Saturday, May 3, 2014
Summary of Final Project #16
Friday, April 25, 2014
C4K Summary for April
Summaries for April, Last Summaries!
The first Child I commented on their blog for the month of April is Sione. For his blog on April 7th he published about a rugby player who was injured and put into a comma. This was a very sad story. In his blog I shared with him how great it was that he is keeping up with the news and sports. I also told him it was great for the people who were not keeping up with the news, they can look on his blog and find things like this out.
The second and last child's blog I commented on for this month was Brooklyn. In Brooklyn blog that she did on April 11th it was titled cops and robbers. This is a game she plays, and apparently is very good at it. I assumed this was a math game, and gave her a question and she tried to answer it, or find the robber in the least amount of guesses she can. I shared with her the importance of finding educational games, and the fact that she is having fun and learning stuff at the same time is wonderful!
The first Child I commented on their blog for the month of April is Sione. For his blog on April 7th he published about a rugby player who was injured and put into a comma. This was a very sad story. In his blog I shared with him how great it was that he is keeping up with the news and sports. I also told him it was great for the people who were not keeping up with the news, they can look on his blog and find things like this out.
The second and last child's blog I commented on for this month was Brooklyn. In Brooklyn blog that she did on April 11th it was titled cops and robbers. This is a game she plays, and apparently is very good at it. I assumed this was a math game, and gave her a question and she tried to answer it, or find the robber in the least amount of guesses she can. I shared with her the importance of finding educational games, and the fact that she is having fun and learning stuff at the same time is wonderful!
Thursday, April 24, 2014
C4T #4 Summary
The teacher I commented on for the month of April is Matt Gomez.
1.) The first blog I commented on was on March 30th for week 13. The title of his blog is Presentation: Sharing Learning With Tech. In this blog he has two instructional presentations videos,and also a presentation he had made in his Google Drive to share. This blog is about learning different technologies and incorporating them into daily lessons. I found all these tools he has shared very useful. He outlines that the main topics he was going over, and wanted to make clear in this particular blog were: Blog Examples, Flipping, Educreations, more example blogs, Global Collaboration, and Facebook.
These tools are great, and more of them I did not previously know a lot about. I learned a lot from these, and also did further research on the tools because I was curious. He seems like he loves his job, and is happy. This is wonderful to see and hear!
2.) For this week, week 15, my final comment for C4T his topic for this week was Using Class Dojo for Work Management. In this blog he shared this program that is for behavioral management. He says that this program allows the students to be able to look at the work they have done, and for them to share this with their parents. (Or if the student doesn't share this with them they are still available to access this).The best part about this app is that it is free! This allows for time management, which he explains is very important to him. He uses this for kindergarten! This seems like most likely a similar app or program Dr. Strange uses for our class to keep up with our stuff. I personally loving being organized and having everything together and online instead of in binders and everything, this has become a lot less ideal for teachers in this generation. This is a tool I could see myself using for sure, and the best part is that it is free!
1.) The first blog I commented on was on March 30th for week 13. The title of his blog is Presentation: Sharing Learning With Tech. In this blog he has two instructional presentations videos,and also a presentation he had made in his Google Drive to share. This blog is about learning different technologies and incorporating them into daily lessons. I found all these tools he has shared very useful. He outlines that the main topics he was going over, and wanted to make clear in this particular blog were: Blog Examples, Flipping, Educreations, more example blogs, Global Collaboration, and Facebook.
These tools are great, and more of them I did not previously know a lot about. I learned a lot from these, and also did further research on the tools because I was curious. He seems like he loves his job, and is happy. This is wonderful to see and hear!
2.) For this week, week 15, my final comment for C4T his topic for this week was Using Class Dojo for Work Management. In this blog he shared this program that is for behavioral management. He says that this program allows the students to be able to look at the work they have done, and for them to share this with their parents. (Or if the student doesn't share this with them they are still available to access this).The best part about this app is that it is free! This allows for time management, which he explains is very important to him. He uses this for kindergarten! This seems like most likely a similar app or program Dr. Strange uses for our class to keep up with our stuff. I personally loving being organized and having everything together and online instead of in binders and everything, this has become a lot less ideal for teachers in this generation. This is a tool I could see myself using for sure, and the best part is that it is free!
Saturday, April 19, 2014
Blog post #13
Blog post #13
What can we learn about special education?
After watching these videos, write a reflection on what you have learned from the videos, and what you found the most interesting?
Special Education K-2
Incorporating Technology into the Classrooms
Tips on Teaching in a Special Education Classroom
Reflection:
Just the fact that the teacher cares enough to sit down in a circle with them and talk about their day and do all these special things with them is wonderful. She makes them all feel very special. Also, I liked how she said she lets her students go into PE with children without special needs so they can learn different things from them, and hear things in a different perspective. This teacher make it obvious that this is her passion, and she truly cares about these kids so much. It was wonderful to watch!
This video is wonderful, and the teacher made a big deal about incorporating the smartboards, and also the use of laptops in the classrooms to get them to engage with the new forms of technology. By the looks of the video, the teacher had lessons for her students to do on the smartboards and helped them throughout the lesson and allow them to have the feel of what it was like to use the technology. The students really seemed to get a lot from it, and seemed to enjoy it!
Although this video is very short, it is very informative. In this video, the teacher gives the most important tips on making sure you have what you need to be successful in the classroom. She talks about making sure you have everything the students would possibly need while at school; whether it is special chair, fabric, utensils, and supplies. Also, she mentioned it is very important to keep contact with the parents to make sure to find out what triggers the students, so they do not get upset. These are a couple simple things that everyone does not think of. They are so important, and this is great for all teachers, or future teachers to watch!
What can we learn about special education?
After watching these videos, write a reflection on what you have learned from the videos, and what you found the most interesting?
Special Education K-2
Incorporating Technology into the Classrooms
Tips on Teaching in a Special Education Classroom
Reflection:
Just the fact that the teacher cares enough to sit down in a circle with them and talk about their day and do all these special things with them is wonderful. She makes them all feel very special. Also, I liked how she said she lets her students go into PE with children without special needs so they can learn different things from them, and hear things in a different perspective. This teacher make it obvious that this is her passion, and she truly cares about these kids so much. It was wonderful to watch!
