My EDM 310 Blog Assignments are Now Complete

To my fellow classmates, I enjoyed working with all of you in this class. I'm glad we made it through all those Blogs and those hard Exams!LOL! I hope and pray that you are successful in your career. Happy Holidays! See ya next semester.

What I learned in EDF310

There was so many new things that I learned in this class. As a matter of fact, I think everything that we did was just about new to me. I learned about Podcasting, Blogging, Spreedsheets, Database and about iTune. I feel this is one of the first classes that I can actually say that I have gotten hands on experience and teaching and really understand. Although I don't think my brain could hold anymore information this semester so I don't think there was anything that I didn't learn.

Classmate Blog

Before entering this class I had never heard of a blog. When Dr. Strange instructed us on how to create it I thought it was a great idea. I have learned how to do a lot of things with blogging. I am able to add pictures and links to my blogs so that others can see pictures and go on the websites that I went on to read important information. I feel that blogging is very effective and that it should be used in school. One way blogging is effective is that it allows student to interact with other students outside the U.S. and outside the classrooms to broaden their view of life. It also you to post different assignments and allow other students to read them and post a comment about it. The person that I have chose to read their blogs was Lisa Frye. The reason I choose her was because she was completed with all of her blogs. This showed me that she made the effort to stay on top of her blogs and not get behind on them. I can't say the same for myself, because their were times when I forgot I had to post them and I kind of got behind. As a future teacher, I would like to incorporate blogging into my classroom. It would be a great way of keeping communication open between the students, as well as the teacher.

Teacher Contact

The teacher that I contact through via e-mail was Mrs. Argyle. While I was looking for a teacher with a class blog, a came across her and became really interested. She teaches kindergarten at Freedom Elementary in Hooper, UT. She is happily married and has two boys. When I emailed Mrs. Argyle, the topic was mainly how she incorporated technology into her classroom and do she think its okay to be technology illiterate.
she use the 2 computers in her classroom as a center rotation. The children can visit the computers during center time and play various games, etc. evolving around what they have been learning in class such as(letter and sound games, math activities, etc). They are basically used as an extension of what they have already learned and practiced in class. She also said she do not think its okay to be technology illiterate. She said that technology is a very important part of this world, and it can be very helpful to me as well because I could use it when I need ideas on making lesson plans. Although she don't use it as much as she would like, yes technology is important and it is not okay to be technology illiterate. http://blogCami's Class

Access Lab

I went to Mary G Montgomery High School to visit their Access Lab. So much has changed since I was in high school. It may sound crazy, but I didn't know that high schools had access labs in them. Mr. Roes is an instructor at Mary G who teaches an access lab class. When I entered the classroom, their were big screen tvs and cameras all over the room there was also a smart board. I actually had the opportunity to tap in on another access lab at another school. The other school wasn't in the class at that moment, but I still was able to hear the sound of people in the hallway and the next class over that's how well the mics pic up volume. A question that was ask was how much does all the equipment cost, and he said around 85thousand dollars, that's a lot of money, especially when this is been incorporated it schools all around the world. It was stated that starting next year, it will be required that the students their take a web class before they graduate.

Documentaty Studies

After looking at the choices from the Duke University Center of Documentary Studies podcasts, I chose to watch a film called Broken. This is an educational film from South Africa about HIV. It was a short film that conveyed the reality of rape and sexually transmitted disease that children face every day. It was a film made by children, reaching out and sending the message that children are the future and they must be protected. It was a "MAD about ART" production. I looked up the website that was given at the end of the film. Mad about Art is an organization that uses art to educate people in South Africa about HIV and AIDS. I feel that this was a very important podcast, because the children are indeed the future and it is our job to help the and provide them with information on how to be safe.

iTuneU/Mathematics with Technology

Before this semester, I have never used the internet as much as I have in this class. I would have never though technology would have become this important in life. It has opened my eyes to various ways of learning and teaching. There are so many websites that give someone so much information in every subject. I watched a podcast about math. It was about why people do not like math, why people do, and it gave different feedback about how a teacher or student could better understand. This is great because it shows me that there are different ways a student can learn outside the school. As a teacher we could give students different websites to go to for practice. Not only for math but for all subject areas. Because some student don't do well in math, I feel that websites like this one could help the student understand and learn different techniques on how to do math. As a teacher, I would provide different websites to students so that they can look at them at home to see if there is a better style of learning a subject for them.

