Sunday, September 30, 2012

My Sentence Video

Blog Post #5

The iSchool Initiative

In this by Travis Allen, talks about his solution to the school systems throughout America. He thinks the solution. In this video he talks about instead of using books, pencils,Paper and expensive printing machines that we should incorporate iTouch in Schools which provides apps that do all things that books,pencils and paper would do. As for taking notes, there is a note App on the iTouch which would allow them to get all the notes and with email available, they can email back and forth with the teacher. There are some pretty cool Apps such as Chemical Touch. This App shows the whole periodic table and displays information on any element. There is also a Iclassic which gives you access to all your texts books and you don't have to waste paper or any resources. The assignments act is pretty cool. It allows the student to see all his assignments and the teacher is able to see and respond to them right away.

After watching the video, I believe that this video was very informative. It provided great information on how schools should transition to this iTouchs. Having this technology with make it easier and less expensive on the student and parents. Another thing is that kids these days stay on there iphones and itouches anyways so I think students would enjoy doing classwork on their phone. Using more technology will also save so many natural resources by not using pencils and paper and other school supplies. Overall, I think this is a great idea to incorporate technology into the school systems.
Using technology in schools
Eric Whitacre's Virtual Tour

The video Eric Whitacre's Virtual Tour was pretty aweasome. It is pretty cool how technology can produce voices like that. He was so outgoing towards these people he has never met and showed them how cool technology was. Personally, I think it was a amazing video because I have never really seen anything like it. These days technology has come such a long way its incredible and i think people should take advantage of it.
Eric Whitacres Visual Tour

Why I flipped my classroom and Dr. Lodge McCammon's FIZZ

After watching Why I Flipped my classroom and Dr.Lodge McCammons FIZZ I really came to like the idea of Flipping the classroom. She was completely right about how the variety of students in the classroom can change. There are students that are fast learners, some are slow learners and some are lower level students. Personally, I could see myself using this strategy. Now a days there are so many kids that never really get the lesson plans. In a classroom there are some many kids and different kind of learners and i want to be able to reach out to all of them. Letting the kids go on there computer and listen to the lesson plans over and over again will prepare them for the class and will help them be more active in that days lesson plan. For those fast learners, they can work ahead. When the kids are able to be in a group with the same leveled kids that makes it easier to learn. I feel like more classrooms should do this because i know i like learn better when the teacher is specific and more hands on.
Why I Flipped My Classroom

Teaching in the 21st Century

After watching the videoTeaching in the 21st Century by Kevin Roberts, he believes you have to understand concepts and provide facts,content, formulas and other things. He goes on to say that students can learn some anywhere, anytime, Anyplace. The importance of the web is huge in kids life today. He says that we need to incorporate the tools that the kids already know how to use to learning. As a educator, I will have to adapt to my students and give them the best chance to learn. My biggest thing is to get the students to interact and engage in the classroom and im going to do whatever i can to make that happen.
Teaching in the 21st Century







Wednesday, September 19, 2012

Blog Assignment #4

1st Graders create there own Read-Along Audiobook

The video 1st Graders create there own Read-Along Audiobook was about first grade students creating a podcast on the book they read that day in class. The whole time throughout the podcast the teacher continued reading. By the time she was done reading the book she already had 10 scripts collected. Each student creating a podcast for different parts of the book. When they finished they listened to the podcast and followed along with it in the book. At the end of each chapter there is a distinct sound which lets the students know a new chapter is about to begin. Once the class was done with the book, the teacher had them write a few sentences about what they learned. The teacher loved it, she thought the students were so engaged and it really help them learn. I think this is a great way for kids to learn. Kids love to hear there and voice and when there doing something fun they are more into it, which makes them learn a little better.
Kids creating their own Audiobooks



Listening-Comprehension-Podcasting

This Blog Listening-Comprehension-Podcasting talks about how to actually understand words and make it part of your vocabulary. It says that in order to internalize a word, you have to hear at least seventy times and not just hear it actually the context the word is embedded in. It also says that when learning a word you want to attach and feeling you can to that particular word so you can remember it vividly. I think the recording and editing a podcast is pretty cool. The particular gives the learner so many different options. They can hear their voices,read the sound, sounds can be deleted as well as edited. They had Second Graders trying to learn Hebrew so they had them create a podcast on the class blog so they could show their parents. The story they were reading was called Purim. The students loved recording these podcasts because they got hear their own voices and try to learn this language better. Using podcast allowed the students to record sounds, re-listen to them and then try to present the story. Personally, i think this a great tool for young kids to learn language. When they hear it and interact with all these tools they have it makes it so much easier to learn.
Listening and Comprehending


