Blog Post Assignment #16 - Final Relfection

What My Future Classroom would be like

Describing The Classroom

My future classroom would be an oasis for learning. There will be a smartboard in the front of the room instead of a white board. Each student would have access to an ipad or a laptop. The walls would be decorated with math related items that are colorful and attractive. As soon as the students walk in, I want them to say, "This is going to be a fun and exciting class!" Instead of arranging the desks in rows, I would have them in a circle centered around my desk(in the middle).

The Types of Methods for Teaching

I would use several different methods for teaching my students. I will NOT stand up and lecture for 90 minutes a day, seven days a week. I will lecture when necessary, but the other times the students will be asked to teach their peers. I will use the smartboard to lecture and teach, and so will the students. I will also use online videos from different math teachers around the globe to give the students a different perspective on the lesson at hand. Also when the students do projects they will be required to teach the class on what they have learned by doing the project.

The tools that I will be Using in the Classroom

I have already mentioned a few tools that I would like to have and use in my classroom. I would love to have a smartboard to do lessons and presentations on. I think this gets the students involved because it is something different then sitting there listening to a teacher lecture through a lesson. I would also like my students to be able to use ipads and computers for research when they don't understand something from the material or if they question what I am teaching them. I would also use blogs so that the parents of my students can see what their students are doing in the classroom instead of having to rely on their children and I. I would allow calculators for some parts of the material, but not all.

The learning That Will Take Place in my Classroom

Not just the students will be learning in my classroom. I feel that if I am trying to get my students to learn, then I should be learning as well. I think that when you have a classroom that learns together then nothing is impossible. I think that if we learn as a unit then we will achieve great things. Also part of the learning will be collaborative. I would have my students apart of a "learning community", which means that every will have a part in the class's learning. In my classroom, if you don't want to learn then to bad. In my classroom, learning is a vital part of growing, and if you don't want to learn then you are telling me that you don't want to grow. Learning will be self inflicting. I mean that I want my students to want to learn for themselves and not take my word for it. I would want them to question me, and then go and research the answer.

What I would change about what I wrote at the Beginning of the Semester
First, I would change the fact about calculators. Although I was taught to hate calculators and that I should be able to do the math without them, I think that calculators can play a vital role in helping students understand why they got the answer they did. I don't think that they should be used in excessive, but as long as they are used in moderation to aide my students in their learning I will not have a problem with them. As Dr. Strange asked in class, "What do I think about calculators?" I said I hated them because I thought that they would hurt the student more than they would help. But then he asked, "Would you say the same thing about telling time?" I really didn't have an answer for that. I wear watches all the time, and I don't know how I would tell the time without pulling my cellphone out of my pocket to check. It's not like I could pull a sun dial out and check the shadow of the sun. No one uses those anymore so why should I expect my students to revert to past history if I do the same thing with telling time.
Another thing I would change is my teaching methods. I would still want my students to apply what they have learned to real world settings, but now I would want them to be able to learn on their own as well. I think that it is vital for my students to perfect this type of learning because who better to learn from then yourself. It is like the old saying goes, you will never learn unless you learn from your OWN mistakes. I believe this to be so true. You do not fully learn something unless you have tried and possibly failed for yourself. Also, I would add to this that I would want my students to be apart of the teaching process. I don't want to stand up in front of the class everyday lecturing each lesson and I know that my kids wouldn't either. I would want them to teach their peers on what they have learned from projects and presentations

Blog Post Assignment #11

Part 1: Little Kids...Big Potential

In the video, Little Kids...Big Potential, the students were really excited about the things that they were doing inside their classroom. They showed us all the different technologies they were using. The students know how to use blogger, skype, video-recordings, and much more. They even used their nintendo DS's. I thought that was really neat how they incorporated a video game into the classroom. I also thought this was interesting because there have been many debates about banning video games, and how they are such a distraction from school work. I thought that it was very cool to see a video game used as an educational tool.

Part 2: Skype Interview with Ms. Cassidy

She got involved in technology about ten years ago because she was given five computers. One of the main points that I want to talk about is that pen and paper are not appealing to children. These days, children are always in some sort of technology whether that be a video game, an ipad , or the computer. So Ms. Cassidy chose to have her students write on blogs on the internet. That way her students could get their ideas and thoughts seen by anyone with access to a computer and the internet. I think that this is a good way for students to get feedback from someone other than their peers (in the classroom) and their teacher. I think that this way motivates these students to want to do better and strive to do better. When they see that other people are viewing their blog posts and leaving comments, I think that gets them excited to want to do more.

C4T #4

Live the Conversation

Struggles

In this blog post, Becky Goerend talks about how she struggles with keeping her students social habits under control. Most days she feels like a broken record by the end of the day, so she asked herself and some colleagues of hers to come up with an idea to put that in her students hands. So she came up with an idea and decide that she would implement it into her classroom over the next several weeks.

My Comment:
Hi, I am a student in edm310 at the University of South Alabama. I like the fact that you are trying to engage your students to see what you could do about their behavior. I think that it is really important to bring to their attention the problems that their talking and lack of focus is doing to them and to the rest of the class. I really look forward to your next post. Turning it over to them - Success in the Making
In this blog post, Becky Goerend talk about a project that she had her students do. It was a project to define where they had the most trouble in behaving while learning. So that got together as a class and came up with a rubric and the areas where they had the most trouble in. Next, they set a goal to reach, and then for four days when it came time for those subject areas, she had two students each day assess the class and then collaborate together and report back to the class their findings. She continued this process for another couple weeks. Each week they set new goals and tried to go past them. Each week the students saw improvement.

My Comment:
"Hi, my is Chris Perry and I am a student in edm310 at the university of south alabama. I think that this project was a great idea. I think getting your students involved with their own assessing of themselves is an ingenious idea. It gets the students more involved in class, and keeps them focused on their work just as your data was and is showing."

C4T #3

What Now? What Next? So What?

In the blog, PaCT with the Devil, she talks about this new system that their education system is developing and trying to put in place. It is a system that is designed to categorize every student into different categories based on the number of years they have been taught and so fourth. She goes on to explain that you can't do this for every student because not every student is the same. She thinks that this new system will hurt many students more than it will help. So she just wishes that they would stop trying this new system and take a different approach to the problem. This is all happening in New Zealand. But let's think about it. Isn't this very same thing happening in our education system. Isn't that what standardized testing doing? I think so.

