Saturday, October 27, 2012
Symbaloo
Blog Assignment #9
This week we were assigned to read the blog post of an amazing teacher with very valid and useful points.He is a 4th year teacher that is very dedicated to his job and inspiring. I chose to read At the Teacher's Desk and What I Have Learned This Year. Each blog reflected his third and fourth year teaching which turned out to be very informative and helpful. I believe we, as teachers, learn more from our students than they learn from us but it seems as if Mr. McClung did not. He was so wrapped in trying to please his co-workers/"peers" that he neglected the real reasons he became a teacher. I know that we sometimes put ourselves in situations to feel like that, but he shows us in his blog that through his students he found happiness in who he really as a person.
Mr. McClung also mentioned that you can not expect others to be excited about new ideas and that is true. Everyone is not in the teaching profession for the right reasons and that sometimes can spoil it for others who are. One rotten apple does not always have to spoil the others. If you separate the apples the bad apple can only rot by itself. I think we take others opinion sometimes to help fuel our own decision making, but we do not always have to. Its called an opinion for a reason. Do not be afraid of being an outsider. Odd is what gets you noticed in my opinion. People, students in this case, are always looking for a mentor; someone to look up to other than their parents. Why not be that mentor?
Never get too comfortable and that seems to be a reoccurring them in both blogs. This indicated to me that this could be a major problem that all teachers either have already faced, still facing, or will face. It kind of gives me the heads up and keeps me on my toes. Always have something new and innovating for the children in order to keep their brains active and attentive. It is so easy to lose them.
Sunday, October 21, 2012
Blog Assignment #8
To answer the question of weather or not I am prepared to write with multimedia, no. All of this technology scares me to be honest. It puts me in the mind frame of the movie IRobot. Weird, I know. But, Richard Miller seems to think different. In the video This is How We Dream he presents the idea of multimedia as a perfect way for kids to learn visual literacy. He starts off with addressing the particular ways that writing in the academy and writing in the culture has changed and that is one thing that I would have to agree with him on. Certain technology with the help of the internet has made communicating instant and global. How we write, where we work, how we research, and how we publish is so much different than before. Everything is done with the click of a button.
Williams goes on to talk about the incremental changes. For example, most 21st century classrooms does not use pen, paper, or books; but desk tops instead. It is now possible to collaborate not just with text but with the web. People are able to work on projects for school or even have study sessions from home using their web cam. It is now possible to create visual and sound documents such as the one he made himself on the great Martin Luther King Jr. He even informed viewers on how the government is able to keep up with voting records through using technology.
One thing that I did think was pretty cool was the visual representation of the whale hunting. I think this is a great way for others to learn about nature and with the right resources and equipment, people could actually learn and get to experience the outdoors for themselves. Williams made a perfect statement that I also agreed with. He said "Ideas do not to be used individually but culturally and as educators we must be prepared to share our ideas." We as teachers are at the front of pushing ideas into our culture and we should not be afraid nor selfish when we have ideas. They could possibly change society.
Carly Pugh's Blog Post #12
I totally agree with Carly Pugh in her effort to bring change and inspire aspiring teachers. I really enjoyed her enthusiasm in her blog and hope that the same excitement come to viewers when they read my blog. She seems like she is a very smart individual with a lot going for herself. It also seems as if the A.D.D. helps her move forward rather than hold her back. I do see why reading/watching her BlogPost#12 was assigned. It gives us soon-to-be teachers a chance to come up with an assignment for our students. Practice makes perfect. We must be prepared because we are no longer looking out for our own education, we have a whole generations to look after and educate.
EDM310 is Different
I like the videos that were assigned to us by Dr, Strange. Mainly because it is something that anyone who has ever taken this class can relate to. It is frustrating at times but college is not made for students to fly in and out of. With that said, my idea for my video that I would like to create. My video is going to be of a high school graduate who is indecisive on weather or not she wants to go to college. She falls asleep on the high school graduation exam and dreams that she is working at McDonald's, living pay check to pay check, hanging with the wrong crowd, barely making it through life, and she feels behind because all of her high school friends are living life to the fullest while she works to pay bills. She wake up and understands how important college is. She knows it is tough but she decides to sticks through the tough time that a college student encounters. It pays off in the end and the student is able to live better and has a happy ending.
