Technology Inquiry Wiki

Today I finished the screen cast for my wiki.  It only took a few takes, and, like before, Jing is very easy to use.  However the wiki was giving me a lot of trouble a few weeks ago.  Finding the sources was not a problem, although finding examples of elementary teachers was more difficult that the abundant information on middle and high school teachers with interactive whiteboards.  The real problem was adding the information to my wiki.  I used Google Sites and sometime my computer wouldn't "connect" so it was unable to save the information.  Sometimes the information would be completely deleted when I pressed save.  After trying multiple computers I visited Professor Boyer and got the situation straightened out, and got most of my information back.  However, despite this bad experience I still see the value in using wikis.  In my future classroom I will use a wiki through a different website, but I still like the ease of adding information, unlike using computer programs (like Dreamweaver) to update websites.  I know that I will definitely have a classroom site online to share agendas, news, homework assignments, pictures, etc with students, parents, and community members.  Keeping an "open" classroom can have a number of benefits, the biggest one I see being parent support and communication. 
Also, I see how students can use this technology to compile research, as I did for this project.  Having them publish it online will make them more accountable to work hard and produce great work.  They can show parents and long-distance relatives the work they've done, and even view, learn from, and comment on each other's research.  Despite my set-backs in this assignment, I definitely see a lot of potential for wikis in my classroom. 
   

Reflections from class 12/9

Today is the last day of class.  After the technology class is over, I can still stay up to date on news about technology in education by adding Professor Boyer on Twitter because he tweets all the interesting news articles.  He also encouraged us to contact him in the future, student teaching or the first few years while we are considering ways to incorporate technology into the classroom.

In Class Activity: Identify 3 ways I will integrate technology in my classroom
Since my school district is in a rural, low income area, , I don't have the opportunity to use interactive whiteboard technology in my third grade classroom.  I had to come up with some other creative ways to incorporate technology. 1.)  My third graders use blogger to share their opinions and reflections after important assignments or key classroom discussions. 2.)  I keep a class wiki that includes our daily agenda, pictures from fun activities, upcoming events, and homework posted for both students and parents to keep up to date.  3.) Because my school's discipline structure is modeled after the PBIS model (which puts an emphasis on "school-wide" rules)  my students will be making videos (writing the script and acting) at the beginning of the year to be shown to the younger students in the school about how the exemplify good behavior in multiple school settings. 

Other ideas that my classmates came up with that I like:
Podcasting-students can listen to or make; I could listen to for professional development
Scratch- creating educational, interactive games for specific skills that I cannot find games for online
Epals- students talking to students from other cities, states, countries
Delicious-organize information, like for a research project resources, or interactive games to access at home
Audio documenting- have students record reading beginning, middle & end of the year to hear progress

How has my thinking about technology's role in teaching and learning changed over the semester?
Before this course I didn't really have an interest in technology in the classroom.  I imagined my classroom having a projector and using the computer lab playing interactive games.  This was the elementary experience I had, and used as a model when I imagined my future classroom.  However, now that I've seen WHY technology is important, I've definitely changed my mind.  With technology students find more meaning to the content because they can see the relevance to their life outside the classroom.  I like the idea of using technology (like blogs, videos, presentations, etc) for student assessment.  I also like presenting information through technology because it gives the students another source of information other than the teacher.  Technology allows them to explore the content without me, and gives them the skills to seek and explore knowledge outside my classroom--creating life-long learners.

Reflection from class 12/2

In class today we first watched a video that a teacher made to document her use of technology in her classroom.  Some ideas I liked and could see myself using in my future classroom to make sure my students are "active in their educations"

• SMART boards- to actively engage and encourage student participation by having them use the board
• Collaborative Social Networking- to connect and share information in real time with other students from around the world, to collaborate with experts in their fields (history, other countries, science, etc)
• Blogs- For teacher to use to document her agenda, post homework assignments, classroom news/newsletter, etc. "Open Classroom" "Transparent teaching"  For both students and parents to keep up to date.  Also can post excellent student work online for parents to see examples of projects and motivate students to do best work
• Student blog- to reflect, not recall,  to share opinions, also to motivate students to do their best work since it is published on a public forum

Some of these goals could be accomplished without advanced technology, but ALL of them are more efficient than the old methods.  Some activities can be more efficient without technology, so those good engaging activities don't need to change.  But if something can be accomplished better, faster, or more actively with technology, I need to find a way to use it in class for my students. 

We also read articles on 7 smart uses of technology and 7 stupid ways to use technology.  I saved these articles in my Delicious to reread later.  Basically, it's important to know that technology is not a "phase" that's going to pass so teachers need to stop ignoring it.  Furthermore, we need to learn how to EFFECTIVELY integrate technology to best benefit our students.  Just adding in technology is not enough.  There are some "stupid" ways to use technology also, so we really need to analyze how students learn best and how technology can facilitate that.

PSA Reflection

The PSA was one of the most challenging assignments yet, comparable to using Scratch.  Choosing a subject and writing a script was no problem.  We recorded in one of the library's group study rooms using Courtney's Polaroid camcorder.  It's very similar to a Flip camera, the USB plug pops out of the side and connects directly to the computer.  The most difficult part about video tapping was the sound.  The small room made our voices echo and because the person behind the camera was also the narrator, she had to talk very quietly to get her voice at the same level as the rest of us.  After connected the camera to a Mac computer, we weren't sure how to use iMovie.  It was difficult to figure out how to import a video, or even how to save the video off Courtney's camera onto the computer.  Luckily we were in the computer lab in the library, so we asked one of the lab assistance to help us.  All we could figure out how to do, even with his help, was to add title pages.  We looked into adding music and sound, and couldn't figure out how.  Also, after I uploaded it to Blogger, our voices are very quiet, almost too quiet to even hear with the computer volume turned up all the way. 
If I were to try to make a video in my classroom, I would definitely need to become more experienced in using iMovie.  I see the most potential with this tool in using it as a kinda of assessment for my students, or using it to keep parents up to date on what we are doing in our classroom.  Either way the students would be acting.  I can't see how this technology could be a one-person tool.  I could not be filmed and be holding the camera at the same time.  So, if I wanted to be on the screen to send my students a message, I would need to find someone to help hold the camera. 
Because I do like the idea of using video in my classroom, I will not let my lack of current knowledge on the technology hold me back from using it in my classroom.  I know I will have to explore iMovie's features before I use it, but I like opportunities that it gives students.  For example, if they did create a script and video documenting what they learned on a certain topic I would be confident that they understand the material well since "creating" is on the top of Bloom's Taxonomy of learning. 

Public Service Announcement

Reflection from class 11/18

After the group presentation we revisited some of the ideas about how education is going to change in the future.  One of the ideas that came up was the new three R's of High school education: Relevance, Relationships, Rigor.  However, these characteristics can also define elementary education.  In order to motivate students they need to be able to connect relevance to their material.  Also cross-curriculum relationships are important to foster when planning our my learning structure.  If children can identify relationships between material across a number of different subjects, the probability that they will find it meaningful and remember it will greatly increase.  Lastly, rigor is also important because I think that many elementary schoolers aren't being challenged enough.  Teachers are too often just transmitting knowledge to them instead of challenging them to discover their own.

Idea of learning and school are too closely related.  People assume one applies the other.  But, just because students attend school does not mean they are learning.  Professor Boyer said "I'm in favor of the idea of learning over the idea of school."  Learning should be the focus, the the physical school building.

Attitudes about technology have not changed since they emerged.  When cell phones came out, they were instantly banned, as they still are today.  I understand that personal use of a cell phone in class could be distracting, but now with all the functions of a cell phone, it could actually be a resource for students.  Same with other technologies.  We need to think about what medium we are providing knowledge and if it what this generations students will relate to the best.  Could we provide a more effective mode of learning through technology?  And, wouldn't that better prepare them for their jobs and future learning outside the classroom?

