Lesson 8 in Review

This weeks reading focused on security and its importance when it comes to the use of technology.  Our readings were from the two following links: How Computer Viruses Work and Netiquette. 

The article about computer viruses discussed what types of viruses are out their that can affect your computer and how they are transferred from person to person.  These computer viruses are compared to viruses that are spread from person to person.  They have a way of replicating, and moving from computer to computer by e-mails, documents, etc. This is a great article to check out! Make sure your computer is protected by a secure site.  Don't trust those links that look like spam, and if you're suspicious of an e-mail, don't open it.  For those that have had the experience of a computer crashing or a virus infecting your computers hard drive, you know what I'm talking about when I say this is HORRIFYING! I have had experience with a computer crashing and my debit card information being stolen and used.  It is not fun to go through either of these experiences.  Luckily with the case of the debit card, my bank was quick about noticing suspicious expenditures showing up on my account and contacted me. Everything was quickly taken care of before much damage could be done.  I am very thankful for this.  

The article on Netiquette is about the etiquette that we shout have when surfing the net.  This article discusses what we should say, do, post, not post, etc. on the net.  If you are unsure about a site, take time to get the feel for it and pay attention to what others are positing.  Sometimes a site may have certain rules for posting content and in these cases, make sure you're aware of these rules.  This is also a great article to check out.

The rest of our focus for the week was on Edward de Bono and the Six Thinking Hats Process.  Edward de Bono is very well know in many different fields of study and work.  He has written multiple books which have been translated into at least 34 languages.  He has been invited to lecture at multiple conferences in 52 countries and he has been awarded several prestigious awards.  Edward de Bono was born in Malta in 1933 and he introduced the idea of lateral thinking.  He has made his works practical and available to everyone.  There are multiple schools that use his works and programs as tools for teaching and learning.

The Six Hats Thinking Process is split into six categories organized by different colored hats. These include the white hat, red hat, yellow hat, black hat, green hat and blue hat. Each hat focuses on a different way of thinking. The white hat focuses on data and states the facts.  The red hat is the emotional hat. The yellow hat is the positive way of thinking. The black hat is the conservative hat.  It focuses on the negative aspects and the risks of a decision. The green hat focuses on creativity and new ideas. The Blue hat is the facilitator hat and its focus is on the structuring. The six hats thinking process can be used in any line of business, meetings, and education.

I see this being used in my classroom in the future when examining different questions that I discuss with my students. It provides students with different ways of viewing the information and learning to use those different ways to think about information.  A site I found with a great classroom example is located here as a Teaching Example.  

This week has been filled with valuable information that can be transferred into my classroom.  Thanks for reading my blog and feel free to leave any questions or comments.

Lesson 7 in Review

This weeks focus was on the brain, educational technology and Web 2.0 tools. I will begin by discussing the technology explorations, followed by the Brain Module, and then the Web 2.0 tools and educational technology that I plan to use in my classroom.


Technology Exploration 19:
Delicious, History Pin, Diigo, Calculator, and A Talking Calculator.
Delicious is a place where you can collect items from across the web.  This site reminds me of the site Pinterest, which has become very popular over that last couple of years.  Delicious was designed to help users create "Stacks" which are organized with links, pictures, videos, etc. of related materials. I liked the site, but I already am a member of Pinterest and really like it.  I would recommend it to other educators though.
History Pin is a way for people to share glimpses of the past and build up on the story of human history. I found the site interesting and would recommend it to other educators. I could see it being used to research a child's state or county history.
Diigo is a transition from Delicious.  There are similarities and differences and it's also very similar to Pinterest. It is similar to a cloud-based personal information management service which allows users to collect information from a variety of devices, websites, etc. I still prefer Pinterest, but it is still a good resource, and educators can make their own judgement on this resource.
The Calculator from PBS Kids is a good resource for students when calculator use is allowed. I do not like my students to rely on calculators, and use is very limited, as they need to learn the processes to work math problems out on their own and not rely solely on this resource. It is good, but again I would limit students use of this resource.
The Talking Calculator sounds like it would be a great resource, but I found it to be a nuisance, as I felt I had to jump through many links to try to download the resource and still didn't accomplish this goal.  I found it to be rather annoying and complicated to download something that should be easy.  There were multiple advertisements you have to go through to get to the product you are actually trying to download. This is a resource I wouldn't recommend to other educators and if I did would warn them of all the problems I faced.

