ED636 - Fall 2006

ED636 - Fall 2006

Thomas Petra
“Media and Materials” response
ED 636 - Dr. Riverra

While reviewing the concepts of media and materials in the text Instructional Technology and Media for Learning, I was able to judge my own recent performance and learn something new. The most important realization I have made from this task is that teachers can use technology to make more efficient and varied lessons for their students.
If teachers wanted to enhance a lesson in the past, I think the traditional question they’d ask would be “Is there a video?” Although availability may have been a criterion in the past, that needn’t be the case now. Depending on the method of instruction a teacher may want to take, there are a variety of media formats he can choose from and with increased ease. Although the preparation of these materials may be time consuming, the overall goal of student learning can increase greatly.
I have been recently working on a Health and Nutrition unit for middle school students. There wasn’t any available unit for me to use and I didn’t have much notice to prepare for this. Basically, I will have different middle school classes for 30-40 minutes, 4 days each quarter on a rotating basis. So, I need 16 lessons for the school year.
My first objective was to build the awareness in students of health and nutrition in their lives. Is there a video? Well, actually that is how I started. I decided to use a documentary called “SuperSize Me” that I had recently watched. The video recounts the experiences of a man who ate nothing but McDonald’s food for 30 days as a health experiment, while also presenting startling information on the current obesity epidemic in America. This video definitely met my objective of building awareness, as I still hear students talking about it primarily at lunchtime. Although I initially viewed the movie for my own enjoyment, I went back and previewed it about 5 more times this time with an educator’s eye. There were several scenes that “may be considered unsuitable for younger viewers” that I flagged for censorship. I also mapped out what chapters on the DVD I would use and created a time log so that I had the material I wanted that fit the time span for the class. I introduced the video and told the students what to watch and listen for. This took two of my four days with them, so the remaining two days I gathered materials from different sources in the form of handouts and nutrition activities. So far, I feel I followed the concepts of media and materials fairly well presented in our textbook. But I also have 12 more nutrition lessons in the future to fill, and that is where I learned the most from our book.
The viewpoint of teacher-centered instruction is what most teachers would follow. It would be time-consuming, but I could shift my nutrition unit to student-centered instruction with increased learner participation. Instead of finding food pyramid handouts left in a desk, I could present students with a multi-media health education that will be more meaningful for them.
I need to gather materials and sources. I probably would have used nutrition labels for manipulatives, but maybe I can find one of those 10 pounds of fat molds to give students something they can touch. I already have nutrition fact sheets provided by McDonalds but I could also have the students compare the nutrition of different fast food restaurants on the internet more easily. Students can make charts, go on hypermedia webquests, and I can research more videos on nutrition. In fact, I recently found that there is a educationally enhanced DVD version of SuperSize Me available with 24 curriculum lessons. I’m sure there are also plenty of nutrition pamphlets available for free, I just need to order them. This will be a work in process. The nice thing about having the students on a rotating basis is that I can edit and revise the lessons’ content. At the end of the year, perhaps I will have a nutrition unit the school can use in the future.
I chose the topic of health and nutrition to teach students in this time spot because I think their health habits are horrible and it is a topic most educators glance through, especially in the higher grades. I wanted to give them something more memorable and hopefully make an impact on how they live their lives in the future. The media and material concepts from our text couldn’t have come to me at a better time.