Sunday, February 24, 2013

Project 10

Find the Right Tool
 Picture of the world
I am majoring in Elementary Education with the hopes of teaching Kindergarten. I researched tools that can be used in a K-2nd grade setting. Symbaloo is a tool I can use for any grade as a class. Symbaloo is a organization tool perfect for anyone! With Symbaloo, my class can have access to student's/teacher's blogs, resources from Scholastic, and many more resources. I think Symbaloo will help me keep all of my education resources organized throughout my career as a teacher. With technology always growing I can just picture having Symbaloo up on my smart board for my students to use different links during down time.

Thursday, February 21, 2013

Blog Post 6

The Networked Student

World connected to the internet The Networked Student by Wendy Drexler is a video about a teaching style truly for the 21st. century. Her video was inspired by the connectivism course called "CCK08". Connectivism is the belief that learning connects within a social network of different diversities. Conectivism connects teachers and students around the world. In this style of teaching, the teacher never lectures the class and there is no text book. In the video the student explored Google Scholar, created his own book marking site, and searched for opinionated blogs. After exploring, he proceeded to create his own blog to experience networking for himself. He also used other resources to learn. For example, he used iTunes to listen to podcast of lectures by professors all over the world. The student was able to learn so much more about his topic by using technology.

The video ask the question, why does a student of connectivism need a teacher? Without a teacher there to guide students, the networked student would not have any guidance. Think of the teacher as a the track that helps the train know where to go. The teacher teaches the students how to build their own network and take advantage of different learning opportunities. When a student gets stuck or comes across an inappropriate website, the teacher is there to help he/she get back on the right track. Teachers are also the role model for students and they show their students how to communicate properly and respectfully.

Connectivism is the perfect learning tool for an independent learner. Teaching your class like this will make them more prepared to face the real world alone. It gives them the tools to be independent, yet efficient in their learning. The society we live in today is web based in every aspect of life. It is important to me for my students to be prepared for the future, and to know how being connected through a network can benefit their academic career. Networking can truly make a difference in your career path. It can lead you to opportunities you never knew existed.

Personal Learning Environment

One of Wendy Drexler's 7th grade students made a video about her personal learning environment. The student was in Wendy's Science class which is paperless and all networked. In the video, the student explained her daily process of networking. Her daily process is a lot like our EDM310 class. Learning this way gives students more freedom to be creative and open minded. It also gives students a sense of responsibility because some days the teacher lets them decide what they need to work on. Students are becoming more and more independent through types of teaching styles like this and it will help them in the long run!

Sunday, February 17, 2013

My Sentence

Blog Post 5

Krissy Venosdale

Dream Big in a cloud Krissy teaches Gifted Education. With her vivid imagination I can just see how much the children must adore her! She really inspires her students to be the best they can be. She strives to make her classroom a place where kids can imagine, create, dream, and explore. Teaching them how to think and not what to think is a huge focus for her!

If I Built a School is an amazing dream! Krissy paints a picture of the most fun and talented learning environment I could ever dream of teaching in! Her dream is so fascinating where "creativity would ooze from every pore in the building. Colorful walls, comfy seating, nooks, and crannies where kids could collaborate, discuss, dream, and learn.". The common core of her dream school would be character, helping others, and being your best.

Owning my own preschool has always been one of my retirement dreams, so this assignment has the wheels in my mind spinning! Sadly, I never really thought much of what it would look like. When I think of a learning environment, I picture color everywhere! Children's and teacher's art covering the walls. A library the size of Texas, so each student could have the access to any book they wanted. Science labs they required field work so children could actually get out of the building. Hands on projects would be a huge part of the curriculum. When I walk into classrooms I want to hear laughter, because learning is fun! Children should want to go to school!

Virtual Choir

Eric Whitacre’s Virtual Choir video is breath taking! Just the thought of 185 people all harmonizing together over the internet blows my mind! How fascinating is it having people from all over the world participate in such a creative project. Composed and conducted by Eric Whitacre, "Lux Aurumque" merges hundreds of tracks individually recorded and posted to YouTube. The final product incorporates 185 voices from 12 countries to form a "virtual choir" that spanned the globe. His work is truly a piece of art!