Technology Exploration 20:
Math Wiki and PicLits. These two resources were explored in Technology Exploration 20.  The Math Wiki was designed to help teachers gain an understanding of Writing Across the Curriculum with Math.  I found it to be very informational and provided several examples of how writing can be used in Math. I would recommend this resource to other educators.
PicLits is interesting.  It is a site designed to create creative writing through graphics. I could see this being used for a writing or art class, where students can create their own story using a picture.  


The Brain Module was very interesting and I really enjoyed looking at the site: http://www.dana.org/. The site was very informational and provides educators with multiple resources about the brain, how it works, and about different disabilities that relate to the brains functions.  I really liked the resource that was about the arts in schools and how it relates to students learning.  I was a musician throughout middle school, high school and even through college, and still play the clarinet to this day.  I enjoyed music, and overall it helped with my understanding of repetition and how that is important in learning.

Web 2.0 tools and Educational Technology resources are also valuable resources in reaching our students and educating them.  Some examples of technology that I have seen used with my special needs students this past year include: Phonemic Awareness- a computer program that quizzes students on their reading comprehension, awareness of letter sounds, rhyming, etc. It was very useful as it let our teacher and the rest of us (assistants) see what the students had learned. We also used websites such as http://storylineonline.net, http://mothergooseclub.com, and http://pbskids.org to help with our students learning.  Storyline and Mother Goose Club were both sites where students could choose a story or nursery rhyme to listen to. This allowed students to follow along with the text of the story and learn the correct pronunciations of words. PBS Kids provided students with educational games, such as math, where it tested students knowledge of the topic that had just been covered. One example is measurement. Students used a game on measurement from this site to reinforce what they had learned in class that day or week.  They enjoyed it and it covered the material they had just learned. It made learning more enjoyable for them.
Our school also used Accelerated Reader, which tested students comprehension of books they read independently or had read to them.  This was used to see and track students progress with their reading.
One Web 2.0 tool I could see myself using in the future is Edmodo. This could be a very useful tool in communicating with parents and students. I also like the virtual manipulatives website, and the math dictionary websites we were provided with in class.  These are all helpful links that can be used and be beneficial to students learning.


Hope you enjoyed this weeks blog review.  Please leave any feedback or comments.

Lesson 6 in Review

Lesson six was about WebQuests and how to use them in the classroom. This weeks assignment was to create a WebQuest of our own on any educational topic.  I designed my WebQuest to allow students to explore the continents, other countries, and get an idea of someone elses culture.  I think it's very important for students to be exposed to other cultures.  It is also important for students to read a map and be able to identify countries and continents on a map, which was the sole purpose of this WebQuest.

This WebQuest also allows them the chance to work on presentation skills and collaboration skills. The students work in groups to research an assigned continent, then create a group presentation. This WebQuest allows the class as a whole to practice their writing and illustration skills by creating a book about the countries they studied.

The link to the WebQuest is listed below.

Countries and Continents WebQuest link

What's so hard about creating a WebQuest? 

Well, for me coming up with a topic was what I found to be the hardest part of creating the WebQuest.  I love to travel, and this led me to creating a WebQuest where students study the 7 continents, and a country of their choice. They must work in a group setting to study their assigned continent, then they break off individually to study a country.  With their country study they must create an oral presentation, draw their country's flag, and create a page for the Class Country Book which will be shared with the rest of the fourth grade team.  (I am not in a classroom right now, and have only worked as an assistant this year, so this is a WebQuest designed for a future classroom).