My Comment:
"Hi, I am a student in edm310 at the University of South Alabama in the United States. I agree with your blog. I don't think you can categorize every student. Each student is different and no two students are the same. So why are education leaders trying to make it this way. I have asked myself this question many times and I have yet to come up with the answer. I wish that these leaders would take a step back and give the teachers and the students the reigns since we are the ones in the classroom and are seeing what is going on."

Tears

In the second blog post I read. She talks about one of her students getting really excited about Arbor Day. She then goes on to talk about how she didn't get the chance to talk to him in class so she tweeted him. I was shocked to see students at that age already using twitter and facebook. I couldn't believe that children of that age could learn and understand how to use those technology tools, but some adults cannot. I thought it was amazing how she used those for of communications to talk to her students.
My Comment
"Hi, my name is Chris Perry and I am a student in edm310 at the University of South Alabama. I think that it is amazing that your students are so interested in a day such as Arbor Day. I know that many children in the United States are not. They think it is silly and unimportant. It is nice to know that there are still children out there that do care about our planet. Also I am shocked to see that your students know what facebook and twitter are. I did not think that they would have any knowledge about those things. The use of technology can go a long way if used in the proper setting."

Blog Post Assignment #14

The Blog Post that Dr. Strange FORGOT!

Read Bellman Receives T3 Leadership Award for Creative Technology in the Classroom.
Summarize the article and then tell what you could learn from Allan Bellman.

What can I learn from Mr. Allan Bellman?

In the article, Bellman receives T3 Leadership Award for Creative Technology in the classroom, the author, Jerra A. Scott gives us a little background into who Mr. Allan Bellman is. He taught for 35 years in the state of Maryland, and then moved to the University of Mississippi. There he began to work with T3 development team to help develop the TI calculators that we now have today. He wanted to help create something that would help give his students a deeper knowledge into the material. He also incorporated this new technology into his lesson plans in hopes of challenging his students to use technology. Throughout his career at Ole Miss, he used many different activities to help his students understand the material. He used toy cars to race them down the halls, the popular video game "Angry Birds", and even a barbie doll bungee course to help relate mathematics and physics to everyday objects. He hopes to inspire his students that want to become teachers, to continue with this type of method when they start teaching.
I think that Mr. Bellman would be an awesome teacher to have. I believe that if he can relate those items to mathematics and physics, why can't I? Throughout this class, I have always wondered how I was going to incorporate technology and project based learning into math. But, after reading this article I realized that if you think outside the box from normal everyday teaching then you can engage your students to things and objects from outside the classroom. I mean really who wants to sit in a classroom all day and listen to some know-it-all lecture to you. I know I don't, so why would I expect my future students to do the same. But if I incorporated some of these new-found ideas into my lesson plan, then I think I would see a change in attitudes from my students. I think that my students would rather enjoy coming to my class then dread the awful subject of math.

Project #16 - Prezi Presentation

Blog Post Assignment #15

ICurio After watching the interview session with Dr. Strange and Anthony Capps, I learned quite a few things that I did not know about iCurio. ICurio has several different features to the program. The first is that it is a curated search engine, to allow students to safely search the web and find videos, music, and texts for their projects that they might be working on. The next feature is that iCurio allows you to store your information that you may have found that would be useful for your project. So you can create folders and then drop your items into those folders. The last feature that Anthony talked about was the timeline. You can go into iCurio and search for specific people from a specific place and a specific time period. It is almost kind of like a directory. But, I thought this program will be a great tool for students to use in the classroom as well as outside of the classroom.
Discovery Ed. After watching the interview between Dr. Strange and Anthony Capps, I feel like I have learned a lot about Discovery Ed. One great thing about Discovery Ed. is that you can use this program to add to your lesson and/or text. They say that a picture is worth a thousand words, well then I guess a video is worth a million. Anyway you can keep your students engaged in the lesson and have them retain the information, then I don't think we should be opposed to using that method. I think that Discovery Ed. is a great tool and I want to do some more research to discover more for myself. The Anthony-Strange Tips for Teachers Part 1
In the video, Dr. Strange and Anthony Capps discussed a few ideas to be a great teacher and the steps you need to take. These steps are:

Be a great learner to be a great teacher.



Be flexible, The Unexpected will happen.



Teaching Never ends it is hard work and it is very rewarding.



Engage 100% of your students 100% of the time in 100% of their projects.



Reflect, Revise, Share work with an audience.

I think that these are all great things that everyone who is aspiring to be a teacher should set as their goals every time they step into a classroom. I know I cannot wait until I watch the second part of the video series so that we can finish the list and that way I always have something to work towards and remind me of what it means to be a great teacher.

Use Tech- Don't teach it - Sherri Hudson

Interview with Anthony Capps Dr. John Strange directed a podcast with third grade teacher of Gulf Shore Elementary Anthony Capps. Not only is Anthony Capps a third grade teacher, but he is a good friend of EDM310. They talked about two educational search engines throughout two videos, iCurio Anthony 070113 and Discovery Ed Anthony 070113. One search engine is called iCurio, and it allowed Mr. Capp's students to safely search the Common Core Standards. The other is called Discovery Ed. The search engine iCurio allows students to access the account. There is a feature that allows the students to pick up where they left off. They can search by criteria, and if there is an abrupt disruption iCurio lets the students pick up where they left off. Students with disability can have the text read to them. After listening to Anthony Capps I understood that Discovery Ed is much like iCurio. It does have a feature where a student can watch a video that matches the criteria that they have research. Dr. Strange said that our generation is "listen-watchers" which means we learn through visuals. Because it's more like a hands-on project, I think iCurio and Discovery Ed is a good addition to the classroom. According to Use Tech--Don't Teach ItMr. Capps, "technology shouldn't be a list of things to do." He stressed that technology made executing the curriculum or lesson plan easier. His lesson plan didn't consist of teaching the technology either. He suggest that we allow students to figure it out independently. For example, his students rapidly learned iMovie. While they learned the technology, they made mistakes. He recommended giving them time for the reflecting over their mistakes since nobody is perfect. When the students ask questions about using the technology that is incorporated into the assignment they learn two 21 century skills. PROBLEM SOLVING and QUESTIONING. I learned that iCurio and Discovery Ed are very vital for the classroom, but most importantly I learned to let students learn technology by themselves.



