Blog Post #10

Do You Teach or Do You Educate?
I loved how this video was put together. Amazing, how something so simple could give such a powerful meaning. I think this is without a doubt a video all future educators should watch. The meaning behind the words were so inspiring. I want to be an educator and know that I never wasted an opportunity to show my students the best that I possibly can. Being a future history teacher I want my students to not just leave my classroom with facts but the knowledge on how to make a brighter future for our world. We learn from the past and the classroom is where it all begins. I thought this video was amazing, the few words said it all, the music was great, and the pictures were powerful. My favorite part was "Education is the kindling of a flame, not the filling of a vessel"- Socrates

Don't let them take the pencils home!
I thought Mr. Johnson did a wonderful job presenting this argument. It is a very simple statement, "Don't let them take the pencils home." He addressed just as that, simple. Why should we stress about something to the point that it gets in the way of education. If you do not focus on the solution you will never solve the problem, that is all there is to it. He tells her that he has given the children an assignment that will keep them interested enough to know that a pencil is not an object that it is a tool and that is how it is to be used. Some teachers are stuck on test scores and statistics that they have lost the focus of mentoring, inspiring, molding...education. Learning is what it is all about and even as teachers we learn more every day.

Summary C4T October

This month I had the blog Langwitches
by Silvia Tolisano I enjoyed reading her post. The first post I read by Ms. Tolisano was an outline on how to have a great blog. She breaks it down into steps on where someone needs to start on a blog, what you need to know before you start a blog and so on. She said in the first blog that this is going to be a few week process. In her outline she starts with the basics; Reading, Writing, Commenting, Connecting, Reciprocation, Consistency and Quality. Her outline was very helpful. Her outline talks about how teachers need to be prepared before they start blogging. They need to read other blogs to understand the basics of how to write a successful blog. Here is a little of what Mrs. Tolisano had to say about reading;
Part I- Reading
As teachers, we need to be aware of  blogging potential in relationship to learning. We need to formulate and address intended student learning outcomes beyond checking off “technology integration” on our lesson plans. Becoming an avid blog reader of a variety of other blogs will help expose teachers to the potential blogging holds. As we read blogs regularly, the better we will become in RECOGNIZING learning opportunities, GAGING the quality (or lack) of our own students’ blogs.
This part will include sample blogs for different grade levels and subject areas to give teachers a head start in finding quality examples.

The second post I read by Mrs. Tolisano is the beginning of the steps. It is about reading. She stresses that teachers need to read other blogs to learn what is to be expected for a successful blog. She says to have a blog you must first become an avid blog reader. She gives many examples of blogs to start with to become a reader. Mrs. Tolisano then talks about how to find quality post, so that you are not lead in the wrong direction reading poor post. Lastly she breaks down the basics on what you need to know if you are an Elementary teacher, Math, Science, History, English and so on. She even talks about what you need to know for a Librarian. I really enjoyed Mrs. Tolisano's blog and look forward to more of what she has to say. 

Blog Post #9

First I read Mr. Joe McClung's post from May 27, 2009
  What I've Learned This Year (2008-09). I thought this would be a great place to start since it was his first year. The first year has to be the best but yet scariest time of your life! It is the moment you have worked up to for years then you realize it is fly or fall. I really enjoyed this first post. I could see that Mr. McClung grew as a teacher in that first year. I know that there will be triumphs and I know there will be time when I fail. I feel that seeing that it happened to someone I do not know puts mind my at ease knowing that it is a learning process for even the teacher that I am not the only one that will make mistakes. I think the most important part was that he talked about listening to the students and understanding them. How well you teach, in reality is not decided by our superiors but by our students. I think that his post will really help us understand how our first year will be like. Having the tools and guidance to move forward makes all the difference in the world.
Then I read Mr. McClung's post from June 23, 2011 What I Learned This Year (2010-11). His second post was also amazing! Reading it I can see how he has matured in to an amazing teacher. I like how he shows from one post to the next that no two years are the same. In this post he talks more about being a teacher and your adult  responsibilities rather than basing it about the students. I like this because he has now given us a very rounded look on teaching. What I got out of this the most was the paragraph on "Don't touch the Keyboard" That is something everyone struggles with at one point or another. You see it would just be easier to just do it and think you are showing them when really you are not teaching them how to do it at all. I have had a major issue with this with my grandfather and his cell phone. I feel it is much easier for me to just do it, and it is. But in the end he hasn't learned anything.
I loved this post. Thank you again Dr. Strange.

Smartboard Project #13

Green Eggs and Ham Book Trailer

Blog Post # 8

This Is How We Dream Parts 1 and 2
I could not really get into the groove with this video. I feel like he was talking about information we have already learned in EDM310. We know this is where the world is heading, we are already there now it is just getting better with time. I thought the video was put together very well I just feel his information is all information we have already seen in other videos and personal assignments. I do feel my students will be able to do this, I feel they will learn very early how to write with multi-media. Studying to be a Secondary teacher I know I will be giving assignments like this and I am looking forward to it. To see what a student can create with an unlimited amount of resources is going to be incredible. Teaching is taking a whole new turn visual learning has gained a new chapter.

