Final Reflection

I enjoyed the presentations tonight. My take away from this course is to make sure every lesson plan has some facet of technology in it for your students. Assisted technology is more then just computers and cars but also simple tools such as chalk and handouts can also be considered assisted technology. It’s a tool to make life simpler.  I would like to incorporate these blog assignments with my students to get them to write more. This will also line up with the CCSR.  All in all I enjoyed the course and learned a lot. 

Video Presentation

I enjoyed the other group’s presentation and the topics they discussed. I was very surprised the topic our group did our project on was so well received. The discussion that followed the group’s presentation I felt really added to the topic. We shared our own experiences an made a personal connection with the projects. I enjoyed working with my group and the warm reception the class gave us made it all worth it.

Assisted living

When I think of assisted technology I think of devices more for the disabled then for the common man. After the class I came to realize that almost every thing we use can be considered assisted technology. Anything that makes functioning easier can be considered assisted technology

Chapter 9 blog

Using multimedia technology in the classroom can be used for multiple uses. For example the uses of basic media features of audio books, iBooks, projectors and YouTube videos are some effective ways to reach children and make your lesson plans more engaging to the students. These are simple examples that can be used and basic computer skills we should all have at this point. 

The chapter mentions utilizing PowerPoint as well and this is also a basic tool we learn in high school.  Slide rocket is a presentation method used that spices up the boring PowerPoint presentation. It may seem too fancy and complicated at first but it is a basic program that really livens up your presentation. 

I loved the idea of using podcast as an effective tool to use with your students. Providing that all the students have a base level to be able to use the method of delivery. In the same manner that we use the blogs for this class you could assign two person groups and they can make podcast about the weeks assignments. There are so many free resources out there at our disposal and we should take advantage of them. Teachers should be community activist.

 Online community is a new area we need to learn to explore. We need to venture into the different areas  in able  to provide a better lesson plan. YouTube is a good video resource for the teacher to use. We first have to make sure to screen the videos and the links that accompany them to make sure the students eyes are not diverted to a site that you can get in trouble for. 

  

Take Away

I did not hear anything that was said tonight. The incident before class continues to occupy my mind the entire time. The way the meeting occurred. What was discussed. I have the feeling of being deflated due to nothing being accomplished or really discussed. I felt I was not able to speak due to the fear I put in people. The message that was given was I misunderstand everything. Everything from the assignments given, the sequence of events that occurred and I have to just accept it. I feel deflated. I feel like I am going to fail the class and there is nothing I can do about it. 

Chapter 8

Communicating with students in this day and age is very new and exciting. What I fear is that too many of us will become too friendly and not know where to draw the lines. I partake in social media sites but not under my professional name. When I discovered that perspective employers and schools look into your Facebook and Instagram accounts, I went into hiding, lol. The first thing I thought of is, when I am a teacher how my students will view this. I think having so many different lines of communication in order to reach your student’s is great, and meeting them where they are will also help you reach them. You have to know that your student’s should not see you as a “person” and always view you as their teacher. I fear, students will start to loose respect for you if you start to associate you as one of their friends.

With that out of the way, having different avenues to reach your students is vital to reaching students who are not as outgoing in the classroom. Giving parent’s different ways to communicate with you is also vital to your relationship with them. If a parent has a concern, they might not always be available during your office hours or during the school day. Being able to send an email is important to keep the lines of communication open. You should also have a disclaimer that all communication sent and received from your school account is monitored and viewed for safety purposes. You should also save all email correspondence. This can save you later if something comes up. In this day and age many parents do not attend parent teacher conferences, and this may seem like more work on the teacher’s behalf, but at least being available via email is better then not communicating with the parent’s altogether.

Another issue we discuss in our English skills and techniques class is how to get the students to write more. Surprisingly the students write everyday, all day. they do it via text message, email, going to websites, searching for topics in Google, on Facebook, on Twitter and who knows where else. The issue is getting them to write in the class. Some suggested in my class to use these sites for our advantage. You can actually set up twitter accounts and do a time line project with the social media site. The issue is if we find this ethical or not? Are we allowed to use websites that are not educationally based and risk the chance of violating some kind of school policy.  If the content of educationally based and the teacher monitors the communication, I don’t see anything wrong with it. I feel we are at a disadvantage now a days. students are allowed to rebel more and more against school and teachers have less and less power. We have to use what tools we do have to reach the students and be creative as well. I think I am going to be a teacher to use the students preferred form of communication as an engagement tool. I don’t see it as me against the students but me trying to fit into their world.