It's Hard Work:A Day In The Life of a Third Grade Teacher - Tonya Murphy

Blog Post # 15 The first video I watched was iCurio. This video was a conversation between Dr. Strange and a previous EDM310 student, Anthony Capps. Anthony is a 3rd grade teacher at Gulf Shores Elementary in Baldwin County. Anthony talked about the important tools that iCurio have to offer. iCurio enables students to begin learning the basics of storing things in folders. This allows students to begin organizing things early in life. Another point he brought up about iCurio is if for some reason the students had to leave what they were doing in a hurry, when they came back, they could just pick up where they left off. I think the best thing about iCurio that was mentioned in the video is the fact that all the information is filtered to the appropriate grade level.

The next video I watched was about DiscoveryED. In this video Dr. Strange and Anthony Capps were discussing the facts about this useful tool that is used in the classroom today. One of the main facts that were brought up is, with DiscoveryED, the students are able to get a video with the topics that they are searching for.

The last video I watched was, It’s Hard Work: A Day in the Life of a 3rd Grade Teacher. In this video conversation between Dr. Strange and Anthony Capps, they discussed the downside of being a teacher. Anthony tells us that in the beginning, until October, he was spending 16 hours a day Monday through Friday working. On weekends he would spend about 8 hours a day. In October, he began to get exhausted and cut his days down to 10 hour days and began to hate his job, because he wasn’t able to find time to finish his work. He said that during this time he would go home and mark “yes” or “no” on the calendar. He did this because at the end of the year, he would add them up and that would be the deciding factor as to whether or not he would work the next year. In November, after talking to some of the other teachers, he was about to balance out his work schedule and began liking his job again. He also told us that teaching needs to be a hobby and is not for everyone. He explained that his work does not stop at the end of the school year. In order to be a good teacher, you must take the summer to begin planning for the next year.

Project #8 - Book Trailer

PLN #2 - Final Summary

It has been a long semester and I have found it difficult to keep track of all the new applications that we are learning to use. But when I started using Symbaloo, I realized that I could use this program to keep up with all of these applications. I have used this application on many occasions. Whenever I couldn't find the right application that I need for a particular project or assignment then I would always turn to my symbaloo webmix. It keeps all my favorite applications neat and organized. On my webmix, I have each application color coded so that they would be even more organized. I think that this is a great tool for teachers and students to use. I know I will continue to use this application throughout the rest of my college career and my teaching career.

Smartboard Project Part B

Project #15

Blog Post Assignment #13

Salman Khan: Let's Use Video to Reinvent Education

I watched the video, Let's use video to reinvent education by Salman Khan, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. He starts off by telling us how he came about making these youtube videos that he has done. He started it by doing these videos to help his nephews learn math. He did not make these videos private and very soon he started getting comments from other people telling him how these videos helped them. So soon after that he decided to quit his job and focus only on these youtube videos. His organization is a non-profit organization.
In his video, he talks about humanizing the classroom. What he means by this is getting the students that are watching these videos and working on these problems in the program are now learning at their own pace and then going and tutoring their peers. Now instead of the students going to class listening to a one size fits all lecture, they can watch these videos at their own pace and as many times as they need to until they understand the lesson they are trying to learn. In the program you can work many different types of problems, any where from basic mathematical problems to vector calculus. This program is designed to help you master each step along the way so you do not miss any important details as you go along in math.
I think that we can learn from Salman Khan is that students shouldn't have to learn in a setting of a one size fits all lecture. I think that students if are given the chance to explore and learn for themselves, then they will surprise all of us. Also if the students can learn to master the lessons on their own and then come back to the classroom and help other students who are struggling is less intimidating, then having a teacher come to them and not understanding why they are not getting it. I think that if we incorporate outside instruction and supplement from someone besides the students teacher, then when they get back in the classroom with the teacher they will be more prepared for what the teacher has in store for them.

Education in the Slums - Sherri Hudson

From Ken Robinson's ten favorite Ted Talks, I watched the video Education Innovation in the Slums that was conducted by Charles Leadbeater. I learned that any child can learn through technology. During his lecture he empathized the drive that children living in the Rio and Kibera slums possess to better themselves with education. The children in those slums went to research centers and locations where computers were in the wall and willingly taught themselves information. Two thousand games were designed to teach the children, and they were gathered to sit in a circle to answer a question. Most of the children didn't have living parents, and the ones that did have parents had dying parents. Those living in those conditions believed "education plus technology equals hope" Mr. Leadbeater says that "motivation is the key," and I believe that motivation kept the children from giving up. The conclusion: Let children be attracted to their education. If we make radical teaching more possible then more ideas are developed to improve the future! Think about what Mr. Leadbeater discovered about education from the slums. I believe American children have a lot to learn from children in the slums. They can learn drive, dedication, and gratefulness for the new aged tools and assistance they have. I learned to attract my students to my lesson. I can ask quality, open- ended questions such as "how" or "why." From there I want them to control what they learn next.

"To This Day"...for the bullied and beautiful - Tonya Hudson I watched the video, Shane Koyczan: “To This Day”...for the bullied and beautiful. WOW! What a powerful video. This video brings to life the reality of bullying in the classrooms and in the hallways. This video brought me to tears. The age that bullying starts amazes me. How can children be so mean.! As teachers of these young children, we need to tell our students every day, “you are beautiful.” We need to uplift our students to compensate for the tearing down that the other students may be doing. We need to find a way to constantly be trying to build the confidence of our students. Being a teacher shouldn’t only be about teaching. We have to love on our students as well. I know there are boundaries in school, but we have to find a way to let the students know that they are loved and cared for. We as teachers need to let our students know that we chose to be teachers because we love children and we love them. We didn’t become teachers just because we love to teach reading and writing. In his poem he said to look in the mirror and see something beautiful and if you don’t see it look a little longer. We need to help children find beauty in themselves. Children are so influential. If they are constantly hearing you are nothing and you are worthless they begin to believe it. As I said earlier, we need to counteract this and help these children discover their beauty and talents. Show them that they are worth something. I did a little research and according to bullyingstatistics.org, 42 percent of kids have been bullied online. 77 percent of children have said that they were bullied. “The American Justice Department bullying statistics show that one out of every 4 kids will be bullied sometime throughout their adolescence.” As a parent this is appalling. What is wrong with children today. Something has to be changed. Koyczan mentioned that he tried to take his own life. This breaks my heart. According to bullyingstatistics.org, “10 to 14 year old girls may be at even higher risk for suicide, according to the study above.” These are babies! What I got from this video is bullying is real. We as adults and as teachers have a responsibility to educate these children on the effects of bullying. I remember bullying was around when I was in school. I am sure it has been around forever. I don’t ever remember a teacher educating us on bullying or trying to talk to us about it. We need to do that.