4 EDM310 Podcasts

Today I listen to four EDM310 Podcast including my own. Listening to these podcast were great. As I listened back to the podcast that I was in I realized that a lot of improvement could have been done. One of the things I noticed was I was nervous and began to stumble over my words. If we were more prepared, we would have been less nervous and did a better job.

I also listen to other podcast and one of the things that I noticed was that people were nervous and the reason I could tell is because I heard a lot of ums and ums. A positive critic is some presentation wasn't to long and some wasn't to short. Also the information that was given was important to know about the different topics.

I really enjoyed doing this assignment although I was nervous and scared, but now that we have gotten the experience of podcasting, I feel that as we listen to ourselves, we will be able to critic ourselves and learn from our mistakes.

Growth vs Fixed Minds

The video cast we were assigned to listen to this week was call "Growth vs. Fixed". The video cast was produced by The Stanford Institute of Technology. The video cast is about a study conducted by Carol Dweck who is a Professor of Psychology at Stanford University. Dweck was interested in mindset of learning, she said that some people base heir activities on whether their intelligence is going to be noticed or not, while others want to learn. The study was composed of of two groups of students. One group were taught study skills, and the other group were taught study skills and growth mindset lessons. None of the participants were aware that there were two groups and two different teachings.

The study showed that students who were taught study skills only did not show improvement. She said that they lacked the motivation to do well. On the other hand the growth mindset group showed significant improvements and were even noticed by their teachers. She also stated that growth mindset is related to dealing with mistakes, accepting them and moving on. Dweck had conversation with a well renowned raqcong coach named Ross Bentley about the growth mindset.

This video was neat. It was cool to see the professor talk about her study and what she found. I think this is a great tool for situations like that, as far as telling of studies and similar things. I wish they would have shown some statistics as far as how much difference they lessons actually made. I really like the versatility of these video casts as far as the many uses that they have in the world of academia.

K-5 "City of Coral" Energy Flow In the Coral Reef Ecosystem

Coral Reefs are found in tropical water near the surface because they need energy from the sun to survive. The plants and algae there convert energy through photosynthesis.
Each small coral is made up of many coral organisms. The brown spots on the coral are their cells. The plant cells collect energy from the sun through photosynthesis.

This podcast was very informative and for me as a teacher i could use this in my classroom when i am teaching my students about different organisms and plant life in the ocean. By looking and listening at the podcast it can give the students a more in depth look at life in the water

Edible Schoolyard/A Night in the Global Village

I watched a six minute video on The Edible Schoolyard and it was very interesting. It was about a school by the name of Martin Luther King Junior Middle School in California that literally had an edible schoolyard. HA! First period students would come outside and plant gardens and grow vegetables and other sorts of foods and then use them to cook all kinds of yummy foods! They would cook them during class in the classroom. It was very interesting how well the kids worked together. The person who started this was a lady by the name of Alice Waters and she did this to serve the kids better food in the lunch room and it just became this thing where the kids took it over and it became a class. The teachers integrate all subjects into this class from math to science. The kids love it, they have fun and learn at the same time. It also teaches them how to work together. It would be nice if I could do something like this in my classroom when I begin to teach but that is wishful thinking!

A I watched a video called A Night in the Global Village. It was about a group of students who took a field trip with their teachers to this village at the Heifer Ranch in Perryville, Arkansas. They were trading one night as an American for one night of the less fortunate of the world. They were divided up into groups and some stayed in refugee camps, while others where in Thailand homes ...etc. It was very interesting to watch the students try to get through the night and cook their food. The next morning when they woke up they were very excited and ready to talk about everything they had experienced. I really liked this video!

Different Approches taken to Podcasts

I listened to four different podcasts and they were all very interesting. The first podcast I listened to was the SmartBoard Lessons Podcast. Ben Hazzard and Joan Badger were the two people that host the show. At the beginning of the podcast they introduced themselves and the topic they would be discussing. There would be music at various times during the podcast which made it enjoyable. There was never a time where I could remember that there was a period of silence. They also brought in special guest that would talk during the podcast. I really enjoyed listening to their podcast!

The second podcast I listened to was the KidCast. Dan Schmit was the only host. This podcast was different than the other on because the little that I listened to didn't have any music. Being there was only one host, I think it might have been hard for Dan to find words to fit the time. It seemed really boring at times. I am assuming that this pidcast is for teachers only because in one of his podcasts he talks about "99 bottles of beer on the wall" and I would not fit that appropriate for children. Which brings me to my next point...why would he call it "KidCast"? Why not call it TeacherCast? Who knows! I really didn't care to much for this particular series of podcasts.

