typingweb - WBI Evaluation

URL:  http://www.typingweb.com/

Typingweb is free online typing tutorial.  The website is designed for both educational and personal tutoring.  The website is designed around three tabs, and my description will follow the same format.

Teachers can sign-up for a free account through the teacher portal.  The account allows teachers to enter the names of students and create classes from this list.  The classes can be monitored, and teachers also have the ability to run reports to track student achievement.  The reports have several filters: such as a date range, type, and class.  The reports can even be exported into a spreadsheet format.

The typing tutorial begins with the most basic skills.  The learner can start with the home row keys, or they can immediately skip to intermediate or advanced lessons.  Specialty lessons that cover various topics, like headlines, are also offered for free.  The premium lessons have to be purchased.  Although the lessons are self-paced, each lesson records data such as overall wpm (words-per-minute), overall accuracy rate, lesson accuracy, lesson wpm, and time elapsed.  Anyone can practice these skills; no registration is required, but if you want to keep track of the previously mentioned data, you will need to register for the website.  A user can also change the language and layout and color of the keyboard.  Registration is required to take test or view statistics.  A customized lesson is also available for learners.  The lesson is intended to review and strength the user's weak letters or skills.

The last part will be mentioned briefly.  Users, with a login, can complete certification tests and print them out.  These certifications are supposedly official and approved by the Typing Institute of America.

WBI Evaluation

Instructional Aspects
1.  Objectives clearly stated - 4
2.  Objectives appropriately sequenced - 4
3.  Instructional strategies appropriate for the objectives - 5
4.  Instructional activities/process clearly described - 4
5.  Tasks adequate/significant for achieving objectives - 5
6.  Resources adequate/significant for achieving objectives - 4
7.  Learning achievement adequately evaluated - 5
8.  Evaluation criteria clearly expressed - 5

Motivational Aspects
9.  Gaining and maintaining learner's attention - 3
10.  Relating to learner's interest and goals - 4
11.  Building on learner's prior knowledge and foreshadowing what the lesson is about - 5
12.  Providing positive feedback and feeling of accomplishment - 3
13.  Motivational strategies serve for objectives - 4

Web Design Aspects
14.  Navigation clear and easy to access - 4
15.  Authorship and date clearly stated - 4
16.  Text follows rules of grammar, spelling, and literary composition - 5
17.  Use of multimedia (Text, graphic, audio, video, animation, etc.) visually appeal - 3
18.  Mechanical aspects (No broken links, misplaced or missing images, etc.) - 4
19.  Web design appropriate for objectives - 5
20.  Web design appropriate for learner characteristics - 3

Total 83/100

While searching for an appropriate website to evaluate, the business teacher sent out an email about this particular website.  Although this is not in my particular subject of expertise, one of the reasons I was very interested was because of my children.  My oldest son is in fifth grade, and Common Core went into effect this year for grades 3-8.  I have been to enough workshops that I know part of the standards calls for students in some grades to produce typed products.  Just this past week, He had to type up a scientific method report.  He doesn't know how to type, and won't be officially taught until 8th grade.  He manage to complete the assignment with the hunt-and-peck system.   I thought this would be a productive tool for him to use at home.  The second reason I was interested was that the website could be used as alternate method for teaching typing skills to younger students.  This might appeal to schools that have limited resources.

Personally, I like the website.  It is very practical and provides solid instruction for a much needed skill.   It may not be visually appealing, but one must consider the skill that is taught. Visual interest is important, especially for younger learners.  Since the audience for my project is high school students, I will be sure to incorporate elements that make my project visually appealing to my students.

IXL - Multimedia Evaluation for 09/20

IXL is a site that offers users the ability to choose from thousands of math skills ranging from counting on your fingers to experimental probability.  There are over 2300 skills between pre-k and geometry, and IXL does an excellent job of making it simple for teachers or students to select the appropriate practice session.  It is a drill-and-practice format, though.  The practice sessions do not include introductions, tutorials, or direct instruction.  Given that IXL categorizes math skills along grade levels, state curriculum frameworks, and common core standards, users should find site navigation to be highly intuitive.   

IXL’s strength is in its simplified approach: users select a skill and receive immediate feedback as they work.  The feedback sometimes comes in the form of an explanation or example of how to solve a problem.  Such explanations or examples are usually very short and direct.  Users are encouraged to continue working by accumulating points against a clock, through messages telling them they’ve answered correctly, and by receiving notifications of skill mastery.  

There is no audio or video instruction on the site.  It appears that IXL had made a decision to keep its offerings simple and accessible for most users.  In this regard, IXL doesn’t address all learner modalities.  Many of the math questions do employ flash animation to help clarify the problem/process.  IXL is a highly categorized, over-simplified problem generator.  If teachers approach this site with that mind, they should find it to be a useful online learning tool.

Users can access IXL for free, but this version lacks the unlimited access, tracking, and reporting that makes it useful for learners and educators.  IXL offers subscriptions for classrooms ($199 per year, 100 user accounts) or families ($79 per year, 5 user accounts). 