Blog Post Assignment #12

What can we learn from Sir Ken Robinson I watched the video, How to Escape Education's Death Valley, and Sir Ken Robinson talked about how the education system is very different here in America. He started with the no child left behind act. He stated that in reality that we are leaving children behind by following this act. He gave three principles to bettering our education system. The first principle is human beings are naturally diverse and different. There are no two children alike. So he asks why do we set up our education system to treat them as such. Sir Ken Robison said that children prosper best when they are introduced to a broad curriculum. The second principle is that children are curious. Children are natural learners. They thrive on wanting to know more information then what they already know. He states that curiosity is the engine for learning. So we have to ask ourselves whether or not we are teaching our children to be more curious when learning something new. Are we provoking them to want to learn more? Teaching is the lifeboat of the school. Teachers are also there to mentor, provoke, stimulate and engage students into learning. Sir Ken Robinson states, "If there is no learning then there is no education." I found this to be a rather curious statement. I said to my self, How can there be no education without learning? Then it hit me, if we as teachers are not engaging our students to want to learn for themselves; then they will not and cannot learn. If they do not learn then we cannot say that we are educating them. Therefore I do not think that we can call ourselves educators. The role of the teacher is to facilitate that learning. Sir Ken Robinson also stated that standardize test should support learning not obstruct it. I could not agree more. Students do not need to wake up dreading going to school in fear of a standardize test. They should be waking up saying that I am ready to learn something new today. The third principle is that human life is creative. We are creatures that want to develop new things everyday. Our minds should not have limits placed on them. If we give our students the reigns and sit back and let them create something, I think they will arise to the challenge and surprise us all.

I think that we can learn a lot from Sir Ken Robinson. He is a great and knowledgeable man that knows a lot about education and how children learn. I think if we stop putting pressure on our students to prepare for these so called standardize tests and start putting more emphasis on the learning of the material, I think that we will start seeing our dropout rate decline. The students that are dropping out are costing us more in money then keeping them in school. If we work harder to keep our students in school and give those students who are struggling the help that they need we will see a rise in our economy.

I FAVOR CREATIVITY, NOT CONFORMITY- Sherri Hudson

Ken Robinson Says Schools Kill Creativity and is he lying? No, he is not lying. Last semester, I learned that school is designed to convert students into conformed, manageable citizens and not engaged, creative learners. I've read articles from various authors that make the same argument. Children who grow up in front of the television or with their noses in books are used to having an imagination something compelling--something they can't resist enjoying. Creativity.

Creativity is as important as literacy," says Mr. Robinson. In his video, he passionately lectured in favor of creativity in the classroom because the children are our future, destined to live in an unpredictable future. How can our children surive the future without creative alternatives? They can if our schools keep striping them away. History is ordained to repeat.

As teachers we have to promote creativity. I learned from Ken that I should let my English students express their imagination because those with great, creative minds are the ones that drive the future. I want my classroom to be the place where it happens.


Changing Education Paradigms- Tonya Murphy

I watched the video, Changing education paradigms. This was a presentation given by Sir Ken Robinson. The presentation was animated with drawings of the things he was talking about throughout his video. He started the video out by stating that all countries are reforming public educations for two reasons. The first reason is the economy. He asked the question,” How do we educated our children to take their place in the economies of the 21st century?” The second reason in culture. He asked the question, “ How do we educate our children so that they have a sense of cultural identity, so that we can pass on the cultural genes of our communities? Robinson said the way they are trying to achieve these things are by doing what they have done in the past. By doing this, they are alienating millions of children who do not see the point in going to school. One reason students do not see the necessity of an education is because graduating college no longer guarantees a job. Sir Ken Robinson also talked about ADHD and stated that it is NOT an epidemic. He said that the farther East you travel in the U.S. the worse the diagnosis gets. He stated that children are being medicated to sit still and listen to boring stuff and I agree with this. I believe that ADHD exists, but if education was a little more interesting, maybe children would not have to be medicated. Many students only receive their medication while in school and during the summer, their parents take them off. The reason we have to medicate our students in school is because there is no stimulation in the classroom. My son can play educational games and watch educational movies and give it is undivided attention, but he gets in trouble in class because he can’t sit and focus on the teacher. He also made a point that we are anaesthetizing out kids instead of awakening them to what is inside themselves. I agree, we wouldn’t have to medicate as often if at all, if the classroom was an enjoyable place to be.I think the classroom should use technology to teach. Our children are growing up in the times of advancing technology. They are bored unless they have some form of technology or something hands on in front of them. Why not take advantage of that? Robinson also asked the question, Why are students classified by age? I agree! Why can’t students advance in their own time? Why can’t education be individualized? Why can’t students advance at their own pace?