This video is wonderful, and the teacher made a big deal about incorporating the smartboards, and also the use of laptops in the classrooms to get them to engage with the new forms of technology. By the looks of the video, the teacher had lessons for her students to do on the smartboards and helped them throughout the lesson and allow them to have the feel of what it was like to use the technology. The students really seemed to get a lot from it, and seemed to enjoy it!
Although this video is very short, it is very informative. In this video, the teacher gives the most important tips on making sure you have what you need to be successful in the classroom. She talks about making sure you have everything the students would possibly need while at school; whether it is special chair, fabric, utensils, and supplies. Also, she mentioned it is very important to keep contact with the parents to make sure to find out what triggers the students, so they do not get upset. These are a couple simple things that everyone does not think of. They are so important, and this is great for all teachers, or future teachers to watch!
Monday, April 14, 2014
Friday, April 11, 2014
Saturday, April 5, 2014
Blog Post #11
What can we learn about teaching and learning from these teachers?
Brian Crosby- In his video, one of the main things he made clear was that he wanted his students to be active and engaged in the learning process. In his class, he likes for his students to express themselves through videos and blogs. This way they can share whatever they are thinking, and can post it online and in return have someone comment on it. Another technology he liked his students to use is Skype, he calls this network this type of network personal learning networks. He advises his students to set out for help in answering questions they my have in the classroom through the blogs, this way students from around the world can reach out to them. This is a wonderful message he is sending to his students, for them to be able to express themselves and not be afraid to get feedback from others. Also in his video he shares that in his class, all of his students are not 100% comfortable with the language. He has some second language learners in his class. He found out for himself that all children are different, have different cultures, beliefs, histories, etc. It is important for him to keep a diverse mindset and try to be considerate of all of his students. Because of this he expressed the importance of making sure the curriculum abides by this. I learned a lot of great things from this video, and a lot of his points and interests made perfect sense. It was an entirely new way to think!
Mr. Paul Anderson- This teacher is a high school AP Biology teacher in Montana. In this video the concept of the "Blended Learning Cycle is presented. With this online, mobile and classrooms learning techniques are all combined. With this being said he shared that the five E's that have to be incorporated into the learning cycle are: engage, explore, explain, expand, and evaluate. QUIVERS, this is the acronym that he uses to describe the following six steps: having a good question in order to engage your students attention and interest. Understanding of the concepts is also something very important. Inquiry learning allows other concepts to derive from this one and therefore the learning process continues. Videos, educational of course, can be a great source for students to see things in a different way than just in the classrooms. They hear things from someone else for a change, which can sometimes help for the information to stick. Elaborating, or further explanation/review is then necessary. This is very important because if you as a teacher moves to a different subject, and the student is still lost from the previous topic then they will continue to be behind. The last step in the process is to take a quiz. Here the students will be tested and graded on their performances on what they have learned throughout the process.
Mark Church-In his class he likes to have his students get into groups and work on things in the class collaboratively. He thinks kids work better this way, and in the end get more out of it. They need to make sure to all do a part and for the experience to be equal and education for all of the students. He believes that with all of their minds being combined that they can think more about the questions given and can get past the generic answers. He wants his class to be creative and think outside of the box. I like the idea of kids being in groups, and feeding knowledge off of each other.
Sam Pane 4th grade- In this classroom the first thing I noticed was the eagerness his students has to learn. They were excited, and ready to go to school. This is not the normal mindset all children have in the mornings, but in their case their teacher makes things very interesting for them by having them develop super hero characters. This concept is being used for their lesson on Internet Safety. Instead of them listening to their teacher tell them the basics on internet safety in a lecture form, their super hero they make up is the one protecting them from all the bad things potentially on the Interet that they do not need to be involved with. This is fun for them, and gives them a chance to use their creativity. I think this is a wonderful lesson, and seems to work! This is by far my favorite lesson!
Project Based Learning- This video is different than the rest because in the previous videos we had one teacher express how they have been doing things in their classrooms, here we have the minds of three teachers combined in one classroom. The combined courses were English, History, and Technology in Canada. These teachers goals were to combines the curriculum for the three different subjects and have the students develop projects in groups. This gave them a wider range for the material they could use. This also gave them a challenge, they had to incorporate more things this way, and ultimately learned more than they would have if just one subject was used. Project Based Learning is great for many different reasons, I did not grow up doing things in groups. My classmates were always shy and would rather work by themselves than with others. Now a days they would rather talk than be quiet, and make new friends by working with others! This is so great, the kids at this young age have personalities that are starting to shine, and they need to be told that what they are thinking is wonderful and have encouragement from their peers.
Roosevelt Elementary's PBL Program- In this video group work is also a big part of the video. Not only do the students need to talk it out and work together with each other, but they need to be able to ask their teacher along the way if any questions come up. In Education so many different ideas are always thrown around, and because of this educators need to work together and share things with each other. Whether this is face to face, via email or some form of technology, or even the teacher themselves looking up ideas online to share with their students. This is the fun part, finding new materials and ways to do things is one of the many things that keeps things interesting. If the students mind wonders, or they get bored it is really hard to capture their attention again.
Mr. Paul Anderson- This teacher is a high school AP Biology teacher in Montana. In this video the concept of the "Blended Learning Cycle is presented. With this online, mobile and classrooms learning techniques are all combined. With this being said he shared that the five E's that have to be incorporated into the learning cycle are: engage, explore, explain, expand, and evaluate. QUIVERS, this is the acronym that he uses to describe the following six steps: having a good question in order to engage your students attention and interest. Understanding of the concepts is also something very important. Inquiry learning allows other concepts to derive from this one and therefore the learning process continues. Videos, educational of course, can be a great source for students to see things in a different way than just in the classrooms. They hear things from someone else for a change, which can sometimes help for the information to stick. Elaborating, or further explanation/review is then necessary. This is very important because if you as a teacher moves to a different subject, and the student is still lost from the previous topic then they will continue to be behind. The last step in the process is to take a quiz. Here the students will be tested and graded on their performances on what they have learned throughout the process.
Mark Church-In his class he likes to have his students get into groups and work on things in the class collaboratively. He thinks kids work better this way, and in the end get more out of it. They need to make sure to all do a part and for the experience to be equal and education for all of the students. He believes that with all of their minds being combined that they can think more about the questions given and can get past the generic answers. He wants his class to be creative and think outside of the box. I like the idea of kids being in groups, and feeding knowledge off of each other.
