7 Powerpoint and Other Supporters

I would use Powerpoint to help assist my lesson plans without overpowering the students with useless information. Within my research I have found that it is better to use simpler fonts and less words. I would apply this to Bloom's Taxonomy by making sure my instruction and assessments are aligned with my lectures. Say in one of my lessons I want to talk about the importance of the Oxford Comma, I would not bullet a bunch of examples and reasons about why we should be using it, but instead I would talk more about the Oxford Comma and use the Powerpoint to assist me and use about 3-7 words per slide to make sure my point is still getting across. Some of the techniques that have been mentioned for mastering Powerpoint were to use pictures as the backgrounds and to make the font simpler but with concise information and that is what I plan on applying in my classroom. 

Some adaptive technologies can be seen in the Web 2.0 applications if you are applying these technologies to TAG students. I am a gifted student and I saw Web 2.0 used in the classroom almost everyday. We were also given differentiated instruction so we could learn at our fullest potential. Using technologies like concept mapping software kept some of the lesson plans more interesting and that keeps TAG students engaged. There are challenges with any type of application because the success of the application will also depend on the student. Other special needs student could use reading assistive technologies to help them learn the words as they are going over activities. One of these technologies is recorded books. These could help special needs students because they could listen to the words and follow along and then read them by them self. 

What I learned from the assessment was how to make a classroom appropriate webpage while still having it be cute and engaging for the students and the parents. My webpage included several different hyperlinks, photos of a fictional classroom, a fictional calendar, and information about the teacher. It gave me an idea of what I will be doing for the rest of my life and I had a lot of fun working on it. I enjoyed learning things that I will actually be doing for the rest of my life. 

http://www.msmackiesclass.weebly.com

Digital Leaders

Technology is becoming one of the most advanced practices today and this Powerpoint shows how it is affecting our society. I am learning that Powerpoint can aid people in their presentations by just having simple slides.

Being a Digital Leader... for College Students and Everyone from Paul Brown

6 Websites and Organization

The website I decided to review for my blog today was the class page of Mrs. Cookerly, a 2nd grade teacher at Pine View School for the Gifted which is located in Osprey, Florida. I chose this website because I had a close relationship with her while attending this school. Most of the information seen on her page includes news from the week and homework assignments that are due. The tabs on the side of her website take you to a school supply list, summer readings, a weekly focus link, and other resourceful links that can be used by the students to further their education. The links that Mrs. Cookerly posts include fun activities and games that help the students understand the lesson without having them consciously know they are learning. 

For my own use of technology, I plan on creating a website but unlike Mrs. Cookerly, I plan on making my website private so it is only accessible by students and their guardians. I also plan on using spreadsheets to help with my organization of my documents so I can update them every year. My PowerPoints will include different types of animations to entertain the students while getting them to understand the subject. My slides will also include hyperlinks to other websites that I will reference to. With my materials being digital, they will be easier to update and I will be able to use them from year to year. It will also be easier for me to share my documents which while enhance my own and other teachers productivity. I plan on using Evernote because it can be used in lesson planning and it is one of the most flexible note-taking tools I am currently aware of. 

I personally did not like the Web Resource Evaluation because I thought the assignment was too vague and I feel like I already know how to evaluate websites. This assignment reassured my knowledge but I felt like the assignment itself was just common sense. I felt like the assignment could have been more effective if we were evaluating each others websites and commenting on how we did ourselves. Looking at other websites just felt normal because I typically look/judge whatever website I am on regardless if it is part of an assignment or not. In my future profession, I will continuously be judging websites to make sure they are appropriate enough for my class, but I would have done that without the reinforcement of this assignment. 

5 Web 2.0

Web 2.0 is one of the most useful technologies that a teacher can use in the classroom. Web 2.0 allows people from all over to collaborate through social media, blogs, wikis, and so many others. Blogs and wikis can be seen in most classrooms today and they are some of the most useful applications that a teacher can have to get their students involved. Wikis allow students to collaborate on assignments, like the one due next week. Students are able to work collectively to produce a singular idea. Blogs also allow students creatively answer questions that teachers assign, this blog being exhibit A. Mobile devices could be used to access these applications but it is not ideal due to the fact that students could also be using their cell phones to just text their friends or play games. Instead of mobile devices, the students could use tablets with only the select applications already installed on the device. Electronic whiteboards would be ideal for the teachers to use because they could use the whiteboards to show the students the program. 

The website that I chose to review is called Wikispace. This website allows the collaboration between teachers and students but in a more privatized environment. This allows for a more secure environment for the students. With the private environment teachers can control where the students go within the website. With this website teachers can create a different Wiki for each chapter which would allow for easier organization. 

This website also allows for students and teachers to share documents, files, and videos. This website comes with visual editors which will get the students used to editing documents. This website is also incorporates other websites like Blackboard and Google Apps. With the extended reach of these websites, students will be able to be inclusive with all of their academics, documents, and assignments. 

Wikispace

With our concept mapping assignment, I have been able to figure out how to make a new type of study guide. The concept mapping also allowed me to figure out how to make relationships between dates, issues, and people in a visual representation. Next time I could make my concept map have more pictures or better color coordination but overall I believe my concept map is pretty easy to follow. In my future career I will use concept mapping to link together historical events or make study guides interesting. I could also use concept maps with homework assignments by leaving some of the circles blank and having students fill in the blanks with their answers.

