Final Post

I am really happy that I took EDM310 this semester, because I really learned a lot! One thing that really sticks out is the podcasts. I think those are definitly something that could be used in a classroom. Not only can podcasts be used to teach in a class, but you can use them as a project like we did. The students can make podcasts to show what they learned from a lesson. Also, by doing the podcasts I learned about using youtube in the classroom. This is the topic my group did our podcast on, and I'm glad we did. I never would have thought to use something like youtube in my classroom but after doing the podcast I learned how helpfull it could be. We also stumbled across teachertube, which is also something I plan on using in the classroom. If we had not done the podcasts in class, I never would have thought to use either of those things once I become a teacher.

I think we learned pretty much everything in this class that I would have liked to. The only thing I can think of that might have been nice to go over, atleast shortly, would be parent-teacher correspondence. It would have been helpfull just to go over the correct way of writing letters or reminders to parents since that is something we will all have to do soon. Other than that, I think I learned everything I wanted and hoped to learn. It was a great class and very helpful!

iTunesU

iTunesU has this great digital library available to teachers. It's WGBH's "Teacher Domain" where you can find free digital media from different PBS programs. They make it very easy to use by splitting the media into three different secions; k-5, 6-8, and 9-12. This is very helpfull because instead of having to go through everything looking for what you want, all you have to do is pick your grade level and go from there. Of course, you can't teach a class solely based on these, but they are a great enhancement to a lesson!

I watched a video titled "Observe Clouds". This video podcast talked about how children should pay mroe attention to the clouds. They are changing every second. That is something that I didn't know. This would be a video you could show in a science class or if you were talking about the sky. I think this is a great resource to use as an addition to a lesson being taught to your students. It will help to hold there attention and change up the normal teaching method a little bit.

The Edible Schoolyard

Lately, Americans have been becomming more and more concerned with health and what they are eating. The push to "go green" and eat organic has been increasing daily. Why should this not be carried down all the way to middle and elementary schools? Chef and author, Alice Waters, created the Edible Schoolyard based on this concept. In 1995 Martin Luther King Middle School in Berkley, CA got just that. They founded an organization that was made to "create and sustain an organic garden and landscape that is wholly integrated into the school’s curriculum, culture and food program."

When I first started watching this, I thought that it was a concept that would go right over the children's heads. Most middle school students are not very concerned about their personal health and eating habits, they would rather live off of pizza and icecream. I was suprised to see how excited these chidlren were getting about the project. By learning these healthy habits early, there is a better chance they will continue to follow them into a healthy adulthood. I definitly think the Edible Schoolyard is a very creative and fun way to teach students and it should be tried in other schools across the country.

iTunes University

After writing the last post about the possibility of using iPods in classrooms, I was interested to see what Apple, the creator if iPods, thought about it. TO find out, i visited the Apple Education Site to find out more.

According to the website, Apple is using iTunes University to let teachers distribute digital lessons to their students. Since the students are going to bring their cellphones and iPods to school anyway, they might as well take advantage of this and use it to their (the teachers and the company) advantage. Podcast are sent to students over their iPod or iPhone and then they are able to study and learn on their own time. If something comes up, the student is easily able to pause the podcast and come back to it later, leaving no excuse for why they could not finish their homework.

Apple is even making it very easy for teachers to use. The students already have the devices, so all the teachers need to do it get the software to use it, and Apple makes everything they will need. Clearly, learning does not only take place in the classroom anymore.

iPods in Instruction

In todays classrooms, everything from food to youtube is being used to teach, so why not iPods? Using iPods in a classroom is never something I would have thought about, but after being about it, I see that it is an idea that would actually work! I read this article on how iPods are being used in the classroom. It said that within the last year, the number of iPods being used in classrooms has quadrupled and the number of classes using them has doubled. That was very suprising to me!

I like the idea of lectures being uploaded so you can listen to them anywhere. I think that would take a lot of the stress out of the class because if you miss something while taking notes, you do not have to panic, you can just go back and listen to it later. I also think that many students would use the iPods just to listen to music or watch videos and ignore what is going on in the class which could ruin the chance of using them for class work for everyone. It may also give studetns an excuse for not going to class since they can just upload it later. Even though there are some downsides to using iPods, like anything else, in a classroom, I think it is a concept worth trying out.

