Blog Post #10

Do You Teach or Do You Educate?

By watching this video I realized that there is a difference between being a teacher and being an educator. I have never really thought about it being two different roles. I have just always thought of a teacher and educator as being one. I am so glad that I got to watch this video, it really showed me how wrong I was.

Now that I an aware of the difference I am glad to say that I want to be an educator for my students. I don't want to just be a teacher and give my students instructions. I want to be a role model for them and inspire my students to learn. I also want to be there with guidance for them. I feel that all teachers should watch this video and learn more and educating not teaching. When I have my classroom of students I want them to know that I am an educator not just a teacher.

Don't Let Them Take the Pencils Home!

Tom Johnson's post was mainly about how people tend to focus on the problem more than the solution. When a problem occurs it is best to focus on how something good can come out of it, or even work to make something good come from it. Like in this post, taking pencils home was not such a bad idea because he did not care what they were doing with the pencils because it was keeping their minds busy. I hate to think that there are teachers out there who are more concerned with the test scores. Let students "bring the pencils home". They are learning something even if they are using their pencils to play Hangman!

Summary Post C4T #3

1.) I was assigned to read Ms. Liz B. Davis blog post "The power of educational technology"

The article is based on one school in one town in Arizona, hardly a statistically significant sample. The only reason given for the failure of technology is a lack of increase in test scores in a district that already had high test scores. Finally, there was no test comparing the technology skills of students in this school to any other school in the state.

I enjoyed reading Ms. Davis's article. I agree with her reasoning of the article. I too disagree, I believe that technology is great! It should be should in schools and just because one school in a small town did not see a difference, this should not affect other schools thinking about technology. Children these days are growing up in a world that is full of technology. Technology is a great source for learning.

2.) I was assigned to read Ms. Liz B. Davis blog post "Marching Backward into the Future"

I have really enjoyed reading Ms. Davis's blog post. I enjoy reading articles about technology. Technology is our future. I like how she talked about how when she first started teaching she could not imagine iPads or Kindles. Until I got to South I had never had a smart board in the classroom and it wasn't until emd310 that I actually used one. There has been so many new types of technology come out just in the past decade. I liked how she said "everything we look at is shaped by our experiences." I have never thought about it that way.

“We look at the present through a rear-view mirror. We march backwards into the future.”
(Liz B. Davis)

Project #13 SmartBoard Instruction Part 1

Blog Post #9

After reading Mr. McClung's What I've Learned This Year, I found that he wrote about some very important rules to consider when teaching. Mr. McClung wrote these rules after his first few years of teaching in Noel, Missouri. It is great that Mr. McClung decided to blog about some of the things he learned because now we, as future teachers, are able to get some knowledge of what to expect.

One important rule that he wrote about is that it is not "all about the teacher". In his first few years of teaching he thought that it was all about him, the teacher. He saw teachers who were more worried about how they delivered the lesson than how their students comprehended it. "In order to be effective you have to be able to let your audience drive your instruction." Teachers have a tendency in wanting to make the perfect lesson. The lessons we make will turn out different than how we expected, and that is okay. We will learn how to make the situation a learning experience even if it does not go exactly the way we planned it to.

Another important rule Mr. McClung wrote about was our expectations of our students. Teachers seem to have high expectations for our students and sometimes if they do not meet the goal they are punished. Mr. McClung states that when a student does not meet the goal that has been set, do not punish them, instead help them to get back on track and maybe meet the goal next time.
"Our job as teachers is to simply pick them up after they fail, dust them off, and encourage them to try again."

A third rule he wrote about was "Do Not Be Afraid of Technology". As future teachers, we need to be aware and prepared of the technology that is available for us to use in our classroom. He explains that even though we may not master technology, at first, we still should keep working with it. Technology will help us and our students learn and grow, so we should start learning as much as we can about it!

The last few important points that Mr. McClung made was to listen to our students. Something so simple makes all the difference. It helps to get to know our students in order to build a good relationship with them. Also, if we are taking a interest in their life outside of school their parents will love that too. Students will grow closer to us and want to listen to us if we listen to them. Also, Mr. McClung wrote about never stop learning. This is one of the most important rules, in my opinion, because we can never learn to much. There is so much that I am going to learn in my next few years at South and I will not stop learning after graduation.

