Educating Esme

My technology class has come to an end, but I'm not sure if I am done with blogging, so I will just share some recent discoveries. I have just finished reading the book Educating Esme. It is a diary of Esme Codell's first year of teaching. When the diary was written, it wasn't meant to be published. It was simply a journal to collect thoughts, to vent about the problems and joys of the classroom. Yet after it was found by a friend, it was published to inspire new teachers everywhere and to remind others why they went into teaching in the first place. That being said, it wasn't edited before put into print so mistakes were made by Esme, and there are some situations she probably didn't handle the best, but as you may already know, how can you improve if you never admit to mistakes?

This book was great. Esme is definitely a creative, strong, and determined individual. She brings imagination into the classroom by creating such things as a time machine and the happy box. She doesn't let people bring her down, she challenges the administration when needed and makes sure that everything she is does is what's best for the children whether or not that matches the other teacher's views or the administrations. She is a fantastic teacher who knows strengths of combining creativity and uniqueness with discipline and respect.

The best part of the book is that it has tips for educators in the back, including a shopping list and advice for how to handle the current political view on teachers. It also talks about Planet Esme, a website created by Esme herself to help teachers explore the world of literature and use it if they wish in their classroom. On that website, there is also a link to esme's blog: http://www.educatingesme.blogspot.com/ where she talks about current struggles teachers are facing or learn about new books with the book-a-day setup.

I strongly recommend checking these out if you're a teacher or even if you have an interest in children or creativity, but as Lavare Burton of Reading Rainbow used to say, "You don't have to take my word for it!"

May 12th Exit Slip

Today we had one last discussion. We did an activity where we learned how people who have a lot of differences can also connect together.  Then we also talked about other jobs we could do if we don't end up teaching. We then talked about if we  had Ella Boyer in our classroom, how could we integrate technology? As a class we talked about the use of technology in reenacting old historical events in present times, or using blogs to connect with parents. I talked about the use of visual clickers for younger kids for assessment to hear the voice of each student. We talked about new things to add to our portfolio and explain specifically how we will integrate technology in our classrooms. Change standards 3-5 to say I will in. Also, remember to submit reflection paper. Long enough to cover context (who you worked with, what you did, where you did) and what did you learn (what do you now know that you didn't know before. 

Chapter 10 in Rethinking Education

Well I can't believe it, but I just finished the last chapter of this book. This is the first chapter that not only talks about the possibilities of what technology might do to society, but how it will. It provides ideas to help assist education through technology. It talks about the importance of education to helps students in the workforce. This includes providing federal funding to provide offices in high schools to include information about colleges and higher learning as well as for students who are not going to college. It talks about implementing a who cares attitude when teaching subjects to teach students about the jobs that use that information or careers that might implement them. These careers could technological based or otherwise. It talks about the importance of teaching technological opportunities. It talks about the importance of teaching transition properly. Students should be aware that just because their leaving school, they shouldn't stop learning. It is becoming more common for people to switch jobs constantly and move up in the world in other areas than their major. It's important to also have federal government be a big benefactor to the schools in order to implement technology. It should no longer be the jobs of the towns or states.

As a whole, this book raised a lot of important issues and ideas. It was still very vague about what to do. The majority of the book was to make people aware of problems, but it did little to explain how to fix them.  I hope teachers still try. I think this book has helped my learning and it is a great resource for an introductory technology course.

iRLO Scratch Project

I had a lot of fun working with Scratch. There were times when it was frustrating, but I am very proud of my accomplishments. I can now say I made my own mini video game. I don't know if I will use Scratch in the future because it is very time consuming, but I may use pre-made videos from the internet to promote interaction. I spent hours on my project. I wanted to make it look professional. I also recorded my own voice and used music to make it apply to Early Childhood aged children the best. It impacts my future teaching due to the fact that I now have a new resource to use in my classroom and a new way to engage my students in lessons.

PSA-Security Theft

It was a lot of fun working on our Public Service Announcement about Security Theft. This was a video made by Bryan Ratz, Elizabeth Sommer, Lynsey Carlson and myself. We met twice to work on this project. Each time we met for at least 2 hours. We met once to plan it, and film it, and once to edit/upload it. We tried to make it like an old fashioned PSA commercial from the 90s. We did it in black and white, and referenced people like Nancy Grace. This was a great way to apply the technology we learned in the class and apply it to a project. I wish there was a more advanced rubric for it, since we didn't know what kind of effects were wanted, but I still had fun doing it. Here it is. Let me know what you think!

May 5th Exit Slip/Peer Led Discussion Post

Today in class, Lynsey and I presented. I was weirdly nervous even though we were well prepared. It's hard to have a 20 minute discussion on anything. I'm really looking forward to next week when we can spend the majority of the time on one main discussion. I wish we could have gotten feedback, but sometime we run out of time. It was a worthwhile discussion and I'm glad I got to give it. We put a lot of work into our lesson. We met beforehand to decide what we were going to teach, and then I worked individually on the Prezi and she worked on the discussion questions. I also found a video to engage the students. This lesson helped me to create an interesting discussion from a chapter that had many choices of what to focus on. This lesson helped me to evaluate the reading and to have the class evaluate it and learn it to a greater extent as well.