Dr. Christie's Website

I decided to write my blog this week on Dr. Alice Christie's website. Specifically, I am writing about the part on Electronic Portfolios. A Electronic, or digital portfolio is a collection of your teaching or scholastic artifacts but together in some kind of multimedia program. At USA, we use Folioteck for this.

That was the main reason why I decided to write my blog on this topic. In the education major here, we all have an electronic portfolio and I was wondering if using this technology for something so important was better that just keeping a paper file. Something Dr. Christie said that I really agree with is that a portfolio has to be more than just a bunch of documents thrown together. It has to have purpose and structure. She said that a portfolio needs to be organized around standards, just like ours are. I think this will make it much easier to make sure that you have everything you need to go out and start teaching in a school.

She also said that your portfolio needs to contain future goals based on your past performances. I think this is very important too. Having your goals as a teacher clearly listed in your portfolio will be a big help to future employers. It lets them know where you want to go with your teaching career and if you are a good fit for their school. That way there is less of a chance that you will spend a few months or years there just to find out that it is not the right school for you and then you have wasted your time.

By making your portfolio electronic, you have less of a change of losing important documents and more of a chance of being hired as a teacher. This shows the employer that you are not only organized but computer and technology literate, which is a big plus! You can find out more on what Dr. Christie had to say by clicking here

Wikipedia

Wikipedia is a "free, multilingual enclylopedia project supported by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation" (www.wikipedia.com). This site is often used as a reasearch tool by people all over the world. I definitely think that Wikipedia can be used as a source of information for research. At the same time, I do not think that Wikipedia should be your ONLY source for research.

One reason why WIkipedia should not be a trusted source as a final answer to anything is because anyone can make changed to the information on wikipedia. According to The NPR Blog major corporations have been going into wikipedia and making changes to entries containing negative references or information on them. These companies include Exxon, Walmart, and even the CIA. That makes you wonder if you can believe anything you see on the website.

On the other hand, you are able to see who the source of the information is, so you can decide for yourself if the informatin is reliable. If you are doing research on something like Walmart, you may want to check other sources where Walmart is not able to have only the informatin they want posted, but, if you are writing about George Washington, atleast some of the information on Wikipedia should be usefull. Users need to use Wikipedia at their own disgression and check all of the facts they decide to use.

Randy Pausch's Last Lecture

I went into this blog thinking "Do I really have to listen to 40min of some guy talk? This is going to be so boring." Once I started listening to it though, I was quickly proven wrong. Randy Pausch did not spend his whole time talking about how sad his situation was and try to make people feel sorry for him. Instead, he was surprisingly upbeat. His biggest point throughout his speech, was to always go for your dreams. I thought this was a great message!

This lecture is not something only the students in the EDM310 class have been listening to, people all over the world are listening to what Randy Pausch had to say. Mr. Pausch has inspired people everywhere with his lecture on Lessons Learned, Childhood Dreams, and Enabling the Dreams of Others. Never in the lecture does Randy Pausch talk about how he can not obtain his dreams because of his condition. He went for them all anyway and lives his life to the fullest extent he could.

One thing I loved about his lecture, was when he talked about the brick wall. He said the brick walls in our lives have two main purposes. Those purposes are to show us how badly we want something and also to stop the people who do not want something bad enough. If you are willing to find a way over the wall, then you deserve to obtain the dream that you are working for. I think it ties in with the saying "nothing worth having comes easy". I also liked how he talked about how it wasn't a total waste if you didn't get what you wanted. You still get experience and I think that it just as important, because that will make it a little easier to go back and try it again.

I thought this was a great lecture and I strongly encourage EVERYONE to go and listen

180 days?

For the best of 2007 on Fischbowl, i decided to read 180 Days?. I liked that the teacher talked about used the did you know? video to start a class discussion because I think that would really work and you would get a great response.

This blog talked about how the 180 days of school were not enough and out of those 180 days, he wondered how much was used for actual teaching. He said that things like movies were not a necessary part of teaching but other teachers dissagreed. They said they showed their students movies when they needed a break or when the students deserved a reward. He talks about how he thinks the curriculum needs to be changed to incorporate more of the "necessary" things and take out the not to necessary.

Out of the 180 days of school, only about 120 are actually being used to teach. That leaves 60 days of "wasted?" time. Some of those days are things that I feelare necessary. Those include days taken for your classroom tests and days that you review for the tests. It also includes things like final exams when you do not go to every class and state testing when classes are shortened. I believe that those are good things to take time out of teaching for. I think that the creator of the power point would agree.