Sam Pane 4th grade- In this classroom the first thing I noticed was the eagerness his students has to learn. They were excited, and ready to go to school. This is not the normal mindset all children have in the mornings, but in their case their teacher makes things very interesting for them by having them develop super hero characters. This concept is being used for their lesson on Internet Safety. Instead of them listening to their teacher tell them the basics on internet safety in a lecture form, their super hero they make up is the one protecting them from all the bad things potentially on the Interet that they do not need to be involved with. This is fun for them, and gives them a chance to use their creativity. I think this is a wonderful lesson, and seems to work! This is by far my favorite lesson!
Project Based Learning- This video is different than the rest because in the previous videos we had one teacher express how they have been doing things in their classrooms, here we have the minds of three teachers combined in one classroom. The combined courses were English, History, and Technology in Canada. These teachers goals were to combines the curriculum for the three different subjects and have the students develop projects in groups. This gave them a wider range for the material they could use. This also gave them a challenge, they had to incorporate more things this way, and ultimately learned more than they would have if just one subject was used. Project Based Learning is great for many different reasons, I did not grow up doing things in groups. My classmates were always shy and would rather work by themselves than with others. Now a days they would rather talk than be quiet, and make new friends by working with others! This is so great, the kids at this young age have personalities that are starting to shine, and they need to be told that what they are thinking is wonderful and have encouragement from their peers.
Friday, April 4, 2014
Thursday, April 3, 2014
C4K Summary March 3rd-30th
The blog I commented on Week 10 belonged to Harold. In their class Harold was a giraffe that shared with them very important information with them throughout the week in their classroom. They have a stuffed animal giraffe in their classroom, but I believe they read a book about Harold and this is how he stuck with them. I shared with them that it was very important to have someone that you look up to and like a lot, but it is especially important to keep them around when they are sharing important information with you!
For Week 11, the kid's blog I read was Chloe. Chloe loves sports, and her favorite part of the day is when they get to walk to another school and play sports with them. She explained the rules of the games they played for the game and they sounded very fun! It was very interesting learning about the games they play over in her culture, because they are different from the games played here in America. She shared her passion, and shared the importance of fitness with her and how awesome it is that she enjoys being physically active. It is very healthy for her!
For this week, Week 12 I am commenting on is Lorenzo. For this week he made a video where he interviewed one of his friends who he named Jack Jones. This was a humorous video, but I believe it was making fun of Americans? The editing was done well for their age, and the effects/sound he used was good for his age. I shared with him how it was great that he is making videos, and he should keep it up.
These kids are all so cute, and I have enjoyed reading their blogs.
C4T Teacher #3 Summary
The Teacher who's blog I commented on for these past 2 weeks was Mrs. Mel Hamada, who is a PE teacher.
The first blog of hers I commented on was posted on March 12th and my comment was posted on March 24th. was about using the two tools Quickcast and autoCrat,two tools that she found very useful to her throughout her teaching experience thus far. She explained that with this tool she can make a video for 3 minutes of either herself, or her computer screen with her voice over it discussing the lessons that she can later share with her students along the way. This system seems very easy to use, and would be great for keeping organized and up to date on when and where all her information is. When I left a comment on her blog, I shared these things with her and said this was a wonderful tool and I could definitely see this being something I would use in my career. This would make things more interesting with videos and everything else involved! She also shared a lot of instructional videos and examples of how to use the tool. Wonderful!
The second post I just commented on was posted today, April 3rd. This blog was about SEPEP, which she later explained stood for the Sport Ed in PE Program. This gives the students the opportunity to participate in different sporting events in class, and within their groups come up with roles for everyone. She inserted a project manual, which if you would like more information on this you can visit her blog site: Mrs. Mel Hamada's PE Blog. Also something else I found very interesting about her blog was that she wanted/hoped to have iPads for the next school year to help with giving examples of the games for students, instructional videos etc. I wouldn't have thought about having an iPad in PE but how she explained it, it sounds like it would really help and I really hope they give her one!
Everyone should go and visit her blog, she has a bunch of wonderful ideas! Whether you are planning to be a PE teacher or not, she is still very smart and obviously knows what she is doing, and her tools could help for any teachers/subjects!
The first blog of hers I commented on was posted on March 12th and my comment was posted on March 24th. was about using the two tools Quickcast and autoCrat,two tools that she found very useful to her throughout her teaching experience thus far. She explained that with this tool she can make a video for 3 minutes of either herself, or her computer screen with her voice over it discussing the lessons that she can later share with her students along the way. This system seems very easy to use, and would be great for keeping organized and up to date on when and where all her information is. When I left a comment on her blog, I shared these things with her and said this was a wonderful tool and I could definitely see this being something I would use in my career. This would make things more interesting with videos and everything else involved! She also shared a lot of instructional videos and examples of how to use the tool. Wonderful!
The second post I just commented on was posted today, April 3rd. This blog was about SEPEP, which she later explained stood for the Sport Ed in PE Program. This gives the students the opportunity to participate in different sporting events in class, and within their groups come up with roles for everyone. She inserted a project manual, which if you would like more information on this you can visit her blog site: Mrs. Mel Hamada's PE Blog. Also something else I found very interesting about her blog was that she wanted/hoped to have iPads for the next school year to help with giving examples of the games for students, instructional videos etc. I wouldn't have thought about having an iPad in PE but how she explained it, it sounds like it would really help and I really hope they give her one!
Everyone should go and visit her blog, she has a bunch of wonderful ideas! Whether you are planning to be a PE teacher or not, she is still very smart and obviously knows what she is doing, and her tools could help for any teachers/subjects!
Sunday, March 30, 2014
Blog #10
I will start by saying that for both non-educators and educators this is a very influential video and is definitely taking the 16 minutes of time to watch it. The question for this week is What Can I Learn from Sir Ken Robinson?
I found his entire video very educational, but I will share some of the most interesting things from this video Sir Ken Robinson: Bring on the learning revolution!. He started off his lecture with saying that people are divided into two groups in this world: The people who love what they do, and the people who either do not or are just, as he calls it, "going with the flow". His example he shared deals with education. He says that the education system is always changing or transforming. He then calls it a "revolution". This made me stop and think, what it would be like for someone to be a teacher and not enjoy or love their job. Everyone would suffer, but the children would suffer the most. Teachers have a huge impact in students lives. Students look up to their teachers, and if the teacher is putting negative information or charisma in their minds then that could affect how they live the rest of their lives: how they treat other people, the jobs they endure, the people they associate themselves with, and especially the decisions they make along the way. With a 2 minute conversation in the video, it got me thinking really deep about what he was sharing.