Chpt 10 Rethinking Education

This chapter is interesting because it acts as the conclusion of all we are learning.  Basically, we need to rethink how and what we are teaching in schools in order to make our children successful beyond the classroom.  Since the world around us is constantly changing, why hasn't education?  The introduction makes the case that the U.S. used to be a global leader in the worlds resources.  Now technology brings information across the world, and levels the educational "playing field."  Millions of students have the same information on how to be a successful engineer, doctor, technician, etc.  So how can our students out-compete them in the global job market, especially since the links/communication of technology make it possible to hire a person from across the ocean to do an "American job."  The greatest advantage we can give to students is how their education is structured.  We need to rethink learning.  Learning can be done outside school and we must give our students the resources to learn by themselves.  This allows education to become a live-long process.  Motivating students to continually seek new knowledge through the new available technology will make the successful people beyond my classroom.
The biggest change as an educator will be to rethink what a teacher's role is.  For me, it will be much different than my elementary school teachers, or even the teachers I study with for practicums and student teaching.  I have to create a whole revolutionized job description in order to help this generation's students succeed.  I need to act more as a motivator and empower my students to seek their own information.  I will be a supportive resource and still provide the necessary scaffolding to ensure their success and growing knowledge.  But if I want my students to succeed globally, I must be the leader that reexamines education and it's goals.

Reflection from Presentation

My presentation didn't take as much work to plan as I anticipated.  It took our group about two hours, plus practice time.  I enjoyed using Scribble Link in class and suggested to my group that we utilize that tool in our discussion.  This tool appealed to me because I am more of a visual learner.  So far, the class discussions have all been verbal.  Instead, students who don't usually speak up, will be more willing an less intimidated to share their ideas.  Unfortunately, the links did not work in the classroom five mintues before class started.  We created the pages on Monday, then re-tested them Wednesday, so we could not figure out why the links didn't work on Thursday.  But, luckily we discussed a back up plan on Wednesday just in case, since this was a new tool for us.  So, instead we conducted verbal group discussions like previous groups.  I think our lesson would have been more creative if the links would have worked, but the back up plan still helped our classmates get the main ideas from the chapter. 
This set back will not hold me back from testing new technology in my future classroom.  I will still experiment with new tools and now I understand the importance of a back up plan in case technology fails me.
Since we were not the first group to present, it was less pressure, espeically since the students' discussions make up the majority of the lesson.  The same can be applied in my elementary classroom.  Giving them enough time to discover their own information will allow me to do less prep work and help them more. They will be in charge of designing their own learning.  I must be prepared to guide the discussions, but not totally lead them.  Also, after my first couple of lessons on the first day of teaching, it will get easier to design lessons, just as it was easier because my peers went before I did.

Reflection from class 11/11

Today was my presentation.  Most of the feedback will be on my reflection from my presentation post.  Professor Boyer did add to our last, closing quote.  He asked us whether we were going to be innovative teachers.  Are we striving to fit in, or stving to be the best teacher we can be to benefit the students?  The design of my presentation proves that I am going to try to be an innovative teacher.  We tried a new technology tool, Scriblink.  Also, I keep a list in my notebook of ideas that I could see myself using in my classroom.  When a good idea arises in class, I make sure I remember it by writing it down.  If it is just a gerneral tool, I brainstorm ideas on how to specifically implement it.  For example, a blog can be used by students to document thought in journal form, it can be used to answer a specific homework question, or I can use it to record what we did in class for parents and other educators to access. 

Also, Profressor Boyer shared some more links on the D2L home page, all pertenant education topics dealing with technology/learning or teaching on Wisconsin.  I will read and add these to my delicious account.

After that, we have work day for the rest of the hour.

Chpt 10 What It Means (Blogs...)

The last chapter in Blogs, Wikis, and Podcasts was more like a chapter from Rethinking Education in the Age of Technology.  Instead of introducing another new tool for the classroom, this chapter was more of a wrap up, hence the title “What It All Means.”  Similar to our other textbook, it talked about the major changes in the education world is partly due to changing technology and the new possibilities for learning.  It states that the most important aspect of education now is for teachers to examine and use all the knowledge effectively.  There are so many new tools, that all provide a huge variety of information.     Teachers cannot just make all of this technology available.  They must conduct enough research to find the most effective tools for learning for their specific students.  For example, if my class is full of visual learners, I would want to include interactive media via a SMART and photo examples via Flickr.  However, a podcast would not be the most effective method of teaching for these students.  But, as I know, not all my class will have the same learning style.  Technology will allow me to vary my instruction to reiterate a concept in a number of different methods.
Another big idea is that education now has the possibility to be collaborative.  This will prepare students for their future career and teaches teamwork.  However, because information is collected, compiled revised, build upon, etc, students need to be more aware of inaccurate information.  The Internet can be a useful tool for research, but students need to actively review all their information for accuracy.  Also, as I said above, with all the information available, it is unrealistic that students will be memorizing as much anymore.  They have valuable tools available at their fingertips.  Instead we need to teach students how to search, collect information, and evaluate it effectively.  These are some of the new ideas what education is moving toward in order to mesh with modern society.  We need to provide students with a more relevant and applicable education than the only outdated option now.

Chpt 9 Rethinking Technology

This chapter talks about the how the advanced technology will impact learning (positive or negative.)  It gives examples of positive and negative impacts of students learning from technology, currently assuming there is a lack of adult guidance.  Technology can include video/computer games, social networking sites, Internet use, etc.  The chapter asserts that for the first time in history, children know more than their parents on an important aspect of culture.  Adults, including parents and teachers may not understand and consequently cannot provide the proper assistance to young technology users.  Since this area isn't under our direct control, we need to be aware of what students are learning from this aspect of their lives.  After studying the impacts, like problem solving skills, communications skills, violence (and other negative effects from uncensored media) educators need to understand how to utilize this technology in a way to benefit students.  Right now students experience a gap between their reality and school experience.  They are uninterested if they can't find a connection or learn useful lessons that apply to their lives.  In and out of the classroom life should be consistent since the classroom should be preparing students for life after their school years.  It is inevitable that thier lives will be closely intertwined with technology and home and in their future careers.  Right now there are seperate pieces, like interactive learning games, distance learning, learning through socail networking, and many more ideas some teachers have to integrate technology sparatically into a child's education.  However, as educators, we need to be leaders and pull all the pieces together to be consistantly education through updated, relavant technology.  It will give our students an advantage in learning traditional education concepts (math, language, science, etc.) as well as build their experitse in technology tools that will give them an advantage in a global, technology literate job market.

Podcast

This was a surprisingly easy assignment.  I will be more likely to use the quick, simply tools in my future classroom because of limited time.  I anticipate preparing for my lesson plans to consume most of my time, especially in my first year.  I am not going to simply adopt a previous teacher's or goggle "lesson plans" to form my whole curriculum.  I have no problem taking parts from all different sources and compiling the most effective activities and ideas.  But that requires research and critical evaluation, which will take a lot of time.  After a few years, I will have a repertoire of great, effective lessons suited for a variety of learning styles.  But as my class, and their needs change, I must continue to actively critique my lessons.  I want the majority of my time to be devoted to this research and preperation.  Along with grading, assignments, assessments, parent contact, etc, I will not have a lot of time to address "extra" projects.  Podcasting, however, is a quick, painless tool that can update and integrae technology into a traditional lesson.  Even though the information will be still coming from me, the teacher, it will vary my methods of instruction to keep the class engaged.  It is important that the teacher is not the only source of information.  Since this is not me in person speaking, it can act as another source for the students.
Also this tool is easy enough for the students to use themselves.  The class can work individually or collaborate in groups to create a podcast.  This could be a form of assessmet at the end of a unit or be used to report a research porject. 
It would be nice to make a monthly podcast, or even weekly if the class is really interested in it, to chonicle the classes favorite lessons and what they learned.  These could then be posted on a class website or blog and parents, community members, or other educators.  Although these are just a few examples, I can see a lot of possibilites for podcasting and since it is simple to use (I used garageband on a Mac) it will be easy for my to integrate this technology into my classroom frequently.