Some of the other things that were taking away from teaching days were things like parties, pep ralleys, scheduling classes for the next year, and days before vacation. He said that the days before a school break were "wasted" days because many students are absent, leaving for vacation early, and the students that are there are to distracted to consentrate. I don't think that just because christmas break starts the next day or in two days that you can not do anything in your class. It is still a school day, so teachers should still be able to plan on teaching that day. If a student is absent, they will just have to make up the work when they return.

Last Semesters Blogs

I listened to two podcats from last semesters EDM310 class. The first one I listened to was "Possibilities for using Facebook in an Educational Setting" by Allison Midgette and Shaundretta Bethel. Both girls started by telling what their views on the pros of using facebook were. Allison had actually even used facebook in a classroom before. I think they should have spoke a little more on what the different applications available on facebook were. They were also talking pretty fast, so I thought it was kind of hard to keep up with what they were talking about. One other thing I noticed was that they used the words umm and uhh a lot which I found very distracting.

The second podcast I listened to was the ALEX/ACCESS podcast. I decided to listen to this one since I am going to be a kindergarten teacher and those websites may be useful to me. I saw when I wrote my first blogs about ALEX and ACCESS that they had links to other sites and useful information that I will probably end up using at some point. I thought this podcast was very good. I felt it was a lot easier to listen to and follow than the first one I listened to. One of the speakers did sound like she was very nervous while she was talking. I felt for her because I'm sure I will sound the same way, but that is one thing that I did notice about this podcast.

Fischbowl

It is hard to believe that in todays day and age, there are still some poeple that do not know how to use the internet and other forms of technology. By not knowing how to use a computer, you will have a hard time finding a job. Many jobs today require the use of computers. One profession that definitly has a technology requirement is teaching.

I agree with Karl Fisch, the creator of fischbowl, when he said you will have a hard time being a teacher without knowing a bit about computers. With the amount of computer work necessary to run a classroom, I do not know how a teacher could run an effective classroom being technologically illiterate. Teachers need to put forth the effort and time to continue their education and become computer literate, if they are not already, if they are expecting their students to put forth the time and effort to be willing to learn in their classroom. Teachers must lead by example. If you expect your students to learn, you also must be willing to learn.

Podcasts

The SmartBoard Lessons Podcast is the podcast that I started with. This poscast was titled Teachers Connecting 3 IWB and Smartboarding for Community Partners. This podcast focused on the use of smartboards in the classroom. By using a smartboard, students have a way of interacting with the teacher during lessons. The thing that I thought was so cool about this podcast was the fact that the two hosts were actually thousands of miles away from eachother but you would never be able to tell by listening.
The next podcast I listened to was Kidcast, episode number 58. This one was titled "The Median is not the Message". In this, the host talked about diferent ways to teach children/students how to use technology. He thought it would be great if students and teachers would use this in the classrooms to extend learning.
I also listened to the Connect Learning podcast. This was an educational podcast. The host of this one, David Warlick, goes to different conferences to interview people and uses those interviews for his podcasts. Something different about this podcast was the use of Skype, which allows people to actively participate in the podcasts.
In all, I think podcasts are very interesting and can be a great addition to a classroom. I am excited to make our podcasts in class.

International K-12 Blogs

Not only did I come across blogs from schools in the United States, but I also found some from other countries as well. The first website I used to find these was Australian Blogs The teacher made this blog to try and move her English class into "the digital age". On her blog, she talks about things such as how to podcast, the best ways to study, how to decifer a political cartoon, and a list of 1000 novels she thinks her students should read in their lifetime. This blog is different from the other blogs I found because it is not specifically to her students. She uses her blog to give information to anyone that wants it, be it her students or someone just looking to find out the easiest way to make a podcast.

The other international blog I looked at was from a school in Indonesia I specifically looked at the blog for the Kindergarten classroom, because thats the grade I want to teach. The kindergarten teacher also uses her blog to keep in touch with the paretns of her studetns and let them know what is going on in the classroom. She talks about the field trips they took and gives instructions on how the parents can recreate some of the art projects at home that the children really enjoyed makign in class. I really liked how she posted the Monday was one of the students birthdays and wished him a happy birthday. I think that probably made that child feel very special to see their name on the computer. I think this is a good way of reminding parents of upcomming events in the school as well as the classroom.