"Human communities depend on a diversity of talent on the singular conception of ability". Wow. This is such a bold example and it really struck me. The subject of college was talked about, and he said that college is indeed very important but at the same time it is not for everybody. Some people do not have to go to college to do the things they love. Not everyone has to be an educator, or doctor, etc. which is what is takes to get to college. The humorous example he gives is when he was talking to a guy who came to his book signing and he asked him what he did for a living, and his answer was he was a fireman. The man shared that he had always wanted to be a fireman, but along the road in school a teacher told him that this was a wasteful career for him and he had so much more potential, that he should do more with his life. No matter what his teacher said, he signed up and became a fireman. Later down the road his teacher and wife were in a car crash, and that student saved both him and his wife's life by pulling them out of the car and doing CPR. The teacher was in fact wrong, and surely had a different thought process after that day.
Thursday, March 27, 2014
Wednesday, March 19, 2014
Blog #9
This week we watched the video First Graders in Ms. Cassidy's Class and she briefly had her students talk about the technology they used in their classrooms. Also throughout the video it showed previews of the students in the classrooms, and how they used the technology. They used computers for blogging, and in the video the students shared how much they really enjoyed blogging because they like seeing comments from different people. Whether it is from their family members, or strangers, they enjoy seeing new comments when they log into their blogs. The students also shared that blogging is one of their favorite things to do because they can do this both at school and at their homes as long as they have a computer. The students are also using iMovie to make videos, both in groups and individually. They like to make videos of what they might have learned in class for that day, or throughout the week. Also, this is the first video I have seen where the students get to use their Nintendo DS' in the classrooms. These are usually used only for fun, but they get to use them for playing educational games. The students have commented on how some of the games are helping them with being able to spell and pronounce certain words. This sounds like a wonderful tool for the students to use, especially if by saying the word out loud and them repeating the words back actually helps them overall! All of the technology she used from her videos I could see myself using in my future classrooms. I believe that if the technology is used appropriately by the students, and certain rules were placed for the technology then they can be used in the classrooms! There are so many different tools out there used for learning, and I am going to make it my mission to search and search until I think I have found something great. Then when there becomes something even better, I will try out the different tools and so on and so forth. 
Sunday, March 16, 2014
Thursday, March 13, 2014
Blog Post #8
For This week's blog we were prompted to find some tools outside of class about our personal field of study and or interests. My personal goal is to become a special needs teacher in the future. So upon searching I found some very useful tools: videos, lesson plans, and activities especially for special needs children and children with learning disabilities. Enjoy!
Her video is short and right to the point, what she is sharing makes so much sense. Working with the students, and knowing what their personal struggle is and finding ways to help them perform the needed skills for class is wonderful! It takes extra time and patience to help kids like these, but it is worth it when you see a child learning and progress with their learning throughout the school year. What a wonderful teacher! She is someone who knows what she is doing.
Special Education Materials: Lesson Plans
This is a website I have found if anyone is interested in teaching Special Needs students in the future. This website has lesson plans for all different subjects, print outs, word searches, you name it and it can be found on this website. This is a wonderful tool, and while looking through these tools it makes me so excited and anxious to being a teacher one day. I am thrilled to get to work with students I can call my own on a day-to-day basis and hopefully change their lives for the better.
C4T#2
For this week I commented on Will Deyamport's blog. He is a teacher for a Public School District in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. In his blog I read for this week, he shared about his attendance at an Edcamp in Jackson, Mississippi. This was his first conference, and he went in thinking positive and very excited to be around other teachers with the same passions as him. Although the turnout was as expected, he still thought it was a wonderful experience and he would definitely attend something like this in the future.
After reading his blog I felt truly inspired. Not all teachers show how passionate they are now a days. Some just do their job and do not get much out of it. This is obviously not the case with this teacher. I hope more people act like this, and go into this profession with a positive mindset.
After reading his blog I felt truly inspired. Not all teachers show how passionate they are now a days. Some just do their job and do not get much out of it. This is obviously not the case with this teacher. I hope more people act like this, and go into this profession with a positive mindset.
Sunday, March 2, 2014
Friday, February 28, 2014
C4K Kid's Blog Summaries
The kids blog I commented on for week 4 was Kevin, and he was in Mrs. Reuter's class. In his blogs he develops stories that are honestly very creative. When I read his blog post it reminded me of a video game. It was about a man being called for a secret mission out of the blue and having to go wherever they sent him and he could not tell anyone. He ended up going into war, and was fighting for his life. The fight was very brutal and violent, and he saw some excruciating things. He ended his story with a cliff hanger, very clever. This made me want to go back and keep up with his blog to know how the rest of his story would go. So yes, I am still keeping up with Kevin's blogs today. He is a truly talented writer, I shared with his to keep being creative and keep up the good work!
For week 5 I was suppose to comment on a students' blog names Phillip, but he did not have an active blog so instead I commented on Anika's blog who is in Mrs. Little's class. For her blog on that week she wrote some wonderful poems. She has three poems that she shared, and they all were different. One was titled sadness, and it was just that. It was a little dark and sad, but to write something like this is truly takes a lot of gut. Her second poem was titled “Forest”, this poem was my favorite of the three as I shared with her. This one was fun, and the words were spread out throughout the page and some were in bold. It was definitely an attention getter, she paid very close to detail which is important for writing! If the eyes are not interested then it is hard to stay focused. Her third poem was titled lily, and was very about a flower, and was very simple and to the point. They were all great, and I shared with her to keep the writing up, and to keep her imagination roaming!
For week 6 I commented on Latice’s blog who is in Mrs. Miller’s class. In her blog she compared reading books to what she would see in movies. The movie she was talking about was not mentioned, but she said she liked watching the movies better than reading books because she found them easier to follow and understand. After reading this, I mentioned to the student how important it is to read books and how reading more books can enhance ones writing skills. With this being said, after suggesting this, I told her that her thoughts were normal for her age and to keep writing and updated the blog!