Learn to Change, Change to Learn
The arguments presented in this video are really good arguments. The world has changed and the educators have to keep up with it or else the youth will get bored with learning. I think it is a wonderful idea to take their entertainment and put a twist on it. To make it where they are social networking, gossiping, and finding what they are interested in at the same time as learning. Although it may have its flaws, they are minor compared to the major impact this has on the education system.
Scavenger Hunt
I love the WEB 2.0 site. This seems like it will make a teacher's job easier. It provides lesson plans and ideas for each subject. The tool that teems to be most like Twitter/Facebook is the community tool Edmodo.com. It allows students to only communicate with their peers and teachers. Filtering out all others who are not social networking for education purposes. This is an excellent idea and will allow me, as a teacher, to post class notes for those who were absent, leave notifications to my students and their parents, along with a variety of other things.
The tool most likely used to create the video we were assigned is PhotoPeach.com. Its an ideal tool for creating slideshows and presentations that makes your classroom lecture a lot more bearable. It also gives teachers a chance to give quizzes in the same fun environment. Although to visit the website is free, the feature that Photo Peach offer is not but the prices are certainly reasonable. For a classroom with one teacher and fifty students the cost is only $9! Cheap, I know. The website offers more than just that deal, it offers a lot more deals for larger classrooms.
Create Comix
Video Tool
One of the video tools that I have never used is Animoto.com. This is a cool, neat feature that Web 2.0 offer as an additive for educators. Some of its features consist of choosing any image from any social network such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc and adding your own words to tell your story. Another cool feature is accessible uploading of your own personal music and video in order to create a memorable attraction for your viewers.
Create Polls
Sunday, October 14, 2012
Blog Assignment #7
The Network Student
The Network Student is an excellent approach to get students to understand the future of technology in the educational society. It gives students a chance to better their education and higher their learning by building their own personal learning skills. I am assuming, from the video presented, that students will be basically teaching themselves with only a little help from the instructor.
My reaction to this video is a little curious. Mainly because I am in favor of old-school teaching methods. I like the students looking to the teacher for their concerns and questions; although the teacher does not have all of the answers, in my opinion, it gives the teacher a sense of importance and keeps the teacher on his/her toes. The video presented the idea of connectivism. This is a theory that presume that learning occurs as part of a social network of many diverse connections and ties. However, this raises the concern of students being distracted by social networking. Not that it could not be controlled, but it is an issue.
Connectivism only raises a few concerns when it comes to education, but it seems as if it will help more than harm it. Connectivism makes blogging, Googling, Wikispace, etc. a learning experience. It presents a wide range of connects and presents a new learning opportunity with every informational source. To answer the question of "Why do the network student need his teacher?", she/he is used again as a "filter". Teachers are going to help the students get connected with the world. The teacher is the incubator; the core to the learning apple.
In this video we see how/why students these days are more interested in learning the harder subjects such as math and science. For example, we are introduced to a 7th grader who finds that learning with her own PLE, she is able to experience fun, independence,and responsibility while enlarging her knowledge and exercising her brain. This is a good experience and a skill that can be utilized throughout her life. I see a lot of similarities when it comes to her PLE and my PLN. We both are able to connect to others with different or same opinions as our own and we get to learn and do our work. By the end of the video, the narrator reassured the viewers of the question that was asked earlier. Will technology distract students from learning? The answer is no. Technology enlarges the students resources and only helps the learning process.
Sunday, October 7, 2012
Blog Assignment #6
Randy Pausch Last Lecture: Achieving Your Childhood Dreams
As a professor at Carnegie Mellon University, Randy Pausch has done numerous lectures to help college students improve their learning methods and achieve their dreams. In front of a packed McConomy Auditorium, Pausch shares his own experiences in order to help/motivate his own students and their family. The "Last Lecture" was a humorous, yet serious discussion that not only had me laughing, but had me rethinking my route to success.
