TED TALKS

The three videos I choose to watch for this week were Bill Gates, Twitter and the Sir Ken Robinson

I thought the Bill Gates video was very interesting. I think it is awesome that he has so much money and is doing something great and helpful for the world. I am sure there are people out there with tons of money that will never help anyone else out. Bill Gates addressed two problems in this video Malaria, and teachers and education. I thought the part about Malaria was interesting, especially when he talked about how more money goes into hair loss products than it does to stop Malaria. When he switched over to education I got even more into the video, being an education major. He brought up the fact that more good teachers seem to quit teaching than worse teachers. This fact is horrible, if the world is left with bad teachers what is the future going to be like?

Second I watched Ken Robinson First, I liked the humor in this video, but I also liked the points he made. He brought up the choreographer for the Broadway play Cats, who had ADHD. How boring might this world be if we gave everyone medication for everything? I can think of one student I work with that has ADHD. This child is so creative even though he is on medicine, but is there a chance he would even more creative if he was not on the medication?

Last I watched the video was on Twitter. Using Twitter myself, I thought this was interesting. I liked the mini background information on Twitter. I guess I also never realized that when you do update, it is in under 140 characters. It really amazes me how much I am hearing about twitter, and seeing it all over the web. Especially seeing as how I had no clue what it was four months ago!

So much technology for classroom use!

As I was going through other blogs from our ED483 I realized how much is really out there for teachers to use. I always had this strange thought that “if some sort of technology is free on the internet (aside from blogging and social network type of things) that it is not going to be that great,” but I have completely been proved wrong.

I loved the post that Don had in his blog. This website that he has is a technology that allows you to convert a video into a jpg file. There has been so many different times when I have wanted to be able to do this, but I did not think it would be possible. I know that with a little bit of playing around with this site I will want to use it in my classroom!

I also really enjoyed Morghan’s entry on twitter. She stated to “just jump right into it!” Which is something I did for a little bit. However, lately I felt that I have slowly started to back away from it. I didn’t realize how much you could actually do with it until I looked at her entry and then her twitter account. I have also noticed how often I have been hearing about twitter on the news lately! It is growing so large! I really need to start playing around with it a little bit more.

I also liked Shea’s post on wikispace. While I have mine I have been a little “shy” with it. I loved her idea about showing it at a potential interview. I have been planning on using it for my final project and posting all of my lesson plans on it, but she had so many other ideas that you could include on the wikispace such as an about me section and different videos, like the planet party video that our class did!

Sites for the Classroom

The other day in class we looked around at the website www.cooltoolsforschools.com This website has tons of links off of it that teachers and students can use in their classroom. The group I worked with the other day was in charge of looking at music websites. My two favorite websites were www.mixturtle.com and http://blip.fm/all both websites allow people to look up different songs. Blip is really neat because you can have the website linked to other websites. I have mine linked to twitter. So as soon as I listen to a song, it can be linked to twitter to share with all my friends! I like mixturtle because it lets you listen to music for free. While you are not able to download the music you can make a play list to listen to while sitting at your computer.

Both websites might be nice to use in the classroom because you would be able to let the students look around for music. However, I am not sure how you would be able to sensor certain songs or musicians from the classroom. As well as the icon for mixturtle is not exactly the most apporpiate picture, even though it is one of a turtle.

Wordle

25 Thoughts on Education

Here are twenty five things I have noticed while working in the classroom

1. Think before you speak

2. Correct Grammar is a must

3. Students love to use technology and the computers, they seem to get very excited about this

4. Dot your i’s

5. Always question your teaching, “how can I make this better?”

6. Let the students be creative in their writing and art

7. The little stuff might really matter to the students

8. Working with the parents might be harder than the students

9. You always have to think about how the students day started out, and where they are coming from

10. Many different subjects can be incorporated into one lesson

11. Always model for your students, it will help out in the long run

12. K-3 Students are learning ro read, after 3rd grade students are reading to learn

13. I have always wanted to be a teacher, just now I am starting to get nervous about it

14. I am a horrible speller, when I tell this to students I work with it seems to cheer them up. They realize that you can do anything no matter what.

15. I hope to make a connection to teach student I work with.

16. I want to teach my students as much as my students will teach me.

17. What some students find fun, others do not

18. I love buying school supplies, mainly pens. I could spend forever looking at pens and trying to decide what I want

19. As much as I love pens, I strongly dislike pencils. They smug

20. Candy was a great reward for me in school, I plan to use it somewhat in my classroom

21. I am a horrible test taker, as a result I don’t think they are a fair way to judge students

22. I have always loved putting together bulletin boards

23. Teachers should never just teach from the textbook, if that’s all it takes anyone could teach

24. I wish I knew what the education process to become a teacher use to be like 50 years ago, and how it has changed.

25. Teaching and the classroom needs to be organized, at least while I am teaching in it.

So far this semester…

This semester I am in my first block of methods for elementary education. I love it! Aside from this technology in the classroom class I am also taking a Children’s Literature class, special ed class, and a reading and writing class. In my Children’s Lit class we are looking at different books that are good for the classroom. We are also looking at what makes a good book, and what makes a book not so good. I find this really interesting because in the past I have always just thought “oh I don’t like that book” and not really why I don’t like it. The special education class is very interesting, I no prior experience or knowledge of what we are learning so everything is new to me. My favorite part of this semester is my placement in the reading and writing class. The class is so much fun and I love spending time there.

In this class we have worked on the computer a little bit, on of the things the students did was work on their math facts using Math Magician. They have also used the computers to take different tests as well as look words using the online dictionary Little explorers.

Being a math minor I found some other websites I thought would be great to help enhance student’s learning, they are:
Pizza Game
Decimal Darts
And the favorite Lemonade stand

Technology in the Classroom

So much has changed in terms of technology in the last ten years. I remember when I was in second grade my parents spent around five months looking into computers to see if it was a good idea to buy one. Now if a person wants to buy a computer they will research what type of computer to buy, instead of “should I buy a computer.”

With how much technology has improved over the last few years I feel that it is essential to include it into the classroom setting. There is so much the students can learn through the new programs that have been created. One example of this would be in the science classes for educators at Northern we have used Labquest labpros. This was a great tool for doing science experiments as you could easily measure things like temperature or pH levels. I also like the idea of blogging in the classroom especially for students that are too shy. Even though I do feel that it is something that is needed in the classroom in the 21st century, I don’t think that technology should replace hands on experiments and activities.