer the question, it should cover what you discussed in class and it should be aligned with the learning outcomes of the course.

 8. Item Analysis: The way of the items should be appropriate, they should be related to the learning outcome, relevant to what discussed in class and they should be very clear. 

9. The table of specification (TOS): Helps the teachers to align the assessment with the course learning outcomes. It helps a lot to decide on the content of the exam regarding levels. This strategy can be used for a variety of assessment methods but is most commonly associated with constructing traditional summative tests. The TOS will assist teachers in mapping the amount of class time spent on each course learning outcome to the cognitive level at which each learning outcome was taught thereby helping teachers to identify the types of items they need to include on their tests.

Why Google Drive?

     Students must focus on what they've learned and internalize social learning by metacognitive practices like journaling and asynchronous discussion. Google Drive is a suite of applications that includes the weblog (blog) software Blogger and is accessible online and on mobile devices. Blogs can be used as interactive online journals that the learner can personalize and use for relevant information.

     Google Drive includes a number of tools for collaborating through computer-mediated discourse. Google Messenger (synchronous and asynchronous text and video messaging), Google Circles (synchronous and asynchronous text messaging and multimedia sharing), and Google Hangouts are all examples of these tools (synchronous video chat with up to nine people at once, face-to-face-to-face). Blogs' collaborative nature enables them to be used for online communication and exchange of ideas. When it comes to assessing student engagement and interaction, Google Docs' revision history tool helps teachers to follow each student's contributions by analyzing their writing and editing processes, as well as the comments they post to their peers.

     Other tools for online course administration are available in Google Drive. Gmail, the email application, can be used for formal teacher-student correspondence and the distribution of grades and other important announcements. Updates on the syllabus, deadlines, and course reminders can all be found on Google Calendar. Google Docs can be used to create online surveys and questionnaires. Furthermore, course documents can be stored in Google Drive folders; the syllabus, readings, and sign-up forms can all be accessed and modified at anytime from anywhere. Google Drive helps students to create folders to upload their work. Educators may use Google Hangouts to hold online video conferences to discuss group work.

      Because of Google Drive's integrated design, all course communication, debate, administration, and student job presentation can be completely integrated and personalized to the needs of the learners. Users can customize their preferences and receive notifications and alerts about all activity on the course. So, students may use one-to-one synchronous messages on Google Messenger or create their own Google Circle for group chat to communicate informally and promote social presence. Also, Google Circles, Google Hangouts, and Blogger all allow for formal discussions and reflection. It's worth noting that Google Hangouts supports synchronous video conferencing, which is especially useful for teaching and learning.

      Educators and groups of students may use Google Hangouts to see, hear, and speak to each other at scheduled times, which has the potential to significantly increase social and teaching presence. Students can write and show their learning using a variety of customizable apps, like Blogger, YouTube, and Google Presentation, as well as word processing, drawing, and spreadsheet tools. All of these apps enable users to share and interact with one another, as well as control who can see and contribute to their work before it is introduced for feedback.

     As a conclusion, Google drive is a very useful tool that helps for the interaction between teachers and students. It helps the teachers to move the content used in face to face class to be conducted remotely in front of the screen either by asynchronous way that is by recording the sessions, or by synchronous that is real-time classes.

Threat or Opportunity?

       In light of the current situation in Lebanon, an important question can arise which is whether we consider the learning trends that have emerged due to Covid-19 a threat or an opportunity to the Lebanese Educational System?

       Actually, we all know that the whole world is passing through the Covid-19 pandemic that forces the teachers and schools to update the teaching-learning approach. In other words, Covid 19 pandemic has drastically changed the way we teach and learn. So, the learning trends that have emerged due to this pandemic give us an opportunity to put new modifications that can be beneficial to improve the actual Lebanese Educational System. Accordingly, our mindset and our way of thinking, of exploring things with students and of teaching skills to students is different. So, they give us a chance to rethink of what we are doing in education. Also, they provide us with new strategies in teaching, and so students learn more about technology.  Moreover, they give us an opportunity to focus on the transversal skills and to do professional development of teachers. 

What can you do now that we were not able to do a year?

     Dealing With New Issues

    Every failure of society manifests itself in our schools. It is not new to say that schools reflect the broader societal instability. With this in mind, many issues I didn't have to deal with a year ago. Actually, I couldn't have imagined a year ago how we'd develop a risk-calculating reflex. Masks and social distance will keep us safe, but faceless and isolated. Time and space, which were once distinct and tangible, became abstract. Every day at home was the same as the one before it, with each room serving as the backdrop for a video call in order to explain the lessons to my students. However, I didn’t allow this situation to cause me depression, however, it was an opportunity for me to rise up and continue my studies and register TD. And what’s so special of this experience is that I have to communicate with doctors and colleagues I have never met before.

