Wrapping it all up!

I believe that it is very important to incorporate technology in the classroom. Technology is around us and part of our everyday lives and as a teacher, if I include and teach in ways that my students experience everyday life, I believe that they will have a higher chance at success; which of course is ultimately my goal as a teacher: to prepare and help my students succeed!

Some of the benefits for me as well as my students include the constant modern ideas and activities that can be applied inside and outside the classroom, lesson plans, experiments, and projects. Technology is constantly changing and becoming more advanced, so why shouldn’t the classroom be one of the places to embrace this concept? With technology, students have the opportunity to explore new ideas, express their understanding of the content in a variety of unique ways, and learn through different mediums that were not as readily available with the paper, pencil, and blackboard style of learning. As a teacher, incorporating technology can make our lives more efficient, more organized, and in some ways, faster. It opens many doors to lesson ideas, activities, and creativity. With office programs, the large amount of paper work we need to hold becomes quicker and more organized.

Although technology is a great tool to use, it does have some challenges. Some of these include: the availability of this technology within the school district, sometimes there are glitches in different systems, and some families in the school district may not have the money to supply the technology at home that needs to be carried over to the home.

The most important lesson that I learned and will take with me from taking this class is that never limit myself, expand my horizons, and to not fear technology! Coming in the class, technology and I had some rough patches where we did not agree, and I feared it, but now, I know that it is possible for us to be friends. I want to include technology often in my classroom because it makes learning more interesting and fun and I want my students to remember my class and to retain all of the information that they can. I want to relay these beliefs onto my students because I want them to explore technology and use it in their own creative ways.

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Copyright

In discussing copyright laws in class, the law that surprised me the most was the law on music. Especially in the cases where artists were sued for using another song because four of the notes in the music were the same. This seems absolutely crazy to me! I played an instrument 10 years in school and if that was the rule, then every composer from Bach to Handle would be up for violation of this copyright rule. Many pieces of music have similar notes, while even in the same key; I mean seriously there aren’t that many notes in the musical world, they are bound to repeat!
Throughout my schooling career, many of my teachers have violated the copyright law. My most prominent teachers are my music teachers, especially in my high school orchestra and choir. My teachers copied music very often. Though this is wrong, the setting of my school makes me understand why. I went to a high school where there were only grades 10-12 and it still had a larger student body than Albright’s student body. Although not every student played an instrument or sang in the choir, the number of participants in these activities was still larger than the normal high school and the laws were violated due to budget issues within the department. Although I understand why these laws were not upheld, it is still wrong. I have also had teachers who copied workbook pages for the entire class out of one workbook instead of purchasing the workbooks for the class.
I feel as though it is my responsibility as a teacher to teach how to respect copyright laws. Just as we teach students that plagiarism is wrong while copying out of books and claiming it as their own words, copyright should be taught since it is the same thing, maybe just in different contexts. Therefore, since I will be teaching these rules to my students, it is important to show that I listen to my own advice and respect the laws of copyright. Practice what you preach is the best way to convey a message to students; they will not respect what you are teaching if they see that you are not following the rules. I will model copyright ethics as a teacher by using lessons plans, activities, and technology that are under the fair use guidelines or specifically say that I may re-use it. I will not misuse information that is not mine and if I create a video library, I will have it set up like a video store, have that one copy that I will show only my students, and have other teachers check it out if they wish to view it.

Whiteboards...the new cool thing

Whiteboards in the classroom are very useful and I feel as though they make teaching lessons and activities more fun in the classroom. I feel that they make teaching more interesting. For myself, I am a visual learner, so having a lesson taught through graphics along with text enhances my learning. I feel as though for children of all ages, especially those at the elementary level will learn better because of the visuals. Along with instruction, whiteboards are interactive, giving the students the opportunity to “play” with the technology while learning and/or reviewing. Since review is a major factor in learning, previously used activities from the lessons can be brought up and used or they can be slightly altered so that the concept is still there but the exact details may be different.
I found that the technology was easy to learn how to use. Since I am accustomed to power point I found it quite similar. The tools were tricky to use in the beginning such as switching back to the pointer after adding a text box, but on the whole I found it easy to use. Actually presenting on the whiteboard I also found easy because I have used them in other classes and other lessons that I have created.
Some of the pro’s of having a whiteboard in the classroom would be having the opportunity to have hands-on-activities that the children can do other than the regular manipulatives. Whiteboards also allow teachers to create lessons that connect to the internet and have on-line games that the students can play to review what was learned. Some of the con’s of having a whiteboard would be that the students may not be able to reach it easily, especially in the younger elementary levels. This problem can be solved by step stools or lowering the board, but in general, it could still possibly cause falls. Another con could be vandalism to the whiteboard. Markers should not really be used on them and anything other than a expo marker could cause damage. Upper grades my do it just because they can and younger kids may not mean to do it because they may not understand. One final pro to having one is having the technology to have learning more interactive and therefore, more fun to the students. I feel as though when students have fun learning, they remember it better!
From past lessons in the tree branches of government in social studies, I could incorporate Smartboard into the content by having virtual tours exploring the White House, or the Capitol Building. There are also many neat websites that have interactive activities for the students that I could incorporate as one center while rotating centers for a day. I also could create games and exercises such as review for quizzes, and make my bulletin board virtual for a day.