The third podcast I listend to was the MacBreak Weekly. There were four hosts. There names are Leo Laporte, Merlin Mann, Scott Bourne, and Alex Lindsay. They seemed to work real well together, always finding something to say. One person would say something and then another person would find something to say off what the first person said. Never a silent moment. There was music in various moments. Anytime someone said something funny they would play funny noises in the backgrounds. It seemed more like a morning show on the radio, nothing for kids. I really enjoyed listening to it.

The fourth and final podcast I listened to was This Week in Photography. The hosts were Scott Bourne and Alex Linsday who are also hosts on the MacBreak Weekly. I didn't really care too much for this series of podcasts. There was music in the background. They did bring in special guests during some of the podcasts. The series focuses on gadgets so most of the podcasts talks about photography. I'm not really into photography, but if you like taking pictures, then this would be really interesting to you.

Randy Pauch's Lecture

Randy Pausch's Last lecture on being able to enable the childhood dream of others was an inspiring video. After listening to Randy I found out that he is a very humorous person. He did a great job at keeping the audience focus and excited about his last lecture.

Randy talked about so many interesting things in his lecture such as his childhood dream, Enabling the dreams of others and how you can achieve your dreams. The way he started his lecture was wonderful. He explained that his father had always said that "if there was an elephant in the room, introduced it" this is when he showed a slide of his CT scan showing all ten tumors in his liver and that is when the doctors told him that he had only 3 - 6 months to live and he was on his 9th month.

There was so many different inspirational quotes that was mention in the lecture that encouraged me. Some things that I learned is that brick walls are in our life for a reason, they let us prove how badly we want things. Brick walls let us show our dedication. You shouldn't bail; the best gold is at the bottom of barrels of crap. Don't complain; just work harder, be good at something it makes you valuable and the last one that I liked was always find the best in everybody no matter how you have to wait for them to show it.

Everybody has to have childhood dreams. It might take a whole lifetime to be able to achieve those dreams. The most important thing that I have learned is that no one should ever let go of their childhood dreams. Always work toward them on a daily basis, because you might find that your lifetime has been shorted in any given morning.

Duke

I think that the use of iPods in schools is a great idea. Many universities have started using "iTunes U." There are six schools that have participated in a pilot program with Apple called iTunes U. Duke, Brown, Stanford, the University of Michigan, The university of Michigan, The university of Wisconsin-Madison, and the University of Missouri School of Journalism. http://cit.duke.edu/pdf/reports/ipod_initiative_04_05.pdf

Duke University used iPods in a variety of different ways. Some are to post lectures and other materials that can be available to download to your iPod, Class recording, studying, and storing files and being able to transfer files. Using iPods has been a positive experience for some universities. One positive outcome was the increase in class attendance. Using this technology has increase the students desire to learn.

Dr. Christie

After viewing Dr. Christie’s site I know for sure that I will implement some of her technology ideas into my classroom. What I liked and thought was most important to me on her website was The Pitfalls, Perils and Potentials of the Internet in K-12 Education. The internet offers extensive opportunities for student to enhance their learning through the use of social networking, blogs, podcast, cell phones and many more things.

The site provides definitions of many web 2.0 tools available to teachers and students. It allows students of all ages many opportunities to reach other people all over the world through websites. It also provides examples of effective ways teachers can incorporate these tools into their classrooms. On Dr. Christie’s site there are so many useful tools you can use as a teacher.

Wikipedia

After reading the article on Wikipedia it was interesting to know the truth. I found out that you should not trust what you read on it because you really don't no where the information came from. Although you are able to see who has gone in to make edits, I would still advise you not to be careful.

Anyone can change Wikipedia and as of now, Wikipedia can't be trusted and I don't know if it ever will. I have never used it and now that I know the truth about it, I don't think I ever will plan to use it in the near future.

Why Wireless?

This article was a great article because it allow people to see how being literate to technology will help students in school. Some people ask why give students another reason to be off task at school, I say it gets them on task as well as keep them ahead. Now days almost everything require internet access. There are so much resources available online for students to use.

Teachers who uses blogs in their class allow students to access their grades and assignments. it also allows them to do presentations. Using the Internet in schools expands the students view of life. It allows them to see beyond the classroom and to interact with other students around the world. The world that students are living in now is on a whole new level then when their teachers were growing up. Students should have the opportunity to learn with no limits, by using wireless access it will allow them to do so.