What issues might you face when creating a WebQuest?

I had issues with my documents wanting to not upload properly to attach to my WebQuest, but after several attempts, they finally loaded.  Also, I had issues with my rubric not fitting to the page width correctly, and attempted to fix it several times, and with each attempt it got worse.  After attempting it the last time it looked better but still didn't look completely correct, but was left the way it was. 

These were the problems I ran into when creating a WebQuest, but overall the experience was good. This was the first WebQuest I have ever created and I can see this being a great resource for my classroom in the future. I will design more WebQuests in the future, hopefully with greater ease each time.  I think coming up with a topic will become easier when I'm in a classroom of my own.

You can design your own WebQuest by visiting the site Quest Garden.  Enjoy and have fun creating your own WebQuests.

Lesson 5 in Review

This week focused on visual literacy.  We were assigned four technology explorations and several resources on visual literacy. This weeks technology explorations were Prezi, Spicy Nodes, Edmodo, A Math Dictionary, Glogster, JIng, YouTube for Education, SchoolTube and TeacherTube.

Technology Exploration 15:
Prezi and Spicy Nodes: Prezi is a cloud-based presentation software that can be used to create unique presentations. There are multiple resources available to help explain how to use Prezi.  This is a great resource for teachers and can be used for any subject area.  Spicy Nodes is a site that gives visitors a visual guide through a website.  It helps organize information and makes searching for materials easier. This resource could be used on a classroom website.

Technology Exploration 16:
Edmodo and A Math Dictionary: Edmodo is a site that is similar to Facebook for educators.  It is a place where teachers can share information with students, parents and guardians, as well as other educators.  This site has actually been recommended to the teachers at my school.  It can be used in any classroom to help keep students up to date with school work, especially if they were absent that day. A Math Dictionary is a wonderful resource for educators and students.  It provides students with definitions of those tricky math terms that students sometiems struggle with and provides examples that students can work out.  This site is great for educators that have a SmartBoard and could use this as a form of interactive technology for students to practice problems.  It could also be used as extra practice and for tutoring purposes.


Technology Exploration 17:
Glogster and Jing: Glogster was created as a resource for digital expression and as an alternative to offline boards, posters and web tools.  This provides educators with a resource that students can use to create artwork to express themselves.  I could see this being incorporated into a writing assignment where students have to create an illustration portraying their story. Jing allows users to take a screenshot and capture an image that you see on your computer.  You can also record comments and video for up to five minutes.  This resource can provide educators with a way to grade students writing assignments and record their comments for students to see, allowing for them to see what they need to correct or work on.


Technology Exploration 18:
YouTube for Education, SchoolTube, and TeacherTube:YouTube for Education provides high-quality educational content while blocking those sites teachers don't want in the classroom.  It provides teachers with videos that can be related to the material they are covering in class. SchoolTube is a site that provides teachers with a safe sharing environment. This resource also provides educators with a place to share lessons and projects with others. TeacherTube is a place for educators to view and share videos, photographs, documents and audio files.  


All of the resources from this weeks Technology Explorations were great resources for the classroom.


We also explored several resources on visual literacy. One thing that really struck a cord with me was looking at the wiki space and the Ten Most Confusing Traffic Signs that I looked at.  This really showed how some visuals can send mixed messages.  This made me think about the directions I may have given my students in the classroom in the past and how some of those directions may have had multiple meanings depending on the students interpretation.  I started thinking that as educators, we need to be sure that we are clear with our expectations and directions for our students.  This wasn't something that was completely new to me, but it made me think about how we perceive the intended meaning of our directions compared to how our students may interpret them a little differently.

The information gained from this week can help me make better judgements about how to give students clear explanations, how visual literacy affects students learning. Our students are surrounded by visuals everyday, from TV commercials, videos, and shows, to the Internet ads, and billboards.  Students are exposed to visuals at such an early age now and this truly has an effect on their learning.