Blog Post #12 by Carly Pugh
First I would like to start off by saying that I think Carly Pugh is going to be an amazing teacher and her students are very fortunate to have her as their teacher. I wish I had English teachers in my past that had as much spunk as she seems to have. I loved her videos. They were all very inspiring, watching her playlist I thought of something. What a great idea to have a playlist for your classroom. Making a playlist on YouTube to follow along with what your class is studying and while a teacher is presenting the lecture boom there the videos are all on one page. This also gives light to what we have learned with podcast for a student to be able to go back and watch what they had seen in class that day for extra help. I think she did a wonderful job with her post. I hope to get as much out of EDM310 as she clearly has. Multi-media learning is a very important tool. It can reach out to all of the many types of learners you will have in your classroom and will give them all the keys to success in learning.

The Chipper Series and EDM310 for Dummies
I really enjoyed these two videos. They are helpful, I think what I try to remember the most when it comes to EDM310 is to just breathe. It gets a little stressful. It was a very good message showing the road Chipper went down when she did not try at school. This happens to many people and I have seen it first hand. With EDM310 for Dummies I believe this is every student in EDM310 until it is over then we look back and will say "Wow, that wasn't so bad!" We will also then realize everything we have learned in EDM310. I can already see a difference in my life I know that in the end it will be amazing. The video that I would like to see more in EDM310 or PC friendly videos. I personally can not afford a Mac. I would love one but do not see myself having one in the near future. It is very difficult for some students to get to the lab often and not having a Mac makes things even harder when you truly do not know how to do something on a PC.

Learn to Change, Change to Learn
Once again another amazing video!!! How do you find these Dr. Strange? I really want to keep them for my classroom! I loved this! This video was so true. I think that people that have nothing to do with education should watch it. I make my roommate watch at least half of the videos we watch in EDM310. I love where education is going. At the beginning of the school year I was very hesitant towards technology in the classroom and now from this class I have learned I was hesitant to the most useful tool there is to teaching. Why not teach children with what they use everyday outside of the classroom! I applaud these educators and the educators we have for pushing this forward. Thank you so much!

Project 11 "Why I want to be a teacher!"

Dr. Strange I tried everything I knew to do to fix the audio where it is in sync with the video. I do not know what happened.

Blog Post #7

Randy Pausch Last Lecture

In the beginning of the video Randy Pausch does a very brave thing. Like he said he wanted to "get rid of the elephant in the room." He talks about how he is dying of cancer and that how this lecture is not about that. It is about fulfilling your childhood dreams. I really like how he is showing basically his notes on what he is talking about. He has everything on a list then he breaks them down one by one. He talks about how some of his childhood dreams had to change a little and some didn't. For instance being Captain Kirk changed to meeting him, and he talks about how amazing that was to meet your idle. I really like how he truly did not give up on any of them. One of my favorite quotes from this video is him talking about brick walls he says "brick walls are there for the other people" saying brick walls are for people that give up and he wasn't giving up.
I love that how some way his dreams came true. They may not have been how he had exactly pictured them but they still came true. I love what extent he went through to make sure he got to experience zero gravity. Then he says no to taking a job as an imagineer. It is incredible that he worked on the Aladdin ride at Disney. I know that those six months were incredible. He then talks about a project that he is doing with his students and how they work in a group of four for two weeks then switch up. I think that is an amazing strategy and can not even imagine the number of ideas that went through that room. I thought it was so funny that he said he had students parents showing up to class to see their projects.
I have to admit I did not really get the "Hello World" it was a little odd. But I know that for the time, it was awesome. The Virtual Worlds were amazing! I know they had so much fun! I really liked the raft one. I wish I could do something like that. What an amazing Masters Degree, the ETC how much fun five projects doing something fun and that you love. Who wouldn't love that? Randy Pausch is like Dr. Strange with no book work it seems he doesn't like the burp back education. I really liked the bar chart on other students feedback on each student. Showing how easy or hard a student is to work with.
Alice oh what a great "head fake" he made. Teaching kids without them know they are learning. They think they are having fun. When really they are learning how to program. He talked about how his next version was teaching kids Java and really they think they are making movies. It is so sad but also amazing that he talks about how he knows he will live on in Alice, that is his legacy.
I love the "Lessons Learned" part of the lecture. It was without a doubt my favorite part. I feel it shows his "I am a normal person" how his mom would say "This is my son the doctor, but not the kind that helps people" I just thought that was so funny. How he can admit when Andy van Dam told him he was being a jerk. Not many people can call themselves out like that. He talks about never losing your child like behaviors and to have fun. I have a lot of a respect for someone that is dying and can give such an inspiring lecture to a room full of people. Thank you so much Randy Pausch, you much like Steve Jobs will be missed.