Podcasting with First Graders

This podcast Podcasting with First Graders was a little different than the first two I read. The teachers way of using the podcast was pretty interesting. Like all the other posts these students were so excited to learn because they got to hear their own voices. This teacher had her students come up with question and answers about the book they just read. She interviewed both the boys and girls. The students more so excited to record their question outside the classroom while the rest of the class continued to read the book. The interaction between the students seemed awesome. These podcast got the students to actually process what they read. I think using these podcast is a great idea for younger kids. It opens up a whole new way of learning for these kids and they love it.
Podcasting with First-Graders

C4T

The two post I have read from Lisa Thumann have been pretty fun to read. She provides very good information. In here first post, she visited a school and wanted to present the Edcamp. She talked about how when she first walked in the students really didnt care about what she was saying. They asked "Will I Learn anything?" or "Do you have any Handouts?" But she prepared very well and presented what she wanted to very well. She reviewed everything and gave them fun ways to learn these steps. She got some really good responses afterwards, thanking her for such a great presentation.






Sunday, September 16, 2012

Blog Assignment 3

Peer Editing Tutorial

In the video,Peer Editing Tutorial,and the slide show Peer Editing SlideshowI feel like the video on Tutorial Peer Editing was very informative and helpful. I already knew how to peer edit but this made my knowledge of peer editing better. I also learned that there are three steps and that helps improving your peers paper. I found it very informative how you should always be positive when your critiquing someones work. I like that, because if someone peer reviewed my paper I would like that person to be positive as well. It also says, to always start of with positive comments and I love that idea. When someone puts all the hard work and time into a paper, they want to be told what they did right, not what they did wrong. Being positive encourages the writer to add things to their paper and make it the best paper possible. I also learned to give positive suggestions and when giving these suggestions be positive and specific. It is also very important to read through the whole paper or blog before you decide to make any corrections. So you have a complete understanding of the paper and not just a partial understanding.
In the video Writing Peer Review Top 10 mistakes, it was very helpful,because I find myself making these common mistakes while peer editing papers. One thing I got out of this video is that the person editing the paper should be more specific and not be broad. When people put things like this sentence "doesn't make sense", I feel like they should be more specific and actually tell them how to correct it. Another mistake people make while peer editing is rushing through the paper, instead of throughly reading the paper. Which ends up being no help to me ,because they did not put the time in to help me better my paper. Another mistake is when people get real defensive over people critiqing his or her paper. Instead of taking it in a negative manner, try to understand that they are just trying to help. I wish people could learn from these mistakes and become a better peer editor.
 Two girls peer editing a paper


Technology in Special Education

The video Technology in Special Education shows how technology can effectively help kids with special needs. These kids with these special needs arent able to function and learn quite like kids that don't have special needs and technology gives these kids the oppurtunity to learn and interact with their surroundings. The video showed that a kid that cant talk or communicate, can communicate while typing on the computer instead of communicating while talking. For example, Chris liked tying his words out because it helped him communicate with the teacher. Technology helps them to have experience in the real world. Another way technology helps it when the kids listen to the assignment on their I-Touch and it helps them follow along with what their doing in their book. Some kids are auditory learners rather than visual learners. This means kids pick up on things better that they hear rather than what they see. With this technology I feel like like it would make the kids more eager to learn.

If I ran a classroom with kids containing special needs there are several things I would do to help these kids improve their learning. For example, if I assigned a book in class, I would play the book on tape so they could follow along better rather than just trying to read. I would also get these kids to type the things I was saying so they could better understand it. If they couldn't understand a word or sentence I was saying, i would get them to type it out.
A special needs child using a laptop


How Ipads work for Academics with Autism

In the videoHow IPads work for Academics with Autism and after visiting the website Apple Education I picked the App Alphabyes, which I think would help kids with special needs tremendously. This App contains illustrations, sound effects and helpful hint options to help them learn their Alphabet. This will help kids learn words alot easier rather than just writing it down on paper. Rather than just being told they are wrong, this app will give them another try and continue to help them to learn these letters. This App gives a good visual effect and is a great learning tool for kids with disabilities.
 The IPad helping kids to learn more efficiently