Project #11 Short Movie

Project #12 Book Trailer

Blog Post #8

This Is How We Dream Parts 1 and 2

Richard Miller’s video, This Is How We Dream, is showing how multimedia is being used in classrooms all over the world. EDM 310 is similar to this video because we do not use books to find answers or information, we use the internet. Students in EDM 310 learn so much because we are watching or reading something online and having to blog about what we just watched or read. I believe having to search for our answers online with little guidance helps us grow.

Using the internet makes research much faster than going to the library and searching for books. With the internet you really have an endless amount of material to choose from. Also, people come together online which makes learning more fun because you are able to share what you with people all around. This idea gives everyone the ability to share information through things such as: blogging, skype, podcasting, and more.

Will I use multimedia in my classroom? Yes, most definitely. I believe multimedia is a great way to incorporate different ideas into the classroom. It would make the lesson so much more fun and interesting and would be another great way to engage your students. With multimedia you are able to combine audio, text, images, and animation together into one. I would love for my students to use multimedia as well. Assigning your students to a multimedia projects have many possibilities for learning things such as: working together in groups, the importance in research and planning, presenting information in a different way rather than on a poster board, and creatively constructing something.

Blog Post#12 By Carly Pugh
In Carly's blog post she talks about ways to better teachers in their classrooms. She decides to make a YouTube playlist. I enjoyed reading her playlist. It had some great videos on it, that I think would be really helpful to a classroom teacher. A YouTube playlist would be great for any teacher. They would always be able to go back and review videos on how to teach something. She made a great point by saying, "good teachers teach by example." That is so true. There are always room for improvement.

The Chipper Series
The overall message from the two videos was to do your work on time and to work hard at what you are doing. The Chipper Series, showed many different things. One of the things it showed was EDM 310 can be overwhelming at times, but it is not too much and it can be done. Also, Dr. Strange talked about the importance of deadlines. He said that deadlines are there to get you to turn your assignments in on time. In the video, Jamie Lynn was upset with Dr. Strange because “he wasn’t doing his job”. She felt like Dr. Strange was not teaching and making us learn and figure everything out on our own. I feel that Dr. Strange is making us grow as students and as future teachers by making us figure things out on our own. It gives me a feeling of accomplishment after I finish my blog post, my projects, and other assignments because I know I could have had help if I needed it, but mostly I did all of these things all on my own!

EDM 310 for Dummies
EDM 310 For Dummies was very funny and entertaining. I believe that we all probably feel stressed out and overwhelmed at times. However, if you stay on track, keep up with deadlines and assignments, and do not procrastinate then you should be doing just fine.

An idea that I had while writing this blog post would be to show the different websites that I have been introduced to in EDM 310. Before EDM 310, I was unaware of all of the resources that were online and available to use in the classroom. I think it would be great to share the websites to others and show other students and teachers so they would be able to incorporate them in their classroom too. Websites I would include would be many from my PLN because I found many useful websites while it. I would talk about PBS Teachers, Wordle, National Geographic Kids, Story Starters, and others in my video and the importance in each. It would be good to add lessons and how you could use the web sites in your classroom.

Learn To Change, Change To Learn
What an awesome video about educators speaking of the changes that could be made in the classroom. One of the things I found interesting in this video was the quote, “Technology is not a choice, it has created a world.” This is very true because technology is simply not a choice of whether or not to use it in the classroom or not. If you are a educator not using technology there is so much that you and your students are missing out on. Another thing I found interesting was when one of the educators said, “All of the social networks that kids are using and are good at are banned from schools”. Students are good with social networking and it is something that interests them, so why not incorporate it in the classroom somehow?

A final quote that I found important was, “It’s not about memorizing the facts that they will need to know for the rest of their life, it’s about knowing how to find information, how to validate it, how to synthesize it, how to leverage it, how to communicate it, how to collaborate it, and how to problem solve with it. That’s the new 21st Century set of literacy’s and it looks a lot different than the model in which most of us were raised under.” This was probably the most important thing that was said in this video, to me, because it reminds me of EDM 310. When the educator said this quote it made me think of Dr. Strange explaining to the class what EDM 310 was all about. It is important because it talks about how remembering facts and memorizing information is not what should be important in the classroom.

Project #10 First PLN

Making my PLN was very fun and interesting because it is such a great organizer and way to keep all of your important websites together. I decided to make my PLN using Symbaloo because it seemed pretty straight forward and easier than Netvibes. Symbaloo will be very useful inside the classroom and outside the classroom because it keeps all of your websites together on one.