Chapter 9 Social Networks

This chapter was interesting because it said to consider Facebook for our own personal use instead of using it in the classroom.  It is a great tool to network with other educational professionals.  Many school Internet security filters will not even allow users to access Facebook.  But, I did not get any new insight about Facebook's possibilities since I already am a memeber.  I understand a lot of the networking possibilities from the social site.  Even though that section of the chatper did not provide any new suggestions, I still plan to continue to use the website even as I enter the educational field.  As i already planed to do, I will add fellow educators and be very hesitant to add students.  I am already careful to make sure my profile is very professional and tasteful in everything from posts to pictures.  I keep my profile, information and pictures on the highest privacy settings so others, including my future students cannot "creep" on their teacher. 

I did enjoy reading about the idea of using Ning in the classroom.  I think my students (hopefully grades 2-4) will probably be too young to use the site, but if I get a job in 5th grade or above I think it would be a very appropriate class website.  It can teach the students internet safety, which too often doesn't come from parents.  It can help them learn to effectively use social networking for learning purposes instead of purely social motives.  Students would be more likely to use this technology for out of class learning because it is presented in a format they are familiar with and already use. 

Reflections from class 11/4

Note: Get article off Professor Boyer's twitter (Experimental school gets rid of classes, teachers)
From group disscusion remember to set expations of assignments before people move or start an activity. But the group did a great job with visual aids.  They used a venn diagram to organize the information.  (Sciblink can b used to have everyone organize info at the same time if u share the same link.)

I found the article  about experimental school very interesting.  This idea is school-wide.  But I like the idea so much I think it's possible to use one classroom within a school.  It might not be possibe to structure the whole day in this way since it has to be cohessive with the rest of the school's schedule to a point.  I like the asspect of viewing the teacher as an advisor, much of the information is accessed directly by students, the work-like structure of the classroom, and the length of a subject's study is flexibile. 

We also discussed the iRLO, and I need to see Prof Boyer in order to make it more "reusable" and also help the directions to be followed even while speech bubbles are up.

I need to link my wiki page and finish my annotated bibliography.  Make sure to review the requirements on the week ten lecture.  Also, view a classmate's as example.  For this assignment I would want to organize this the information carfully since it's all on one long page.  Images are accpetable and indenting would help as well.

There are many delicious worthy pages to go through, inculding all of the cool tools. 

Chapt 8 Rethinking Technology

In the introduction that the ideas of customization, interaction, and learner control are driving the revolution of education.  I agree and additionally think that all of these features will be great advantages to students who are products of this new education.  I wish these opportunities would have been or could even be available in my current/past educational experience.  I think it's very contradictory that some university professors do not practice what they teach.  In our education classes we are told to always make things more hands on or have activities to reinforce lecture since auditory is only ONE type of learning style.  However professors teach as though that information doesn't apply to college students.  When has our learning style changed?  Just because we graduated high school doesn't mean we all become auditory learners, excited to sit through long lectures.  The idea of customized, interactive, and learner controlled education applies to every level of education.  I'm not sure what learner wouldn't want any of those three words to describe his/her learning experience.  And, as was the chapter's point, technology can help achieve all of those new objectives.

Also, I really identified with the paragraph on page 113 that talked about not having to completely build the classroom's technology repertoire.  The district I would ideally like to teach in, as I've repeated many times in this blog, is a low income, rural area.  We definitely do not have the funding available to secure all of these technologies in my classroom.  I am planning to accommodate my students infrequent Internet access and lack of advanced tools like SMARTboards.  I know there are many grants set aside for technology which I plan to apply for, but in case I have to work with what I'm initially given, I try to pick out tools that would give my students the same benefit as more technology advanced districts.  In this section of the book it says "We do not need to start a new education system from scratch," we just need to learn to design the system to reshape, combine and utilize the existing technology.   The rest of the chapter includes ideas on how to take the current assessments and curriculum and redesign them to meet the goals of customization, interaction, and learner control.  I enjoyed this chapter because for the first time, I felt like I could apply the idea of the education revolution even without the newest, most expensive technologies. 

Screencast

Creating a screencast through Jing was very easy.  Although, even though I wrote out my script I still could not get it recorded perfectly like I wanted it, or couldn't get it the perfect length since each time would not be word for word the same as the take before.  I can see how this would be helpful in my future classroom, especially since I aim to use much more technology than I was accustomed to.  I understand that students will have much more technology "smarts" than I had growing up, but they may not be as familiar with educational or learning tools.  These are the products I would create screencasts for.  For example, if I have the students create a blog in journal-form for language arts I could cast an example of how to post and what requirements I am looking for in the posts.  I would be more willing to implement this tool through out my cirriculum especially as an alternative to giving oral directions because Jing makes it so easy to do.  With a few simple clicks, I can record exactly what I expect my students to do from the website and then easy upload it to them, either to a classroom blog or as a link to a classroom website.  The biggest limit with Jing is the 5min time limit.  Some of the longer instructions my classwill need will have to be recorded in chapters and viewed seperately.  However this also helps my monitor what I inculde in the screencast.  I will really have to evaluate the importance of the content of my screencast because it will have to be clear and very concise.  Also, since I plan to teach elementary school, if the screencasts were much longer, it would be hard to keep their attention.  So, although a longer time limit would make it easier for me, it is an advantage to my students to keep it short. 

Podcast

http://internetsafety.trendmicro.com/internet-safety-whos-teaching-our-kids

Reflections from class 10/28

Today's discussions did not go well.  It was hard to understand what our questions were getting at.  Using "gains" vs "losses" terminology made it confusing.  Our group didn't know the goal was to come up with + or - for the question, and the two questions didn't seem to hint at that.  Our groups, For technology or Against technology did not seem to necessarily match up.  For example, just because I was For technology doesn't mean I was coming up with gains for the question.  It was mostly opinion questions and the discussion questions were not clear.  Also, just having us summarize the key ideas of our own discussion did not at all match up with what would have been an appropriate summary of the chapter.  I feel like the group discussion did not build on the chapter of help me understand the the Gains and Losses of the educational revolution.  Professor Boyer had more positives and negatives and didn't really ask for our feedback (just told us to build on his topics.  I definitely had more negatives than positives. 
I was also surprised that when Professor Boyer shared the results of his mid course evaluation and was pleased that his workload was considered high.  Especially because I thought that was a very generous answer (I answered Much Too High.)  He said that ten hours is reasonable.  And I know that's what to expect with a three credit course.  But I think professors sometimes forget that we have other class with similar heavy work loads, a job, and other responsibilities.  This week I plan to count to see if I am really doing only ten hours of homework, because I feel like it is very high.  If I do have more than ten hours, I plan to talk to Professor Boyer.  One of the things he does better than any other professor is making himslef available in a wide variety of ways (skype, email, office hours, etc.)  By keeping track of my hours spent I can see what activites are taking up the most of my time.