4 The Internet, Research, and Me

http://www.cpalms.org/Public/PreviewStandard/Preview/4906

•          MAFS.K.CC.1.1: “Count to 100 by ones and tens.”
•          http://pbskids.org/curiousgeorge/busyday/bubbles/
•         Educational game; educational arcade game
•          To help my students learn how to count to 100 by ones and tens I would use educational games so my kindergartners would learn while still having fun. Sometimes kids get worried when they just see a bunch of numbers, so incorporating games into the lesson will make it easier for those students.

The Internet is one of the many tools that can be used to support student research. The Internet is used today by students everywhere to find information that they need for a project, a paper, or any general assignment. The Internet gives students access to web pages, blogs, search engines, social media, journals, and so much more. The students use these sources on a daily basis to further their education. The Internet is not useful when the sources are not credible. If the sources are not credible then the students are getting the correct information.

I research on the Internet for almost every assignment that I have. I typically look for my credible sources when I do my research and if the source is not credible I usually don’t fully rely on it. By figuring out the credibility of the source I can usually figure out whether or not I should be using the source. I typically do not use Wikipedia because I know some of the sources have been altered but I do go to the bottom of the page and look at the links that the sources supposedly come from.

Some of the new skills I have from the web hunt include simpler ways for me to find exactly what I am looking for. I realized that you get different results if you put what you are looking for in quotations. I learned how to use a lot of different online tools to further my knowledge on Internet research.

Web Hunt Challenges:

1. Find a picture for a motivational poster you could sell at school.

2. Find a weekly calendar that students could use to organize their schedules.

3 Internet --> Newsletter

For my visual critique of a website, I have chosen the website Edmodo. This past week in class we were introduced to this website that seems to be a web enhancement to a traditional classroom. Edmodo also is a learning management system in the way that it allows the teacher to give quizzes, share articles, and share news with the students in a comfortable environment. Edmodo allows the teacher to connect and collaborate with students, parents, and other teachers as well. 

This website allows for traditional classrooms to easily integrate into more web-based classrooms.

edmodo.com

Based on Chapter 9, I would use the tool NetSmartz. NetSmartz is a tool that can be used by teens, tweens, and even younger children. I would only use this in my middle school classes because it teaches students digital ethics and it helps them find their digital identity. I chose this age because this is when most kids start using most aspects of technology for classes and communication. This website would be ideal for middle schoolers because it can teach them that whatever they share online represents their digital identity and they can't get rid of something once they post it. We need to teach our students the responsibility that comes with technology because no matter how safe and easy it seems the internet can be a very dangerous place/ 

Some of the new skills that I acquired while working on the newsletter mainly including learning how to make a proper newsletter. That might have sounded redundant, but when I began the assignment I literally had no idea what I was doing. Once I started adding text boxes and clip art I began to get the hang of it. I actually had a lot of fun making my newsletter. I think me being so passionate about this class and this assignment made me strive even harder to create the best newsletter I could. That was proven when I got 2nd place out of the entire class! Learning this was crucial to my future career and I am very proud of myself for gaining this knowledge. 

2 Word, Copyright, and the Twitter

Way back when I was elementary school, I took a computer class. I was in the first grade and I was just learning what a computer was. My computer teacher then continued to explain to us what we were learning for the day. We were learning how to use Microsoft Word. For the first time in my life I was learning how to use a program that I would be using almost every day for the rest of my life. Since then I have used Microsoft Word to write a countless amount of essays, journal posts, research papers, and even just taking notes in class. I’ve seen my teachers use Microsoft Word to write syllabi, study guides for students, create outlines for assignments, and even take their own notes during a student given presentation. I plan on using Microsoft Word for some of the same things I have seen other teachers use it for. I also plan on using Microsoft Word to make tests for my students.

During my educational experience I never had to deal with copyright anything. I thought copyright had to do with plagiarism and citing my resources and such. I learned today in class that my previous knowledge was nowhere near correct. When using a certain type of media, you need to give credit to the owner/author of that material when it is due. I learned today in class that when I become a teacher I will face these copyright laws on a daily basis. I will see this when I make PowerPoints or when I show videos in the class and I will need to make sure I don’t break any of these copyright laws. I will need to show my students the importance of copyright and exactly what needs to be done so they do not break these laws. I will mainly be teaching younger students so I will mainly need to show them how to copy and paste the website link into their material, but as they grow older they will need to learn the more in depth rules that these laws entail.

New skills that I learned from the Twitter activity that we had were some fun and inexpensive ways to keep my classroom organized and up to date. I plan on using almost all of these ideas to organize my classroom while keeping it a fun environment. One of these ideas was to put up a QR code at open house with all of my contact information on it so they could easily reach me. There were 37 different ideas on this link and I am excited to use all of them. I can't really use twitter to communicate with my students because they are so young, but I can use it to communicate with other teachers and to communicate with the students parents. I will use Twitter as a tool to better my teaching with the help of other teachers