As of right now I have about 20 titles added to my Symbaloo. I added websites such as: facebook, twitter, gmail, google, South Alabama homepage, the EDM 310 class blog, and others. Also, I added websites that I thought had good teaching ideas. Symbaloo has a lot to offer. I will continue adding tiles to my Symbaloo as I find anything interesting.

Project #9b Timetoast

Summary Post C4T #2

1.) I was assigned to read Ms. Mary Worrell's blog post " Paper Reinforcers"

I enjoyed reading this blog post. It was neat how Ms. Worrell first started off by talking about how her school was without technology. She used paper reinforcers as a metaphor for technology. Before technology and especially computers, everything was done with pen and paper. Now that we have all of this nice, new technology it is another learning tool for students in the classroom. Students today have never lived without technology. It is part of their everyday lives. I believe technology is a great thing. I love technology but there are still those few things I would rather do with pen and paper.

Ms. Worrell also talked about in her blog post and podcast. She described and discussed a few ways that she has used podcast in her classroom. She believes podcast are a great new way of technology. I told her how I have never podcast before this edm310 class, and still do not know much about them and how much they can do. From what I have heard from friends and teachers, podcast is a great form of technology. Teachers can record books for the children to listen and follow along in their books. I hope to one day use podcast in my classroom!

2.) I was assigned to read Ms. Mary Worrell's blog post " Reading the gender binary"

Ms. Worrell explained the differences between boys and girls in all aspects, not just the learning and schooling part. She discussed how the times have changed in the fact that boys and girls are coming out as whoever they are. They are not letting what other people think of them affect them. Boys are coming out as gay. Girls might even be "girl-friendly" or tom boyish. Children are going to be who they are and not let other people affect them.

Children are complex as they explore their identities. Are are misconceptions that girls are better readers than boys, but that is not always true. Every child has different strengths and weaknesses. The classroom should be one place where every child comes for the same thing, to learn. It should not matter race, religion, nor culture. Every child should feel welcome and comfortable in the classroom.

I am glad I got to read Ms. Worrell's blog post. It was something that I read and re-read to understand and consider for my classroom. I want my classroom to be all about learning. I want it to be fun and exciting so my students will want to learn.

Blog Post #7

Randy Pausch’s video, The Last Lecture, was very inspiring. He made some very good points and he seems like he was a wonderful educator. Randy Pausch used different methods when teaching which made his course even more fun and interesting. His love and passion for teaching showed through him and that is truly a way that students get excited about learning. The Last Lecture was about Randy’s childhood dreams, enabling the dreams of others, and lessons that you learn as you go on to be an educator. Also, he shared that we will be able to use the methods, he told us about, to enable your own dreams and the dreams of others. He talks about his own childhood dreams and shares his life situations which make it easier to see that your childhood dreams can come true.

One method that Randy Pausch discusses in The Last Lecture is the importance of enabling childhood dreams. He says that enabling a child’s dream can often be better then enabling your own. It is so important to help children reach and get to their dreams because that is something they strive for. As future educators, we have to have the drive to help every student accomplish their dreams and goals. Part of our job will be to enable the dreams of each one of our students.

Another method that Randy Pausch spoke about was a different meaning of brick walls. “The brick walls are not there to keep us out; the brick walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something. They are there to keep out the other people. ” With this quote, Randy gives brick walls a whole new meaning. This is such a motivational quote because we all reach “brick walls” in life but we have to decide how to get over the wall. We have to work hard and push through the wall to make it to the other side, to what we want. This quote has a lot of meaning behind it because it could be a great illustration for our students, as well as us. Teaching our students about the importance in “brick walls” and how to get to the other side is a good way to help them accomplish anything they want!

A final teaching method that Randy talks about is the importance in creativity and having fun while teaching. Teaching is so much more than books, paper, pencils and chalkboards. It’s about engaging your students in learning and having fun while doing so. Randy Pausch sounds like he was a very fun, creative, lively, loving, passionate teacher. He had the motivation and the skill to make students want to learn. I am a firm believer of keeping your classroom alive with creativity and fun! Don’t get me wrong, I understand learning is serious business and we will be preparing our students for the future. But who says that learning can’t be fun? And if there is any opportunity to make the lesson interesting, I’m going to take that opportunity and run with it.

C4K Summary Post

My first kid I got the joy of reading her blog post was mg2011 from Mr. Stephen Wolf's 3rd grade class. Her blog post was right after the school year had started. So, she was still talking about what I great summer she had. She talked about what fun things she got to do while on summer break. One thing that was very interesting was the fact that she was able to go the blue bell ice cream factory. I love blue bell ice cream and that it would be nice to get the chance to go to the factory. She is in the 3rd grade this year. I told her to have a great year and to learn and enjoy school. I also reminded her to make friends, have fun, and make good grades. The good grades will pay off in the future!