My PLN

After watching a video we had a few weeks ago I fell in love with Symbaloo! I had never heard of it and now I have everything on there. I have work sites, school sites, and ones that I need for my personal life. I love how I can have everything on one page. What I use or consider to be my PLN is facebook, Twitter, Blogger, Skype, Hotmail, Gmail, YouTube and even texting
I use them all in so many ways. I use facebook to talk to my friends but mostly to stay in touch with my family even my grandparents in their 80s have facebook. Facebook is what I use the most it is sad to say that facebook comes up in just about any conversation I have. I will actually say to some of my friends and family when we go to talk "Let's see if we can have a full conversation without saying the word facebook" usually we can't. I use Twitter to follow my stuff with EDM310 some Hollywood stars, and some others but I mostly use Twitter for school stuff. I use Blogger strictly for school, I use our C4C blogs to help with my own. Seeing others really helps me work on mine. I use Skype to talk to my friends even to help studying. It makes for a nice study session. I use Hotmail for all of my bills I can email my bank, and all my other bills. I get everything paperless. My family also emails me through Hotmail just about every day. I use Gmail only for school. My EDM310 stuff of course but also everything that goes to my jag account is forwarded to my Gmail. I use YouTube to see all kinds of videos, ones I've posted, my friends posted, commercials, clips I want to remember and so much more. YouTube is an amazing contribution to the internet. Lastly my favorite, texting. I text all day. I wouldn't know what to do without it. I can get in touch with every one I talk to all day at any time. It is a wonderful feeling.
Well that is what I consider to be my PLN, and it is all organized by Symbaloo.

C4T Summary of Steve Anderson

I had the pleasure of following Steve Anderson and his blog, Blogging about the Web 2.0 Connected Classroom. The first blog post I read was "Some Google Searches You Might Not Know About" I learned more about Google than I even thought was possible. Mr. Anderson broke the blog down into Google Books, Google Blog Search, Google Scholar, and Google Patent Search, he also has a link to so much more. Google Patent Search? Wow, I did not know that even existed. My favorite part from this post is Google Books. I looked up some of my books I needed for this semester and there they were, free as can be. I thought it was amazing. I will definitely be giving Google Books a try next semester before I buy my books.
The second post I had by Mr. Anderson was about Steve Jobs. Mr. Anderson posted Steve Jobs 2005 Commencement Speech at Stanford. I have seen this video many times and like I said in my comment on Mr. Anderson's blog, every time I watch the video I don't know if I learn something new, fall in love with it more or both. Steve Jobs was an amazing person. I hate that he passed away I feel like his work wasn't done. His inventions changed everything. Our lives were touched in so many ways. For instance, my iPhone I love my iPhone it is my second one and I will be getting the iPhone4s next month. I am so excited thank you Steve Jobs. In his speech he talks about his life. How he was adopted, and his birth mother wanted him to go to college and he went to college but dropped out after six months. The crazy part is that he still went to college. He just sat in, he talks about how he sat in a calligraphy class and that when he was designing for Apple that the class came back to him. He talks about he used everything he learned and made different fonts for the computer he then made a joke about how Windows copied everything they did and that if he hadn't dropped out he wouldn't have taken that class and PC's may not have ever had fonts. Crazy stuff. He talks about how we need to live our lives for ourselves that we do not have much time it is a very touching speech and I suggest everyone watch it.

Blog Post # 6

The Networked Student
I have to say I did not really enjoy this video. I didn't get much out of it. I like the ideas of the iSchool, blogs, podcast and all but I do not like the thought of students learning from blogs. I think that blogs should be how students show what they have learned. Because of blogs being so opinion based I do not think they are a good tool for facts. I feel that a student could misinterpret what a person has stated as an opinion for a fact. That in some ways can be tied to plagiarism. A student can take someones opinion write it as a fact when really they should have been forming their own opinion in the first place then what has happen? A students belief has been skewed. I don't know, I believe I am taking it to far but that is how I feel. I think that it is appropriate for students to read a professor's blog and state their own opinion on what the professor has said like we do but I do not think blogs should be used as sources. I wish her good luck with her middle school students I hope it all works out as she has planned.
I think that even with this plan the teacher will be needed just as much as teachers are needed now. A student will need guidance on how to write a blog post, if the source is credible, and so many more things. We will need to grade the students, tell them if they are going in the right direction or if they have gotten lost along the way. Students want to know if they are right or wrong. That is something we have been taught all our lives, to get the answer right. Teachers will be there for the students each step of the way. Whether that is physically  or virtually teachers will always be here.

A 7th Grader's Personal Learning Environment (or PLN)
I really enjoyed this video. The student really seemed to enjoy how her science class is being taught and I must say I enjoyed it as well. With that being said I really hope that they do like we do and meet in class from time to time. I think that at her age group they should be meeting at least once a week. I really really enjoyed how she had every thing set up in fact I liked it so much I Googled "symboloo" and I am going to try it out as soon as I get done with my post. I think her class is a lot like ours. It is not a go at your own pace class and I like it. I think the way her science teacher has everything set up that it is very effective and educational. I hope all of the other kids enjoy the class as well I am interested to see what students have to say that do not enjoy the new method of teaching.
Thank you so much Dr. Strange.

Group Project