CP 4 & 6

Chapter 4 points out that there are two ways that teachers use technology as a necessary means of integration. One way is through the teacher's state of mind and the other is through differentiation of teaching. If I am not into what I am using in the class and it makes me uncomfortable, then the students will see this. If I have to ask the student’s for assistance or have to call IT for assistance, this will detract from the larger lesson. Many schools encourage using new technology, however the school should teach the teachers how to use this new technology or offer outside resources in order to assist the teachers and facility to use the technology being integrated.  In order for the teacher to be comfortable using the new technology, they must have a general understanding of how to use it. This will make them more at ease and want to use it more, if they feel they can master the new tool.

The chapter also points out that technology integration is not limited to just electronic based advances. The wheel is not a computer based tool but it was a technological advancement for its time. Using tools to make your job easier is what I am all about, “Work smarter not harder,” I always say. In my classroom I would hope to include a lot of art and pictures into my lesson plans. I want the words the student’s are reading to be more then just print on a page but rather vivid stories they can not wait to read. Wearing costumes for story time or interactive lesson plans can be fun ways to integrate low level technology into your class. Technological advancements have significantly affected our ability to control and adapt to their natural environment.

Chapter 6, points out that the internet should be used for a starting point and not used for the entire project or as the only resource used. This I fear is not the case as fewer students utilize the library for their books. Computer stations have become a new standard for research and I do not think that this is a bad thing. As long as we are demonstrating to our student’s the importance of peer reviewed work and how to conduct proper online searches, they will be able to find solid information for their papers.

Digication

I learned a few new tricks to use with digication but over all I do not think this is going to be a site I utilize in the future. STJ has to make us use it and I understand that but I would have benefited from weebly.com instead I think.  I will continue to work on my webquest with the examples given and hopefully have a better webquest to present to the class. 

Chapter 7

Chapter 7 offered a few interesting tips I had not considered in evaluating websites to use for the children. I am starting to see that you must evaluate the websites you choose to use with your students the same way you evaluate the literature you share with them. The book points out that the websites we use have to be appropriate for the students in terms of language and content. Engaging activities for the students will retain their attention and promote fun educational facts that assist your course content. The table on page 181 provides us with a guideline to justify using certain video games. We may not be sure if using a video or game is appropriate but the guidelines provided allows us to evaluate which ones we may use in an educational manner.

InspireData and Persuasion Map are two tools that I would like to use in my classroom. If I am able to have a few computers in my classroom, the students would most likely prefer to write their essays on it. The Persuasion Map is an interactive graphic organizer that enables students to map out their arguments for a persuasive essay or debate. Students begin by determining their goal or thesis in a short sentence. They then identify three reasons to support their argument, and three facts or examples to validate each reason. The map graphic in the upper right-hand corner allows students to move around the map, instead of having to work in a linear fashion. 

InspireData also caught my attention as a tool I want to utilize because students can use InspireData to investigate, analyze, represent data and information in dynamic graphs and charts. InspireData tools make it easy to change variables and plot types so students can explore data in multiple, meaningful ways. This encourages them to investigate data analytically, ask more questions, and apply their understanding of the data to form better conclusions and continue exploration. 

The suggestions made for the learning skills games for vocabulary building is also a new age way of tricking your students into learning vocabulary. Depending on the age of your students, there are plenty of games you can play with your students to foster learning. Incorporating educational concepts into the games they play will assist the children in retaining the information because in the background they are listening to the cues on screen. Depending on the task they have to achieve they will match the corresponding educational goal you have for the students. The students are focused on the action of the game without knowing that they are learning at the same time because the tasks the game has the children's achieve are educationally based. 

My big take away form this chapter is for me to learn to view evaluating the websites I use with my students the same way I evaluate the books I use in the classroom. I now know to evaluate everything from the outside links the websites offer to the vocabulary used on the sites as well. I did not think that so much work went into choosing the websites I use as long as the school has the proper filters on their system.This would work for the sites I use in class but not for the sites I assign for outside reading or projects.  

Class Discussion

My take away from this class was the benefit of using the Internet for virtual field trips and exposing the students to different cultures and other schools thru technology. The benefit of using the Internet as a virtual tour allows the students to have a base knowledge of a subject. This is an exciting new technology aspect I would like to use in my classroom and link up with other schools in other states for virtual conferencing.  I would have to first monitor the content I look for before I present it to the children but this will assure I have a well-rounded knowledge of the content they are looking through as well.  My only hope, as I always put, I hope my school will be accessible to technology in the classroom for the students. 