For this week, I commented on Ashlie’s blog who is in Ms. Frahm’s class. She did a color poem for this week and the title of her poem was “Tropical Bloom” and it was about the beach. Her uses of adjectives were wonderful to read. She made going to the beach sound very enjoyable! I told her to keep writing poems, and blogging!
Thursday, February 27, 2014
Blog Post #7
What Can We Learn About Teaching and Learning From Randy Pausch?
This week for our blog we were told to watch the video Randy Pausch Last Lecture: Achieving Your Childhood Dreams. Randy opened up his speech with what he called, "introducing the elephant in the room". He told the audience that he has cancer, and has about 5 months to live. Instead of being or depressed about the manner, he explained that it was pointless and he would rather live the life he has left to the fullest. Upon hearing this, I felt absolutely inspired. The driving question from this blog is, what can we learn about teaching from Randy Pausch. Well firstly, this man has a wonderful outlook on life, and even though he is in a bad situation in his life right now he is making the most of it. I think that is definitely a lesson learned right there. In his presentation, he talked about his goals when he was a kid and how his goals either came true or at least something good came out of them. The main teaching moment I saw from his video is that it is important to make goals, and stick to them. No matter how outrageous they may be, stick to them because worst case scenario "Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted". So no matter what, try for it and live your life to the fullest! I think if anyone who hasn't yet seen this video, then they should definitely watch it. Randy's dedication, and determination are truly inspiring, and a lot can be learned from this wonderful video. This is a video that will take some time to watch, it is over an hour long, but do not let the time get you down. It is totally worth it! I hope many individuals can learn from him and remember all the wonderful things he has done and accomplished.
This week for our blog we were told to watch the video Randy Pausch Last Lecture: Achieving Your Childhood Dreams. Randy opened up his speech with what he called, "introducing the elephant in the room". He told the audience that he has cancer, and has about 5 months to live. Instead of being or depressed about the manner, he explained that it was pointless and he would rather live the life he has left to the fullest. Upon hearing this, I felt absolutely inspired. The driving question from this blog is, what can we learn about teaching from Randy Pausch. Well firstly, this man has a wonderful outlook on life, and even though he is in a bad situation in his life right now he is making the most of it. I think that is definitely a lesson learned right there. In his presentation, he talked about his goals when he was a kid and how his goals either came true or at least something good came out of them. The main teaching moment I saw from his video is that it is important to make goals, and stick to them. No matter how outrageous they may be, stick to them because worst case scenario "Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted". So no matter what, try for it and live your life to the fullest! I think if anyone who hasn't yet seen this video, then they should definitely watch it. Randy's dedication, and determination are truly inspiring, and a lot can be learned from this wonderful video. This is a video that will take some time to watch, it is over an hour long, but do not let the time get you down. It is totally worth it! I hope many individuals can learn from him and remember all the wonderful things he has done and accomplished.
Saturday, February 22, 2014
Blog #6
What is personal learning networks? Or PLN.
PLN consists of different networks for both teachers and students to share ideas and needed tools constructed to help him or her. One of the great thing about PLN is that one can design this for their needs and create whatever it is that will further help them throughout their career. Even after watching these videos I can tell there is still so much more I can and need to learn about this subject. I am excited to have this technology provided for me when I start to establish my teaching career. This is a subject I am very interested in learning more about, and even more interested in using one day! My professor Dr. Strange has definitely helped us with this because he has introduced us to the C4T blogs we are doing, which introduces us to different teachers and gives us the opportunity to see what they are doing and most of them provide either positive or negative feedback they have learned from their trial and error.
Without even realizing it, I have already started using some sort of PLN cite with Pinterest. On this app it allows people around the entire world add things to boards of interest whether it is apparel, food, or teaching ideas. This is a very useful tool I have discovered, and I cannot wait to find out more cites like this along the way that will help me in my career! With doing this, I will try my best to share my findings along the way to help more people in their careers as well! Here is a very fun, and informative video I found on YouTube about personal learning networks, I hope you enjoy!
PLN consists of different networks for both teachers and students to share ideas and needed tools constructed to help him or her. One of the great thing about PLN is that one can design this for their needs and create whatever it is that will further help them throughout their career. Even after watching these videos I can tell there is still so much more I can and need to learn about this subject. I am excited to have this technology provided for me when I start to establish my teaching career. This is a subject I am very interested in learning more about, and even more interested in using one day! My professor Dr. Strange has definitely helped us with this because he has introduced us to the C4T blogs we are doing, which introduces us to different teachers and gives us the opportunity to see what they are doing and most of them provide either positive or negative feedback they have learned from their trial and error.
Without even realizing it, I have already started using some sort of PLN cite with Pinterest. On this app it allows people around the entire world add things to boards of interest whether it is apparel, food, or teaching ideas. This is a very useful tool I have discovered, and I cannot wait to find out more cites like this along the way that will help me in my career! With doing this, I will try my best to share my findings along the way to help more people in their careers as well! Here is a very fun, and informative video I found on YouTube about personal learning networks, I hope you enjoy!
Friday, February 21, 2014
Sunday, February 16, 2014
Blog #5
What do you learn from these conversations with Anthony Capps?
Upon watching the videos and hearing the conversations between Anthony Capps and Dr. Strange I found out a lot of very interesting details about teaching with project based learning. It amazed me the things Anthony shared about his third grade class. Thinking back, I don't think I was on the same level of learning as the kids are today. They are really expanding their learning knowledge, which is a wonderful thing! He talked about how he had his kids in his classroom do some research and write some letters pertaining to what they were going over in class at the time. After they had finished their final drafts of the papers, the students themselves got to critique the letters and choose the best ones out of the ones they had done. This is a wonderful thing and got the students involved, and made them want to do the best they could do so their letters could be the ones sent off! Anthony shared some wonderful information with Dr. Strange via video, that he so kindly shared with us.
