Friday, March 30, 2012
Blog Assignment # 11
Little Kids.. Big Potential.
In this video, I love the way Ms. Cassidy approaches technology. When I first started in EDM310 and was introduced to the idea of student blogs, I was a little skeptical. But now I can see the awesomeness that the blogs bring! One of the greatest things is that it helps strengthen the students' writing abilities. They are getting extra practice and having a fun time doing it! If I have upper level elementary students, I would love to have a class blog. Who knows? I might have future EDM310 students comment on my kids' blogs! I really like the idea of Skype in the classroom. I thought it was super cool that they were skyping with a geologist! I want to do something like that in my own classroom! I also would like to incorporate the types of websites the students had as choices during centers. I just think it's so cool that students are excited to learn and excited to put what they know to use. Watching her video and hearing about how she got started in technology, really REALLY makes me excited to have my own classroom one day! I just can't wait!
Blog Assignment #10
Teach or Educate? That is the question. I have never really thought of the two words as having that much of a difference. But this video really sets the two apart. According to the video, teaching is to explain something, encourage facts, give information, cause someone to learn, and induce them by example or punishment to do or not do something. This definition does not sound too far off from what a teacher does. But once you see what an educator does, hopefully you would make the switch! An educator is one who enlightens, inspires, and empowers. An educator is one who gives intellectual, moral, and social instruction. Can these things be given by someone who just gives information and facts? No! We must be educators. The kind that the video shows. Educators that are mentors, experienced, and trusted advisors. I think it is super important to be more than just the lady that knows the facts. I want my students to grow as people. I do no want to be a boring teacher whose kids do not learn anything. I want them to learn about school related materials and I also want them to learn about life. I want to help them think outside the box and help them relate things to the real world. I do not think a "teacher" can do these things. But I know strongly believe that an "educator" can! That is %100 what I want to be!
![Pencils]( "Source:Google")
Don't Let Them Take the Pencils Home
The man the writes this blog is brilliant. I spent a lot of time reading Tom Johnson's Adventures in Pencil Integration. In the particular post we were assigned to, Johnson uses pencils as a metaphor for computers/technology. In this situation, Gertrude, an academic specialist, tells Mr. Johnson to not let the students take the pencils home. She says that when they get home, they will use their pencils for entertainment purpose and end up with lower test scores. Technology in the classroom is a big topic that we have researched a lot for our class. Several times I have came across the problem of students using their computers for games and other entertainment purposes. This is where Gertrude is going with the pencils. Even if the students are going home to play Hangman, aren't they still learning while not even trying? They are thinking of words and spelling. Just because computers are used in the classroom, and yes they are also used for recreational purposes, it does not mean that they are not learning anything and their test scores will automatically be lower. I like how Mr. Johnson does not dwell on the problem. He constantly pushes solutions about students' and their pencils. I say let them bring them home! Learning does not stop the minute they leave the classroom!
Don't Let Them Take the Pencils Home
The man the writes this blog is brilliant. I spent a lot of time reading Tom Johnson's Adventures in Pencil Integration. In the particular post we were assigned to, Johnson uses pencils as a metaphor for computers/technology. In this situation, Gertrude, an academic specialist, tells Mr. Johnson to not let the students take the pencils home. She says that when they get home, they will use their pencils for entertainment purpose and end up with lower test scores. Technology in the classroom is a big topic that we have researched a lot for our class. Several times I have came across the problem of students using their computers for games and other entertainment purposes. This is where Gertrude is going with the pencils. Even if the students are going home to play Hangman, aren't they still learning while not even trying? They are thinking of words and spelling. Just because computers are used in the classroom, and yes they are also used for recreational purposes, it does not mean that they are not learning anything and their test scores will automatically be lower. I like how Mr. Johnson does not dwell on the problem. He constantly pushes solutions about students' and their pencils. I say let them bring them home! Learning does not stop the minute they leave the classroom!