WebQuest

Webquest is a new innovative way to engage the students with online learning. It is an online journey you are taking the students on and a new way for the students to view learning. Using a tool they are most comfortable with is like tricking the students into learning. A term I would hear a lot growing up was to trick the students into learning is the only way to get them to learn. This can be the new form of “tricking” the students into learning. Using the Internet and incorporating engaging activities into your lesson plan can get the student to want to learn. The internet has many different avenues the students can be shown to use to improve their school work and can be shown educational areas that have more to offer then just YouTube.  I learned today that you need a lot of links and areas for the students to go to. You should be speaking to a general audience not just a specific class.  Each area should have the appropriate steps to follow for the students, so they are not lost in your webquest. Viewing the different types of webquest that are on the web provides me with a lot of ideas for how I would like to construct my webquest.  I find the most important part of the webquest, or component of the webquest, is the more links you provide the longer the students will be engaged.  My fear is that the school is work in will not have enough computers in the classroom, if they have any, to utilize webquest. 

Wikipedia: To use or not to use?

The first lesson and the demonstration on how to use iMovie was very helpful tonight. I own a Mac and never even opened the program so using it for this assignment I think is a fun new challenge. Seeing what I can create and see if what I make is similar to what is in my mind is going to be fun.  I plan on working on it this weekend and see how far I can get with it.Your 5 W’s for evaluating a web site will also help me in grading the websites the students use and the websites I will use with the children as well.

Another topic we brought up that I enjoyed discussing is the credible sources we need to teach our children to use in the classroom. We first need to know what material we will accept.  Making the comparison to the days we were in school and using magazines for materials and now Wikipedia was very eye opening. I never made that connection but it is try. This topic of correct sources to use has always been around. We just need to learn the new ways the students will implement in order to complete their projects.  I would have to agree that as long as they have other peer reviewed journals and cite their sources correctly, I wouldn’t mind them using Wikipedia.  Not an issue for this teacher. 

My storyboard topic will be on self-esteem. I want to use the book Stargirl by Jerry Speneli. It is a very good read and I hope the project I make does the book justice. 


Site:
Who: Stjohns.edu
What: web site for Saint John's University students and individuals who are seeking information on Saint John's. 
Where: www.stjohns.edu
Why: ...

Ch. 5 Internet as a Wonderland

Our discussion in class about student assessment mirrored much of what chapter 5 was about. Learning how to be a teacher that uses not only conventional methods such as worksheets and note taking, we also have to learn how to work online and use appropriate online material for them as well. The heading on the opening page “A Library of Unimaginable Size,” is what the Internet is. How we use it is up to us but what we can do with it can greatly assist our ability to teach.

Reading the chapter I have to admit that I still have a lot to learn in the area of evaluating source material and proper search engines to utilize for my classroom. Over the course of my college years I have used the same search engine, ProQuest, for all of my work. Where I lack, besides new sites to use, is the proper words to put into the search bar and different combinations to put them in for better results. I have to work on this and continue to work on this when I start teaching.  Teaching the student’s about scholarly material and peer reviewed journals can assist them with their searching but also expose them to well written material. The students need to learn the difference in speaking in the learning environment and with their friends.

Another issue the chapter brings up is plagiarism.  As long as the students know how to site their sources, they can avoid this problem. Teaching the students the proper way to site sources at the start of the semester can assure all the students know how to do this. Spending the first few classes demonstrating to the student’s how to site sources can assist them not only for your class but their academic career.

One tool I would like to utilize is the electronic note-taking site. I would like to work in a school that has their school information online so everyone can see what is going on.  I had one professor not allow us to take notes in class and only listen and partake in the lesson. He said that students cannot take notes and listen to everything at the same time and miss key points. If you take this small task out of the class and post the work online and focus on discussion and group work, the classroom can be more of a freeing place. I have not worked in a classroom yet, but would hope that I can work on this technique and have more of a discussion type of classroom and not just lectures. 

Class 4

Lessons Learned:

Today’s class discussion made me think more about formal and informal assessments and how I could use them in my class. The formal assessments of test taking and having students create projects are a valuable way to reach the children but what about informal assessments? I was taught a strategy by a professor of simply putting a thumb up to ask a student discretely if they are okay or if they are understanding a lesson. They can do this discretely and it can be a personal ting between the professor and student.

The topic for my video I am thinking about presenting is revolving around the short book Star Girl. The book has themes of individuality, and the awkwardness of being a child and how it is not revered as children but admired by adults. This ties into another class so it would be easy to continue from that small project to something like this. 

Blog 3. The Designer Teacher

Who are you designing for? 

You are designing a lot of things when you are a teacher. You are designing lesson plans that are relevant for the students and match the different learning levels that are in your classroom. You are putting into your lesson plan check points to make sure the students are able to follow your instruction. When designing your classroom or lesson plans you have to consider the students who are following your lessons, the parents who may have question and are curious where they can follow the material. As well as thinking of your common core standards who ask for different points to be implemented into your curriculum. 