My next student was Dana from St. Elmo's school. Dana's post was a letter to Lucky Buffet thanking her for providing Dana's class with iPads. Lucky Buffet had donated to Dana's class a set of iPads for the students to use in the classroom. Dana and her classmates all wrote Ms. Buffet letters thanking her for the iPads. I think that is so generous of Ms. Buffet. IPads are a great source of new technology for the students. All of this technology was not around when I was in elementary and I think that it is great that kids now days have it to use. The world today is technology advance.

Alex was also a kid that I got to comment on his blog. He was new to blog just like I was a few weeks ago. The first assigned him and his classmates had was to make an avatar. I did not know at first what an avatar was until after seeing and reading about it on Alex's blog. It was neat to learn something new from a kid. Suppose ably a person goes to a web site and can design their own to look any way they want it to. Its really a neat assigned for kids. It can show their creativity.

Project #8 Podcast

Blog Post #6

1. The Networked Student by Wendy Drexler

Even though technology is and will continue to advance, there will always be a spot for teachers. Teaching is a job that is definitely needed. Teachers will continue to grow and learn as technology grows and they will learn to teach their students all that they can. The job of a teacher will be the same no matter how technology advances. The main goals are to keep students interested by keeping creativity in your classroom, help students to love learning, guide students to reach goals and to strive harder. Teachers will always have to help guide their students in learning. I think this video should ease the fear that future teachers may have about technology taking our jobs.

While watching this video I began to compare this method to our EDM 310 class. It shows how students and teachers from around the world can stay connected with each other simply by blogging. New ideas, new ways of learning and communication are all through technology. I feel that EDM 310 helps students stay on top of things and search for the answers. It is such a good feeling to find out new things on our own because it makes you feel accomplished and proud, which is something I look forward to my students feeling.

In my opinion, I am well on my way to being a teacher of the networked student. EDM 310 is my first educational class and it has already started to prepare me. Everything that students do in this class prepares us to be awesome teachers with technology. I look forward to what else EDM 310 will teach me and also what I will take from my educational class

2. A 7th Grader's Personal Learning Environment

This 7th grade student did a great job creating her PLE. I like that she has different categories for her tiles. That makes her PLE very organized. Also, it was interesting to watch how she set up the different sites and tiles for her science class. I started on my PLN before I watched her video but after I watched it I went back and did more to mine because her video had good direction to how to make it. We both have Blogger, Facebook, Google, Youtube, and Yahoo. I hope when my PLN is complete it will be detailed like hers.

Project #9a Timetoast

Blog Post #5

1. Don't Teach Your Kids This Stuff. Please?

I found Mr. McLeod's article to be very interesting. It made me really stop and think about technology in another way. Technology is being used in some many ways these days. Mr. Mcleod pointed out some good points when talking about the negative ways technology can be used. Even though there are students who use the technology to look at porn or other such things. There are many other students getting ahead in their education because of technology.

By looking around and googling, I found out some things about Mr. McLeod that most people might not know. Mr. Scott McLeod, Ph.D. is an Associate Professor of Educational Leadership at the University of Kentucky. He also is the Founding Director of the nation's only academic center dedicated to the technology needs of school administrators. Mr. McLeod is widely recognized as one of the nation's leading academic experts on K-12 school technology leadership issues. He has also received many awards for his accomplishments.

2. The iSchool Initiative

Wow, talk about a money and time saver! Travis is seriously on to something with the iSchool initiative. He has put a lot of time and thought into how schools, students, and parents could easily save money. He estimated that we could each save around $600. That is a great saving! I was not aware of how much the iPhone could do.



I would like to think that sometime in the future the idea of the iSchool could possibly happen. I mean, technology is growing at a rapid rate as it is. The iSchool would definitely save a lot of money and time looking for a book or homework you misplaced. With the iSchool everything is just a few clicks away from your iPhone or iTouch. Could something as simple as downloadable Apps onto our phones really start taking the place of books, computers, calculators, calendars, paper, pencils, and more?

3. Eric Whitacre's Virtual Choir

This is incredible. As I watched this video my jaw literally dropped because I can not even imagine how this is possible. The participants did not meet each other to practice, nor did they meet Eric Whitacre's. These people are from all over the world and are able to put something together like this. I can not even begin to think through the process of all of that. Eric Whitacre's obviously has a great deal of creativity and a lot of knowledge about technology.