Chapter 7 Rethinking Education

This chapter covers the costs and benefits of a revolution in the current education system.  At first glance, I thought it was interesting that the "What May Be Lost" section was considerably longer than the "What May Be Gained."  But, after reading the chapter, I found that for much of the costs the book counters by saying the negatives are not that important to a current society.  For example, one cost of changing the current system is a loss of cultural assimilation.  This was a major component of pubilc education because the waves of immigrants moving the US at the time our current education system was designed all needed to be "Americanized."  However, this is not such a common concern now that Americans are connected through Internet, media, and other advanced technologies.  This downplays the importance of the cost.  And now as future educators, oppositely, we are taught to avoid assimilation and instead accomodate for differnt cultures and teach are studnets to be respectful of differences. 
One majory cost I do see in the education revolution is losing access to an equal quality experience.  Low income areas and families will not have the same opportunity to educationally support their children.  They will have less supplemental material like hired tutors or learning software because they will not have the means to obtain them.  Also, having access to technology, or even a warm lunch and adult supervision during the work week may not be as readily accessable to poorer areas. 
In the "What May Be Gained" section, the text brings up an interesting problem: students' attitudes towards learning.  "The goal becomes to get grades that are good enough... with a minimum of effort" (pg110.)  This is interesting be this implies the real revolution must come from the students, not the structure of teaching or method of instruction.  As teachers we are each responsible for motivating and inspiring our students to WANT to learn and discover new material. 

Chapter 8 Podcasting

In this chapter, I thought there were very two important points the chapter raised about using podcasts for educational use.  First, I think it's important for teachers try out and become very familiar with podcasting before they have the students create their own, as the chapter suggests on page 117.  There are a few different ways for teachers to get familiar with this technology.  First, using iTunes, there are many educational podcasts to subscribe to.  For me, having never listen to, let alone created a podcast before, this is a good starting point.  I do have iTunes, and am interested in finding one informational educational podcast to subscribe to.  I already have an idea where I want to live and teach, and it is about 20minutes to the school.  On the to and from school I can listen to these educational ideas via my ipod and get some creative idea and suggestions from other teachers and professionals.  After I get the idea of the type of content, length, and quality of podcasts, the next step would be to create my own.  I would love to start by picking a favorite lesson, or a time when a handful of students are missing class to document the classroom lesson.  This way my class can catch up on the work they missed or review an interesting lesson at a later time.  I was very surprised to find that listeners do not need an MP3 player to take part of the podcasting movment.  All listeners need is access to Internet.  I thought that an ipod was necessary because of the "Podcasts" tab in iTunes, assuming it was a unique feature to ipods.  But, now that I know how accessible podacsts are, it's definitely something to look into as an educational learning tool.
The second point I found interesting was using podcasting as a medium for "kids [to] make their learning transparent for others" (pg 116) This idea fits with Dr. Buchanan's model of how teachers should not be the only source for infomation for students.  In this form, students can be learning directly from students.  I probably won't have my students create podcast in my first year teaching, but it definitely seems manageable to have my students listen to other schools'/students' podcasts.  Once I get familar with using them in class, I can have my students create infomational podcasts as a source of infomation to other students, including studnets in my class the next year, and as it will be available on the Web, in any other school. 

Chpt 6 Rethinking Education

I understand the transition from apprenticeship-based education to a more universal schooling took place.  Instead of learning specific skills and duties from a child's parent to take over a job position, education revolutionized into giving all Americans an equal education.  School began to teach and transmit American values onto students, which in some cases conflicted with the students' parents values.  I agree that all students need the same basic foundation in key subjects like math, language, social studies, science.  But, I also think that education needs more of an individual learning aspect as well.  Students should have more opportunities to discover information interesting to them.  Many more students would have a more clear idea of what to declare as their college major if they had these learning opportunities in high school to explore different subjects they find interesting.  For example, as a student I could have had the opportunity to study more psychology, the way students learn and teaching strategies which would have really prepared me for my college studies.  It's not important that students pick ONE area to focus on, but that they have the freedom to study in depth any information that would appeal to them.  America would have much more passionate professional is students had time to develop interests and strengths in these area instead of having to suddenly declare their majors in college with, in some cases, little background information in those majors.  A common curriculum is good for younger ages, as that information can benefit them throughout life, despite what career they choose.  But, somehow I feel like I won't be using all my advance chemistry or anatomy and physiology knowledge I had to study in high school.
I found it interesting that the chapter says it is a goal of education to have students "learn how to learn" (pg 94.)  I don't feel like i had enough information on how I can learn in the future.  In my experience, the teacher was the source of information.  If I had a teacher with me for the rest of my life, I know I could be learning.  But since they were the source of information, and it is not realistic to have a teacher follow me around, I am not so confident learning on my own.  One great benefit to technology is students can learn on their own.  They can learn in their own style and in subjects that interest them.  I don't think schools are fully taking advantage of this individualised learning yet, but they should be.  

Reflection from iRLO

This assignment was especially frustrating.  It was hard to complete in a week.  While the daily homework of other classes to complete kept me busy during the week, and on the weekend I tried to get caught up on homework, and only found a little time to experiment in Scratch (and watch some online tutorials) I ended up having to work on this project from 8pm-2am Wednesday night.  I know professors usually don't understand how busy students are and they always justify their heavy load of homework by saying that we probably procrastinate or spend too much free time with friends or on other activities.  But this is not the case for me.  I am overwhelmed with school work and between class, work, hall government obligations and Latchkey duties, its hard to balance all of those obligations with homework and study time.  If we had two weeks for this assignment instead I could have spent a week exploring Scratch, then I would have had a better knowledge of it capabilities.
I found myself constantly revising my lesson.  I knew what I wanted the students to do, but couldn't find a way for Scratch to accomplish that.  For example, I wanted many different sprites with prefix or suffix words on them.  Then, the students could click and drag them to the Prefix Monster or the Suffix Monster and the Monster would give feedback like "Good Job!" or "Try Again."  However clicking and dragging would have been too difficult to elicit a response, so I changed my idea to pressing "p" for prefix or "s" for suffix.  This was also problematic because if the first word was "Pigs" and the students presses "s" for suffix, then all the responses from all the other sprites would go off too (so the Suffix Monster would say "Good Job!" 5 times, "Try Again" 5 times and same with the Prefix Monster) because Scratch did not know which sprite the student was referring to.
Eventually my program works now, but not as smoothly as I would like.  I'm interested to get my peers feedback and look at their projects to see how they handled some of the limitations of Scratch.
I can see the usefulness of this program for students.  i don't think I would take the time to teach them how to use it themselves, but I would like to design maybe two games as a review of the previous grade's skills they need to remember before starting lessons in my grade.  I don't think I would want to create more than that though because of the time it takes.  There are many available online interactive games to utilize, so I would only use Scratch is it was a subject I needed to customize the information for my specific class. 

Reflection from class 10/21

I need to remember to write my reflection on the blog from my iRLO.  Also, I still need to post my reflection for this chapter in Rethinking technology.  I still need to comment on my peers' Notebook lessons.  I will have time on Friday and will make those a priority now that this crazy weekend is over with. 

The Chapter group focused on three main points, that education is effected by parents, government, and individuals.  As far as the discussion goes, I think we need to start thinking about ways to discuss and report verbally the information.  Especially being one of the last groups to go.  We need to consider ways to engage many types of learners--including kinesthetic and visual learners as well.  Maybe we can switch groups after we converse on one topic.  That way when we regroup (having one person from each topic form a new group)  Each person will report what they talked about-- and even give their opinions on a new topic from their group's perspective--- called "jigsaw."  Also, the summaries started to get long.  If they made a structure on how to report and it can help lead and spark ideas for the discussions.  Reporting would be quick and easier to follow.