Thursday, March 29, 2012
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Blog Assignment #9
The First Year
Mr. McClung talks about loosing touch with his audience. I can see where a lot of teachers do this when they are starting off. While we are in our student teaching, it's lesson plans, lesson plans, lesson plans. We have to a have great lesson plans because we are trying to please our teachers. The main focus should be the students. I like how Mr. McClung pointed out that it is the student comprehension that matters the most. I think that every future teacher needs to read this next line and always keep it in mind: "NO LESSON IS EVER PERFECT. THE LESSON YOU TEACH AND THE ONE YOU PLAN ARE ALWAYS DIFFERENT." This shows that being a teacher means being flexible. Leave your OCD habits at the door. In Mr. McClung's post, he mentions communication and the importance of it with fellow teachers. Communication is a great thing to have with anybody. Like Mr. McClung said, it is not something that comes easy to everyone but it is something every one needs to have a working relationship with others. He says to be reasonable. We might think we are helping our students by setting high expectations but when they do not meet these expectations, we are hurting them. When it comes to technology, Mr. McClung says that we should not be afraid. I grew up with computers so it's hard to think of people who actually repel technology. Hopefully with time, everybody, especially teachers, will embrace technology! Another main point in this post is about listening to your students. I think this is a big deal. We expect them to listen to us and do as we say. We should listen to our students opinions. We could learn something from them! Lastly, Mr. McClung reminds us to never stop learning. I never want to stop learning. Things change everyday so we can learn new things everyday. I hope to always keep an open mind to learning new things!
The Third Year
I really enjoy reading what Mr. McClung has to say. He is talking from experience and he makes it easy to relate to. In his reflection of his third year, he talks about knowing who your boss is. Teachers must never loose focus of who really matters at the end of the day and that is our students! It is easy to get wrapped up in the outside world and worry about pleasing other adults. There is no need to be. Always keep your students in mind. The post also talks about not expecting others to have the same thought as you. Mr. McClung would get excited about new presentations and ideas for the classroom and others wouldn't. I hope to never cross to the dark side like he mentioned. I have had too many teachers in my life who I feel like crossed to to the dark side. I do not want my students to ever think about me like that! Another great point I will remember from this blog is to not be afraid of being the outsider if it involves your students being benefited. I never want my students to feel like I'm neglecting them or that I don't like them. I'm glad there are teachers that want to sit with their student's at lunch and like to communicate with them. When Mr. McClung talks about not teaching the keyboard, his remarks really hit home. I get so frustrated when I ask someone to help me do something on the computer and they just take over and do it. In the end, I learned nothing from them! This was a great way to relate to education. No matter how hard sometime tries, do not do it for them. They will not learn anything! We do not want that for our students. Remember to make sure that they benefit from it even if it is a little frustrating at the time. In his last thoughts on this post, Mr. McClung talks about being "movers and shakers." He wants us to not a reach a point where we are comfortable with how we teach and stop. We need to keep moving forward and I think these are great words to live by. Keep moving forward!
Tuesday, March 27, 2012
March C4K
Sunday, March 25, 2012
Blog Assignment #8
This Is How We Dream
These two videos are are form Richard Miller of Rutgers University. The videos are about how technology should change how we think about the future, about teaching, and about learning. The first part of the videos is about writing and how it has changed in our culture. Everything regarding writing has changed. How we write, where we write, and where we publish is all different than how it use to be. These are electronic now and available at the touch of a button. This video points out that the days of having to go to the library to research something is a memory of the past. If you have access to a computer, you can find pretty much anything you need. This goes along with how much we have learned in this class about the classroom and the importance of technology. The computer and internet makes anything possible when it comes to learning and teaching. In the videos, Miller talks about two different types of changes; fundamental and incremental. Incremental changes are such as articles always being on the web even if you delete it, it is still available. Another incremental change mentioned is that of sharing collaboratively. This is something that we get to experiment in EDM 310 with our next and final projects. Some fundamental changes are the internet downloads of lessons. We did a form of change when we made our podcast for a project. Miller also wants to see a new type of processing to be used by students when they compose their work. It was hard for me to really understand the message of this video. I had to watch it several times before I even could come up with my own opinion. I think I was too busy trying to pay attention to all of the different things on that screen that I was missing what he was saying. At the end, I can tell that he is trying to make a bigger and better future for the reading/writing aspect of learning. As of right now, I am not sure that I am prepared to write with multimedia. This video confused me on the subject more than anything. I hope to improve in that area so that I can teach my students to be efficient in this area when it is necessary.