     Also, by this year, I know more about technology and how to integrate it in teaching and that helps me a lot, as well as many other teachers, to improve 21^st century teaching and learning skills. I can use drill, practice software and use digital learning and my students also gain experience in how to use such software. Teams, Zoom, Google meet, and others offer many features that help teachers communicate with students and give all students chances to participate.

Online Challenges

      Lebanon is a country with an economic crisis from 2019. And like any other country in the world, it is passing through the Covid-19 pandemic. These two big issues change the way of delivering knowledge and information from face to face learning to distance learning. Thus, many challenges could occur when learning or teaching online.

     The first challenge is the sudden shift to distance learning and the need to acquire new skills without adequate support. Then, the absence of a national training strategy to support principals and teachers. Next, the lack of an accessible to- all platform that provides high- quality education. As a result, teachers in Lebanon are not prepared for the change from traditional teaching to online teaching using digital devices and technology. The students, as well as their parents are not well trained, and they don’t have enough experience in using technology. So, the parents are not pedagogically qualified to teach their kids. Another challenge is the financial burden on parents for securing school fees and materials. Therefore, some families don’t have enough devices for all their kids, preventing some students from attending online classes and studying.

     Moreover, due to the Lebanese situation, there is an absence of support such as free internet connection, computers and electricity. Thus, our community is suffering from cutting in electricity and even network, so not all the students have access to online class at the same time. The connection will put the student in anxiety, especially if they have a formal or informal assessment.

     In addition, the teachers or parents do not observe students during online assessments; this will make cheating easy for the students looking for an easy way to succeed. Cheating will make summative and formative evaluations not valid and not reliable. At last, young children are not aware of keeping their private information, which creates an easy target for hackers. 

What do you think students should be taught when working online to avoid problems?

  Two advantages of online learning are flexibility and convenience. However, online learning is much more challenging than it seems. In fact, online lessons take just as much time and effort as traditional classroom lessons, if not more. As a result, many things should be taught to students when working online to avoid problems like teaching them the online rules and many skills like the computer skills, effective time-management skills, appropriate communication Skills, reading and writing skills. Besides, we can teach them how to be motivated and independent.

     At first, to avoid problems while working online with the students, we should teach them the online rules. These rules convey the message that “I'm here to teach and you're here to learn.” So, these rules give students the structure they need and also help them feel that the online class is a safe and predictable place to learn. Second, we need to teach them basic technical skills. These include the ability to create new documents, use a word processing program, browse the Internet, and download apps. Then, it’s important to teach students how to manage their time effectively in order to stick to a routine study schedule, or to complete assignments without daily reminders from a teacher. Next, teaching communication skills are important and especially in online learning because students must seek help when they need it, so they have to learn how to communicate effectively. Also, in an online class, students must learn how to interact by reading and writing. Although some hard copies of textbooks might be needed, students should be able to read and type a large number of documents on a computer screen. That’s because some tests and quizzes have multiple choice questions, but many of the assignments will involve writing short or long answers.

    Not only this, but also we should teach students to ask their own questions. That’s because students who learn to ask their own questions become more interested, take ownership of their learning, and show greater comprehension of challenging content. Moreover, we should teach students that online learning requires independence, internal motivation, responsibility, and a certain level of maturity. Also, we have to teach them to take into account the ergonomics to avoid health problems.  That’s by telling them to make sure that the chair, keyboard, and computer are all at a good height for them. The forearms and thighs should be parallel to the floor and level. When typing, avoid bending their wrists. After that, they have to set up the good lighting. To minimize eye strain, the room lighting should be at least as bright as the computer screen.

    As a result, many aspects should be taught to students when working online to prevent issues, such as computer skills, good time-management skills, acceptable communication skills, reading and writing skills, and how to be motivated and autonomous. Actually, it may take some time with them to develop good habits, but being well-organized and completing their tasks will bring them satisfaction. By teaching these aspects and skills to students, they can avoid many problems and achieve success.

 

How to be a Digital Citizen?

       The word citizenship means the quality of an individual’s response to membership in community. Everyone knows his responsibilities and his rights and the relationship between people is based on respecting each other. The same idea when discussing digital citizenship. Digital citizen ship is the quality of a response to membership in a digital community. It puts a frame for the communication between students and teachers and between students themselves while using digital classrooms. Actually, to be a digital citizen, we need to think about all of these things: I’m inclusive, I’m informed, I’m engaged, I’m balanced and I’m alert.