He starts his lecture by stating some of his own childhood dreams. Some of which he accomplished. For example, he dreamed of working for Disney. Although, when offered the job he turned it down, he had an excellent experience to share with others. I have had childhood dreams of my own, despite the fact that they changed every year as a child. I started off as wanting to teach. I then changed to a lawyer, a councilor, a judge, a photographer, an interior decorator, a wedding planner, and so on and so on. However, education and the youth has always stuck with me. Pausch gave his audience members a lengthy laugh with his other dreams of winning teddy bears, being in zero gravity, playing in the NFL, etc. All of which he achieved.
Pausch makes the statement that "Brick walls are there for a reason: It is there for us to prove to ourselves of how bad we really want something." I think this was an optimistic way of looking at situations people encounter that has just come to a stand-still. I have had this feeling before and it is not a good feeling; but knowing that they are there for a reason and inspires motivation helps me look at the glass half full, instead of half empty. Randy also states that we as imperfect people must learn the fundamentals first. Without laying the foundation a plan will fall to pieces. I totally agree. Another thing that stood out to me that Pausch stated is "Experience" is what you get when you did not get what you want. I have heard this is his earlier lectures, but it inspires me every time.
Enabling dreams of others was a substantial subject of Randy's. His point was to inspire others and help them reach their own goals. Rather it is a child or an adult. As aspiring teachers we need to know how to encourage and feed their ambitious spirit. This in turn will be forever changing. Implementing fundamentals and hard work towards our students, our babies, will only lead to positive effects. Randy Pausch's lecture taught me that we learn from our students, to never give up, and made ask myself "How can I enable others dreams??" My answer: by sharing my experiences, my knowledge, and my dreams.
As a professor at Carnegie Mellon University, Randy Pausch has done numerous lectures to help college students improve their learning methods and achieve their dreams. In front of a packed McConomy Auditorium, Pausch shares his own experiences in order to help/motivate his own students and their family. The "Last Lecture" was a humorous, yet serious discussion that not only had me laughing, but had me rethinking my route to success.
He starts his lecture by stating some of his own childhood dreams. Some of which he accomplished. For example, he dreamed of working for Disney. Although, when offered the job he turned it down, he had an excellent experience to share with others. I have had childhood dreams of my own, despite the fact that they changed every year as a child. I started off as wanting to teach. I then changed to a lawyer, a councilor, a judge, a photographer, an interior decorator, a wedding planner, and so on and so on. However, education and the youth has always stuck with me. Pausch gave his audience members a lengthy laugh with his other dreams of winning teddy bears, being in zero gravity, playing in the NFL, etc. All of which he achieved.
Pausch makes the statement that "Brick walls are there for a reason: It is there for us to prove to ourselves of how bad we really want something." I think this was an optimistic way of looking at situations people encounter that has just come to a stand-still. I have had this feeling before and it is not a good feeling; but knowing that they are there for a reason and inspires motivation helps me look at the glass half full, instead of half empty. Randy also states that we as imperfect people must learn the fundamentals first. Without laying the foundation a plan will fall to pieces. I totally agree. Another thing that stood out to me that Pausch stated is "Experience" is what you get when you did not get what you want. I have heard this is his earlier lectures, but it inspires me every time.
Enabling dreams of others was a substantial subject of Randy's. His point was to inspire others and help them reach their own goals. Rather it is a child or an adult. As aspiring teachers we need to know how to encourage and feed their ambitious spirit. This in turn will be forever changing. Implementing fundamentals and hard work towards our students, our babies, will only lead to positive effects. Randy Pausch's lecture taught me that we learn from our students, to never give up, and made ask myself "How can I enable others dreams??" My answer: by sharing my experiences, my knowledge, and my dreams.
Wednesday, October 3, 2012
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