Incoporating digital video in a classroom

If I were to incorporate a digital video project in my classroom, I would have the project be used in a fifth grade social studies class that is studying the revolutionary war.
Prior to beginning the project, I would need to make sure that there would be video cameras and microphones were available for the students to use. I would also need to make sure that the computer lab had the proper programs such as Microsoft Windows Movie Maker or another type of movie maker. Along with that, I would need to sign out the computer lab for at least two weeks. The first half of the first week would be used for researching one of the battles fought in the Revolutionary war, what types of clothing were worn, and how the battle resulted. I would have to take a day going over how to use the video camera and another showing the students how to edit the movie. Then I would need at least a week for the students to record and put their movies on the computer to edit them.
Some of the challenges that I would face would be signing the computer lab out for such a long period of time when other teachers may also need the room. Another problem that I could face would be working with the children recording and editing the movie; they may not understand or have problems using the programs.
I would create a checklist of the project from beginning to end:
· Sign out video cameras from the school, or acquire them from parents who will let us borrow them.
· Sign out the computer lab for two weeks.
· Make sure that there is a computer or laptop along with a projector in the building and sign it out for two days, three weeks later, in case the schedule is off and we cannot view the projects on the day that we intend.
· Pick out five battles for the children to choose from for the project.
· Find websites that the students should look off of to find out information about the battles.
· Tell the students about the project and divide them into two or three groups; each group pulls a battle out of a hat to decide who is doing what battle.
· Take the children to the computer lab and have them research about their battle: who was involved, where did it take place, when did it occur, what happened, why were they fighting there and why was it important, how did it result?
· The students will then plan out how they will fit their movie into ten minutes; scripts, and where they want to film.
· Teach how to use the computers for editing the movie once it is recorded.
· Record the movies (over three days) have the students who are not re-enacting help set up and then watch as the other group records.
· Take the videos into the lab and take a three or four days to edit the videos.
· I will combine all of the videos into one so that we can view all of them together.
· I will then find a projector and a school computer/laptop or use my own laptop to show the video to the class.

Not So Silly Software Skills

The software skills we learned in class are very useful for not only projects and assignments for education classes, but also for life. I would have never known how to write a formal newsletter using a program other than Microsoft Word. I loved the Microsoft Publisher program because it had templates that helped to organize all of the ideas I wanted to include on my newsletter. I will definitely be using that in my classroom one day! I also enjoyed exploring Microsoft Word deeper. Although I knew much of the information we used in class, I did not know how to create the fill in the blank form and that will definitely be useful when I student teach. I even created one for one of my other classes this semester so that I can easily complete the homework assignments. The inspiration program was also awesome. I am a very visual learner so I cannot wait to use it again for another lesson or unit that I will need to create.

I believe that the lessons on the software skills were extremely beneficial to take the time to learn. I wish that I had this class earlier in college because not only could I have used it in my education classes with lesson plans and units that I created, but also in other areas of study such as general education classes. I feel that every freshman, regardless of his or her major, should take this course, or at least this section of the course.

For myself, I feel that both the Word and Publisher were beneficial. These programs are commonly on computers and, now that I learned many new tricks and functions that I can do on them, they will definitely help when I organize and plan for my future classroom lessons, units, and important handouts that I will give to parents. I hope that the school district that I teach in one day will have the inspiration program as well. This software is very beneficial in my opinion. The fact that I can create visual aids makes me very excited because I am a visual learner and I feel that visuals help the younger-elementary levels, which is where I wish to teach. It will also help me to organize my thoughts on the lessons and units I want to teach.

By having the software programs that we discussed and explored in class, I will be a very organized teacher who will be taken seriously by parents. I can use the programs in any area of study. I can create quizzes, tests, create flyers and newsletters for parents, and provide my students with visual aids to hang around the room for any subject area including reading, writing, spelling words, and science and social studies cycles.

