Phet simulation as a situating tool

Phet simulation is the name of a website developed and maintained by the University of Colorado, we can visit the website through https://phet.colorado.edu/ This website provides educational simulations which provide virtual learning. we can either search our topic and select our subject from physics, chemistry, maths, biology, and earth science.

I am lucky to have known this website where I can download or play the simulation on the website, this will help me let my students explore on the topic and learn virtually. Here I can provide a link to my students and let them learn through this simulation. 

For example: To teach my students about circuit construction, I can provide the link https://phet.colorado.edu/sims/html/circuit-construction-kit-dc-virtual-lab/latest/circuit-construction-kit-dc-virtual-lab_en.html, students click on this link and do their experiment there. 

Students have the authority to use and explore the materials inside the simulation to construct the right circuit.

Benefits of using phet simulations are:

1. Engages students in deep learning- apart from in-class activities, students will be curious to try out the simulation. This will let them explore and focus on the simulation where they will learn better. 
2. Practical view: students will get the feeling of reality when they learn through simulations
3. Improve retention: Students will remember for a longer time when they do it on your own. Playing with simulation lets them learn through play and will help them remember for a longer period of time. 

There are tons of simulations on this website and I suggest my readers try these simulations. 

My experience with google classroom as constructive tool.

Google Classroom, for me, was the most suited application to be used between teachers and students. My experience was solely developed from the activity that I have done. The activity was on creating a classroom in google classroom.



Creating a classroom: before creating a classroom, I logged in with my google account and opened the google classroom app. Then I clicked on + sign and I am given the option to join a class or create a class. Then, I am required to fill-up the class name, section, subject and room. Inside the virtual, I have four taps:

• Stream- Here stream acts as a social platform, whatever happens in the classroom is notified. It will show the latest news about happenings in the google classroom. For, if a teacher posts an announcement, it will be shown under the stream tab or even when a teacher uploads anything a reading material or a video, it will be notified. The teacher can even use this tab to post an announcement. I have posted an announcement in my class to let the students know that I have uploaded some materials for students to read. 
• Classwork: Under the classwork tab, I can create assignment, quiz, upload material and I can even reuse my previous posts. I have uploaded a pdf reading file, a youtube video link and a web link for students to go through under the materials tab. I even uploaded an assignment task under which I used a pdf file, a video link and a web link for students to go through before doing their assignments. I even prepared an online quiz for the students to do. This was prepared as a second assignment. Inside the quiz, I have used five different question types for students to attempt. 
• People: Under this tab, I can even invite a co-tutor or students from there using their e-mail. To invite someone I can even give them the google classroom code from my profile. 
• Grades: under grades, I can view the marks of students for their assessments. 

Making of a promotional video: This was a challenging task as I had to firstly, record the video and then I had to edit it and finalize and uploaded under materials for students to go through.

Here is my promotional video. 

I would suggest my readers try out google classroom as it provides plenty of features to use to make teaching and learning easier and fun. 

Reflection: ICT as a situating tool

The modern technologies can play a very vital role in our day to day life. These technologies can also act as a situating tool. I can define situating in ICT to locate or situate places, measuring distance, and learning in a virtual environment.
For me, even though I have an android gadget and applications that can help me to situate information and locate places, I rarely used it.
Let me share my understanding and some of the features that Google Maps provides.

1. Measuring distance: I am in disbelief when my tutor said that we can measure the distance between two places. These for me was new learning. I always wanted to know the distance between Paro Dzong and Paro College where I take about 20 minutes to walk. I directly used my google account and checked in google maps. There I found, the distance between was  1.33km.
2. Calculating time: here, to calculate the time we can easily find out the longitude of a place and direction, whether the place is east or west of Greenwich. Here, we can use the longitude and direction of the place to Greenwich and calculate time.
   
3. Measuring area: I am also able to find the area of any land. Here, I can easily calculate the area of any place I want. As a test, I have measured the area of my college football pitch. I got the area 7315.05 square centimetre. 
4. Street view: This is the feature I liked the most about google map as we can view like as if we are at that place. It provides 3D images which makes it more realistic. 

So, to my readers, I suggest you all try out google maps to the features in it. There are tons of things you can do with google map and makes our work easier.