Blog Post #12
I can only wish that I will be as creative and goal driven as Carly Pugh one day. She seems to have exactly everything planned out that she wants to project to her future students. She appears to be extremely organized and knows exactly what she wants with her career. Her blog post about the YouTube assignment sounds like a great idea. I actually want to do this to have for myself. I have never been addicted to watching YouTube videos but I feel like I may now. With Carly's post, I can understand Miller's writing with multimedia a little better. With Carly's assignment, you can put a story of your teaching philosophy together without really writing anything. Videos can come across better depicted that paper and pen can. Carly makes me want to strive to be a better student in college and a better teacher for the future!
EDM310 is Different
The Chipper Series is a great video about not procrastinating. I feel like I was a Chipper my first year at college. I did not want to do my work on time, I wanted the teachers to just tell me what I needed to do. In the end, that did not really work out to my advantage. Now I see things differently and I am doing much better at school. I think it is important for people to see this message so that they see the importance of learning for yourself. Students need to see where this can take them whether it is upwards to their masters or downwards to the garbage collector.
EDM for Dummies sums up the emotions you go through once you enroll in EDM310. I definitely wanted to throw my computer around the first couple of weeks. All of the information is so overwhelming! But once you learn how to work the programs that we use in the class, everything became so much clearer and I got to focus on the actual material instead of the programs being used. If I was to make a video to help other students in this class, I would want it to be about adding creativity. I would want to show some difference between a student's work who clearly adds no effort and show a student's who went above and beyond. I think it is important for us to remember that we are leaving a trail that any potential employer could look at. If we were to hire someone based off their blog, would you pick the Plain Jane? I bet we would all prefer the student who really got into the assigned project or post. Learn to Change, Change to Learn "We have to accept, as educators, that technology is not really a choice." This is a great statement that came from this video about technology in the classrooms. The more videos I see about this topic, the more I get excited about having my own classroom one day that is full of technology! An eye opener topic to why technology is important is the talk about what children do outside of the classroom. If what they take part in once they leave school is so much more advanced than what they do at school, which one do you think they will remember more? The children are all about texting, emailing, and Facebook. These are all highly advanced technological things. Why should we forbid these types of things at school. We need to incorporate such things in the children's learning. "It's the death of education but the dawn of learning." These is a bold and powerful statement. Teachers teaching is not the focus of the classrooms anymore. The focus is about the students learning and them learning in the most effective way.
Scavenger Hunt 2.0
1. Edmodo is a great site! It is a mix between Twitter and Facebook. Sign up as either a teacher or student and check out all the neat things you can do. In my future classroom, I would love to use this site. I can communicate with the students and their parents. I can also link up with other teachers to see what they are doing in their classroom. This site allows you to create groups, manage your calendar, and even keep up with grades. Students and their parents can log in to see missing assignments or notes from me! Another really cool feature from Edmodo is the quiz aspect. If I have a classroom of older students I would love to try this out. You can create, submit, and grade quizzes all in one spot. This is a wonderful site. I am so glad I found it on this scavenger hunt!
4. Photo Peach is a place where you can create and share slideshows. Music, captions, and comments can also be added to your slideshow. There is even a Photo Peach for educators where you can create an account and have a place for each student to create their own slideshow. You can choose to share their work with their parents and the community and keep it private from the public. Different versions of this site does cost per month and per number of students.
5.Poll Everywhere is a neat site. For small polls, it's free!
These two videos are are form Richard Miller of Rutgers University. The videos are about how technology should change how we think about the future, about teaching, and about learning. The first part of the videos is about writing and how it has changed in our culture. Everything regarding writing has changed. How we write, where we write, and where we publish is all different than how it use to be. These are electronic now and available at the touch of a button. This video points out that the days of having to go to the library to research something is a memory of the past. If you have access to a computer, you can find pretty much anything you need. This goes along with how much we have learned in this class about the classroom and the importance of technology. The computer and internet makes anything possible when it comes to learning and teaching. In the videos, Miller talks about two different types of changes; fundamental and incremental. Incremental changes are such as articles always being on the web even if you delete it, it is still available. Another incremental change mentioned is that of sharing collaboratively. This is something that we get to experiment in EDM 310 with our next and final projects. Some fundamental changes are the internet downloads of lessons. We did a form of change when we made our podcast for a project. Miller also wants to see a new type of processing to be used by students when they compose their work. It was hard for me to really understand the message of this video. I had to watch it several times before I even could come up with my own opinion. I think I was too busy trying to pay attention to all of the different things on that screen that I was missing what he was saying. At the end, I can tell that he is trying to make a bigger and better future for the reading/writing aspect of learning. As of right now, I am not sure that I am prepared to write with multimedia. This video confused me on the subject more than anything. I hope to improve in that area so that I can teach my students to be efficient in this area when it is necessary.