Some of the very important things I learned from these videos is let the students be in charge, and do research on things that interest them most. If teachers do this, they will get better quality things from their students because they will be more willing to find out about the materials that interest them! Another very important thought received from these videos were when Dr. Strange shared that in order to be a great teacher, the teacher themselves have to be prepared to learn for themselves throughout their teaching process. Teachers cannot think that they know everything there is to know, or they will not be successful. Knowledge is ongoing and not one person can know everything there is to know about everything. Teachers also have to be very flexible and creative. Having a backup plan is essential! Especially with technology. Something always goes wrong with technology, without a doubt. So being flexible and having something else to keep the students entertained either while you have someone come and fix the problem, or you set up the next activity for them to do. This is something that is very important, because once a teacher has lost the attention of his or her students then it is hard to catch their attention back. Students, especially at a very young age, have very short attention spans. Having something for them to do at all times is essential.
Upon watching the videos and hearing the conversations between Anthony Capps and Dr. Strange I found out a lot of very interesting details about teaching with project based learning. It amazed me the things Anthony shared about his third grade class. Thinking back, I don't think I was on the same level of learning as the kids are today. They are really expanding their learning knowledge, which is a wonderful thing! He talked about how he had his kids in his classroom do some research and write some letters pertaining to what they were going over in class at the time. After they had finished their final drafts of the papers, the students themselves got to critique the letters and choose the best ones out of the ones they had done. This is a wonderful thing and got the students involved, and made them want to do the best they could do so their letters could be the ones sent off! Anthony shared some wonderful information with Dr. Strange via video, that he so kindly shared with us.
Some of the very important things I learned from these videos is let the students be in charge, and do research on things that interest them most. If teachers do this, they will get better quality things from their students because they will be more willing to find out about the materials that interest them! Another very important thought received from these videos were when Dr. Strange shared that in order to be a great teacher, the teacher themselves have to be prepared to learn for themselves throughout their teaching process. Teachers cannot think that they know everything there is to know, or they will not be successful. Knowledge is ongoing and not one person can know everything there is to know about everything. Teachers also have to be very flexible and creative. Having a backup plan is essential! Especially with technology. Something always goes wrong with technology, without a doubt. So being flexible and having something else to keep the students entertained either while you have someone come and fix the problem, or you set up the next activity for them to do. This is something that is very important, because once a teacher has lost the attention of his or her students then it is hard to catch their attention back. Students, especially at a very young age, have very short attention spans. Having something for them to do at all times is essential.
Sunday, February 9, 2014
C4T #1
My name of the blogger I am assigned to is Dianne. Her blog is called "Dianne's Digital Discoveries". From what I have seen, on her blogs she posts helpful videos to help viewers learn more about potential resources and cites that are very important/helpful to her. The first blog I commented on was published January 11th(which happens to be my birthday) and she put up a tutorial video of Adobe TV. I had heard of Adobe TV, but had not used this source, and also did not know very much about this at all. So, upon visiting her blog, I watched the tutorial videos and became better educated on the subject.
The blog for this week is about Newsela. At first glance, I had no idea what this was, and was not even sure what this would be about. I looked at the tags involved in the blog and they were: reading, comprehension, news, current events, literacy, and newsela. After reading the description in her blog, she explained that it is a relevant daily news cite for helping build students reading comprehensions. This definitely sounds like something very interesting and I will try it out! I will read more about it, and give some updates on how I like it next time.
Saturday, February 8, 2014
Blog #4
The question for my blog this week is, "what do we need to know about asking questions to be an effective teacher?"
An important factor to remember while being a teacher is that, although we may think we do, we will not know all the answers! From asking questions, teachers should get the impression that their students understand the discussions going on in the classroom. In the article The Right Way to Ask Questions, a valid point has been made. While asking the question, "okay does anyone understand?", this is a way for the teacher to get any last minute questions out of the way before changing subjects or moving onto new task. The students either may be embarrassed to ask a question, or are not certain on if they understand or not. If this is the case, they will not have specific question about what was just done, therefore will not ask any questions and could be lost before the activity even begins. So, as teachers we need to stop and try to think of a different way to ask this question so we can better make sure all the students are on the same page. Maybe by asking more specific questions? Or even thinking of different strategies upon trial and error.
While reading the article "Three Ways to Ask Better Questions", the author shared the idea that "Good questions make students think, they encourage participation and I think they improve the caliber of the answers students give and the questions they ask". Following this, the 3 potential actions he shared to better improve this problem were: Prepare Questions, Play with Questions, and Preserve Good Questions. With preparing the question comes better understanding, and minimizes confusion. While preparing a lesson, the main focus is on the content, activities, and what the are wanting their students to get out of the activities. While this is normal, preparing questions that go along with the lesson can help with confusion, and if the students do not understand the question can help the teacher from being stuck on another way to rephrase their question. The idea with playing with the question, would be to not necessarily have students answer it right away, but have them think about it, and come back to it later. In this article, the author mentions that most students lose interest very fast, almost immediately after the question is answered they forget about it. With this method, they think it can get the student to either write it down in their notes, or even ponder on the question and have something to share in the discussion the next time the particular question is asked. This way they are better engaged, and will be thinking about it on their own, and they will participate in class! The third and final solution is preserving good questions, this solely comes from using the same questions(only if it is a great question) more than once, and taking note on how the answers to the same question change over time. This can also show how the students are learning, and their progress throughout the year. I think this particular article was my favorite out of all of them, and I will definitely plan to keep these ideas in mind when I reach my teaching career!
An important factor to remember while being a teacher is that, although we may think we do, we will not know all the answers! From asking questions, teachers should get the impression that their students understand the discussions going on in the classroom. In the article The Right Way to Ask Questions, a valid point has been made. While asking the question, "okay does anyone understand?", this is a way for the teacher to get any last minute questions out of the way before changing subjects or moving onto new task. The students either may be embarrassed to ask a question, or are not certain on if they understand or not. If this is the case, they will not have specific question about what was just done, therefore will not ask any questions and could be lost before the activity even begins. So, as teachers we need to stop and try to think of a different way to ask this question so we can better make sure all the students are on the same page. Maybe by asking more specific questions? Or even thinking of different strategies upon trial and error.