Teaching in the 21st Century

Teaching in the 21st Century is a informative video about education that uses technology. This includes pod-casting, blogging, cellphones, etc. Roberts had many lists of the different programs available for students to use such as Facebook, Youtube, Google, Wikipedia, Twitter, and many more. He believes that teachers are the filter of knowledge. Anyone can read information and facts, but it takes teachers to interpret information appropriately in order for students to learn properly. Teaching students to use and love technology will help them not only learn in your classroom, but also help them after school for jobs. Now while technology is a amazing tool in the classroom, it is also important not to forget about the old fashion way. For example, teaching students how to write a research paper where they actually have to use books is important. It will teach them not to be dependent on technology. I hope to have a healthy balance of both in my future classroom.

Flipped Classroom

Flipping the Classroom is a method of teaching that helps the teacher cut down on lecture time while teaching. Dr. Lodge McCammon invented this new style of teaching that involves the teacher making videos for the students to watch at home and for students to do what would have been their homework in class while the teacher is there to help. This gives the students a opportunity to ask questions and get the help they seek while traditional homework leaves them lost and confused. Looking back on my high school years, there were many times I just could not do the application part of my homework and spent many nights staring at a paper because there was not anybody who could answer my questions. Having a video of the teachers lecture would have saved me so much time and would have greatly benefited my learning! If done properly, this new style of teaching can truly make a difference in our educational system. I know as a student, I would love to be taught this way.

Sunday, February 10, 2013

Project 5 Presentation

C4T January

Post 1

My teacher's first blog post was Sloving Problems. Joe Bower, the teacher, spent the day with Ross Greene learning about solving problems with children collaboratively. He post talked about emphasis on solving problems rather than on extinguishing or replacing behaviors. There is a big difference between believing that children will do well when they want to versus believing kids do well if they can. When we argue that kids do well when they want to, we make up theories about why they are choosing to do poorly. We all do these four things. We all want to get what we want. We all seek attention. We all have trouble. We all avoid stuff we don't like. The big news isn't that kids do these things -- the big news is that while all successful adults do these things adaptively, children with challenging behaviors do all of these things maladaptively. Some people like to lean on a diagnosis to explain why children are challenging, but this is potentially dangerous. Using a diagnosis to explain a child's challenging behavior is circular thinking. I totally agree with Mr. Bower's post. I feel many people do lean on disorders as an excuse for a child's behavior. Children with challenging behaviors are only challenging when their environment demands their lagging skills which creates unsolved problems. Parents and teachers are too comfortable in saying "Oh, he/she just has a behaviorally problem. They can't help it.". This is NOT okay. Part of being a parent/teacher is figuring out how to over come this objective.

Post 2

Mr. Bower's second post I commented on was Tips for better bloging. This post was absolutely perfect for me to read as a beginner in blogging. He passed on some pointers for a teacher who would like to start blogging. A few tips i found helpful were: 1. You have to make blogging enjoyable or you won't do it for long. 2. Link other people's stuff in your blog and then make them aware that you have linked to them. This is a great way of connecting with others via Twitter or e-mail. 3. Keep advertisements and the desire to profit as far away from your blog as possible. Blogging is about learning and sharing. Try not to get distracted from these objectives with profits and popularity. I am still kinda iffy weather I would want to incorporate blogging in my classroom or not, but reading about other teacher's blogs helps keep me open minded to the idea.

Friday, February 8, 2013

Blog Post 4

Lanwitches

Podcast

Using a podcast in a classroom has never crossed my mind. Langwitches uses podcast in her first grade classroom. Reading her blog will open your eyes to a whole new world of pod-casting with a learning environment. Practical Principals is a blog that has many links for pod-casting that provides updates whenever there is new content. FeedBurner makes it easy to receive content updates in popular pod-catchers.

There are many benefits of pod-casting in a classroom. Pod-casting is an effective way of interacting with students outside the class room. While reading through one of the blog posts, I came across a comment a teacher left. "I teach Grade One in Doha, Qatar (in the Middle East) and we will be starting to read some Magic Tree House stories soon. I will make sure we read the one on Pompeii, then I can take a little break because when my children listen to your podcast, YOU will be the teachers instead of me … you know much more about Pompeii than I do! I know my children will love hearing your podcast and I know they will want to do one too. Thanks so much for for being so awesome!" Knowing that she is using a podcast as a resource in her classroom to benefit her students is mind blowing. I came from a small town where things like this was just not known in the educational world. The idea I really like about using it in my future classroom is knowing that the parents can actually see and hear what their children are learning in school. I know if I was a parent I would love to be able to do that.

Tuesday, February 5, 2013

Special Blog Post 1

Misinterpreted Data

Misinterpreting data can be an easy mistake if your brain in not turned on! I did a WolframAlpha search on the population in China, India, and the United States. The results: China-1.35 billion people, India-1.21 billion people, and United States-309 million people. As the results show, the United States is out numbered to both of these countries.