1. Inspiration is something that I would want to invest in for my classroom. I feel as though it can be used in so many ways in numerous content areas. It can be incorporated in any subject as a concept map, showing students what they have learned and what they will be learning as they continue to branch out. It can also be used to create quizzes for younger elementary levels since pictures are easy to incorporate. It can be used to show cycles and flow charts in science such as life cycles, animal hierarchy, and weather cycles. It can be used in social studies and writing/English to help organize ideas if the students are writing an essay. Inspiration can also be used to construct graphic organizers that can be easily manipulated if I were to create a tiered lesson plan.

2. My favorite Web Resources from class include United Streaming, 4teachers, and go2web20. I feel that these resources will make the classroom less traditional and ‘boring.’ Instead, these sites will incorporate technology that the students see on a daily basis now in the classroom. I also think that the resources on 4teachers will help make my life as a teacher easier because it helps provide ideas and help save time planning.

I think that I will use 4teachers and go2web20 the most when I become a teacher. 4teachers will help make my life easier and leave me more time to come up with more creative ideas to use in the classroom. With 4teachers I can create rubrics and quizzes easily which will be good because as an elementary school teacher I will have more projects than tests. I will also use go2web20 a lot because it gives me the opportunity to explore many new links that I would not have found if I did not have the site to lead me to them. For example, I found a great site that is a you-tube for children which is sponsored by child-friendly television shows and there are millions of videos on all content areas. They can be incorporated and used as reinforcements to lessons that I will teach.

Social bookmarking would be great to use in any classroom. Whether it is elementary or secondary, even college, it is a great way to share ideas and broaden the horizons of students.
As an elementary school teacher, it would benefit my students because I would be able to find interesting sites to use as reinforcements to lessons that I’m teaching that I could post on my page. I could direct the students to the site and they could access the information during class computer time, or even computer lab time. I would make it available for the parents as well to help their children with at home.
I think that social networking would be very beneficial for students at secondary and college level as well. Since that age group is able to navigate on the Internet without supervision, and they are responsible for writing papers and such, I think that if teachers have social networking sites set up with the material and appropriate websites and articles, the risk of inaccurate information decreases.
As an Albright student, and especially as an education major, I feel that social networking is a very useful and powerful tool. Within any of the majors offered here, there are many projects, papers, and research that need to be completed. If students log onto a social networking site they will have the opportunity to see other useful information others have found, as well as tag their own sites which could help out others.

Use the force ...wisely!

It is important to evaluate websites prior to using them in the classroom or for research because one would not want to use an invalid, silly, or inaccurate website when he or she wants to be taken seriously. Websites can be made by any person and when they are made, there are no rules or laws stating that information put up on the website has to be true. This is especially important for research because those viewing your research will not take you seriously and anything you try to report again will not be considered reliable or trustworthy, your credibility will basically go out the window.
I feel that for the most part, people do apply the evaluation techniques when they evaluate websites, whether they are intentionally or consciously evaluating. As intelligent college students with basic common sense and process skills, we are able to pick out the websites by briefly reading and looking at them to decide whether or not it is reliable. Since many of us were brought up with computers and internet access, we have learned through school as well as personal experience to decide if websites are reliable and true.
In my classroom I liked the idea of taking computer lab time, or even a homework assignment of looking at websites, that I provide, and have the students fill out a chart on evaluating that site. This could even be used for assignments and projects, since I will be an elementary school teacher, I would provide a list of websites for research, and maybe even one that is not true and the students will have to figure out that that specific website should not be used. I would only do that after the students had a few months of practice in evaluating websites.
The internet is such a power and useful tool to the majority of lives today, however it must be used correctly or it can be disastrous.

Incorporating Blogs in the Classroom

Blogs can be incorporated into classrooms in a variety of ways, especially with the technology that is available to most school districts today. Elementary schools have the opportunity to broaden the subject content that is taught on a daily basis in a technologically fun way.
One way this can be done is by having a homework help blog where students have until a certain time at night; let’s say 9:00 pm for elementary students, to write on the blog if there was a problem with the homework that was assigned. For example, if a student is in fourth grade and learning long division, and is confused on one of the problems, or even a concept, then he or she can write on the blog explaining how they tried to do the problem, or what part they do not understand.
The teacher will then, the next day, be able to help the student before the lesson, or at least anticipate that the student will not have that problem done. The teacher could also respond back to the blog, if it is seen early enough, and the student could then complete the assignment. If the blog is an open blog to all students, then other students could go online if they are also having problems and see if the question that he or she has is already asked and answered.
The advantages to using this technology in the classroom is that it open up a new world to some students, it makes learning fun, and with a homework help blog, students will feel more comfortable completing the assignments and asking questions about lessons.
One of the disadvantages of using this technology is if the school district is a lower economic district and the students do not have computer access. The library is an option, however, if the student is home alone while parents are working and cannot go to library, then they will not be able keep up with technological homework or a homework help blog.

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