Blog 15

When I reflect on EDU 422, I sit in awe: All the work that we did was long, time consuming, and constant, yet I wouldn’t have it any other way. All the assignments, readings, and presentations all contribute to being successful in the educational profession. The material covered made teaching much more interesting, valuable, and effective. For example, I found the Spreadsheet assignment as a clever, organized, and highly useful tool to keep track of student’s grades and progress. I know I will definitely use this concept in the classroom. In addition, I loved the idea of making a website for the students to be able to use technology and be on task. When I made the web page the “Golden State”, I was able to use different concepts to make the student’s learning process varied, interesting, and fun. I think this would be a great opportunity for students to also form their own pages and be able to be creative, use technology, work on social skills, etc. I also highly enjoyed the program Inspiration. This program I will use on my students to help them understand the basic steps of the writing process. It’s important to teach students ways to organize ideas, and to see the direction their paper will be going and to see if everything connects with the main idea. I found everything to be very valuable, and I am going to take everything I learn and apply it to my classroom. This will incorporate technology to the students and gives variation in lesson plans and useful techniques. I’m so excited to use this information learned that I showed my father, who is a principal, the assignments and materials we covered in class. He was so impressed that he wishes that I show his teachers in hopes they can learn the qualities I was able to obtain in EDU 422.

Blog 13/14

After working on the video through IMovie, I realized how creative a person can be using digital media. I was able to add a butterfly coming out of a cocoon, scenes that my partners and i were unable to film. It was fun adding special effects and music, giving my video much more a uniqueness.I found this project to be very personalized, because although my partners and i all had the same footage, we were each able to edit the movie as we pleased. I think having the opportunity to make our video gives you the option to be creative, professional, and organized with the material you wish to present. This would be an ideal project for students to be included to do.

In the article "Splicing Video in the Writing Process", 5th grade students were given the task to create a video on the Civil War. Students were to create a movies through the writing process and explore the power of digital video in a project that ties content, writing skills, and technology. Having the students create a video gives them the opportunity to encounter new technology directly with curriculum and increase the student's capacity to communicate in digital age. The creation of a video inspires to students to be project content and process driven, use technology as a tool which helps students to become literate in multimedia, digital age. The students are given steps to follow for their projects, and are assigned tasks that capitalize their strengths. The steps involve scripting, a process of creating a digital video that meshes with the writing process. After all the work in done and the videos are finished, the students are not only proud of their work, but excited to present to the whole class their final project. The idea of involving media with content incorporates many angles that benefit the students and makes the experience fun and exciting.






NO BLOG 12 :)

Blog 11

During the imovie project, my group members and I drafted many ideas as to what out topic would be. At first, we had decided on teaching about electricity. For original concept was that we would dress like scientists and use batteries, wires, and a light bulb. The idea was suggested by Nicole, but Beth and I were unsure as to how we would explain the concept since it involved more depth of explanation. In addition, we couldn’t decide on the tools. So to sole our problem, I suggested we do metamorphosis. I found this topic to be extremely easy since I had previously done that topic in my art class. I had made puppets that were a caterpillar and butterfly. Beth and Nicole liked the idea so we went with it. Using a storyboard was highly effective because we were able to be organized and be able to decide the details. Storyboards are an easy way to think out the procedure to make the setting, duties, etc much more smoother to tape the story. I think the total time we spent filming was half an hour. Deciding what topic to do took longer than the actual filming process.

Blog 10

After reading the article, the material focused on the Digital Divide. The purpose to explain the Digital Divide is to acknowledge the differences in access to and equality of technology experience based on categories such as income, race, gender, location, or education. As an educator, it is important to consider these categories so we can improve the interaction students have with technology. Some students may only experience technology when only at school. But if computers are offered only during school hours, how may students be able to use technology? It is the duty of the teacher to provide interaction of technology through programs with the material so students may all have a chance to use the computers. This conflicts with the idea of quantity vs quality. Although some students have the quality of equal opportunity to technology, it doesn't mean each student has the quantity amount of time spent on the computer. Teachers are responsible for the influence of technology present in the student's life and the skills and knowledge influence the student's achievement as much as the student's categories. In order to improve the student's achievement, it is important to be aware of the use of technology on how we use it to assist ALL students. I really found this article meaningful because i grew up with many of my friends who had no means of technology, and as an educator, i have to be aware that not all my students will have equal resources.