While reading the article "Three Ways to Ask Better Questions", the author shared the idea that "Good questions make students think, they encourage participation and I think they improve the caliber of the answers students give and the questions they ask". Following this, the 3 potential actions he shared to better improve this problem were: Prepare Questions, Play with Questions, and Preserve Good Questions. With preparing the question comes better understanding, and minimizes confusion. While preparing a lesson, the main focus is on the content, activities, and what the are wanting their students to get out of the activities. While this is normal, preparing questions that go along with the lesson can help with confusion, and if the students do not understand the question can help the teacher from being stuck on another way to rephrase their question. The idea with playing with the question, would be to not necessarily have students answer it right away, but have them think about it, and come back to it later. In this article, the author mentions that most students lose interest very fast, almost immediately after the question is answered they forget about it. With this method, they think it can get the student to either write it down in their notes, or even ponder on the question and have something to share in the discussion the next time the particular question is asked. This way they are better engaged, and will be thinking about it on their own, and they will participate in class! The third and final solution is preserving good questions, this solely comes from using the same questions(only if it is a great question) more than once, and taking note on how the answers to the same question change over time. This can also show how the students are learning, and their progress throughout the year. I think this particular article was my favorite out of all of them, and I will definitely plan to keep these ideas in mind when I reach my teaching career!
Friday, January 31, 2014
Blog #3
How Can You Provide Meaningful Feedback To Your Peers?
After reading one of Dr. Strange's previous students blogs', Paige Ellis, I was reminded to think like a teacher when commenting on someone's blog. We all want to be teachers here, and are wanting to learn from our mistakes and grow. If we held our true reactions back and did not share with our classmates what we truly thought after reading their blogs then we are only hurting them. Now with that being said, this needs to be done in a positive way. Negative feedback only hurts peoples feelings, and they might become self conscious in the process. If we give them suggestions or share things with a positive outlook and response, then the student is more likely to get something more out of it.
Switching gears, and moving to the Peer Editing video, it has the same message. In the video the girl talks a lot about being positive, and how giving compliments will really help them to improve. Giving suggestions to the bloggers is also great to show them you care enough to give them feedback that they can work with, and that could potentially make their future blogs better. In the next part of the video, a rubric layout it discussed, and the most important aspects the blog needs in order to be the best. The three more important things to keep in mind while reading and or commenting on a peers blog are: 1. Compliments 2. Suggestions and 3. Corrections.
I absolutely loved watching the video of the elementary schools children acting out different "not-to-do's" while peer editing papers. The creative names they came up with, and how they acted everything out seemed very fun and was humorous! This would be a great way for the kids to learn about each of these different ways not to edit their friends papers, and also have fun in the process. Sometimes is takes being silly and doing something in a unique way for students, or even anyone to remember certain messages. All of these ways made sense very much, and I will definitely put them into consideration while reading through and commenting on blogs!
After reading one of Dr. Strange's previous students blogs', Paige Ellis, I was reminded to think like a teacher when commenting on someone's blog. We all want to be teachers here, and are wanting to learn from our mistakes and grow. If we held our true reactions back and did not share with our classmates what we truly thought after reading their blogs then we are only hurting them. Now with that being said, this needs to be done in a positive way. Negative feedback only hurts peoples feelings, and they might become self conscious in the process. If we give them suggestions or share things with a positive outlook and response, then the student is more likely to get something more out of it.
Switching gears, and moving to the Peer Editing video, it has the same message. In the video the girl talks a lot about being positive, and how giving compliments will really help them to improve. Giving suggestions to the bloggers is also great to show them you care enough to give them feedback that they can work with, and that could potentially make their future blogs better. In the next part of the video, a rubric layout it discussed, and the most important aspects the blog needs in order to be the best. The three more important things to keep in mind while reading and or commenting on a peers blog are: 1. Compliments 2. Suggestions and 3. Corrections.
I absolutely loved watching the video of the elementary schools children acting out different "not-to-do's" while peer editing papers. The creative names they came up with, and how they acted everything out seemed very fun and was humorous! This would be a great way for the kids to learn about each of these different ways not to edit their friends papers, and also have fun in the process. Sometimes is takes being silly and doing something in a unique way for students, or even anyone to remember certain messages. All of these ways made sense very much, and I will definitely put them into consideration while reading through and commenting on blogs!
Friday, January 24, 2014
Blog Post #2
1. After watching the movie Mr. Dancealot I will start by saying that this is a perfect example of a teacher who does not know what they are doing! He did so many things wrong in this video, and I am glad I have never had a teacher like this. I believe the central message for this video is that especially in a dance class, students need to be able to get up and practice in class. Because practice is the only way to get better at something. Also, I imagine it would have made it a lot easier on the students if they could actually see what he was doing with his feet, rather than him standing behind the barrier! This is made obvious by the reactions from the students in the video. It was time for the exam, which was for them to dance together as pairs for the first, and they had no idea what to do! I agree with this message, and it was very entertaining and humorous to watch.
2. After watching the video Teaching in the 21st Century by Kevin Roberts(John Strange version), Roberts feels that to teach in the 21st century one needs to be aware of the technology, and be able to incorporate that technology in activities to keep the students involved and interested. A lot of ideas were shared throughout this video, but being involved and having creativity/uniqueness were a few characteristics that stood out to me. I agree with this 100%. If students are able to put their own characteristics in something, and put part of their views and likes, they would be more likely to enjoy whatever the assignment is they are doing. I also liked the format of this video very much, it was very easy on the eyes. Since there is so much going on in the video and so many things are changing, it keeps the viewers engaged. I will remember this for when I become a teacher, and will try to incorporate something like this for my potential students.
3. After I watched the video The Networked Student by Wendy Drexler my first reaction was that it was very artsy and had a lot of great information. This student that was being described in the video was doing things much similar to our EDM310 class, he is making blogs for others all around the world to comment on his intellectual opinions. I did not know that through iTunes U one can find videos of lectures and different things of teachers from different universities. This seems like a wonderful tool that would be very helpful for many students! Also, when he presents the question why would one need a professor? He states that professors are definitely necessary and help to show the students how to use the sites they are using, answer questions when they are stuck, show them how to do things on the internet, and give them the resources and guidance to contact more professor to obtain even more knowledge!
4. I believe the thesis to the video Harness Your Students'Digital Smarts is the fact that having students learn things on their own, and broadening their thinking process is a wonderful thing. When their teacher said that most teachers have the mind set that they need to know everything about everything before they come a teacher, and that is not the right mind set they should have. She shared that she learns new things from her students almost everyday, she believes that she should not have to define all the terms to her students and tell them what they need to do. She said the best way for them to figure things out is to look them up, and figure it out for themselves so they can use that knowledge to share it with the rest of the class.