White Board lesson
*lock down objects that aren't supposed to be moved
*allow move lets objects moved but not be edited (like text of county names)

Also, if I need help with revising my Scratch or IWB lesson, Professor Boyer is on Skype.  I could message or call him when he is online/in his office.  This is more helpful because it would be an immediate reply rather than waiting for an email.  I also think that's important to remember as a teacher, to make myself available for my students.  Prof Boyer make it clear to us to always seek out help if we are frusterated.  Some Professors are very opposite, where even if the don't specifically say it, it's clear that asking for help is inconevient for them.  It's hard to feel comfortable contacting teachers when they are not happy and willing to help us understand their content.

Chapter 7: Flickr

I do see the potential use of Flickr in the classroom.  It would be fun to share pictures with families and the community or create assignments with images the students can access and annotate with this online tool.  However, as I pointed out in my last post, I feel it's important to narrow down the tools I think I realistically use in my classroom and I don't think Flickr will make the cut.  I see too many drawbacks from the stand point of a low-income district.  Parents need to have access to the Internet and the interest in surfing it to have time to view their child's classroom activities using Flickr.  This means they need to have an active Flickr account since I would make the album private for the safety of my students.  Also, as in many Phillips Elementary school (the school I hope to teach in) classrooms, I would be lucky to have one computer for the students to access.  And with every teacher vying for time in the computer lab, I cannot count on constant access to that either.  Flickr would have to be an ongoing endeavor and I don't think the benefits outweigh the cost of time and access. 
This chapter did make me realize that I want to send home a survey for the students' parents to fill out at the beginning of the year.  I know currently some parents don't have the Internet in their homes but with technology expanding so quickly, and the parents I will be involved with will have an increasing interest in technology since they will be a younger generation than current parents of elementary schoolers.  I want to find out what programs parents would be interested in and which they would keep up with, like a blog, Twitter, a Facebook page, etc.  I want parents to feel involved and connected to their child's experience in the classroom.  But, I don't want to do it in a technological advanced way that discourages parents.  I want them to find the mode of transmitting information easy, convenient, and inviting for them to keep updated on their child's success. 
I also don't see Flickr being the best tool for classroom learning either.  A lot of the possibilities of Flickr can be accomplished through other methods.  For example, if the goal is to have the students interact and label images, a SMARTboard can help facilitate that.  The students can come up to the board and write directly on the picture or make a star and tell the class about the picture, this method would be similar to annotating a picture on Flickr.  Overall, I can't see Flickr being the most advantageous tool for learning, classroom management, or parent involvement.  It would not be a wise use of my time and effort as a teacher. 

Reflections from class 10/14

Today Professor Boyer talked about how important it is to talk specially about how we can use technology in the classroom in a job interview.  We need to be able to list examples of what type of technology and how it will utilize them to help futher our classroom enviornment--learning, managment and communication.  This makes me want to keep of list of my very favorite technology activities that are doable in the low income district that I what to be hired in.  It is very overwhelming to learn all of these new ideas at once.  If I don't start to organize my my thinking and favorite ideas I might forget them, or at least the details I wanted to inculde in the technology activities when I get put on the spot to recall them.  Especaily since many of these are not accessible in my district (which is not very technologically advanced.)

From the debriefing I just wanted to remember that the goal in presenting the chapters is to facilitate group discussions on the big ideas, which this group did very well.  Also, they posted directions, and took us where to go to find the Prezi on the computer projected screen.  It helped clarify the directions.

Today we addressed our Scratch assignment.  Go to Scratch.mit.edu and actually install the program (in class we just downloaded it.)  Read the D2L instuctions for complete assignment.  Also make sure to look for the Standard that connects with my program idea.

Chpt 5 Rethinking Education

Overall, I understand and agree with this chapter's main idea: There are many small evolutions in the education system that are leading it to a life-long process rather then just for adolescence.  Home school, for example is growing as peoples are gaining access to more resources (although the idea was not started by technology.)  Adult education is becoming more and more popular as on-the-job training, Internet cafes, and computer software designed for learning is all catching on.  The very idea of learning becoming a life-long endeavor changes our goals as early-age educators.  We need to give students the curiosity and skills to seek information on their own.  Our curriculum's must evolve because our goal is not to stock the children with all the knowledge they will ever need in a lifetime.  It is now to give them the tools to educate themselves.  I know may "old school" teachers may not like our new responsibility because it lowers the power status of the classroom teacher.  We are basically teaching students to effectively teach themselves.  Instead of being the all-powerful knowledge source, the new teacher will be a resource, not a primary source for students.  In the long run, I think this will benefit the students more.  I will be enabling them to be more successful in their lives outside the classroom.  I want to spark a love for new knowledge and new information.  Often, students get frustrated with school because if they are "bad" at remembering a subject or can't understand a concept the teacher is telling them to remember.  By making school more of a "discovery zone" the students will have fun seeking out their own interests instead of being forced to memorize certain topics.

However, I think this chapter was far too long in addressing the topics of the changing school system.  I think they should of focused more on this new idea of learning and less on the "seeds" that are sparking this change.  A few paragraphs would have sufficed in summing up the causes of this evolution.  As a future elementary teacher, I am not interested in Motorola's training program for it's employees, or the many, many other examples of adult education.  Having a few sentences on each topic would have made this a more manageable read.

Chpt 6 The Social Web

This chapter really added to my thinking of how to utilize technology in the classroom.  Prior to this chapter, the text presented a variety of ideas to incorporate tools like blogs, wikis, RSS, twitter, and social bookmarking for the students to use to help facilitate learning.  However, this chapter presented ideas just for me to use as a teacher.  I can link with other teachers and brainstorm ideas for lessons and activities.  Also, if I'm having trouble helping my students understand a particular concept, for example, counting money, I can reach out to my Internet network of educators and ask for their ideas.  They can provide me with lesson plans they use, tools, or helpful hints and techniques they use with their students.  If I have a class full of kinesthetic learners, another teacher may post a link on her Delicious account to a great hands on activity she found online.  Or, I can search for tags like "money" "lesson_plan" and "activity" and scan through the archives of activities that other teachers have saved and found useful.  As a new teacher, I'm sure I'll have many questions and will only begin to build my activity repertoire.  It is very comforting to know that I will have resources in social bookmarking to turn to when I have run out of ideas. 
I'm not sure I'm completely sold on the idea of using Twitter or educational purposes yet.  The text claims it can be a powerful tool for porfessional development and communication.  I just can't imagine that enough teachers are using it for educational purposes for it to be useful for me.  In order for Twitter to be useful, teachers must have the time to devot to tweeting ideas and activities used in their classroom.  I have been helping in classrooms for a few years now and I already know that time is very precious to teachers.  It is much easier to ask a coworker in the break room about a stuggle then to search the "twitterverse" for answers.  Even if Twitter is just used to inspire ideas from other educators, I think the greatest ideas are probably left un-tweeted.  The best teaching techniques require time, research, and preperation.  That doesn't leave a lot of time to tweet about the teacher's success.  I know, personally, I would not tweet about my classroom strategies or lessons.  Not that I wouldn't be willing to share them, I just don't have the time to log them daily.