What are you designing? 

I'm designing an atmosphere in my classroom. A place where students can be free to be inquisitive and not be ridiculed for it. I'm designing different lesson plans yearly and just using last years lesson plans as a guide line. The students change every year and I am not saying I will start from scratch every year, but I will add and tweak the lesson plans to the new crop of students I will be teaching. I do not want to over use technology in the class but I want to design lesson plans that evolves with the students and challenges them.  

What's the final product of your design?

The final product will be a building block for them to move forward. My area of concentration is English and I hope the children will walk away with the understanding that reading content is just as important as pictures. The students use visual aide so much now I fear that they will read for fun less and less. I hope that each year the students walk away with a healthy desire to want to be in school as much as I do. 

Reflection:

I liked the discussion of teachers being designers in both the traditional and none traditional sense. We model the mind of young adults and will touch a lot of lives. What I find is the new common core standards we will have to instruct will gives us a lot of freedom in how we present the material to the students and what we can use.  This allows for each of us to teach to our own abilities which will benefit the students. When you are allowed to design and present the lesson plan to your own strengths, the students benefit. I like how we are starting to think more outside the box and this will lead to richer classroom instruction I feel. 

Blog 2. Chapter 1 & 2

Integrating technology into the classroom is very vital in order to keep up with the times and how the children learn as well. Figure 1.2 in the book demonstrates the huge disparity in the amount Of time children spend with technology compared to reading books.  The students need to be stimulated externally and some if not most have difficulty maintaining on task if the task is not talking back. I am not a huge proponent of technology becoming the soul basis for instruction but I do see the benefits of incorporating it into your lesson plan in order to reach those children so need a little more assistance. Seem students have difficulty participating int he classroom and the anonymity of being behind a keyboard is comforting for some students. 

Using technology to improve your instructional practices can liven up certain aspects of your lesson plan in order to keep the children engaged.  If you we're conducting a social studies lesson plan and going over a continent, you can bring up the continent online and bring up examples of what you are speaking about. I can also have the children participate in a cross school program and have children Skype from children around the world. The book also references the amount of disengagement with high school students and the work they do. If they found the work they do in the classroom as relevant, then they will be more willing to spend more time on their assignments outside of class and bring in richer material.

The students could also work collaboratively more easier online. They have more flexibility in addition to the time they would work in the class as well. The book brings to our attention as well that incorporating technology in the class room also addresses the NYSTE and Common Core standards. With more and more  schools partnering up with Dell and Apple, we are going to have to start to get used to using smart boards and tablets in the class room. We have to use these to out benefit.

The students can also submit their assignments online as well and this can reduce the amount of paperwork you and they have to handle.  The different avenues technology offers also can vary the kind of ways the students present their material as well.  We shouldn't ignore or go against the addition of technology in the classroom.

Blog 1

"I don't do different things, I do things differently." - by Shiv Khera

Academically, I will continue to strive to put forth all of my effort into my classes. I will challenge myself, and work hard at what does not come easy. My goal is to do the best I can and to have fun as I do it. I will focus more on my career decisions than my instincts and passions. Support from my wonderful family has helped also. Their encouragement has kept me strong through the hard times and good times.

Secondly, I want to be involved in something that I really enjoy doing. Over the years I have learned that any job I have had that consisted of something that I enjoyed doing lasted for a long duration. On the other hand, if I disliked the work, no matter what the other circumstances were, the time that I was there was very short-lived. When I look at something that I am going to be doing for a good part of my life it must be enjoyable to me. I dont want to be one of those people who come home from work everyday unhappy, and dreading the next day. My occupation must be stable, and if I hate what I am doing, it is definitely not going to be stable.

My profession must give me financial security. Money isnt everything, but it is surely important. I feel that making an adequate income is something that can only help matters. However, in todays world people are entirely too wrapped up in their bank accounts. I view money as only one aspect of life while it seems to me that others view it as everything. I think that if I am financially secure, I will be less focused on how I can get more money, and more focused on everything else life has to offer.

My personal life will be the last determining factor as to what I am to be ten years from now. As I look at the year of school ahead of me I know that I want to be able to discover all of myself. I want to be able to develop my weaknesses into strengths. I want to experience freedom and try new things. This year I want to search and discover who I really am and where I fit in the scheme of life. Confusion and too many decisions fill my mind right now. I want to be able to sort them out slowly and make the best decisions.

In conclusion, I hope to overcome some obstacles that may come my way, while I am trying to achieve my goals. When I receive my diploma from St. John's University in Secondary Education, it will be a great reward and a great asset for me. But it won’t stop there, I’m sure the future holds a lot for me.