Blog Post #12
I can only wish that I will be as creative and goal driven as Carly Pugh one day. She seems to have exactly everything planned out that she wants to project to her future students. She appears to be extremely organized and knows exactly what she wants with her career. Her blog post about the YouTube assignment sounds like a great idea. I actually want to do this to have for myself. I have never been addicted to watching YouTube videos but I feel like I may now. With Carly's post, I can understand Miller's writing with multimedia a little better. With Carly's assignment, you can put a story of your teaching philosophy together without really writing anything. Videos can come across better depicted that paper and pen can. Carly makes me want to strive to be a better student in college and a better teacher for the future!
EDM310 is Different
The Chipper Series is a great video about not procrastinating. I feel like I was a Chipper my first year at college. I did not want to do my work on time, I wanted the teachers to just tell me what I needed to do. In the end, that did not really work out to my advantage. Now I see things differently and I am doing much better at school. I think it is important for people to see this message so that they see the importance of learning for yourself. Students need to see where this can take them whether it is upwards to their masters or downwards to the garbage collector.
EDM for Dummies sums up the emotions you go through once you enroll in EDM310. I definitely wanted to throw my computer around the first couple of weeks. All of the information is so overwhelming! But once you learn how to work the programs that we use in the class, everything became so much clearer and I got to focus on the actual material instead of the programs being used. If I was to make a video to help other students in this class, I would want it to be about adding creativity. I would want to show some difference between a student's work who clearly adds no effort and show a student's who went above and beyond. I think it is important for us to remember that we are leaving a trail that any potential employer could look at. If we were to hire someone based off their blog, would you pick the Plain Jane? I bet we would all prefer the student who really got into the assigned project or post. Learn to Change, Change to Learn "We have to accept, as educators, that technology is not really a choice." This is a great statement that came from this video about technology in the classrooms. The more videos I see about this topic, the more I get excited about having my own classroom one day that is full of technology! An eye opener topic to why technology is important is the talk about what children do outside of the classroom. If what they take part in once they leave school is so much more advanced than what they do at school, which one do you think they will remember more? The children are all about texting, emailing, and Facebook. These are all highly advanced technological things. Why should we forbid these types of things at school. We need to incorporate such things in the children's learning. "It's the death of education but the dawn of learning." These is a bold and powerful statement. Teachers teaching is not the focus of the classrooms anymore. The focus is about the students learning and them learning in the most effective way.
Scavenger Hunt 2.0
1. Edmodo is a great site! It is a mix between Twitter and Facebook. Sign up as either a teacher or student and check out all the neat things you can do. In my future classroom, I would love to use this site. I can communicate with the students and their parents. I can also link up with other teachers to see what they are doing in their classroom. This site allows you to create groups, manage your calendar, and even keep up with grades. Students and their parents can log in to see missing assignments or notes from me! Another really cool feature from Edmodo is the quiz aspect. If I have a classroom of older students I would love to try this out. You can create, submit, and grade quizzes all in one spot. This is a wonderful site. I am so glad I found it on this scavenger hunt!
4. Photo Peach is a place where you can create and share slideshows. Music, captions, and comments can also be added to your slideshow. There is even a Photo Peach for educators where you can create an account and have a place for each student to create their own slideshow. You can choose to share their work with their parents and the community and keep it private from the public. Different versions of this site does cost per month and per number of students.
5.Poll Everywhere is a neat site. For small polls, it's free!
Create interactive meetings at Poll Everywhere
Thursday, March 22, 2012
Project #11
For my video, I chose to read a story to my daughter and nephew. They were so excited to be in a video. I love to read children's books. My daughter has a huge library in her room because I cannot stay away from books at every store we go to! I enjoy reading to classrooms. I hope this is one thing technology does not take away from me.
Saturday, March 10, 2012
Project 10
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
Blog Assignment #7
When watching this video, I had mixed emotions throughout it. In this video of learning in the 21st century, there is a detailed description of how a student learns a topic on an online basis. The student does the research himself with help from his sources on his personal network. He puts all of his information together and shares it for anyone else who may be researching the same top may see his work.