K-12 Blogs

The first school that I found that uses blogs is Grandview Elementary School. I was looking at the blogs of some of the students in the 4th grade. You can read their blogs by clicking on this site Grandview Student Blogs On these blogs, the teacher has the students write messages to her telling her about what is going on in their lives. The students are able to ask the teacher questions and tell her about anything they want. One of the students talked about living in the Bronx and one talked about hurting their finger with a stapler.

The other blog I found was for Ms.Sanborn's class at Willowdale Elementary School in Omaha, Nebraska. If you want to look at this blog, you can see it here: Willowdale School Blog This blog is set up a little bit different than the first one. The teacher uses this blog in her classroom for the parents. The parents can go onto the teachers blog to find out what their children did in class that day. The teacher updates the blog dialy telling about what they did in each class and any classwide behavior problems. I think that this is a very effective way to stay in touch with the paretns and I think that I will probably use this when I start teaching.

Did You Know?

I just finished watching the Did You Know Movie . I would reccomend that everyone watch this short movie because it is full of a lot of intersting information. Being in such a technologically advanced country, I think we sometimes take for granted how lucky we are to have all of this technology. Without it, I think almost everyone would be lost. It was crazy to me to think that so many children in other countries never make it past the fifth grade, but at the same time, China has 3.3 million college graduates every year!

I loved the idea of the One Laptop Per Child Project. If one in three children in developing countries are not getting anywhere near the education they need, I think this would be a great help. This project started in 2005 and I am very interested to look it up and see what is happening with it today. If you would like to look up more information on the One Laptop Per Child Project like I did, you can go to this website: OLPC

ACCESS

Sometimes students need a little bit of extra help outside of the classroom, and I believe that the Alabama Connecting Classroom, Educators, and Students Statewide (ACCESS) website is a great way for students to get that extra help they need. This website is based on the importance of using distance learning for high school and college students. You can find everything you need to learn more about the ACCESS website here ACCESS

One of the main reasons for this website is because many lower income schools have a very limited course offering for students, so by using ACCESS, students have a way to learn about the other courses they are interested in. Also, by using this site in high school, students will be better prepared to have success in a blended (classroom and Internet) course that they may take in college. This website is very effective because not only is the Internet used to have a web based class, but students are also able to use video conferencing to get in touch with instructors.

After looking over this website and seeing all that it has to offer, I know that this is something I would suggest to students. It will help them to get some of the classes they want to study that their school may not have and helps to prepare them for further education.

The Importance of ALEX and ACCESS

The internet is a very important tool for teachers to use, because there are many great and useful websites to help them. The first website that I would highly reccomend to teachers is ALEX, which stands for Alabama Learning Exchange. The other site I found very useful was the ACCESS (Alabama Connecting Classroom, Educators, and Students Statewide) website.

You can find the Alabama Learning Exchange website by clicking here: ALEX On the ALEX website, teachers can look at lesson plans as well as find other websites with lesson plans. You can also talk with other teachers online. The ALEX website is not only useful for teachers. The website also includes links for administators and students. Also very important on this website are the links for teachers to continue their education with profesional learning.

The other website, Alabama Connecting Classroom, Educators, and Students Statewide, can be found by clicking on this link: ACCESS The ACCESS website stresses the importance of distace learning, which helps students to prepare for high school and college by using the internet. The website includes information for students, educators, and parents. By using ACCESS, teachers are bringing the use of technology into their classrooms.

After looking at both of these websites, I think both are very important. I could definily see myself using both of these once I start teaching. I believe that by using these websites in my classroom, I will be able to benifit both me and my students.

First Post

My name is Amanda Raskiewicz. I am a Junior here at University of South Alabama. I am majoring in Early Childhood Education, hoping to be a kindergarten teacher. I would love to stay in Alabama to teach, but I am willing to go anywhere in the south. When I start teaching, I would like to teach at an inner-city school.

I moved to Alabama in June of 2008 from Wisconsin. All of my family still lives back home, so it is just me here. I moved to Alabama because I wanted to be as close as possible to the beach. I transfered here from a small private college of about 800 students, which was built in the middle of a corn field, so South is a big change for me!

I have been a preschool teacher at a daycare for the past five years. I mainly worked with the three and four year olds. I recently stopped working at the daycare to be the nanny for a three and five year old.

I can not wait to be able to start teaching! I think it will be a great experience and I hope to be able to make a difference to my students. I can clearly remember my kindergarten teacher and know that she made a difference to me, so my goal is to be the same to atleast one of my future students.

One of my favorite websites is Denver Nuggets Homepage