WolfranAlpha Searches

WolfranAlpha is a search engine on knowledge. For fun I searched "What is the french word for love?". I already knew the answer, but I wanted to see how detailed the search engine was. It was a nice delight to see the answer. Love as a feeling translates to "amour" and love as a preference translates to "adorer". I also searched "Leaning Tower of Pisa angle". The answer is "3.99 degrees after restoration preformed between 1990-2001.". WolfranAlpha also gives me the comparisons as plane angels.

WolfranAlpha was created by Stephan Wolfram and his team. WolframAlpha's long-term goal is to make all systematic knowledge immediately computable and accessible to everyone. This is a very useful search engine, because not only does it answer your questions, but it goes the extra mile. It gives you charts, related information, and anything it feels to be useful. This can be a incredibly useful tool in the classroom for a student and for me as a future teacher. Children are full of question and many are completely random. Imagine being in a classroom and a student ask you a question you are not sure the answer of. You could easily type their question up and display it on the board for the whole class to see and learn.

WolfranAlpha has a neat little button, under where you type your question, "random". When you click this, it pulls up random questions and answers. I played with this button for a while just to see what interesting facts it would find. It also has the ability to share your question and answer to Facebook, Twitter, Blog, ect. This search engine has many possibilities for the education world and is something I personally bookmarked in my computer to use for my advantage.

Gary Hayes Social Media Count

Gray Hayes Social Media Chart is a on going counter. It shows how many people are using Social, Mobile, Games, and Heritage. The time frames are now, +1 day, +1 week, +1 month, and +1 year. It is mind blowing to see how fast everything is happening in the world. The numbers are constantly growing from the amount of people liking and commenting on Facebook to the amount of people who have purchased a new television.

Coming from a small town, I never realized how much the world depends on technology. This count is a eye opener to me. As a future teacher, I know it is extremely important for me to stay on top of technology and of course the data. Being aware of how much the world does use technology has a resource is just a start, and Gary Hayes social media count is a wonderful resource as a reminder. This is another great website that I know have bookmarked.

Friday, February 1, 2013

Blog Post 3

Peer Editing


In Paige Ellis's blog post she talks about the importance of peer editing. The main idea of her post is how to cirque effectively and constructively. So what is peer editing? Peer editing means working with somebody your own age and helping them improve, revise, and edit their work. There are three main tips in being a good cirque: 1. Compliments 2. Suggestions, 3. Corrections. Being able to cirque work properly can truly help you as a writer and the persons work you are editing.

It is important to remember to not be a Picky Patty. It is always best to start out with what they did right when you are editing somebodies work. This helps them feel more open to your cirque. When pointing out someones mistakes, it is much more helpful to give them examples or pointers of how to fix it. Peer editing can be a very useful tool in a classroom. It gives students a chance to see the steps in correcting their work.

Assistive Technologies

Assistiive Technologies with and Hearing Impaired Children and the Mountbatten is about making people aware of children with disabilities and their learning. Technologies have made learning so much easier for us all, but especially for people with disabilities. The Mountbatten writer was designed to help blind students stay in a regular classroom. This is an amazing invention for learning! It gives the blind student the ability to translate a document into braille. It also allows the teacher to give feedback. Both videos really shed light on how importance learning is for everybody no matter what may try to hold them back.

Apple product is really amazing. Knowing they have made applications and adjustments for the blind is truly mind blowing. This is just another tool that can enhance learning for the blind. Using the iPad, the students can use the same applications at school and home. This is something I will incorporate in my future classroom. Being able to use an iPad blind to surf the web and play games is beneficently for adults too.

Harness Your Students' Digital Smarts

Incorporating technology into your classroom is beneficial to you and your students. Not only will this enhance their learning, but it will also help them later in life to be more proficient with technology. In Vicki Davis's classroom she promotes technology and learning. In her classroom students create a virtual world. This must really be a tool the students love. Keeping the students interactive in their learning is a great move on her part. Mrs. Davis also makes a great point; not all students can learn from a paper and pencil. She is absolutely correct and it is very important to be able to carter to each child's learning.

I hope I will have the ability to use technology inside my classroom. I believe it can make a huge difference is our students learning experience. The main purpose of educating our youth is to prepare them for their future. In our world now we truly rely on technology and our students need to be able to use it. The classrooms have changed for the better since I was in elementary school, and I hope they will continue to get better as I teach.