Visit IXL at http://www.ixl.com/

WBI Scoring:

Instructional Aspects

• Objectives clearly stated: 3
• Objectives appropriately sequenced: 5
• Instructional strategies appropriate for the objectives: 4
• Instructional activities / process clearly described: 2
• Tasks adequate/significant for achieving objectives: 3
• Resources adequate/significant for achieving objectives: 3
• Learning achievement adequately evaluated: 4
• Evaluation criteria clearly expressed: 4

Motivational Aspects

• Gaining and maintaining learners' attention: 4
• Relating to learners' interest and goals: 4
• Building on learners' prior knowledge and foreshadowing what lesson is about: 5
• Providing positive feedback and feeling of accomplishment: 5
• Motivational strategies serve for objectives: 4

Web Design Aspects

• Navigation clear and easy to access:  5
• Authorship and date clearly stated:  4
• Text follows rules of grammar, spelling and literary composition: 5
• Using of multimedia visually appealing: 4
• Mechanical aspects: 4
• Web design appropriate for objectives: 5
• Web design appropriate for learner characteristics: 4

Total:  81/100

Personal Reflection
I first came across IXL Math two years ago as I was looking for an alternative to assigning problems out of a math book for homework.  When I came across IXL’s grade-level skills, I was convinced I had found a site that would help engage students in their math homework.  Using the free materials, I started posting links on our class website to IXL practice sessions that correlated to our weekly lessons.  The homework alternative was well received, but there was no way of tracking or grading student work with a free account.  I convinced my school administrator that it was worth the small investment - $199 for a calendar year.  Access to IXL’s tracking system gave me a myriad of reports that could be customized to help me reach individual learners.  From learner deficiencies to skill mastery, I knew where all of my students were within the math curriculum.  In 2010, my 5^th-grade class had an average score of Advanced on the Arkansas Benchmark Exam.  Yes, Advanced.  There were other factors (I had a lot of parent involvement), but IXL made homework fun, different, and easy to turn in.       

In consideration of my project for Multimedia, I would like to create a website for learning math and/or science.  I hope to involve several teachers and students in creating media that assists learners with some of the most troublesome areas of the 7^th and 8^th grade curriculum.  These subjects – math and science – should involve real applications outside the boundaries of classroom walls, so scholastic networking tools and project-based learning may be important components.  I hope to infuse the site with original instructional video and audio created by various member of my school.  I’ll most likely narrow my focus in the days to come, but this is where I stand as of 9/16/12.

English Grammar 101 - Multimedia Evaluation for 09/20

The web-based instructional module I will be reviewing is found at English Grammar 101

This website offers free online lessons for practicing grammar skills in several modules of instruction.  The website also offers several resources for homeschooling, classroom teachers, and school districts.  However, the instructional aspect comes in with the Free Online Grammar Lessons.

The following is the WBI Rubric with my scoring.

Instructional Aspects

• Objectives clearly stated: 5
• Objectives appropriately sequenced: 5
• Instructional strategies appropriate for the objectives: 5
• Instructional activities / process clearly described: 5
• Tasks adequate/significant for achieving objectives: 5
• Resources adequate/significant for achieving objectives: 4
• Learning achievement adequately evaluated: 4
• Evaluation criteria clearly expressed: 5

Motivational Aspects

• Gaining and maintaining learners' attention: 3
• Relating to learners' interest and goals: 4
• Building on learners' prior knowledge and foreshadowing what lesson is about: 5
• Providing positive feedback and feeling of accomplishment: 2
• Motivational strategies serve for objectives: 3

Web Design Aspects

• Navigation clear and easy to access:  3
• Authorship and date clearly stated:  5
• Text follows rules of grammar, spelling and literary composition: 5
• Using of multimedia visually appealing: 1
• Mechanical aspects: 5
• Web design appropriate for objectives: 3
• Web design appropriate for learner characteristics: 3

Total:  74/100

Personal Reflection
The lower scores on the rubric indicate the lack of visually appealing aspects.  While the instructional aspects are well-conceived, there just is not very much in the way of motivating the learner or making the instructional modules appealing to look at.  I do like the idea of the website, as I used to use it in my classroom as a whole-class review of grammar concepts.  But, overall, it is not particularly exciting.  The problem here lies in the fact that grammar, in itself, is generally a boring topic.  So, creating instructional modules that do nothing to enhance the dull content really does not create interest. 

While this is meant to be self-paced and self-correcting, I thought that perhaps more accountability in the evaluation might be helpful in achieving the objectives, as it is very easy to "cheat" your way through the modules and not necessarily learn anything.  A student would have to be very self-motivated to really learn independently, which is why I used this as a whole-class lesson.  The pretests and posttests are relevant, although, they do not climb the ladder of Bloom's taxonomy with application and evaluation.  This website is overall helpful for general skill-building, with the support of an instructor.

In thinking about the application to my own web-based instructional design, I will make sure to add easy navigation and motivation appropriate to the learners.  I will try to maintain a "clean" look so that the user is not distracted by unnecessary information and stimuli.  While I will have an adult audience for my WBI project, I think the same principles apply.  Even adults want to participate in something that is interesting and motivating, instead of boring and almost forgettable!