Harness Your Students Digital Smarts

The video Harness Your Students Digital Smarts talks about technology can connect kids to the real world. This video shows that every kid can learn but everyone has a different way that they learn. Not every kid can learn by just lecture or pen and paper, some kids have to learn other ways and this video helps you realize that. She likes to teach kids how to use software and actually learn how to learn. It shows these kids how to learn and actually find ways to found out things by technology. Personally, I feel like this video is aweasome how technology can help these kids learn.
 Kids learning to use technology






Sunday, September 9, 2012

Assignment # 2 blog post

Mr. Wrinkle Wakes
You can check out this video at Mr. Wrinkle Wakes

The video Mr. Wrinkle Wakes by Mathew Needleman was quite interesting. There wasn’t much info provided in this video. Mr. Wrinkle woke up from a 100-year coma andcame to realize the world has changed. He saw people using computers, heard weird sounds and saw people talkingto each other thousands of miles away. He could not believe it. He saw people using oxygen masks and couldn’tbelieve these people were surviving because of these machines. He finally made his way to a school. He sat and watched the students take notesand listen to the teacher’s lectures for hours and he began to realize thatsome things haven’t changed even over 100 years.

The message I got from this videothat they need to improve technology in our school system. If we incorporated more technology in ourschools I feel like it would be easier for our kids to learn. For example, I feel like our industry isbooming because of the modern day technology and I feel like using moretechnology in schools would make it take off as well. Instead of the boring lectures and notetaking, I feel like as a school system, we need to make learning fun for thekids.

Did you Know? 3.0 - A John Strange 2012 Version

You can check this video out at Did You Know?

I watched the video did you know? 3.0 - A JohnStrange 2012 Version by John Strange and I found it to be very interesting.This video provided me with information I had prior knowledge of. It was veryinteresting to see how illiterate our country is. For example, 25% of India’s population hasstronger IQs then our entire country combined. India is so much more knowledgeablethan our kids because they learn more as a little kid. The more you learn as a kid, the more youcomprehend. I also thought it was veryinteresting that twenty-five percent of the kindergarteners that are in the topof there class become the honor students as they grow older.

The facts this video displayed about the Internet and our technology were quite fascinating. It is incredible to me to see how reliant people are on technology these days and a lot of people don’t know how to do work hard anymore. Thevideo showed how much Americans use Google and YouTube and that blew my mind how much time people spend on the computer. Text messaging is definitely a newfad in our world today. People rely so much on texting and have really lost all social skills. I feel like textmessaging is destroying our youth in a way, because they don’t know how to havea conversation anymore. I have seen thisbecome a problem because I have seen someone instead of dealing with a problemwith another student they text their response to the problem and the issue onlybecomes bigger. This video provided a lot of valuable information.I was very familiar with some of these topicsbut I was aware of the numbers of these subjects.

Sir Ken Robinson – The Importanceof Creativity


This video can be viewed atThe Importance of Creativity

The video of the importance ofcreativity by Sir Ken Robinson talks about the creativity in schools. One ofthe main focuses was that creativity is very important in schools but it is notfocused on nearly as much as literacy. As a student, I believe that havingcreativity is very important. It separates you from other students and makesthe students think outside the box instead of just reading straight from thebook. The video wants kids to be outgoing in conversation during class andwants them to interact even if they don’t know the correct answer. He tells us that a big problem we are havingin schools is kids are being educated out of creativity and it is said that weare born artists but we are not able to express it because we are taught out ofcreative minds.

He also talks about his move toAmerica. He talks about how similar the educational programs are. He feels likeart and music should be required courses just as math is. I don’t know how muchI agree with this because math is a subject that has to be a required coursebecause its going to help the kids in the real world. This video really talksabout education just being so plain and simple and not being diverse at all. People around the world are not being able toget jobs when their getting out of college because they do not have a master orPhD and need to go to more school, so they are resorting to video games andgiving up. Personally, I feel like all schools should have a diverse learningsystem so the kids have an opportunity to have a brighter future.

A Day Made of Glass

You can check this video out at A Day Made of Glass

Watching all of these videos kind of out some things into perspective. I think technology is all fine and dandy but I feel like it hurts our youth at the same time. Technology helps the industry andeducation tremendously. I think there could be more in our school system tohelp our kids learn more efficiently. The glass video also opened up my eyes to the technology to come. I feel like when the time comes for that type of technology our world is going to be simpler and more efficient. On the other side of the argument I feel likeit hurts our country to.

To an extent, I feel like technology is crippling our society. Like I said in a previous blog, I feel like text messaging is ruining kids communication and social skills. It also makes everyone so lazy. People rely so much on technology to take care of everything and people forget how to work hard and figure it out on you own. I think people still need to maintain thosehard working handy skills.