Teaching & Technology

Dr. Robert’s Presentation

I really enjoyed Dr. Robert's presentation on media exposure for children and young adults.  I wasn't surprised to see that the amount of media exposure students are getting is increasing along with the different media's being used.  I found it interesting that the students who had the greatest media exposures were also the ones that were doing the poorest in school.  It seems to be a cycle for some students.  Students that are having difficulty in school need an outlet and playing on the computer, listening to music, or watching television seems to be the perfect distraction for them.  Dr. Robert's presentation really showed me how important it is to encourage my future students to love reading books and find creative outlet's for them that do not involve technology.  I thought that the best teaching methods involved using technology to increase their engagement and make learning more fun for them but after this presentation I realized that many students need activities that do not focus around technology and allow for other creative outlets to form to help them express themselves.  

NY Times article “More Pupils Are Learning Online, Fueling Debate on Quality”

Online education courses will help students gain skills they will need in college since online courses are becoming increasingly common but for students at the K-12 level need the face-to-face interactions to help form social skills and learn how to think critical and develop research skills.  Online courses for kids is being cheap and taking all imagination and creativity out of what education should be for them and if class sizes are getting to large then we should stop closing down schools and letting teachers go.  I think that offering online courses for high school students that need an extra class for graduation is fine but not in the elementary grades.    

Technology Resources for the Teacher

It’s important as a teacher to make sure that I am knowledgeable about the technological resources that are available and to stay up to date on software such as Microsoft Windows, Office, PowerPoint, and etc.. but be able to make the technology that you have in your classroom as up to date as possible and provide your students as much exposure to it as possible.  The four websites that support student learning in the classroom most effectively and that I was unfamiliar with were:

http://teachertube.com- I will use this site in the future to observe other teachers teach and to learn new strategies and lessons plans.  

http://www.chatzy.com/- I think this would be fun for students do while in the classroom and when they are working in groups on a research assignment.  This would also be a great way for me to see which students have contributed what and monitor how there research is going.

http://rubistar.4teachers.org/- Designing rubrics can be a tedious task and I think this will make my life much easier in the future and help me design a rubric that measures the students performance, behavior, and quality of work.

http://www.freetech4teachers.com-  I liked this site because it seems to offer a wide range of resources and ideas to use in the classroom such as creating posters, helping students create blogs, and how to incorporate FB in your lessons.