Project #14 PLN #2

Project #13 PBL Lesson Plan #1 - Collaborative

Blog Post Assignment #10

Learning from Randy Pausch



"Anything is possible through dreams." - Dr. Randy Pausch

After watching the video, Randy Pausch Last Lecture: Achieving Your Childhood Dreams, I felt in awe of what a great teacher would look like. I do not mean his physical appearance, but what he did through out his life to inspire and motivate students who were just like him and had childhood dreams. Dreams are what motivates us as we go along in life achieving our other dreams. I think that Dr. Randy is an amazing example of what it takes to change lives as an educator. In the video he goes on to talk about several of his childhood dreams and how he went about achieving them. Some of them were silly, while others were to pursue further into his career. Throughout his into speech/presentation, he had this picture of a brick wall. He used this picture as a metaphor, and says, "Brick Walls are there to see how badly we want things. It also lets us show our dedication." At first when he kept showing this image, I was confused as to what he was implying. After watching the video I realized that there is always going to be a brick wall standing in front of you, but if you are determined to break that brick wall then you need to keep trying and never give up. Randy went on to teacher for ten years and got to do all these amazing things in his lifetime. But the one achievement that he was most proud of was his creation on the ETC(Entertainment Technology Center) masters program. This was his "baby" so to speak. He was very proud of creating this along with a man named, Don Marinelli. The two were complete opposites, but they meshed well together. He went on to talk about some of the projects that his students did and it became a sensational exhibit when shown on campus.



"Experience is what you get when didn't get what you wanted." - Dr. Randy Pausch

I learned a few things from watching this amazing man talk for a short hour. First, I learned that we as educators cannot be afraid to be different or try new things. If we don't attempt to try new things then how will we as educators learn. If we are afraid of learning and trying new things then how can we expect our students to want to learn as well. Yes we might have our critics, but one thing the Dr. Pausch said was to listen to those critics because believe it or not they are the ones who still care for you. If we are constantly doing things the wrong way and nobody is telling us then we have a serious problem. The next thing that I learned from watching this video is that we need to start teaching with the "Head Fake". Dr. Pausch used this method and he succeeded with it, so why not put that method into our lower level teaching such as High School and Elementary. I think that if you can have your students learn without knowing that they are learning then they will retain more information then taking them through a boring lecture in class.

Are you a Tigger or an Eeyore Teacher?

Project #9 Podcast

Project #12 Smartboard part A

Project #10 Green Screen Movie

Blog Post Assignment #9

C4T #2

Negative Times A Negative

In the latest blog post on Dan Meyer's blog, he talks about how we can numerically quantify a negative times a negative integer in real world applications. He was at a conference in California and one of his colleagues asked this question,"How can we quantify a negative time a negative integer in real world applications?" He thought it was a good idea to pose this question on twitter and see what other people had to say about this topic. Within the first day he received over 100 tweets answering this question. He went on to talk about two different techniques that can create two very different classrooms and two very different teachers. I was perplexed by the idea so here is what I said to him:
As an aspiring teacher in mathematics I agree with Rebecca and Brian. I don't think we should limit ourselves to just one idea through a unit. I think to say that, "because you need this.." and "because it's possible..", you can not limit that to one lesson or one point. I think that in order to develop curiosity among students both principles should not be chosen as an either/or situation.

[Makeover] Checkerboard Border
In this blog post Dan Meyer, he discusses an idea of showing students a picture of a checkerboard border for a few seconds. After he has shown them, he asks them to make a guess of how many blue squares are in the checkerboard. They don't have to be right, they just need to make a guess. He suggests to them to make an extremely high guess and an extremely low guess. Then he gives them some smaller checkerboards to recreate on their own. Next, he tells them that the smaller checkerboard has 88 blue tiles. So, then he brings their attention back to the big checkerboard border. So some of his students might try to derive equations to figure out the number while others might apply the first method that they used. Then he tells them that the big checkerboard has 408 blue tiles. So he then asks the students to reveal their guesses and the student with the closest guess gets one clap.

My Comment:
"Hi, I am a edm310 student at the University of South Alabama and I agree with you. I think if you give students something easy to start with and get them engaged, then by the end of it once you deliver the “hard part of the problem” they will have already invested a lot of time so they will work harder to finish. I think that if you start out with the hard part then most f your students will give up without even trying to solve the problem."

Blog Post Assignment #8

What can I learn about teaching and learning from Brian Crosby

In the video, Back to the Future, Mr. Brian Crosby tells us about how he gets his class of multicultural and at risk students to learn using project based learning. He starts off by telling us about his class and how more than half of his students could not tell you what city they lived in, or what country they lived in. Then he goes on to tell us about how he uses technology to gain the interest of his class. In his class they have a ratio of 1:1 with laptops in the classroom. He uses these laptops to allow his students to connect all over the world with other students. All of his students have a blog and allows them to think out of the box a little bit. He then goes on to talk about a balloon project that they did. The students did several activities to prepare for the balloon launch. He requires them to blog about what they had to do and they also post videos from the activities that they did. They also had to create a wiki page, and stories about if they were the balloon. They have a class flickr account. The students also made stratocards with their high hopes that they wanted for their life. Finally, they sent up their balloon. They built their own payload to send up all their stuff.

I think that Mr. Crosby is a great teacher and is a great example of how PBL can motivate students to want to grasp a deeper knowledge of the material that they need to learn. What can I learn from this is that teaching is not about giving students "busy work" and hoping that they grasp all the concepts from that work. I think that teaching is about making the students learn for themselves and from their peers around them. I think by doing projects that allow students to be interactive with each other and other students around the world, gives the students more motivation to learn and want to know more about a subject. Sometimes learning can be boring and tough to do by yourself. But, if you incorporate others into that learning process then each person may gain a deeper knowledge into the material. Learning is not about tests and grades. Learning is about understanding the material and then being able to use that knowledge to perform in real world tasks. As educators we have to understand that not everybody learns at the same pace or at the same level, so we have to create a curriculum that adapts to every student so that the students can thrive and succeed later in life.

Making Thinking Visible - Tonya Murphy

I watched the video Making Thinking Visible. This is a video made by Mark Church. Church wants his students to engage in small groups to perform a certain task. His students watched a video and Mark Church wants the students to come up with a headline capturing what the search for human origin is about. The students get in their small groups discuss the project and write down their headline. Church explains that he is going to display the headlines in the classroom. After two weeks he wants to show the students how much their thinking has changed and progressed. I think this is an awesome assignment for a couple of reasons. It challenges the students to work in a group and come to an agreement on the headline. The headline has to be one sentence, so it challenges them to think and be creative. Also, I think the idea of showing the children their progressive way of thinking is the best part. I think as teachers we should allow the student’s to see their progress. That would also be a way to know, as a teacher, if we are teaching students what they need to know. I believe that at the beginning of the semester the students should be given an assignment to show their starting point in the class. Then at the end of the semester give a similar assignment and show the students their progression.