The first problem I had with this is about the facts. Where are the facts about the subject. It is easy to find someone's opinion about a topic on the internet but finding the actual facts isn't as easy. But when after I thought of this way of learning, I understood a little better. I do think that when you find something on your own, it is easier to remember. So with this idea in hand, maybe having the student do his own research with the topic will benefit him in the long run. The 21st century seems to be getting away from the teacher informing the student of just the facts so I should be more accepting of this from of learning.
When the question is asked about if teachers will be still be needed, it get's my thoughts going wild! Of course we will always need teachers. Previous assignments have really got this to be my current soap box. Without teachers, ours students would not know where to start! Who will guide them in the right direction? Students' dependance on me might be completely different than it was in the previous century but they are still dependent on their teacher. Like the video said, we are here to guide them in the right direction, be their model, teach them how to decipher good information and anything else the internet may throw their way. Teachers will always be needed. I strongly disagree with anyone who says otherwise.
I am learning a lot about building a personal network. I am starting to see more importance of it. I think the best part is being able to see others. If I have a great resource, I would love to share it with other so it could benefit their teaching careers. I'm sure there are others who feel the same way. At the end of the day, it is our students who matter. All teachers should have this in common, so, what other place to get better ideas from than those who share the same views? Go get to sharing!
A 7th Grader's Personal Learning Environment
This video of a 7th grader's PLN makes me want to make my own and share it with anyone who does not know about them. I think it is wonderful that students are being taught to be organized with their work as well as being taught responsibility about their work. I like how the student mentioned that she does not get the option to NOT do her work but she gets the option do her work in a way that excites her. Their teacher is promoting creativity among the students and I think that is wonderful. Her students are probably learning a great amount of knowledge by being able to do the research and post it in way that is unique to their selves.
Sunday, March 4, 2012
Blog Assignment # 6
He has a great lecture about goals that everyone could learn something from. I'm sure we have all said that we have goals in life. But have you ever really thought about specific goals? I know I have not until now. I have had a goal to be a teacher but I think that our goals should be more specific. I want to be a successful teacher that students truly learn from. I think that we need to teach our students about having goals and we need to teach them to be specific about it. As I learned from this video, our goals can also be changed as it needs to be fit. Our goals might be unrealistic as we are younger, but as we grow we can tweak them to be realistic with a chance of reaching them. I think everyone should have goals. Without them, what do you strive for in life?
Another great topic from this video was about brick walls. In our lifetime, we will come to dead ends and be turned away from our goals. Not everything we want will be given to us the first time. Randy explained the purpose of these brick walls. They are good for us and we need to portray this message to our students. Brick walls are there to weed out those who are not truly serious about moving forward. When faced with a brick wall, we will reevaluate what we really want in life. If we want to show dedication, we will find a way to get through the brick wall. We should never give up if it is something we really want in our life. I want to teach this motivation to my students one day. Just because one door might close, or one brick wall comes up, it doesn't mean that we should give up and walk away from it. We need to teach our students to strive for something and go after what they want!
I learned a lot of lessons that I want to remember when I have a classroom of my own one day. The first is about setting a bar for students. When Randy said that his students went over his bar he had set in the first two weeks of his class, I really started to think about it. I think it is very important to be careful when setting bars for our students. If we set them to low, it could have a negative effect on our students and they might think that they are not capable of raising the bar. In Randy's case, the bar was reached by the students and then he was not sure of what to do not. I think in a way, our students should set their own bars but with their teachers beside them in guidance. If we teach them how to set goals and how to strive in their life, then they will set their own bars high enough that will keep them reaching until they succeed. A few other things that I think all teachers should keep in mind when they are with their students is to remember the fun. If we want out students to learn something and actually remember it, make the material fun. A great concept from the video is this question, "Are you a Tigger or Eeyore?" I never want to be a teacher like Eeyore. Hopefully, none of us have the intentions of being a drag. Randy also mentioned to never lose the childlike wonder. If we do, I think this is where the Eeyore's come in. If we can remember what it is like to think like a child, we just might come across to them in a much more effective way.
The last two things I want to mention about the video is that we should always help other because loyalty is a two way street. If we want to trust our students to make the right choices, they need to be able to trust that we are making the right choices when it comes to teaching them and preparing them for their future. We need to always keep their best interest at heart. Never give up on our own lives and never give up on our students!
Friday, March 2, 2012
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