Short Movie

Project 16

Final Reflection

SmartBoard Project 2

C4T #2

I read We Didn't Have [X] when I was a kid. It was talking about how people are not open to the idea of changing technology. The old saying "I walked to school barefoot in the snow every day both ways and I turned out OK"has turned into "I didn't have computers when I was in school and I turned out OK." They may turn out OK, but technology in the world is going to change whether we change it in schools or not. Why not go ahead and teach our students how to use technology to benefit them before they get out in the real world? There is no reason that we shouldn't. It's definitely not going to hurt them if we teach them a little about technology.
The next post I read was Things that AREN'T on the bubble tests. This post discusses the things such as honesty, self-discipline, and reliability that are not taught in schools. We focus so much on "Bubble tests" such as SATs, ACTs, and others so we only teach the burp-back facts that are needed to score high on these tests and we forget about the other things such as motivation. Yes, you need the burp-back facts to make it through high school, but the other things are important in college and the career field.

Blog Assignment 14

Jose Picardo's list of resources for teachers is very helpful. I had never heard of over half of these websites. This could save me a lot of time when I get into the teaching field. I will definitely add this list to my favorites page so I can refer back to it often.
I love his tips for using technology in the classroom.
Using streaming video is a great way to help kids learn. They get tired of just hearing their teacher repeat the same things over and over. But you can find all kinds of videos to teach them.
The same goes for music. I know elementary kids love learning through music. When I did my observation, the teacher played cute little Alabama history songs. When I was in elementary school, we used the Shirley Method for English. I sang those songs all through high school to help me label sentences.
Teleconferencing tools would be great to help the kids see what other classrooms are doing. We could get ideas from them and maybe share some of our ideas to help them out. Or we could use Skype to do interviews with people who could help us with a certain subject area. It would be much more convenient for everyone than them having to come into the school.
Making your own exercises for the students is also a great idea. Like Picardo says, the teacher knows the students strengths and weaknesses better than anyone else. The teacher can make different activities to help certain students with weaknesses in different areas.
Using the SmartBoard effectively is definitely something that all teachers need to do. When I was in high school, we were just getting them and our teachers barely used them if the used them at all. Now, going back to do my observation, the teachers use them all the time and the students really enjoy it. It keeps them more focused and entertained then just writing notes on a chalk board.
Podcasts are a fun way to keep kids involved. We watched different videos throughout the class of students doing podcasts in their classroom and they really seemed to enjoy it. We also did a podcast ourselves and I enjoyed doing it.
Creating a class blog is a great way to work on writing skills. It allows students to be creative. It also helps keep students and parents informed. I have never created a wiki, but I'm sure it is very useful in the classroom as well. I will try it out on day to see if I would like to use it in my classroom.
Using social networks is another option for keeping students and parents involved, although teachers have to be very careful with them. They do not need to use their personal social networking page as a school network page, too. I will probably create a Facebook page specifically for my classroom.
Using internet tools is again something that I have never tried, but I'm sure it would help students and be easy for them to use. I will research this more and try it out.
Using the gadgets that the students already use daily is probably the most effective thing to do. They don't have to worry about getting into the habit of checking something new daily. They already know how to use these things and obviously enjoy using them or they wouldn't be using them often.

Final Report on PLN

I have thoroughly enjoyed using my PLN this semester and will continue to update and use it for the remainder of my school career and when I get out of school. It is very useful and saves a lot of time. I am so glad that I was introduced to a PLN.

C4K November Comments

Mrs. Yollis' class has a great blog! I hope to have this in my classroom one day. She uses her blog to help her students' writing skills and grammar. She encourages family members of the students to view the class blog and make comments. It is really amazing how many visitors she has on her class blog, so much more than our EDM class blog has. I could learn a lot about blogging from her class blog. I really enjoyed exploring her blog.
I really enjoyed reading the Halloween stories that the kids in Mrs. Yolis' class wrote. I had the pleasure of reading Behyan's story called "Crazy Halloween Day". Behyan's has a very good imagination and is a great writer. Her story was very entertaining and creative.
For my last C4K, I was assigned to Sela in Room 13 Point England School Auckland, New Zealand. She wrote a story about being an astronaut and saving the world from all the "space junk". She also has an imaginary planet call Pizza Planet. She also has a very good imagination and obviously has an interest for outer space.