Blended Learning Cycle - Sherri Hudson

I watched Mr. Paul Andersen's Youtube video about the Blended Learning Cycle. Blended learning is a combination of learning with mobile phones, the internet, and being in a classroom. The learning cycle is consisted with engaging, exploring, expanding, explaining with a posed question. All of this inspires the "blended learning cycle."Mr. Andersen claimed that he strayed from what he knew--the power of the question. One thing I can learn from him is letting the students be more in control of their learning. Mr. Andersen began his class with an interesting phenomenon. For example he presented a metallic disk continuously and mysteriously spinning a mirror. When teaching with a posed question we have to be ready to do the following:

Investigate/inquire

Video

Elaborate

Review

Give a Summary quiz

We can learn that teaching is difficult because you have to entice the students. The best way to do that is to put effort in showing the students something new. We have to teach them in a fashion we'd like to learn in. Lecturing is boring and that's what I learned from Mr. Andersen's video.

Progress Report #1- PLN

I chose to use Symbaloo, to start my Personal Learning Network (PLN). So far I have figured out how to change the background and the colors of the tiles. I have also learned how to add different apps and how to create my own even though the site may not have it. I have incorporated serveral of the different social media tools that I use on a daily basis, as well as some different apps. to share with others and myself on things that I enjoy. I find it interesting in that using this site is a great way to stay organized and allows you to share with others what you like and they may also find interesting.

Blog Post Assignment #7

Assistive Technologies

Doing this assignment I had no idea what kind of technologies were out there to help with students and their disabilities. I found this assignment to be challenging, and difficult. So the only thing I could think of was to make a phone call to my mom, who is a math teacher at my old high school. I asked about some of the things that they might be using to help with these students. She told me about a few that they had in place and so that gave me an idea of where to start looking.

So I started my research and found that there are numerous technological devices, and apps to help with all kinds of disabilities. One that I found most interesting was a software called Mathtalk. In this software you can write out a problem using your voice and it will input it into the computer. Also this software makes the need for parents to write out these math problems null, if your child/student is blind. Also within this software, it allows the student to print their work in braille, so they can read it and check it to make sure there are no errors within their work. I just thought that this software was the neatest and interesting "new to me" tool to help those students that are blind. Within the website I found several demo videos explaining and showing how to do each different type of math problem that you may encounter. I would definitely like to use this tool if I was lucky enough to have a blind student in my class. I was fortunate to have a blind classmate when I was going to high school, and I was amazed at how her other developed senses allowed her to learn differently than the rest of the class. it might be difficult or more work to have a blind student, but I think that it would be very interesting to learn through his/her method. I want to teach high school math and with this software you can do several types of mathematical problems from, algebra to calculus and more. Click here to view examples of different problems, and commands using mathtalk.

Assistve Technologies for the Classroom- Tonya Murphy

Assistive Technology in the Classroom The two most amazing forms of assistive technology I found were the FaceMouse and the Sip-and-Puff Systems. Both of these programs are for students that struggle with mobility. The FaceMouse uses the webcams as a computer mouse. Different movements of the head and different facial expressions will operate different commands on the computer. The Sip-and Puff Systems uses a student’s breath to operate a mouthstick which according to this site is similar to a joystick. I located this information on the website 8 Helpful Assistive Technology Tools for Your Classroom. If available, I would definitely use these programs in my classroom. This would give the students that feeling of independence of not having to rely on help all of the time. I also watched the video on the ipad using voice over designed for the blind. This would be a very useful tool in the classroom. It would give the student a little bit of independence by being able to find things he/she may be looking for without having to get constant help. The ipad seemed hard to use. It wouldn’t do some of the things he was trying to show to the audience. This could have been because he was going too fast trying to get all the information covered in a short amount of time, but what he did cover seemed helpful. Audio books were available on the ipad which is a great tool because you can get the textbooks on an audiobook for the blind as well.

Assistive Technology in the Classroom- Sherri Hudson

Assistive Technologies for Classrooms In the video, Assistive Technologies for Vision and Hearing Impaired Children the instructors gave their students the opportunity to identify, explore, investigate, question, and interact with their environment using customized learning. Text to speech Text telephones Cameras Screen magnifiers Interacting calculator Another assistive tool is the Mountbatten, a technology for the blind that is designed for audio and tactile feedback. It can receive files from computers as well as save them to computers. The assistive technology for the blind and hearing impaired reminded me that I have to teach English, a form of a communication class. When they write papers I can tell them to use Purdue Owl or Son of Citation Machine to check their works cited page. In Microsoft office there is spell/grammar check, and it will definitely help my students. Dictionaries and thesauruses come in handy too, but there is nothing better than a reference website to help my students know the literary jargon. Glossary of Literary Terms My eleventh grade English teacher read our papers, found common mistakes, and posted them in a Powerpoint for the whole class to see each others' epic fails. When I passed his class I found out he did that to be slightly funny, but mostly to let us learn from each other mistakes. It actually worked. When I'm an English teacher I'll do the same and I'll need a laser pointer to present my students' out of place commas.

Blog Post Assignment #6

What do we need to know about asking questions to be an effective teacher?



The Right Way to ask Questions in the Classroom

In Ben Johnson's blog, The Right Way to Ask Questions in the Classroom, he wonders whether or not students fully understanding the concepts that we as teachers are teaching them. He brings up the point, that sure all of us teachers ask the question, "Does everyone understand?" Most teachers then wait for an answer and if none of their students speak up then they will move on to the next topic. But Johnson asks what if the students don't speak up because they don't know if they don't understand something if the don't understand what they don't understand. So how can we as educators ask such a broad question and expect to get an answer back if we don't know that the students don't understand enough to be able to ask a question about something that they don't understand? So he goes on to talk about a study that he did. In this study he followed a first grader, a third grader, a fifth grader, a sixth grader, and a ninth grader. He followed them to all the classes and came up with the same result for every one of them. He discovered that some of the students went a whole day sometimes even weeks, or months without answering a single question. So I ask, how can we as teachers expect our students to answer these questions when in fact they might know or understand what we are trying to teach them. So at the end of his blog he proposes a simple solution to this problem. He starts explain a method that has been developed by Mary Bud Rowe, and her method is for teachers to ask a simple question, pause for at least three seconds, and then call on a student. That way the whole class is thinking of the answer to that question. Then after that student has been called on the rest of the class can breath a sigh of relief for the moment until you pose another question and repeat the cycle.

