Independent Learning Project #1

I created a NewHive account where you are able to create multimedia interactive posters, you can view my full poster at http://newhive.com/mkhsvp19/reading! I decided to pretend that I was a 7th grade literature teacher who created a online poster to get my students excited about their upcoming book reports. The poster includes a YouTube video that explains how and why we read,two hyperlinks to additional websites, and a place to type any comments the students might have. I typed out a list of main writing genres that I thought would be useful for my students when they try to find  books that will interest them. Having a good understanding of each genre will allow them to distinguish certain themes in their book reports. I also included a speech bubble reminding the students about the due dates of each book report and my email address so they could contact me with any questions they might have(I made a fake email address for this poster).  

Blog Post #6

       The school's website I visited was my old K-8 school, Bay Haven Charter Academy. When you first log onto the site there is a slide show of pictures and five different tabs; One for applying,teachers,students, parents, and staff. All five tabs can be clicked and are visible to the public. They have a list of the different grade levels available to the public as well as the teachers associated with that grade,the grades range any where from Kindergarten to 8th grade. The site also shows the different programs offered at Bay Haven such as clubs and activities, curriculum, athletics, grade levels, food services, administration, and Pre-school.The class pages show the contact information for the teachers of which ever class grade you choose.

http://k8.bayhaven.org/

       Communication will be made so much easier through the use of technology. Communicating is the one thing I can envision myself being pretty good at when trying to accomplish my professional responsibilities. When I become a teacher, email will be the best thing since sliced bread. I say this because communication is key when it comes to accomplishing responsibilities, especially those in teaching. Teaching is about good communication, using features such as email will allow communication at any time and place making it easier for efficient communication between the teacher, the student, and other employees. Other ways to communicate with students,parents,and staff is the use of a blog. A blog allows people to read and comment on what you are posting. Blogs are a great way to share information to other teachers and students whether it be a link to a website or ideas for a lesson plan. Blogs are also super fun and can be created any way you like! Creating colorful and fun pages is a good way to entice your students into reading and interacting with other students. You can also create a very professional looking blog so that you colleagues will respond to your posts seriously and with much thought.  

       A lot of the technologies found in the sandbox can be considered very useful in the class room, but the one that I could envision in my own class room would have to be the Oculus Rift. I think students would be amazed at how lifelike virtual reality can feel. It would allow them to receive a better understanding of situations and places if they were able to experience it for themselves.Using the Oculus Rift would make students excited for lessons because they would feel independent and it would be a refreshing change from the normal classroom setting. There are many students who come from low income families who can not afford to go see other parts of the country or world, using the Oculus Rift would give them a little bit of that experience which would give them insight about other landscapes and cultures. Hopefully, in the future, Oculus Rifts will not be so expensive and it will be a common classroom technology.

Blog Post #5

       The Web 2.0 tools in the podcast I find to be the most useful are blogs and wikis. With a blog teachers can communicate with  students and parents in and out of the class room. A blog allows teachers to post assignments that their students can reference once they get home from school. This allows students to not worry about forgetting what assignments are due and which ones are coming up. A blog can aid in a teachers professional development by allowing them to obtain a better understanding of their students as well as getting much needed practice in new forms of technology. A wiki is somewhat similar, teachers can communicate with students and parents out side of the class room, but, it also give students a chance to create and publish their own wiki articles as well as gain information from other classmates. Both a wiki and blog are great uses of educational technology but, most of all they are safe for student use.


       When I was in the 6th grade my English teacher told us that we would be doing a web based assignment. I shuddered at the thought of having to explore the foreign lands of the internet, especially when it was for grading purposes. She described the project as an online "cork board" where we would design a page all about yourself and present the finished product to the class. Now I was really scared, not only did we have to go on the internet and register to some weird website, but we had to present an "all about me" project in front of the ENTIRE class. I looked at the board where she wrote down the website and the the text read Glogster.
       Days had passed and all I could do was log onto my Glogster page and create. It had been one of the most fun projects I had ever done, I couldn't believe that I had been terrified to use such a magnificent website.I found myself making ways for me to have to use the website, In fact I created an entire page about Frederick Douglass just because we were learning about him and I wanted to make another Glogster, Glogster is like a type of  electronic poster that allows you to add text blocks, images graphics, and videos. You are able to look at other peoples Glogster and comment, much like how you would on a regular blog. I will be excited to use this tool as a teacher and I hope my students will feel the same way about Glogster as I once did in the 6th grade.

