Glogster

Reflection: Podcast, Website and Blog Mid-term Critiques

    Ms. Alison Adams and Ms. Megan Gibson
Part 1 (Podcast)
    Ms. Adam's podcast was based around incorporating technology in the classroom and included sites such as Animoto; a site we have used and that I plan to use continuously throughout my educational career because of the great opportunities it offers to students and teachers for creating one-of-a-kind slide shows with their own pictures and setting them to music in a way that looks very professional. This follows along the very same lines as my own podcast which was giving students and teachers a chance to use websites that would increase internet usage in the classroom, yet allowing that time to be worthwhile, educational and creative. She also touches on Google Art Project and Google Body Browser. This shows they are definitely thinking along the lines of biology and art lessons, as well as chances for fun educational websites that I think would greatly increase student engagement. Ms. Adam's touched on a new website I hadn't heard of as well which was Qtopia.com. Once an account is made on this website (for free) users can access hundreds of fun, but insightful games teachers can use within their lesson plans.
    Ms. Gibson's podcast focuses on resources for classroom success in an elementary setting. She discusses Google Translate, an online translator that is interactive, Thinkquest, which allows students to create collaborative projects and also allows them to build websites, Livebinders, which is a Delicious type site that can also be embedded into teacher's websites, Kidclick, a great websearch website designed by librarians for students only. Material that is searched on this engine is all student friendly (even elementary, seeing as Ms. Gibson's area of study is ElementaryEd.) Lastly, Ms. Gibson brings up mypyramid.gov which is the national website on nutrition and includes the revamped and revised food pyramid with helpful tips for healthy eating.
Part 2 (Website/Blog)
    Ms. Adam's website is also masterfully done. I like how the website looks similar to iWeb and it seems very easy to use as she has included javascript; something I haven't thought to incorporate yet. I contemplated switching to Wix after viewing Ms. Adam's website. The blog Ms. Adam's created as well is incredibly easy to follow, tastefully built, and shows that she has a solid grip on how to use Blogger. Similarly, Ms. Gibson uses iWeb and of course has created a lasting and memorable website with everything in its right place. This website will obviously translate into a successful and useful site once her teaching career takes off and is in full throttle. Needless to say Ms. Gibson's blog follows in this fashion, even going so far as to be color coordinated with her website.

Podcast Reflection #9: Salman Khan: Let's use video to reinvent education

    Salman Khan has taken the classroom made it interesting and engaging as well as completely virtual. It isn't that he has completely invented a new idea, although. What Khan has done is simply take all the talk that has been going around the education field and done something tangible with it. As an analyst at a hedge fund in Boston, Khan began to videotape lessons and put them on YouTube for his cousins that lived in New Orleans; they said they began to "prefer him more on YouTube than in person." Why is this? Well the idea is OBVIOUS. Now, his cousins could pause, rewind, review, any and all of the lessons on their own time and at their own pace of learning. All thanks to self-paced math lessons. Even better it is all free and not for profit. Anyone can benefit from the Khan academy.
    I love this opportunity because new concepts and lessons aren't easy to pick up and learn right away, especially with so much other environmental factors that can occur within a classroom setting, including a possible domineering teacher breathing down the necks of the students waiting for them to learn the lesson. Without realizing really what he was doing, Khan began to gain notoriety and his lessons took off because of his apparent like-able attitude and demeanor as well as the receptiveness he had to ideas from those watching the videos. What this now does is takes the lecture time out of the classroom. Teachers now assign the videos for homework than have the students bring in their work for class. This vastly increases the value of student-teacher face-to-face time, because instead of feeling distanced from the students, the teachers are able to help them in more meaningful ways.
    One of the great points Khan makes is in a typical classroom, after a test the class moves on to the next topic. This begins to snowball and happen very rapidly which than exploits any gaps that a student may have had in learning the previous lesson because the TRADITIONAL model, what we should be moving away from, penalizes experimentation and failure but does not expect mastery. I love Khan's message: Encourage experimentation AND expect mastery. He gets the go ahead from someone we all know: Bill Gates, who shares the stage with him in this video near the end and we can just hear the teaching verbiage oozing out: Motivation, feedback, collaboration, continuity as well as teacher/student driven learning. It is something we can't afford to ignore nor can we argue isn't useful, but rather we must start accepting the changes now because they have already begun to happen. Get on board for the revolution of education via technology. (This video is a podcast from TedTalk.)

Reflection: Using Twitter as an Educator

    Really I think students are the ones who are more used to this microblogging. I'm still trying to figure out the importance of using this as a teacher. What I thought was since students relate to it much more than I think I ever will, up to this point, then fun activities can be created using Twitter. For example, what tweet would a character in a story be sending during or after a climatic scene in a story. Or, given the amount of charaters Twitter lets you use describe the main points of a story or plot. The speed at which others can access the information others put up for you to see is probably what is most useful in this case. Effective application of this in the classroom has yet to come to mind although...