Blog Assignment 13

I had never heard of Wolfram Alpha until this blog post was assigned. I had never heard of Google Squared either, but did not get to use it because there was an error every time I tried it. 22.88% of China's population equals the United States' population. 89.6% of China's population equals India's population. I think Wolfram Alpha would be very useful in the classroom. Children are always wondering random facts, so when one of those comes up in class all I would have to do it bring up Wolfram Alpha.

Blog Assignment 12

I really had to think hard and do some searching to find an assignment that should have been given to us, but wasn't. I was beginning to think there wasn't anything else to add to go along with this class, but I finally found something pretty interesting.
Go to prezi.com. Create your own Prezi on anything you would like. Make it interesting and have fun! Here is the link to my Prezi. When it comes up, press the right arrow button until the end of the presentation.

Progress Report on Final Project

I guess you could say that our final project is coming along. We are still coming up with ideas to do this project on. Hopefully we will get the ball rolling faster now that it's coming up sooner. I think we will come up with a great project.

Additional Post 1

I did miss the metaphor in Blog Assignment 11. I usually understand metaphors and sarcasm, and use them quite often myself. I guess I was distracted when I read the post or was having an off day. We all have those sometimes, right? I think we use metaphors to keep things interesting and make people think. That's why I use them anyway.

Blog Assignment 11

In the video "Little Kids...Big Potential" there were first graders blogging and using the same things we are in EDM310. They posted a blog regularly, which they say helped them with the writing. They used Skype to communicate with other classrooms and professionals. They even found ways to use their Nintendo DS's. I think their teacher is doing a great job with them and I hope I can do this with my students in a few years. These things help students in more ways than just learning how to use a computer.
Mrs. Cassidy had some great points in her interview. One of my questions about blogging in an elementary classroom was how to protect them and keep them from seeing things that they shouldn't see. Obviously, teaching them not to use their last name, pictures, address, or phone number on the internet is the best way to protect them, but it is so easy for them to get to pages that are inappropriate, whether it is on purpose or by accident. Having links on the class page is a great idea so they will know what pages they can go to for sure. Another thing I have thought about is, when will I have time to get my students to post a blog regularly. I had never thought about doing it during reading sections. I really enjoyed watching this interview. I got a lot of great information! And I loved seeing the snow in her backyard. I would love to have that here every other year or so!

C4K Summary Post 2

These kids amaze me with what they post on their blogs. They have some great ideas and do some wonderful research. One of the kids I got assigned to researched their favorite animal and posted about it. One made a post about their class elections for student council. They had some great pictures and you could tell that they had great presentations. I really loved commenting on these kids blogs and seeing what they have to say.

Blog Assignment 10

Do You Teach or Educate?

This video really made me think. I have always said "I want to be a teacher", but after watching this video, I want to be an educator. A teacher only passes along information or facts, which is great. We need people to pass along facts to our children. But an educator not only teaches, but is someone to look up to. They are mentors and good role models. They are friends to their students. I have had both teachers and educators throughout school, and I definitely learned more from my educators. I will strive to be the best educator I can be.

Don't Let Them Take the Pencils Home

You wouldn't think that anyone would see a problem with students taking pencils home. This one teacher says that there is a study that proves that students who take the pencils home make lower scores on the standardized tests. Tom questions this research and recognized it as a problem, but he actually did something about it. He came up with projects for the students to do at home. I think we should all be problem solvers like him. It is easy to say "hey, there's a problem" but we need to work hard to fix these problems. 