      I believe people learn best when they can experience it first- hand for themselves, that why I think that virtual reality and augmented reality software will become an important aspect to education. There used to be a time where people had to learn everything for themselves if they were to survive, obviously I am not saying we will die if we do not act on our own, but I am implying that there will be a stronger urge to learn if the learner can envision the purpose of what he or she is learning. This technology can place students in situations where they will have to use prior knowledge that they have learned in class. Doing so will show the learner the benefits of their education and they will remain motivated to continue to put effort into their studies.

Blog Post #4

       Twitter scares me. I really have no idea what I'm doing or exactly how to use it. Because I feel so uncomfortable, I have avoided interacting with people one on one. Hopefully as the semester progresses, I will start to warm up to Twitter. I can recognize all the different ways twitter can be beneficial but, until I feel more confident about what I am doing I will not feel like I am benefiting from Twitter.

       When a class room is filled with the majority of  students who come from areas where there was an abundance of technology, teachers tend to forget about the few students who have little to none experience with technology. When a teacher assumes all of their students are up-to-date with the newest technology and give assignments based on those assumptions, the digital divide becomes evident. The digital divide happens when a school contains a mixture of rural and suburban students, and can be seen when teachers use technology in their classroom. There will be the kids that know more about the computers in the lab than the teachers, and there will be kids that are unsure how to log into the computer. With the modern advancements of technology becoming more abundant and cheaper, students will have greater access to technology even if they grew up in a home without technology. As the world progresses so does the availability of technology in classrooms. By the time I become a teacher,there will probably be less of a digital divide but, regardless of the development and progress of technology, there will be students who are behind others.      

       As a teacher, the software I would be most likely to use the least would be concept mapping software. From what I have gathered, concept mapping soft ware is like making a virtual outline or brainstorming sheet. Personally, I have never been one to sit a brainstorm. Most of the time ideas pop in my head when I least expect it or I tend to scribble down loose concepts that I later expand on. Also, I am a bit unsure of what concept mapping exactly is so, before I were to use it, I would need to do some research behind it.Though I may not use concept mapping, I will most definitely use Academic databases and tutorials. I have always been fond of literature. Literature are pieces of work left up to the audience to interpret and analyze based on their own imaginations and reasoning. Using academic databases are an amazing way to find all different types of literature with out taking lots of time to do so. I could refer my students to a particular database, so that they could take their own time to read and make sense of the authors purpose as well as using the database for their own personal exploration and discovery.    

Blog Post #3

       The ELA technology standards I believe I could teach the best would have to be the “Multimedia” Literature and Informational Text requirements. I have always felt comfortable, analyzing and comparing different works across various media, and now that I have learned how to use some of the more advanced features on word and been introduced to a few really helpful websites, I am confident that I could combine different medias and produce a presentation. To be completely honest, there are many more ELA Technology standards that will require a little bit more learning, but the hardest for me will definitely be SL.5 9-12.

        Personally, I would love to be a middle school teacher. I know middle school can be hard but for some reason, they interest me the most. Most middle school students range in the ages 12-14 so they will need to feel like they are not being treated like “babies” and they will probably be more inclined to use technology. For this age group, I think the use of a class blog would be a great idea. It would be a great way to communicate with their peers, receive help and check up on posted assignments, all while under the supervision of the teacher. Middle school kids can be brutal and mean, especially when it comes to social media, but at the same time middle school students love social media. A blog would be safe where students would be constantly having to use “netiquette” and because it would be teacher regulated, students would not have to worry about strangers attempting to steal their private information. Also, if there was a class blog, students would need to check it occasionally for assignments and therefore, the students would gain experience in participating on an online community.  

       Believe it or not, the newsletter design practically taught me how to use word. All I was able to do before this assignment was type words, change font and size, change color, an add double space. I enjoyed every thing about this assignment, I thought it was super fun and helpful. There are not many times that I actually get excited about a project, but this was one of those times when the moment I got home I started the project. This assignment has already helped me in another class this semester. In my Russian fairy tales class, we had to do a project that required two column formatting, which I had just recently learned from creating my newsletter for this class. Next time, I would like to have more help on how to construct the graphs and how to insert and delete columns. I struggled with the graphs because I was unsure of what all the fancy buttons up top in the insert tab were used for. Overall, I think that this was a fun project and it will definitely help me in the future whenever I have/want to use Word.