Three Ways to Ask Better Questions in the Classroom

In Maryellen Weiner's blog, Three Ways to Ask Better Questions in the Classroom, she proposes three ways to ask better questions in the classroom. The first way is to prepare questions before teaching the subject matter to your students. In this way you can make your questions be more clear and precise. Have you ever had a teacher ask a random question in the middle of lecture and you weren't quite sure what they were trying to ask? I know I have, and then you spend the rest of the class trying to figure out what they really wanted to know, meanwhile the teacher has moved on from the question and the rest of the lecture. Before you know the lesson is over and you missed vital information because you were thinking about that one question. Well in this first step if we as educators take the time to prepare our questions then we will not leave our students doing the same thing. The next step is to play with the question. This could be putting it in a powerpoint, or writing on the board and leaving it unanswered until the end of class. Or you could ask a question and then put your students in groups and allow them to come up with different possible solutions before deciding on what is the right solution. The third and final step is to preserve good questions. In this step you can take the questions that your students ask and save them later. So say you have a student ask a good question in your first class and then you can save that question for your next class and say something like, one of my students in the fist class asked me about this, and propose the idea to the second class.

We need to know all there is in knowing how to ask the right question. Asking the right question can promote collaborative learning and innovative thinking. So to do this we need to better prepare ourselves before hand of the questions we want to ask so that when we are teaching we don't just randomize our questions in the middle of the lecture. Radom questions lead to random answers which just confuse everyone in the process.

My Sentence Videos

My Sentence is...



My Passion is...

Blog Post Assignment #5

Langwitches, Podcasting with 1st Grade

In the blog, Podcasting with 1st Grade, she let the class listen in on what some students in the second grade did with their podcast. A lot of the students took great interest in what they had done. So they decide as a class that they wanted to do their own podcast. One of the reasons they gave was because the students wanted to get their "own voices in someone else's computer or ipod." I think that it is great that first graders are so interested in the technology that is out there. She goes on to describe the process that she took to create the podcast with the students. The students had a lot of input into what the script would like. She goes on to tell that the students that were shy came out of their shell, and that she was amazed at how cooperative and attentive they were while doing the podcast. Some of the skills that they learned while doing the podcast was listening, speaking, presenting, voice acting, comprehension, and more. After reading this blog, I was amazed at how first graders can accomplish such a big task. So I said to myself that if they can do it, then surely college age students can most certainly figure out and should know how to do it.

Langwitches, Flat Stanley Podcast

In the blog, Flat Stanley Podcast, another first grade class got inspired by their fellow first grade classmates that they too wanted to create their own podcast. So the teacher gave them an assignment to do for their podcast. So to start the assignment they took the book they were reading, Flat Stanley by Jim Brown, and sent paper copies to their relatives and friends around the country and received feedback and stories. So as a class they decided to brainstorm some ideas about what they wanted to put into they podcast. Their homework was to pick a location and borrow a book from the library or research that location on the internet, and they were to include:

The location (City, State, Country, and/or Continent)
How did they get there (transportation)?
What did they do at that location?
How did they get back home?

They were also given a reminder that this was an audio recording and they needed to be thinking about what sound effects that they were going to need to make the story come alive.

The Benefits of Podcasting in the Classroom

In the video, The Benefits of Podcasting in the Classroom, it discusses the benefits of podcasting within the classroom. Podcasting enhances the students ability to learn, and comprehend the lesson given to them. It also allows for students that have been out sick for a while to stay on top of their studies and not have so much work to make up when they do return to school. I know going throughout my college career that I have be sick for a couple of days and it is hard to try and keep up in the class when you have missed vital information during those days that I was out. Podcasting in the classroom focuses on the Bloom's Taxonomy, which allows for more creativity and innovation. Podcasting is easy to upload the internet, and allows the student and parents to listen in on what is going on within the classroom. In the video the ask the students what they think about podcasts. The students say that they enjoy the podcast because it the sound effects bring the stories to life, parents like it because they know that the children aren't always listening to just music.

C4T #1 Post #1

The Do You Know Blue Student Prizewinner

In his blog he talks about a middle school student in california that competed in a math competition that when she first started the competition she was ranked 33rd, but by the time she finished she had won the entire competition. he didn't really go into too much detail about the competition, which would have been nice, but he did included an excerpt from the article which he found the information from. After the competition he sent her class a pizza party in her name.

In Response to Mr. Meyer's Blog

Hey, my name is Chris and I am in a edm 310 class at the University of South Alabama, and I am a little confused about what you are trying to say. But at the end when you said that no body beat that, is that implying that she won the competition that that student was in? But it is great to see that the younger generation is getting into mathematics. When i was going through school it seemed like no body wanted to take any math courses and they didn't see the point in taking the math courses.

Project # 3 Presentation

Blog Post Assignment #4

Google Chromebook

What's one machine that can keep all your documents, files, and friends all together and allows you to share them instantly and easily? It is built and designed like a MacBook, but is an eighth of the price. That would be the Samsung Google Chromebook. This computer comes automatically with built in apps that allow you to collaborate freely with your friends. It comes with Google drive for sharing documents, as well as Google Play for listening or downloading music, and has a built in photo editor and media player to watch your friend's movies or your own. The Chromebook allows you to keep all these apps in one place and will keep everything organized for you. Do you remember the days when you were looking for that document or file and you couldn't find it. Well no Chromebook easily will find it for you, and keep it stored right where you left it. Do you have multiple children, or adults needing the same computer? Well no problem with the Chromebook. You can have multiple users on this computer and have no problem with someone downloading unwanted apps onto your account. Viruses and other "nasties" are all taken care of with the state of the art virus protection plans. This state of the art computer is light only weighing 2.4 pounds, so you can take it anywhere and not be bogged down by weight of carrying a heavier laptop. You don't even have to carry your charger with you because the battery life on this computer is 6.5 hours. Do you have trouble remembering that website you always visit, not a problem for the Chromebook. Now this computer will start downloading that webpage you visit often as soon as you start typing in the url address. Tired of waiting on that slow boot-up time of your old computer. Well now with the new Chromebook, it boots up in less than ten seconds.