After this week, I really enjoyed Wiki. I found it very convenient and easy. i think it will be very beneficial in the classroom and will be a good source to involve students with technology.I especially enjoyed the capability of easily managing and editing work with group members. The features allow you to customize colors, fonts, and pictures. In addition, the history allows you as an educator to see who has posted, edited, and/ or contributed to the work. This makes grading fair for those who worked hard and for those who slacked off. Wiki gives the opportunity for students to be original and create their own ideas by using the guidelines given by the teacher. The work has been divided into parts for each group member to do. I am doing the Web links along with editing all the other things. I also have added information to policies. I think it is coming together fine, especially given the fact that we all have different schedules and some have started their parts sooner than others. This activity is a very affective way to personalize and manage the internet at your pace. In addition, you control the amount of information and what is posted. I think this will highly benefit us as educators.

Blog 9

Overall, the midterms was a mixture of the material learned. It was very interesting taking the test because it was unexpected what exactly would be on the test, and after taking it, i was able to determine how much information i know. It was satisfying to know that i grasp the material, especially since i will be using it as a teacher. I think all the material on the test was fair game, given the fact that we were told all that we learned would be on the test. I struggled with minor details, but all in all i felt confident and proud that i knew so much given the fact that it was such a wide range of information tested. The way the test was formatted was different than normal tests and was a mixture. It was a good example for us to take in consideration on how to test our students. It gives the students the ability to use technology and to respond without their own answers, rather than a multiple choice test.

Blog 8

After reading the article ‘Creating Valuable Class Web Sites’, Elizabeth Baker discusses three methods that benefit teachers who want to make class websites. If teachers are tentative about the internet and struggle with computers, method one ( Website Providers) is recommended. It gives two ways one can build a website either through a free websites or ones to be a member. This technique makes it easy to make a website quickly. The second method is called Blog, Groups, and Wikis is recommended for users who are comfortable with technology yet have little time to learn. It gives you flexibility, online discussions, and literacy abilities. In addition, it lets you sign up for RSS, a system that notifies of changes on your site through an email notification. In method three, Be Your Own Developer, a variety of software options are available to make it easier to learn how to make a website and generates a site with a simple appearance. Overall, developing your own website requires you to learn, especially since technology is important in the classroom. Giving students the opportunity to use the internet based on a website you produce seems very interesting and beneficial. It is a great opportunity to involve technology and variation in teaching techniques.

Blog 7

World Wide Web: After reading each individual article, the inspiration of using technology and the internet is highly evident how necessary these tools are in the education process. In the first article, the various forms of web databases are discussed. This concept is highly useful for it benefits both students and educators. Educators can organize what topic is to be researched and using databases, plan out how students will investigate information. For example, if given the students the topics of the different biomes, students can use database to find comparisons between the subjects on how related or opposite they are. This facilitates the learning process because students are able to investigate research based on their own findings that are guided by the educator. This process is much more organized form of handling class assignments. Technology can reduce the difficulties of assignments. The second article discussed is the constant changes of technology in the world and the skills needed in daily life. It is important to incorporate both the skills of technology and the everyday skills that are needed. It is a challenge to apply both, but students need to learn at an early age the ability to manage technology and skill such as compute, communicate, conclude, confirm, etc.Technology used such as database is highly needed in order to teach students valuable lessons of organization and interdependency of searching information. It is applicable for all ages since database is an easy concept to understand. There are two parts if database: the records are the topics or names in the research and the fields are the information about that topic and/or name. The third part of the article is about the program called Clarisworks.It is a program that after creating database, you can search specific topics. After using InspireData, this program sounds to resemble to Clarisworks where it is easy and explanations to use the program. Basically, all three articles are about the importance of database and incorporating the use in classrooms. It benefits both students and teachers, making the learning process easier and organized. It allows students to research and investigate in detail, and teachers are able to control the topic and fields for students to find. I will definitely use the idea of database in the classroom in the future.