Is it okay?

Is it okay to be technologically illiterate was an interesting article. This article brings out the importance of being technologically literate. There are still people who are illiterate when it comes to technology. I feel like this world is changing and technology is a big part of it. Almost all of my classes require me to have access to the Internet, therefore; it is very important that I have it and that I am not illiterate when it comes to using it.

I feel that all teachers at some point of there life should learn how to make use of technology and incorporate it in their class rooms. Some teachers do not use it because they are illiterate when it comes to it. Others think that its not as important. While some are use to tradition and are not ready for change. One day they will realize that, that's what this world has come to.

My Presentation

International blogs

The American International School of Guangzhou is an international school that uses blogs in their class. It was founded in 1981 but was originally known as the American school of Guangzhou. AISG is a school that serves students from preschool through twelfth grade. It has a 180 day academic school year and there are over 100 teachers in the school from around the world. This school has aver 1000 students from forty nationalities. Their classes range from 17-20 in the elementary and 8-22 in the middle schools. http://theinternationalteacher.wordpress.com/

Jennifer Carr is also a international teacher who uses blogs in her class. She is a first grade teacher in Canada. This class can post their art work and writings and share them with family members that don't live near them. They also have blog buddies in different countries whom they can communicate with through blogs. These kids are only 6 or 7 years old and its just amazing to see them using blogs so soon.http://theinternationalteacher.wordpress.com/

Correcting links that do not work

The four reasons that the links do not work:
1. The link is not correctly spelled.
2. Nothing is placed between the two parts of a tag.

Apple's Web Site.">
3. You forgot to include http:// in the address. It must be included

Teachers using blogs.

Kalyn Denny is a fourth grade teacher at West Bountiful Elementary School. Ms. Denny states that the students now know more about internet publishing than a lot of adults. There are a lot of ways blogs are being used, but she uses blogs to keep in touch with parents, teach the students about the new and improved internet world, and to teach the students how to communicate with each other outside of school hours.
http://dessertnews.com/dn/view.

Leah Bio is a graduate from Illinois State University in 2005. She teaches middle school; where she teach language arts, social studies and science, she also works on a team with two other teachers as well. Bio class uses blogs to interact with the students and to teach them to post blogs, read others, and comment or respond back to one another.

My expression on Did you know?

I really enjoyed watching the presentation. Until watching this film, I really didn't realize a lot of the things going on in this world today. It was so amazing to know how many people signed up for my space in just one day and that if it was a country it would be the eight largest. The world is changing rapidly, and with the new technology that we have today is a wonder what people are able to do.

It bother me to know how much of time we spend watching TV and playing games. It make me wonder do we spend any time reading and praying. My vision is as parents, sisters, brothers, and any love ones, we should get more involved with our children to make sure they are being properly prepared to have a successful life in the future. I also think we should work on ourselves and see how this world has changed for the better as well as for the worst and make the change now. We are living the life now, but our children are the future.

My view on ACCESS.

The ACCESS distance learning program gives High School students opportunities to receive classes, teachers and technology that will allow them to receive skills and knowledge they will have developed and needed to graduate from high school. It will also prepare them to go to college or the workforce. These courses are taught at high schools on regular school days.

What I like about this program is that this distance learning course is free for Alabama public high school students. I feel this is a great program because it will help motivate the students, you are able to share information with students across the state and it will expand your teaching knowledge.

My thoughts on ALEX

The ALEX is very useful and effective. This learning exchange is being used from kindergarten through twelfth grade. It is also helpful for other professional studies. ALEX is the Alabama Department of Education. This learning exchange helps teachers and students interact with each other to expand opportunities. It is also effective to parents as well. Parents use this to help their children meet school standards at home.

ALEX is a website where you may find teachers lesson plans. Teachers have the opportunity to save and upload their lesson plans for different grade levels. I feel that this will help me as a teacher because if the class isn't mastering a skill that I am teaching, I can look on this web site to see how other teachers use the skill in their lesson plan. This site would also be helpful to me because it would allow me to utilize different learning techniques in the class.

Hello

Hello My name is Andrea Williams. I am currently a Junior At the University of South Alabama, where I am majoring in Elementary Education. I plan to teach first, second, or third grade. Some of the things I enjoy doing are going to church, playing sports, and going to the movies.

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