5. My first reaction to the video Flipping the Classroom was that it is great that they are trying to make changes and better their programs with the students best interests involved. With that being said, I think realistically most students will find excuses for not watching the videos outside of class, and they will see this as something extra like homework they need to do. For young children they might think why would I do this while I could be playing/ or watching T.V. Also this is something that has to be done on a computer, not every household has computers for their children to use. She did address this with saying the students without computer access could watch these videos at school on the computers. When more and more students do not watch these videos it will eat into the set classroom time because they will all be watching the instructional videos, which was what the teacher was trying to pull from in the first place. I think this was a great idea, and I hope this works for the school! I personally would not use this system for the above reasons, but it will work for some people and that is great!
2. After watching the video Teaching in the 21st Century by Kevin Roberts(John Strange version), Roberts feels that to teach in the 21st century one needs to be aware of the technology, and be able to incorporate that technology in activities to keep the students involved and interested. A lot of ideas were shared throughout this video, but being involved and having creativity/uniqueness were a few characteristics that stood out to me. I agree with this 100%. If students are able to put their own characteristics in something, and put part of their views and likes, they would be more likely to enjoy whatever the assignment is they are doing. I also liked the format of this video very much, it was very easy on the eyes. Since there is so much going on in the video and so many things are changing, it keeps the viewers engaged. I will remember this for when I become a teacher, and will try to incorporate something like this for my potential students.
3. After I watched the video The Networked Student by Wendy Drexler my first reaction was that it was very artsy and had a lot of great information. This student that was being described in the video was doing things much similar to our EDM310 class, he is making blogs for others all around the world to comment on his intellectual opinions. I did not know that through iTunes U one can find videos of lectures and different things of teachers from different universities. This seems like a wonderful tool that would be very helpful for many students! Also, when he presents the question why would one need a professor? He states that professors are definitely necessary and help to show the students how to use the sites they are using, answer questions when they are stuck, show them how to do things on the internet, and give them the resources and guidance to contact more professor to obtain even more knowledge!
4. I believe the thesis to the video Harness Your Students'Digital Smarts is the fact that having students learn things on their own, and broadening their thinking process is a wonderful thing. When their teacher said that most teachers have the mind set that they need to know everything about everything before they come a teacher, and that is not the right mind set they should have. She shared that she learns new things from her students almost everyday, she believes that she should not have to define all the terms to her students and tell them what they need to do. She said the best way for them to figure things out is to look them up, and figure it out for themselves so they can use that knowledge to share it with the rest of the class.
5. My first reaction to the video Flipping the Classroom was that it is great that they are trying to make changes and better their programs with the students best interests involved. With that being said, I think realistically most students will find excuses for not watching the videos outside of class, and they will see this as something extra like homework they need to do. For young children they might think why would I do this while I could be playing/ or watching T.V. Also this is something that has to be done on a computer, not every household has computers for their children to use. She did address this with saying the students without computer access could watch these videos at school on the computers. When more and more students do not watch these videos it will eat into the set classroom time because they will all be watching the instructional videos, which was what the teacher was trying to pull from in the first place. I think this was a great idea, and I hope this works for the school! I personally would not use this system for the above reasons, but it will work for some people and that is great!
Friday, January 17, 2014
Blog Post 1
1. The only things I have heard about this course is the fact that it is very hard. Also, that it is a lot of work. At the same time, the people I have talked to have assured me that they have learned what they expected from the course, and took a lot from it.
2. I fear that I will be busy with other things, and forget to do a post or something required for this class. Also, technology has its ups and downs and times where it tends to not work. It would be very frustrating for me, or any other student really, to have typed up everything for an assignment/blog and the something happens to the computer and it loses the work. It has happened before, and is very irritating!
3. This early on in the course, it is very difficult to compare this class with one I have previously taken. I have been in computer classes in the past, learning about Microsoft Office, etc., and also about improving typing skills. I take it that this class is very different, and is about how to use the technology that I would be potentially using in the classroom of my own one day, which is very useful and important to learn about.
4. The most difficult thing for me in this course will be to remember to constantly go online and update blogs, view blogs, and keep up with everything going on in this class. There are no excuses for it, and I will not make any. With that being said, that doesn't mean it will not be difficult. It will also be hard for me to keep a positive attitude about things, and not get overwhelmed with the workload and necessary things for the course. It is important for me to do well and to succeed, and this is what I plan to do!
5. To address this issue, I need to develop better time management skills and make sure to stay on top of things for classes. Also, I need to stay online for this class, and make sure I know what is going on. It is also important for me to use my resources wisely, and be aware of the help that is available for me if needed.
6. At this point in time I do not have questions about the course, and if I did they would be very general questions that would most likely be answered with a couple more classes. I am coming into these class sessions with an open mind, and willing to do work! I will make sure to keep the syllabus for this class handy to look over in case any questions do come about, also I have my professor's email whom I am very confident will answer any questions I might have as well.
2. I fear that I will be busy with other things, and forget to do a post or something required for this class. Also, technology has its ups and downs and times where it tends to not work. It would be very frustrating for me, or any other student really, to have typed up everything for an assignment/blog and the something happens to the computer and it loses the work. It has happened before, and is very irritating!
3. This early on in the course, it is very difficult to compare this class with one I have previously taken. I have been in computer classes in the past, learning about Microsoft Office, etc., and also about improving typing skills. I take it that this class is very different, and is about how to use the technology that I would be potentially using in the classroom of my own one day, which is very useful and important to learn about.
4. The most difficult thing for me in this course will be to remember to constantly go online and update blogs, view blogs, and keep up with everything going on in this class. There are no excuses for it, and I will not make any. With that being said, that doesn't mean it will not be difficult. It will also be hard for me to keep a positive attitude about things, and not get overwhelmed with the workload and necessary things for the course. It is important for me to do well and to succeed, and this is what I plan to do!
5. To address this issue, I need to develop better time management skills and make sure to stay on top of things for classes. Also, I need to stay online for this class, and make sure I know what is going on. It is also important for me to use my resources wisely, and be aware of the help that is available for me if needed.
6. At this point in time I do not have questions about the course, and if I did they would be very general questions that would most likely be answered with a couple more classes. I am coming into these class sessions with an open mind, and willing to do work! I will make sure to keep the syllabus for this class handy to look over in case any questions do come about, also I have my professor's email whom I am very confident will answer any questions I might have as well.
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