C4T Summary Post 3

I got assigned to Teacher Tom's blog for this month's assignment. He works with pre-school kids.  His first post that I read was titled "It's Not My School, It's Your School". This talks about his clean up method. He, like most teachers, gets his students to help him clean up after activities done in class, but he makes it fun. He sings a clean up song while beating a drum. He doesn't have to let the kids know that it is clean up time, they just go into action when he starts beating the drum. We all know that if you tell a child "Put the book on the shelf", you are more than likely going to have to repeat yourself several times to get the desired reaction. However, if you say something informal like "The books go on the shelf", you will get a better reaction. I love his clean up method and will use something similar in my classroom and at home when I have children.
His second post that I read was titled "The Trick to Being a Dog". This post was talking about imagination. Kids can crawl around and act like a dog, in their mind, they area dog, but all we adults can see is a child crawling around on their hands and knees. It is really a shame that we can't be who we truly are because we are afraid of what other people with think and other people judge so much. It would be nice if we could go back to the days that nobody judged you for what you did, and if they did, you didn't care what they thought.

Our Smart Board

Blog Assignment 9

At the Teacher's Desk (08-09)

This is a great blog post. It really helped me get a look at what to expect my first year of teaching on my own. Teachers definitely need to realize that the classroom is not centered around them. It is not about how they are doing as a teacher, but about how well the students are learning the material. If the students are not getting the material, then you as a teacher need to change your plans and style rather than trying to drive the information into the students using the same old method that obviously doesn't work for you class. Teachers also have to be lifetime learners. Technology and curriculum is always changing. A lot of teachers are teaching their students the wrong information because they are not up to date on the changes in new textbooks or curriculum.

At the Teacher's Desk (10-11)

There are some great tips in this blog post. Especially about standing out among your fellow teachers and staff. Instead of being the teacher that doesn't want to embrace new ideas, you need to be a teacher that will think about what is best for the student, not what you feel like doing or what will be easier for you to do. Teachers also need to stay focused on the students and what they need instead of trying to impress and "fit in" with other teachers and administration. Teaching is not about making friends, it is about helping students and giving them the education and attention that they deserve.

Blog Assignment 8

This is How We Dream

I have dreamed about many different things, but I can honestly say that I have never dreamed about the kinds of technology that we have today. Technology allows us to do many wonderful things. We can talk to someone half way around the world instantly. We can talk to anyone, anytime we want to, no matter where we are. We can research anything and everything at any time without having to open a book. It is really amazing what we can come up with when we dream.

Blog Post #12

I think Carly's post was excellent! You can tell she has a lot of creativity and she has a passion for literature. She will make a great teacher! I don't think she could have gotten any closer to what Dr. Miller hoped for writing with multi-media. It is obvious that she put a lot of time and effort into this post. I really enjoyed reading it and watching the videos.

EDM 310 is Different

I really enjoyed watching The Chipper Series. It was a great way to show people that you can't always have things your way, and you definitely can't be lazy in college or when you start your career. The Chipper series also makes a great point about procrastination. Procrastination gets you no where. If you procrastinate in school, you will make bad grades. If you procrastinate when you get a job, you will get fired for not meeting deadlines. The best thing to do is to go ahead and get started on it as soon as you get the assignment so it will be done to the best of your ability instead of being thrown together at the last minute. 

EDM 310 for dummies was a fun way to show how stressful this class can be if you don't know what you are doing, but there is help. if you are not technologically literate, there is a book to help complete this course that explains everything--Blogger, Twitter, class syllabus, YouTube, and anything else having to do with EDM310. It obviously helped the girls in the video, so it has to be worth a try. 

Learn to Change, Change to Learn

This video makes some great points. One woman pretty much asks why is it that e-mailing, instant messaging, and text messaging are banned from schools when they are the main ways people, especially teenagers, communicate. We have to change our classrooms in order for students to learn more efficiently. Now, students are learning more through technology. Students need to learn how to find information, validate it, synthesize it, and problem solve with it instead of memorizing facts. 

Project #9b