Chapter 8 and 9 in Rethinking Education of Technology

Chapter 8 talked about specified learning. It talked about using tests similar to the GRE to allow children to learn about their interests. It would be a different kind of test taking. The test would customize to what each student is best in and focus strongly and teaching them those skills. It would allow students to learn subjects at their own pace. Each question would be given in response to another question. If a question was too easy, it would give you a harder question. If the question was too hard, it would be easier. While this is a great process in order to become proficient in a subject, would it be limiting since the student is only picking out what they want to learn? If students only focus on their original interests, they would no longer be well rounded individuals. While it might not be fun to learn about History if that's not what you're into, it's still important to learn about it. This chapter brought me back to the age old question: Is it better to be sorta good at a lot of things or be able to excel and one thing and one thing only? It's definitely a question to be pondered.

Lynsey and I are presenting Chapter 9 in class. It talks about how to connect to your children through education. If your child likes video games, ask them to teach you how to play. If they like Dinosaurs, show them an interactive website where they can use them. One of the websites talked about using a program called Second Life to get them interested. For my teaching topic, I am going to download Second life so I can show the class how to use it and we can talk about the pros and cons as a class.

April 28th Exit Slip

Today we talked about different kinds of learning. I think the people who taught today had the right idea, but I think they could've taught the lesson a little differently. It was hard to hear them, and they seemed bored and uninterested in what they were teaching. It was hard to have deep conversation since they tried to cover multiple things in such a short amount of time. I think next week when I'm in charge of teaching I will be able to take these ideas to make a more exciting lesson. I plan to use the computer in some way and create strong discussion with the rest of the time. I will talk to Lynsey however to add her input. Dr. Boyer also talked about backgrounds and how display tends to be different on the projected image than it is on the computer screen. The colors are darker and the contrast is much less. Something to be aware of when creating your lesson. Today was long but interesting. I think I will add more enthusiasm and exciting to Lynsey's and I's lesson.

We also talked about our portfolio homework. We can either provide evidence for each of the standards or we can state what we will do in order to gain the development we need. Evidence can include a link to something we have previously done or it can be a statement of what we have done.

Chapters 6 & 7 in Rethinking Education Book

Chapter 6 talks about how some of the subjects students learn are no longer given to them by the teachers. Students choose what they want to learn and explore it on their own through the internet. More and more students are interested in jobs where they are Web designers or mix videos for a living. Most jobs now a days must include skills in resources, interpersonal, information, systems and technology. The role of the teacher has changed as well. In the olden days, Parents were the teachers of their children. Then it was Teachers, strangers implementing them with the knowledge they choose, and now technology is added into the mix. The subjects learned have changed dramatically due to these changes.

Chapter 7 talks about the possibility of different groups taking over the education system. Whether it be more conservative or liberal, environmentalists or different races. If this were to happen it would delete diversity and less culture would be taught. People would be more isolated into their different groups and everything the world has learned about differences will be undone. It ruins the vision of different types of people being able to work together to share experiences and to explore each others' differences. There are advantages as well though. Students will be able to have a deeper focus on one or two specific subjects instead of a little bit of everything. They will get to choose what they want to learn and not learn. The question is, is that really better?

April 21, Exit Slip

Today in class, we discussed chapter 4 and 5 of Rethinking Education in the classroom. Both groups did a great job of keeping our attention and keeping us engaged. Dr. Boyer expressed how important it is to introduce new ways of teaching tops. Routine gets boring. That's something to use in this classroom as well as in my own future classroom. We also rated them in class, and talked about our homework expectations.

Chapters 4 and 5 and Rethinking Education in the Age of Technology

Chapter 4 reminded me that there was a process to getting lots of things in teaching that I take for granted. It talked about the struggle America faced to get to schools with Universal Teaching. I was reminded of the process America traveled of creating an actual classroom where children could learn skills such as read and write instead of just being taught them by their parents. I learned how classrooms evolved from the one room school house to an actual full school. I was reminded of how teaching wasn't always part of the labor force and eventually became a paid position. I learned how aspects of school I just take for granted like attendance, grading, period switches, textbooks and curriculum units were implemented. As a future teacher I will remember the history of teaching and what fellow past teachers have gone through to get to where the teaching world is today.

Chapter 5 talked about the new opportunities (or possibly threats) are approaching the teaching environment. There's been large growth in homeschool, school in the workplace, distance education, adult education, learning centers, educational television and videos, educational computer software, technical certifications and Internet cafes. The face of education is changing rapidly and we have yet to see what form it will take. I learned it is important to stay up to date on these new improvements in the world of education to be aware of what today's children and adults are learning. This chapter went into great detail about these different faces providing pros and cons which will impact how children learn and I how I should teach my everyday classroom. We need to make sure as teachers that we don't let our students think of some of these technological tools as replacements of schools but rather as helpful insights.