Reflection from class 10/7

If I do want to resubmit my interactive whiteboard lesson, the peer reviewers are going to be assigned next week, so I have a week if I do figure out how to edit photos.  I found it interesting that the flexibility in the lesson challeneged me.  Usually I try to follow the requirements to achieve a high grade.  However, with more freedom, it's harder to know what's required.  Professor Boyer made a good point that outside of college we will have a lot of freedom in the educational field.  I will be able to design my lesson plans and add any activities that I select to enchance the students' learning.  I hope that as I continue to design lessons and explore activities it can become more of a natural process for me.  Also, I know that it will depend on my class every year.  I may have to revisit my lesson plans yearly, to revise based on my current classes needs.  One year they may need more help in writing, and the next year a new class may need more hand-on experince with science concepts. 
We also critiqued the group presentation.  Two things to change that I wanted to remember for my presentation is to speak up and consider how to group if we make discussion groups.  I couldn't hear some of the discussion because I sit on the other side of the room from the presenters.  Also, this room is set up poorly for grouping, so we need to consider that when designing our lesson plan.  One interesting idea that came up that I want to remember for my classroom is about redirecting.  One discussion group was considering the wrong topic.  How can I as a teacher redirect the group without making the group feel bad for their wrong ideas? I don't want to discourage them from inputting their opinions in the future.
We also talked about the interactive reusable learning objective lesson.  Using Scratch I can design an interactive game that can target a specific skill or content area for my students to use through the Internet (they don't need to download Scratch to use it.)  For next week we only have to come up with ideas for our iRLO.  But I think it's important to start experimenting with Scratch so i know the capabilities before I start brainstorming.  For the IWB lesson I thought of all kinda of activities that notebook couldn't even do (the Scratch website is under the helpful resources in the agenda for today.)

IWB Lesson

It's a good thing this is only a draft!  I have tried a lot of different techniques, and it took me a little while to get aquatinted with the Notebook software.  I pulled together a review of different Wisconsin counties.  The one thing I wanted to do and couldn't figure out was create a puzzle with the counties by cutting apart a map of them.  I couldn't figure out how to edit pictures, but hopefully for my next draft I will be more familiar with the software and know how to do that.  For now, I have a few different memorizing techniques that will help the students review.  The slides get progressively harder , starting with matching, fill in the blanks, and then writing in the names with out any prompts.  The Interactive white board allows the students to get involved and drag the names to the counties and fill in the blanks or label directly on a blank map. 
I decided to do this lesson because I have my observational hours with a 4th grade teacher in Price county and part of their fourth grade curriculum is learning all of Wisconsin's counties.  He is willing to let me use my SMART board lesson as a review before his students test.  
Their curriculum fits into the social studies performance standard: A.4.5: Use atlases, databases, grid systems, charts, graphs, and maps to gather information about the local community, Wisconsin, the United States, and the world 
Learning the names of counties will help them further study Wisconsin communities and maps later.  I still remember when I learned counties and it especially help me when look at the the weather since those announcements come out by county.  

Chapter 4 Rethinking Education

This chapter was titled "The Development of American Schooling."  It was basically a history review of how schools have developed from being a parent's responsibility to the state's responsibility and now offer more variety of knowledge rather than just job-skill based.  Most of the chapters I find pertinent to my life as a future teacher, and I can connect ideas to my ideals or values as a teacher.  The chapters help me revise and update my ideas of what teaching is and how I can best facilitate learning for my students.  This chapter did not help me reshape or build on my ideas about teaching.  There was one idea that reinforced my thinking about individualizing education, but it was something that was also said in an earlier chapter.  
Near the conclusion of the chapter, it said one of the current issues in school is the diversity of students, with students from various religions, ethnicities and cultures.  According to the text, teachers need to be able to individualize their teachings instead of giving every child the same amount of information on every topic.  This does not fit their needs as learners.  A students will excel in some subjects and struggle and need more attention in others.  This will be different for every learner.  I do agree that technology will help individualize students education.  It makes information more accessible to the students, instead of having them all go directly through the teacher whenever they need information.  I can have a class of 15 students in a computer lab, having each of them play a game I picked out especially to help them develop skills in areas they are lacking, like reading comprehension, or fractions in math. 
However, the idea the opportunity technology gives to individualize information was already brought up in class and in the book.  This was not even the main point of the chapter.  It was generally to outline the history of the evolution of school.  I hope the group this week does well in their presentation so I can connect how the evolution is important to my future teaching.

Chapter 5 RSS

I found this chapter especially interesting because I've never heard of RSS (Really Simple Syndication.)  The idea of collecting all of my favorite sites and information updates all to one place reminds me of my news feed on the home page of my facebook.  I get all the updates of peoples relationship statuses, their events, pictures, comments, and current statuses.  Instead of revolving around my friends' lives, RRS updates me on all my own interests because I pick the pages it pulls updates from.  I do check many different websites like CNN, MSNBC, Glamour and Self.  So having one place to look for all of them would be a great time-saver.  The book called RSS "The Daily Me," implying that like a daily newspaper, RSS has the headlines on all the current topics that are customized for each user. As for using it in my classroom, I am really looking to teach elementary school, so I think they wouldn't be as interested in using RSS for themselves.  I could see how upper elementary school (5th-6th grd) could use it for research projects.  They could type in key words, or add websites that have to do with their research topic in order to recieve updated material.  However, I think I best utilize this tool for my own use in planning lessons.  It is important to stay up to date on the information I'm teaching.  I can add websites or search a subject we are studying in class to get ideas or new information to bring to my students. 

Chaper 4 Wikkis

Chapter 4 is about the interactive, collaborative tool wikkis.  Wikipedia is the infamous example, and the one the book calls a “poster child for the collaborative construction of knowledge…[that] the interactive Web facilitates” (pg 57.)  Wikipedia, however gets a bad reputation from teachers because students often try to cite it as a research resource.  Because wikkis can be edited by anyone at anytime, it is understandable that teachers, as I did, doubt Wikipedia’s usefulness in the classroom.  But, after understanding more about wikkis, I did get inspired for a wikki-related lesson plan that can teach students the proper use of these interactive tools. 
The chapter listed many ideas for a wikki’s role in class like collaborating resources/lessons with other teachers, let students be the creators/manages and educate them on how to research with/ evaluate wikki content. 
My idea is sparked from researching with wikkis.  The book informs us that wikki’s are a common research tool because they have the summary of information from many sources.  This is meant to be the point of a student research paper, therefore, it would be too easy for students plagiarize Wikipedia’s information.  As a teacher, I want my students to consult a variety of sources, extracting the main points of each, and pulling them together into an organized research paper.  After they finish, I can have them compare their results with the Wikipedia page about their topic.  They can edit false information, or add more detail to the page.  It's a great way for them to understand that Wikipedia can be helpful, but because the information can be altered so easily, they need to be cautious about the material on wikkis.

Reflection from class 9/30

Today in class a group presented the chapter on technology skeptics.   I wish there was more time to do discussion.  I joined the technology enthusiasts group to discuss the quote about becoming so involved with technology that we lose our basic skills that we learn in kindergarten (sharing, washing hands, etc.)  I didn’t have enough time to share my opinion in our group because other people were still talking when they ended the discussion.  We said that in our classrooms, even enthusiasts would not eliminate all social aspects of our classroom.  We are not going to eliminate physical interaction between student and teacher or among peers.  Our authority will not be replaced by a computer.  But, I also wanted to add that those social skills are not the only skills children should learn in school.  In the quote the author claims that those are the only skills he needed.  But, education should prepare students for future jobs, not just social interactions.  Jobs are increasingly demanding technology knowledge and skills in order to be hired for a variety of positions.  Technology is being integrated into so many homes and professional businesses, why would we not want to prepare our students for outside the classroom? 

Also Professor Boyer highlighted the idea of student to student interaction. Teachers don’t always have to be the ultimate power and expert of their classroom.  It’s important to encourage students to be equal and build on each others’ comments, not have every opinion go through the teacher first. 

**Remember the steps for my future presentation: Tell us what you’re going to tell us, Tell us, Tell us what you told us.