Now I know you are asking yourself, "Where can I get one of these awesome machines?", and "How much is this new device going to set me back?" Actually they are very easy to find and do not cost that much at all compared to other computers and devices. You can find these computers by simply searching in google or you can go here. The costs of this machine is only $249.

I think that this new innovative machine can be a really great investment in all classrooms and schools across the nation and the world. I think it is less expensive then buying bulky computers that take a lot of IT support. These computers allow you to minimize this support and the chrome operating system seamlessly updates and improves itself automatically, and with the available web-based management system allows the administrators to control the access to the different apps from the Chrome app store. There are thousands of apps to choose from and most of them are FREE! What better way to promote collaborative learning then giving students the power and the means to do it with. This machine allows you to talk and video chat with up to nine people at a time. Talk about making group projects easy.

I would definitely want to use this device in my future classroom.



Flipping the Classroom - Tonya Murphy

The tool I decided to focus on in 21st century learning is "flipping the classroom." What is "Flipping the Classroom?" Flipping the classroom is a way of enhancing learning. As a math teacher I find this tool very interesting. In Katie Gimbar's video, Why I flipped my classroom, she points out a very important fact concerning classroom learning. She points out that there are three learning types in the classroom: the "middle" group, the "high level" group and the "strugglers." The Middle group in her video is the students who are the average students who are keeping at the normal pace of the class. The "High Level" group are displayed in her video as the sleeping students because they are advanced and bored. The "strugglers" are the students who have no idea what is going on in class and cannot keep up. Flipping the classroom takes learning outside of the classroom and makes learning more of a self paced form of learning. The students who are struggling are able to watch the videos over and over again to try and understand what is going on. This also allows for the advanced students to be able to get ahead in class and push themselves and work at a higher pace. Also, I like how Gimbar set her classroom up in her diagram. She put the teacher in the center and the students, grouped according to learning classification, around her. This allows her to be able to get around to all the students and answer questions.

21st Century Tools Improving Learning and Technology - Sherri Hudson

21st Century Tools Improving Learning and Technology I have to start off by admitting that this assignment was slightly difficult for me. I'm pretty sure that I was making it harder than it is. Let me remind all of you that I want to be a high school English teacher. I am accustomed to English class being a critical thinking environment. Critical thinking has always been enough of a tool for me. This assignment made me realize that I need to expand my methods in using technology with my students. I tools like Microsoft Office's PowerPoint and Smartboard are my lovely assistants when I teach English. They can be used when I interact with students simply because they are visuals. I had to think harder. Hmm...what else could I use? I have to teach grammar and literature in an interesting manner. After all, it's the best two subjects in the world! Between you and me, I honestly favor writing. I want my students to get comfortable with writing and reading because it's the two activities students dread. Even I dread it if the material is a snooze fest. The easiest way to get comfortable with writing/reading, in my opinion, is getting involved with your favorite genre. Since iPads are becoming more popular in schools around the nation, I think the iPad can become a vital learning mechanism in my classroom if I use it in this way. 1) Initiate occasional group assignment in my lesson plan. 2) Compose a survey that tells me which genre each student likes and place them in groups according to the survey. (This assures that the students can somewhat get along with one another) 3) Make each group compose a short story or analyze a piece of literature using their iPad for note taking using one of my favorite apps: Evernote. I've been using Evernote since 2011 after my husband introduced it to me. It's constantly updating with ways to be a more efficient app. I use it when I am away from my laptop by using my android app. Whether I'm thinking about a project, a paper, or my book I can always log in to my Evernote account and take notes instantly. My notes for English papers The notes can be as short or as long the students want them to be. They can also create several journals to keep their thoughts, class notes, and personal notes organized. Since I believe critical thinking is the primary tool in an English class I believe getting my students to install the Evernote app provokes the critical thinking since it forces them to translate their thoughts into words. Since it works though email they can email their group thoughts to me and I can evaluate their learning. In addition, they can use it outside of class if they like sitting on a hammock to meditate on their thoughts. Evernote Homescreen If you have a messy notebook and sticky notes lining the bottom of your purse/bookbag GET EVERNOTE! Here is a link on how to use it on the How to use Evernote on the iPad .

Blog Post Assignment #3

Will I offer suggestions publicly (blog) or privately (email, etc.)?

I think I would choose both ways when peer editing someone else's work. I think that it is best to edit someone's work on their blog because they can easily access and see where they may have made mistakes. I wouldn't put them down on the blog or even through email, I would simply offer some suggestions to the author in a way that they could understand and help future readers understand what they are trying to convey. I would mainly just leave compliments on their blog to say what a really good job they did, and tell them what I enjoyed about their work. Like in the video Writing Peer review Top 10 Mistakes, I don't think that it is a good idea to be a "picky patty," or a "mean margaret". It is best if you leave a comment that will help the author understand what they did wrong in a way that you would want someone else to let you know. But I would also write to the author privately, so they didn't feel like I was trying to embarrass them in front of their readers. Again I would compliment on their topic, and leave suggestions for them to think about. Maybe the author made some mistakes that he/she did not catch in their own proofreading. I would then make the suggestions clear and precise on what I think would make their work better, and leave it for them to decide what they want to correct, whie still being positive.

What I learned today from the material

I learned today on how to positively edit another author's work. According to What is Peer Editing?, there are three main steps in writing a great peer edit. I learned that the first step is to always compliment the author of the work. You should always start your peer edit with a compliment. Some examples of those could be: "I really loved your topic.", My favorite part was .... because..."' or "This was really fun to read because...." I also learned that you should be specific about what mistakes you are correcting. Don't be vague about the corrections. You shouldn't be like you did this wrong, or you have several grammatical errors. You should show/tell them what they did wrong so they can go back and fix the mistakes. You should offer up suggestions that will help the author convey what he/she is trying to say in a more clear way. You should comment on their word choice, maybe they had some vague details and need to elaborate on them, or maybe the work was not as organized as it should be. All in all you should offer up advice that is critical but at the same time helpful and harmless so that other readers can understand the work.