Final Submission of Interactive Whiteboard Lesson

I have finally finished my Interactive Whiteboard Lesson (IWB) for the Smart Board and I am glad. It was a lot harder than I expected. I had a lot of trouble with little nit-picky things. I also found out that Smart notebook, for whatever reason, doesn't work well on my laptop. It slows everything down and tends to freeze very easily. I had to redo my work at least 4 times due to this, and I also had problems with transferring my lesson between computers. It was very frustrating. I don't think this project will stop me from using Smart Board lessons in the future, but I might prefer to use pre-made ones that can be found online or from other colleagues.

PLC Presentation

Well, I'm finally done with my Professional Learning Community (PLC) presentation. We presented about Smart Pens. It was exciting to learn about them, and I feel like I learned a lot. I've shared my learned information with people inside and outside of the classroom and I feel like a smart pen specialist. (haha). I think our presentation went very well. We were very organized as a group and we each had our own insight to bring to the table. The speaking during the presentation could've been a lot better. We used an almost infinite amount of ums, and I learned that the way I talk to a crowd is very casual and I need to work to make it more professional during presentations. It's hard, because how I talk is so much a part of my personality, but I can still tone up the professional scale so I sound less like a college student and more like a future educator. This was a great project and I feel I will use this knowledge as much as I can in my teaching career. I also got to make some new friends which is always a plus!

April 14th Exit Slip

Today we had a very interesting student-lead discussion about the difference views between skeptics views on technology and non-skeptic views. It was interesting to talk more in depth on the pros and cons. We also talked about different ways to lead discussion. One group had an activity which had people stand in either the skeptic area of the room or the non-skeptic area and debate their views with the opposite group. The other group's activity had us divided in to separate groups and organizing the different values in the classroom based on importance in the technological world. It was very interesting. I wonder what the next groups will do!

Chapters 2 and 3 of Rethinking Education in the Classroom

These two chapters talk about the many opportunities technology can create for education in the classroom. Chapter 2 focuses mostly on the Enthusiast's argument. This includes how technology in education is changing every aspect of the way we learn. It affects reading, reflection of our own work, the rate at which we learn a subject, the social interaction we have and much more. Technology makes work more accessible to the common person. It allows us to meet communities all around the world to share experiences and culture. Education is no longer just shared locally but globally as well. Chapter 2 also talks about the way teaching outside of the world of technology has become very "Just in time" types of learning, in that there is no ease in to what we are expecting students to learn. We give them the big picture right away before explaining how we get there, or what is needed to learn the basics first. With technology however, we are able to give students those steps that they need. Technology creates more time and online learning by letting students work at their own pace. Scaffolding is now available due to trouble shooting guides to aid a student's help if the teacher or lesson is going too fast. This can also even be learned through multimedia and video games where not everything is presented right away and the player needs to ask questions or explore to finish the main adventure.

Chapter 3 talks about the Skeptics' Argument. It talks about why teachers are afraid of technology. Why this change can sometimes be harder before it is easier. It explains the barriers schools face such as cost and access or classroom management. It brings up important aspects that make it hard to classrooms to experience the new ideas of technology. It also reminds us that computers can only do so much and that it is ultimately the teacher's job to make the most out of technology and the changing society of education. And while this is true, I think as a teacher, it is our job to work to use technology to make the most and make the most engaging and most filled lesson plans and classroom environments we can.

April 7th Exit Slip

Students only spend 14% of their time in schools. That's scary. That's what I learned today in Dr. Boyer's class. We spent our time talking about Ch. 1 and some main ideas of it. We also talked about homework and Scratch (including any questions people might have)

Preface and Chapter 1 of Rethinking Education in the Age of Technology

This book is very intriguing. The writing got me hooked right away (I never thought I would enjoy reading homework!). It is about how technology is changing the way people view learning and education. It talked about how technology makes people of this generation to expect answers with a click of a button, making their patience less and less. Students would much rather learn things from the internet than from lectures. This can make teaching harder since the teacher has to move quicker and work harder to keep their students engaged. As a future teacher, I plan to stay updated on the technological society and world in order to apply what I've learned to the classroom. It will be hard to create lesson plans that are more fast-moving to ensure I get the students' attention, and it will be hard to find new and exciting ways to get my students involved, but I think it is worth the challenge.

March 31 Exit Slip

Today in class we went over a lot of reminders of assignments that are getting closer to being due. We also picked partners for the sharing of book chapters and signed up for what day we were doing on the class organization wiki. We also started our portfolio for 331 and went over tips for Scratch.

March 17th Exit Slip

Today in class, it was my job to write what we did today in the Class Organization Wiki. So everything we did today can be found here under the section 2 subpage. Check it out!

March 10th Exit Slip

Today we learned about the world of Scratch. Scratch is a program creating tool, you can create games and lessons and characters. As part of the A contract we will have to create a program in Scratch. Since I have never had a programing class, I am terrified to do this. I will have to download it on my computer and mess around with it to understand how to use it. We also talked about a couple SLC's we could do with Scratch which also sounds terrifying. I guess I'll have to keep looking for a SLC to do. We also have to evaluate each other's smart boards, which makes me nervous because I keep having problems with smart notebook on my computer, but I'll talk to Dr. Boyer and see how it goes..