Chpt 3 Rethinking Education

   Overall, I don’t think this chapter was a good representation of the technology argument from the skeptics’ perspective.  Many of the arguments were immediately addressed by the technology enthusiasts.  Also, the arguments picked made the skeptics seem stubborn and ignorant about learning and education.  For example, the list on pg 30-31 with the constant advancements in technology like paper and pens that were discouraged then, but now widely accepted learning tools.  This list compares a tool like paper to a tool like a computer or an interactive white board in the aspect that people don’t automatically accept them, but soon they will become accepted practices in learning.  The comparison between the two is definitely not equal because in order to accept today’s technology we must reinvent our definition of school and learning.  This was not the case back when paper was the revolutionary advancement to replace chalk and slates.  The paper can do all the same things a slate could—practice writing words and sentences, working out math problems, etc.  Teachers could basically go through their lesson plans and replace the word “slate” with the word “paper” and not change the structure of teaching.  Now, a computer is not replacing any familiar tool.  It can do so many advanced processes that the children can have precedent access to.  The teacher must change the lesson plans, style of instruction, and even basic ideas about the goals of the education system in order to incorporate new technology.  With such a drastic change, I understand why teachers are so hesitant, especially since they have no model for how to instruct and are sometimes not even as familiar with the tools as the students are.  It undermines the ultimate authority the teachers used to have, as the book points out.  But the idea that teachers would not use a tool that greatly advances learning possibilities and allows their students freedom to discover specialized information makes the technology skeptics seem unreasonably stubborn.  They would not do what’s in the best interest of their students because they will have to compete with computers for the power of authority.  The book makes skeptics out to be the “bad guy” and worse teachers for not thinking of the student’s needs first. 
   However, the chapter does outline some of the barriers for not upgrading technology such as cost and access without a rebuttal.  I think these items are my main concern in implementing technology into my classroom because of the district I want to work in.  Of course I can’t hand select my school and grade level, but ideally I plan to move back to my hometown.  The problem with teaching in Northern Wisconsin is that it is a very low-income area.  Many families there are below the poverty level.  Having access to computes and interactive whiteboards will be a challenge.  But hopefully, with grant money, my classroom can secure some of the advanced technologies other higher-income schools have the opportunities to utilize.

Technolgy Inquiry Question

How can Elementary school teachers effectively use interactive white board technolgy with their younger age students (grades 1-3) to help them learn?

Relfections from class 9/23

Today we had our first group presentation in Chapter 2. They used Prezi and had a class discussion where I had to support the two quotes from a technology enthusiasts point of view.  I want to start looking into technologies I can have the class access online to do individually.  I think that class discussions are used too often in many of our classes.  The idea is good, however, it does not guarentee that every student will get involoved.  Technology can be a huge help in getting students engaged and interactive with the material.  But, another thing I learned when dealing with technology, is make sure to log off the editing mode of a blog or presentation when I post the link to my Delicious for the class to use.

Also, when I revisit this blog post before I organize my presentation, I need to remember to give a short conclusion.  Professor Boyer said in any presentation you need to "1.) Tell us what your going to tell us 2.) Tell us 3.) Tell us what you told us." I think that's a catchy way to remember that I always need to introduce and conclude what I present.  People don't remember every bit they hear, so it's important to reiterate the main points I want them to take away.

Lastly, be sure to rehearse the presentation and if necessary pause before I say "um" or "like" to fill space.  If I need to think, just silently compose my thoughts.  This also means I need to give my classmates silent time to gather their thoughts (7-10 seconds) after I ask questions or ask for feedback from an activity.  

Chp 2 Rethinking Education

First of all, even though this won't be the focus of my post, I want to say that by the send of this class I think I will be a "Technology Enthusiast" by the end of this course.  When I pictured myself teaching, I imagined all the techniques and methods of my elementary teachers because overall, I had a great educational experience.  However, while taking this course I realize I have the capability to make my students learning experience even more powerful than my own because of the advancements in technology.  Back when I was in elementary school admiring my teachers, I could have never imagined the future possibilities of my classroom because the powerful, technological tools I well utilize had not even been invented yet!
With that, the idea that really sparked my thinking the most in this chapter was on page 11 talking about communities.  The text goes into detail about "the movement of communities of place to communities of interest." In summary, it explains how communities used to be based on physical locations and neighborhoods and now the definition is changing to encompass a revolutionary kind of community we choose for ours focused on our personal interests.  Now that there is communication to link people together, like web cams, Internet, etc, location is no longer a barrier.  For my classroom, I want to adopt this idea to allow my students more freedom in their education.  I want keep the structured, organized whole-class instruction by subjects for topics like reading,writing, math, science, social studies.  However, for more specific topics like space, fire, marine life, water color painting, etc, I want to give the students the opportunity to explore the topics of their interest more in depth.  I was talking to Lalani about her educational experience, since she grew up in a Montessori school system.  She really enjoyed the responsibility of pacing herself to get her necessary work done and getting to explore and make her own conclusions.  Some projects she would learn and get done quickly if they did not interest her.  However, when she discovered in interesting subject she had the time and freedom to seek more information on it.  The teacher in her classroom was less of an authority figure and more of a friendly resource if a students had questions they could consult him as a possible resource.  In my class, during free learning time (I'll come up with a more intriguing title) I will structure learning like the Montessori system.  I would not be able to answer every question about stars, but I can teach my students to effectively utilize the Internet to fin answers to any of their questions.

Chapters 1-3 Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts

From chapters 1-3 in out text “Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts” I learned not only the importance of introducing my students to new technology, but also educating them in ways that compliment their new metal structure as a result of technology.  I have heard many times in this class already that it is important to help my students understand safety precautions, evaluate websites, and learn to efficiently use technology for learning.  I know that I must learn and keep up to date on the major advances in technology because my students surely will.  But, in reading the text, I realized that I must also change my style of teaching, even when not educating about technology-specific topics.  Students are constantly using texting, IM, Facebook and many other technologies to stay socially connected.  A student could be talking to someone online in a chat, on a separate tab have Facebook open writing on a friends wall, all while involved in a texting conversation with his phone sitting on his desk next to the computer.  In that situation, the boy is switching conversations so quickly, and must sort all the information separately in his mind to not confuse the conversation topics.  Also, consider the websites that children explore, all the links to and from, and changes pages within the site helps the children “develop hyper-text minds. They leap around.  It’s as though their cognitive structures were parallel, not sequential.” (Prensky, quoted pg 8)  I need to make sure as teacher I keep up with their rapid moving minds and challenge their different minds.  I need to stay up to date on technology to know how it feels to develop a web-like mind.  I need to be able to relate to my students and consider how they learn/retain information best, which, considering the differences, is not how I would prefer to learn it.  For these students, a book for every subject is too slow and boring, all in linear, chronological order.  I need to find new ways to reach their unique needs and technology is the best avenue to accomplish that.  My students will find learning the fundamentals of using technology to be applicable, valuable life skills because it is something they use outside of class daily.  They will also benefit in learning the traditional information of math, English, science, etc, in this new way because it will compliment their cognitive structures.  Therefore, as a teacher I want to utilize interactive websites (examples saved to my Delicious account), experiment with the whiteboard, supplement material with podcasts or my classroom blog. 

Growing Up Online Video Reflection

The video “Growing Up Online” was very reveling as to how dependent adolescences are on technology.  The video showed many occasions where technology was interfering with how the children live.  Since the majority of technology is a way a socially staying close to their peers, it can intensify peer pressure that used to only be an issue in school.  For example, one girl was shown in the video who got support and encouragement to be anorexic from online friends and blogs.  She knew her diet was dangerous, but because she got support and had friends she continued her behavior.  Another example the video presented was a boy who ended up committing suicide because of cyber bullying.  Before technology, kids would have an escape from peer pressure and bullying threats in their homes.  But now, since children are connected to each other all the time through IM, Facebook, email, chat rooms, and texting, there is no end to the relentless abuse of bullies.  The effects of bullying intensified now that there is no end to the cruelty.  Teacher used to be able to monitor the halls and be on guard for bullying, but now so many of students social interactions are not spoken out loud or even at school at all.  Our children need to learn to protect themselves from the dangers of these social technologies.  In my classroom I want to make sure my students are educated on safe Internet use.  It is a wonderful resource and should not be mistreated.  Just like teachers stop harmful social interaction at school by supervising recess and passing time, we also need to protect the children when teachers cannot be present.  As the video showed, adolescence are increasing reliant on technology. If I want to educate my students to prepare them to succeed outside my classroom I must educate them on this vital component of their lives.  Internet safety is a priority in my classroom. 