Podcast Reflection #7: Tech Chick Tips

    This Tech Chicks episode talked about a lot of different blog, website, software programs and podcast resources for teachers. My favorite program that they talked about was Text Paint. You can download this FREE interface software, which is a drawing program for students 3-12 years old. Text Paint is a program that I plan on using in my class, and after downloading the program onto my computer and playing around with it I found out you can upload images and use paintbrushes and create interesting pieces of art. When thinking of ways for students to depict scenes or characters in a piece of literature this will get students more interested than staying with just the standard paper and markers. Another site that the Tech Chicks talked about was Think Quest, this is a really creative site that allows teachers to register groups of students who can then create their own educational websites. After they complete their website, it registers them into a contest and winners with the best site can actually get prizes. I think this site is great and allows for students to take part in technology while seeing what other students around the nation are doing in their classrooms. It also gets them actively engaged in their own lessons and what they are learning. Students can feel a sense of pride by taking part in what they are being taught.

Podcast Reflection #8: Tech Chick Tips (9/9/06)

The Tech Chicks shared the website Pencil on this podcast which is a fun and creative site for creating animation. This is an open source where you can download animation software that is compatible for both Macs and PC's. You can create hand drawn animation cartoons for FREE! This is a great resource really for any Art teachers, but more importantly for projects the students could definitely get some use out of this. I actually went to the website and downloaded the software and have had fun figuring out the program and it's interface. There is a gallery where you can see what others have created and it's really interesting to see other people who are concentration in other education subjects using this program besides just art teachers. Another site that I found useful was Super Teacher Tools, this website is a site offering tech tools for teachers, from classroom management tools to educational games. I also went to this site and found the tools to be very useful. It is no longer necessary for us as educators to make our own jeopardy game. You can find a version of it available on this site along with other games.  Lastly, the site A Thin Line, is a very serious site that was discussed that I believe secondary teachers should discuss with their students. This site revolves around the subjects of cyber abuse and how we can stop it. It provides videos with heavy content about online bullying, sexting and more, along with quizzes. This material is mature so it may not yet be age appropriate for grade school and may or may not be appropriate for middle school students. This subject is one that is prevalent in society and that must be addressed, however.

Classroom 2.0 Reflection

    If I've learned anything from listening to the EdTech Weekly and Moving at the Speed of Creativity podcasts it is that we can no longer stay comfortable and rely so heavily on just our physical social circle of friends for resources, tips and information. Instead, we must broaden our horizons and begin to think that maybe someone, more than likely another educator and Classroom 2.0 assures they will be, that is not even in the same state, country or hemisphere can have ideas and be offering useful help to something I may be doing in my own classroom. The world is shrinking in terms of collaboration. We can now find almost anything we need in any place. Classroom 2.0 simplifies that by connecting educators with their social network. Classroom 2.0 live is an incredible way to hear about the latest news in the field of education and it allows you to participate with those discussions that are going on! The forum has to be the most handy as it lets people post advice, questions, or prompts in order to have a chance for other educators to share and chat about their ideas.

EduTeacher Reflection

    One site that Eduteacher.net offers, that is also on the Kan-ed site, is 4teachers.org. You know this website is useful if it comes up on various websites. The biggest message 4teachers.org is trying to send is teachers need to be integrating technology into their classroom. It covers assessment of technology and stories of how other educators have successfully been using technology in the class. The Educators Resources is the best part about this page, more specifically the Assistive Technology which offers sources that can assist students with a disability or visual impairments all the way to training for educators on how to use technology effectively with students who have a disability. You could spend hours on this website.
    On Eduteacher I chose the subject language arts and another source it offers is bookshouldbefree.com which allows anyone to download free audio books in mp3 format. It has 19 different genres to choose from with plenty of well-known authors like Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Herman Melville, Jack London even Beatrix Potter. Users simply click on the work of their choice and decide whether to send it to iTunes as a podcast or keep it as a compressed mp3 file.
    A lot of websites Eduteacher offers under the language arts heading are for ESL or ELL students such as EnglishCafe.com. You can find lessons even become a member and chat or collaborate with other teachers who teach English as a second language or to students who are just learning. It allows you sign up and do all of these things through Facebook as well. Registering is free and simple for those interested.

Kan-ed Reflection

    Right away on the Kan-ed website, once signed in, I enjoy the fun fact like Daily History and the NatGeo photo as well as NASA astronomy photo of the day. Those are really cool. Really, I think this website can do everything and be everything a teacher needs in electronic form. There is a grade book, a way to search a directory of students, a way to create of build tests with the test builder and it allows students to upload their assignments directly to the page.
    The Reference tools are incredibly valuable. This is a way to get students into the mindset of actually researching information using scholarly resources from an array of legitimate databases, as opposed to Google or Bing, for example. Also 4kids.org gives the students a website that they can get something out of and access fun activities as well as educational assignments while using technology.
    KERC is almost to good to be true. Actually integrating the states' standards, which I thought could only be found at KSDE.org up until this point, while giving resources and links to ideas for lesson plans that fit fight into those standards. Thinkfinity falls along these lines as well and just offers up more resources than one could do with. My favorite part of Thinkfinity is the information it provides on Professional Development. A state-by-state look at the available courses to better teachers in their areas of expertise. I don't think a teacher can go on without these resources and I don't think we can go wrong using them. This Kan-ed website basically offers a solution to every problem in the classroom unless it is how to physically get yourself and your students into the room and in their seats.

I just made a new Voki. See it here:

This is just one of two Avatars I've had fun making; the other is on my web page under the 'About Me..." page.