4. Teaching In the 21st Century

Teaching in the 21st Century had very good points and questions. The part that stuck out most to me was when entertainment and engagement was being compared. Entertainment is not all there is to teaching. We should be learning about how to engage our students with what is being taught.

Engaging students with better activities, involvement, and questions will have them more motivated to learn. Engagement can also be fun, but it is not all that it has to offer. Teaching students in the 21st Century is about helping them find, solve, understand, and answer the questions. It is about having fun while learning and being motivated to learn and want to figure out answers. Teaching students in the 21st Century takes us, soon to be teachers, trying to figure out different, better, more effective teaching methods and applying them to each student in the classroom.

Project #6 My Sentence Video

Blog Post #4

Langwitches

Before reading this article, I did not know much about Podcast. I soon learned how useful Podcast can be for a teacher as well as students. I think it is great that the students were ready to listen and following along in their books while the Podcast was reading to them. Podcast are a great piece of technology to the teachers. It allows the teacher to pre-record a section or even a chapter out of the book instead of reading it their self. It also helps the students to build listening skills. The students have to follow along and keep up with the book, so that they will not get lost. As shown in this article I think it is great that by using Podcast, it makes students eager to learn.

Podcast would be a great use of technology in a classroom. The teacher as well as the students benefit from using them. A teacher can not only use Podcast in the classroom, but if the class or school as a school website, the Podcast can be uploaded to it. By putting the Podcast onto the website that allows parents to view it as well. So if a student might forget how to do something or forget what the homework is, the Podcast is there.


The Benefits of Podcasting in the Classroom by Joe Dal

By watching “The Benefits of Podcasting in the Classroom” by Joe Dal taught me even more about Podcast that I did not know. Podcast are the best way to allow a teacher or student to be creative. Podcast make learning exciting. Podcast can be used any time and any where. As mentioned in the video Podcast are relevant to students of this day and time, because most students that were born after 1980 do not know life without computers, ipod, and smart phones. These students’ learning is revolved around technology.

Mr. Joe Dal made some very valid points when talking about Podcast. Podcast have many benefits. Podcast is information on the go, meaning you can access them anywhere. One main benefit is for students. When a student is out sick they do not have to mess and make up work. They can simple watch the Podcast video by there teacher and not miss any work. That way when they are able to return to school they will be just as up to date as all of the other students. Other reason Podcast are great is because parents can watch them. It allows the parents to stay informed about what’s going on in the classroom and about the students’ class work and homework. Podcast are a great way to stay in contact and informed.


The Education Podcasting Network

The Education Podcasting Network is truly a great way to connect with teachers around the world. Teachers from all over can meet and talk with other teachers. They can learn different teaching methods from one another. By podcasting they can see how different classrooms work and operate. Not only can the teachers put podcast about them but also allow students to make podcast and share with teachers. The Education Podcasting Network really can connect different teachers from different cultures, ethnics, and societies, all by just podcasting.

Presentation Project #5

Blog Post #3

1.) What is Peer Editing?

Peer Editing is when class mates edit other class mates work. It is very useful and helpful for students. By letting other people read and review your work, one they might see a mistake that you did not see, and two it is another person's opinion before the teacher reads it. When peer editing there are three steps to follow: 1) Compliments- Always remember to be nice. Give compliments where needed and keep in mind you would not want someone else being ugly about your paper. 2) Suggestions- Suggestions are a great thing. Suggestions are suggest things as missed spelled works, run on sentences and wrong use of words. Suggestions do not always have to be bad. Let the person know what to improve and me nice about it. 3) Corrections- Corrections are the last step in the editing process. Corrections are the most important. Show a person how they could make their paper better. Make changes! I have used peer editing many times and it is truly helpful. My class mates show me things on my paper that I have missed and help me improve my paper. ~Just Remember to stay positive~

2.) Writing Peer Review Top 10 Mistakes

While watching the video "Writing Peer Review Top 10 Mistakes" I realized that peer editing is a good thing, but can cause some problems at the same time. A student must be open to suggests and keep an open mind when peer editing. The editor has to be positive, but not pushy. The student that is getting his/her paper edited needs to listen and take the advance of the editor. Now that I have watched these two videos on peer editing I have got to see two different views of peer editing. Although, I still believe peer editing is a good idea, I now see it does have some down falls.