Reflections from class 9/16

In class today I really enjoyed Professor Boyer's Prezi presentation of chapter one.  I thought the two quotes that he selected out of the text to agree or disagree on were very thought provking. The first was "Technology makes life more difficult for teachers."  I didn't get to share my opinion in class so I wanted to make sure I noted it on my reflection for today.  I agreed that new technology makes life more difficult, but not in a bad aspect.  I think its good that teacher's are challenged to come up with creative ways to integrate either instuctional (used by the teacher) or interactive (by the students) technology into all subjects of their cirriculums.  Not many textbooks or suggested lesson plans include technology for the students to use.   Now that students are using technology outside of the classroom constantly, we know they are capable (maybe even more so than us) to be utilizing these advantages.  I just want to make sure as a teacher that all my students have the same access to the technology we use in class.  I was even thinking of sending out a survey for parents and children to fill out letting me know what technologies the children have access to at home.  Also by teachers being forced to create new lesson plans, they will continually update their lessons year after year and not get stuck in a rut of teaching the same old fashion way when there are some many more effective and efficient ways evolving daily. This will also make it complicated because teachers will have to keep up with later advances in technology.  We know the students will inately be up to date.  In order for teachers to prove to students that classroom knowlege and skills are applicable and valuable, they will have to incorporate this pivitol aspect of kids' lives.

Criteria for Evaluating Websites' Credibility

      When I first started researching about how to evaluate a website’s credibility, I was getting very frustrated.  I would find an equation on how to identify website’s based on web address, or pointing to an aspect of the website (author, publisher, date created, etc.) but, every time I thought I found the perfect key aspect, I would find a counter example.  I finally realized that there is no one simple factor to point in judging authenticity.  If there was, I’m sure it would be well-known information among all smart internet users.  If there was just an “authentic” stamp that websites earned, this process of evaluating websites for false information would not be so challenging.
       As a teacher, I’m going to stress to my students that critical thinking is the most important aspect of determining a web pages value.  We must assume websites are false until they earn our trust.  We can’t just take everything we read as truth just because it’s posted online.  We need to ask ourselves some questions like, “Who is the author and do they have the authority to be knowledgeable in the subject?” “Do they list the bibliography or credit their resources?” “Is the information biased or opinionated and if so, does that take away from its authenticity?”  “If I needed to site this information, are all the components there—date created, publisher, author?”
Just in general we need to be alert for any information we know is false.  For example the “All About Explorers” website posted on D2L claimed at the top that it contained “everything you wanted to know about every explorer who ever lived…”  We need to ask ourselves, “Is this possible?”  If the bold heading is not true we definitely cannot trust the rest of the information.
      While researching website credibility, my two favorite tricks are to look at the extentions, like k12, edu, and gov are generally better resources than com or org.  Anyone can post on a page ending in com or org, but educational websites and government websites would be my first choice.  Also, after the first / in an address, look out for names, “user” or %.  Those indicate personal websites and should not be resources unless they have the authority to be credible. 
      Before we do anything involving online resources, I want to have my class go through a similar activity.  I like the checklists on Kathy Schrock's Guide for Educators Critical Evaluation Information and would like to use it to evaluate the fake websites given on D2L or others listed on the November Learning websites (all of which I saved to my Delicious account.) I hope they learn how important thinking critically is, not just for classroom research, but whenever using the internet to obtain information.

Chpt 1 Rethinking Education

 It’s often a challenge for teachers to integrate new methods of learning into their classrooms.  For example, techniques for teaching math moved from repeating and regurgitating formulas to puzzling and interacting with math ideas.  They had to read the new curriculum books and test out this new method of instruction.  However, incorporating new technology becomes even more of a challenge for teachers because they are not familiar with the new technological advances.  Not only do they have to be creative in applying new technology in their classroom activities, they must have to learn how to expertly operate advanced machines.  Also, few, if any, regular classroom curriculums require students to interact with technology on the level they are used to outside of school (individually for social reasons.)  Therefore, teachers must master new ideas about the capabilities of technology like cell phone, interactive websites, laptops, social networking sites, etc. to the extent that the teacher can create a whole new lesson plan from scratch in order to fit it in.  For students to be engaged in classroom learning, they need to find it applicable and useful in their lives outside of the classroom.  Students value technology for all it allows them to access and do as individuals.  We also need to format their education to give them more decisions and freedom to study topics of interest.  As a future teacher I will give my students more options and freedom to tailor their lesson plans than I was given in elementary school.  I will still provide a well-rounded education, teaching all subjects.  But I want to allow some freedom for children to start exploring education at a young age.  If I can help spark their interest in seeking knowledge, they will become life-long learners, instead of just repeating the information they are given in class.  The best way to do this is to give them some freedom and a variety of resources to seek out and discover their individual passions.

Reflection from class 9/9

My favorite activity in class today was signing up for my Delicious account.  I’m also going to teach my mother, whose currently a fifth grade math teacher, how to set up an account.  I’m excited to start adding websites and preparing myself for future lessons plans.  It makes my dream of becoming a teacher so much more real and tangible for me.  I also love the idea of being able to share resources with other, more experienced teachers so easily.  I know I’ll benefit from exploring their collections of findings from over the years.  There are many interactive websites my teachers let me explore in school, especially games practicing math and reading skills that I know my teachers would love to share with me.  I can now start organizing all that information in one, easily accessible place.  This is going to make it so much easier to help individualize lesson plans for the students who are significantly above or below the average class level.  For example, if a child is far ahead of his grade level in math, I can let him explore more complex puzzles and math concepts using interactive gaming websites while I personally address the rest of the class with the lesson for the day.  If I had many of these helpful websites on file, using Delicious I could search “interactive math” the great websites I’ve complied with that tag will come up.  This will save me a lot of time because I will not have to go home and search Google and test out every math website.  I will already have found, or other teachers have found and tested the ones I add to my Delicious account.  I will definitely utilize this tool when planning my lesson plans in my classroom.

Using Vuvox

I put  in an ample amount of effort in completing my digital autobiography. I made an attempt to utilize different tools that Vuvox offered--including cropping, resizing, adding customized text, adding hot spots, and uploading background music.  In order the make the most of this assignment, first I watched three different instructional videos to make sure I was taking advantage of all the unique options in designing my slide show.  I found this assignment very valuable because I realized how easy designing digital collages can be.  With little instruction from my professor, I assumed this assignment would be nearly impossible to complete considering my lack of technological skills. I was surprised that Vuvox offered instructional videos and step-by-step directions along the process of publishing my collage.  As a future teacher, this assignment helped me build my confidence in my technology-related skills.  The next assignment I will not be as hesitant or pessimistic to begin.  In my classroom, I will not be as reluctant to test out new technology because it might be easier than I imagine.  I could even share a similar autobiography with my students at the beginning of the year so they get to know my identity as not only their teacher but also an ordinary, relatable friend.

My Collage of Friends

http://www.vuvox.com/collage/detail/02cc6ff345

9/2/10 What is Technology?

1.) A new, more advanced tool to make a task easier.



2.) Technology integration is incorporating the new advanced tool into the environment it is created for. In the classroom some examples of integrating technology could be using computers to type and print English papers instead of handwritten essays or using a Smartboard to organize my thoughts as a teacher to make it easily presentable and more interactive for my students.