-I’m inclusive means that the students in an online classroom are engaged with others online with respect and empathy. This can be shown by taking into consideration the ethics related to the digital community, listening to each other, commenting on each other and giving positive feedback and respecting other’s opinion.

-I’m informed means to evaluate the accuracy, perspective and validity of online information. For example, if the teacher wants to share the students with any information related to the course, she/he must not just simply go to any website, copy the information and share it without making sure whether the information is correct or accurate. And because lots of people are using the social media, sharing information that may be not correct or accurate, the responsibility of a digital citizen is to stop sharing or spreading information that is not correct.

-I’m engaged means that students should be involved while using technology for civic engagement and to be a force for good. They can use technology to attend online courses, to join online groups in order to spread awareness and share thoughts and experiences.

-I’m balanced means that students and teachers should balance working online and social life -working offline. They should put a schedule to manage their time. Such a plan should include online activities and offline activities such as physical activity social life.

-I’m alert means that they should know how to be safe online and offline and so the environment that the teacher is providing should be safe. Students should protect their private information from hackers and spam. Also, they should respect each other and away from bullying.

       As a conclusion, the digital citizen has responsibilities and so in order to be a digital citizen, one must think of being inclusive, informed, engaged, balanced and alert. So that, he/she can have the ability to create, share and collaborate online, to stay safe online and protect privacy, to stand up to cyber bullying and communicate respectfully. Always remember that a digital citizen must have a digital footprint!

"How to choose the proper digital device: Begin along with your learning goal"

          Teaching in the 21^st century means to use the internet and digital tools to plan, share, and curate learning. Teachers need to know how well students are assimilating lessons, so as not to leave anyone behind. They have to assess each student in order to bestow a final grade, to check their understanding and to track their progress. That’s why the online assessment tools are a necessary part of the remote learning picture. Actually, there are lots of tools that can be used in online assessment like Google Forms, Mentimeter, Poll Everywhere, Kahoot and many others.

       Starting with the Google Forms, it is an easy online assessment tool for education. It is go-to among teachers because it’s quick and simple to create documents that students can collaborate on in real time using smartphones, tablets, and laptops which are automatically graded.

        Moving to the Mentimeter, it is a tool that is free to use and that lets you create quizzes and tests, manage student expectations, engage students, and even run a teacher training workshop. It comes with a listening skills assessment, icebreakers, formative tests, post-lecture surveys, and polls pre-installed for use in the classroom.

      The Poll Everywhere is another tool that can give you quizzes, monitor attendance, create word clouds, open student answers, or multiple-choice questions to get a sense of where students are struggling and also assess understanding. Students can respond in various ways, and teachers can see the results in real-time.

     Kahoot is an easy-to-use blended learning platform which works on any device, making the classroom interactive, encouraging both educators and learners to ask great questions. It is a game-based classroom response system, where teachers can create quizzes using internet content. They can choose a ready-to-go learning games or they can create their own in minutes that can be host games live or as assignments. The games are timed and scored, with point scales set up by the teacher.

       Actually, if you didn’t find a tool you loved in the ones mentioned above, here is a list of some of the tools that can be used in assessment.

 1. Flipgrid: It helps students to make quick videos that respond to teacher prompts. 

2. Pear Deck: It is to create interactive presentations and students can take part in via smartphones. 

3. Edpuzzle: It is to choose a video, give it your magic touch in order to track your students' comprehension. 

4. Nearpod: In it, you can not only gather evidence of student learning, like an all-student response system, but also create differentiated lessons based on the data that you have. 

5. Padlet: It provides an essentially blank canvas for students to create and design collaborative projects, and it is great for brainstorming. 

6. Pear Deck: It is to plan and build interactive presentations that students can participate in via their smart devices. It offers unique question types. 

7. Quizlet: It is to create flashcards, tests, quizzes, and study games that are engaging and accessible online and via mobile device. 

         In conclusion, It’s easy to assess student’s progress in the physical classroom. Paper tests, quizzes, and spot questions are just a few of the tools used in assessment we take for granted. The best online assessment tools for teachers give the same level of feedback for targeted virtual learning. These tools like Google Forms, Mentimeter, Poll Everywhere, Kahoot and many others allow for easy quiz creation and administration. They let teachers choose whether to host activities live or as assignments. They also allow flexibility for written questions, video chat, and spot-questions. And they provide key features like instant grading, graphs, spreadsheet results delivery, and quick, automatic grade-sharing with students.