week 14

This week we didn't have class so instead of reflecting about what we talked about in class for the week I will talk about the love I have and the desire I have for teaching students.
I love teaching kids, to watch children have the ah-ha moments is the most precious thing in the world to me. I taught at a Lakeridge Jr. High for a year, I was in charge of one particular child with autism. It was a very difficult job for me, I learned that I need to have those ah-ha moments, I need to know that my teaching is getting through to my students. Although I worked really hard with a child with special needs, and it felt like all of my hard work sort of went to waist, I learned to love my student and stilled loved my job.
For the video this week I thought that the video was a great way for students to learn, I love school house rock. Even though the videos were made so long ago the lesson's are still true and the repetition is very good for students.

Kidspiration

How will PowerPoint and Kidspiration help me teach my students? It is nice to be able to show the students a visual or a movie in the classroom to help the students see a way or a new way of viewing things.
The kidspiration is a great tool to use as a template for exercises in the classroom.

week 11

The video was really good and was really a true depiction of what not to do in a PowerPoint presentation. I enjoyed how he made it funny but it is also a true, as the presenter to make sure that you don't have to many of the animations or words on your slides.
What are the pros and cons of Picasa, PowerPoint, and Google Presentations?
the pros of using the these different types of computer programs are that it can help the audience understand the point that you are trying to put across.
the cons can be that you can have technical difficulties and then if you are dependent of the PowerPoint then you will be without the speach that you prepared.

mash up

These are two very interesting videos. To watch how they can put two videos together. I liked both of the videos but the music video was defenitly more intertaning and you can tell that there was a lot of work put into this mash up.
Digital cameras can help bring different places to life, or different sciences into the classroom.

Did You Know?

This is an interesting video, it is a lot like some of the videos that we have watched previously. It is nice to learn and understand that it is necessary to learn that what you are teaching your students is just a foundation to what they are going to learn in the future.
It is good to know that,from what we learned in class, that we as teachers are the primary educators to our students about Internet safety. It is necessary for us as teacher to teach the our students what they need to know in order for them to be safe while being on the Internet.

For Week 8

Yeah I finally was able to have a video load at my house!!!
I think that this video is important to show to older classes to show how different instances have happened through the years. Also when looked at you can see how the technology has developed through the years.

In my future classroom I will use this website for my students to play and learn different concepts that we will be learning in the classroom. I will recommend them to go to the UEN site for my students that need extra work because what we are doing comes easy to them. I will recommend the UEN website for my students that are having a hard time with a concept, perhaps in math or spelling, and need to have extra practice with the subject that they are having a hard time with. I will also recommend this website to my students when they need to do research for reports or presentations that they will do in class.

I think that the UEN site is a wonderful computer program for students to use. My daughter that is in second grade, when I had internet at my house, asked me all the time for her to be able to play on the computer. She loves playing the games and it makes her feel special for her to know that she has a place on the computer that she can go and play without me being worried about what she is playing. I think that it is a wonderful resource for your students to play and learn while they play on the computer.

I will use the UEN website for parents to know what we are doing, so that they are up to date with what we are doing currently or what we are going to be going to do in future lessons. I think that doing this project is a good project, although tedious, is needed for our futures in our elementary classrooms.

technology in our classrooms

In our classrooms today our students use many different types of technology. Students are exposed to many different types of technology at home, by the time that our students come into our classrooms they can become board with how the technology is presented to them. Teachers need to have new and different ways to introduce technology to our students in order to keep them interested to what is being taught to them. In the 5th grade class that I worked in last semester, the teacher that I worked with was amazing at having his students use technology in different ways, he used the computer for the students to talk back and forth to each other, he had them write songs and burn them to a disk, he had them look up different types of things from their lesson, he also had them write a classroom class paper. His students loved and enjoyed the different ways that their teacher used the technology. It is important to know how to use technology in order to teach our students how to learn and be able to grow from the technology that we teach them.

Some of the tools that are used in the classroom are essential for the learning and comprehension of the students. In my opinion some of the most important tools that can be used in the classroom are the whiteboard, the overhead projector, the computer, a desk, pencil, an eraser, and scissors, even the teacher and the students themselves are an important tool for the other students to learn from. Of these I think that the most important tool would be the pencil and the eraser. The pencil is important because at the beginning of their life it helps the child build the necessary fine motor skills that a child will continue to use through out all of their lives. It also is a tool that helps to teach the student a another way of learning their letters. Most students need to have more then one way of learning, to read and then to write sets this act in stone. A pencil is also an important way for a teacher to convey thoughts to their students. With an eraser it is defiantly important for the student to know that they can make mistakes and it can be fixed. Everyone in the world makes mistakes and it is difficult for a child to realize that it is ok to make mistakes as long as they learn, erase, and try again.
Metaphorically speaking the pencil is a great way for a teacher no not set things in stone along with the eraser it makes it possible to be flexible in planning. Planning for the lesson that needs to be taught or even what is going to happen in the day. I think that it is necessary to have a schedule but with children it is necessary to also know that there is a time that a teacher needs to be flexible for their students, if a teacher isn’t flexible in the teaching of their students they could start to feel frustrated with the students that they are trying to teach.
The second tool that is very important to the classroom is the students themselves. In the classroom setting a teacher teaches a concept to the students, but in the classroom I think that the students learning from each other is one of the most important thing that a student will learn during their school carrier. Students learn a completely different lesson from each other then they do from the teacher. Socially they learn how to interact with each other, this helps them throughout their lives with their future jobs, family, or friends. Educationally when working in groups it is proven that if a student teaches a concept to another student that they not only learn it better but that they remember it better as well. Students helping each other is an essential and crucial part of a students life in school.
It is interesting to think about the different tools that a student uses in the classroom and how important those tools are to them. I also think that it is interesting to realize, in my point of view, that although we have new and amazing advances in technology it is important to remember that the fundamentals of learning are still important and shouldn’t be left out when teaching our student to learn.

Microsoft word is needed so that we can write documents for the children that are neat and organized.
The two videos for this week were very interesting. I think that it is important to reflect on the amount of people that use the Internet and how it has changed the world around us.
It is also important to understand that we as college students are not alone, we all buy books that are to expensive and we all learn things that we will not use in our daily lives outside of our college carrier. The need to know the numbers is important, without knowing how much technology is changing the way we live, some might think that it isn't worth the effort to continue our pursuit of technology.

technology in schools

(I could not get either of the videos to work but I was able to read the description of the video entitled introducing web 2.0)
Not only is it important to learn and understand technology in the in the world today, but it is important to utilize technology and use it to collaborate with other teachers. It is nice to know that in the world today not only can you lean on your teachers in your school but you can have a network of other teachers to learn and grow from.
Last semester I had the opportunity to volunteer in a fifth grade class, not only was it only was it great to learn from the teacher but it was nice to see a teacher able to use technology in her classroom. This teacher was able to have 15 computers in his classroom daily for his students to use. It was a great teaching tool and I could see the excitement of the students every time that they were able to use the computers. The students used this technology to write and record songs and look up terms from their lectures and then email back and forth to each other about the lessons. Having technology in the classroom has opened a lot of doors for teachers and students alike.

The classroom that I have envisioned as my classroom is one that is very open, room to walk around the desks or rows of desks, the door open and ready for any parents to come and join in on the fun for the day.
I want the walls to have new artwork or any new projects that the students have worked on to be displayed, so the students can be proud of work that they have participated in.
I want to not only be organized and prepared for the day but my room to look as though I am prepared also, My desk not to have stacks of papers or clutter on it.
I want for there to be defined work areas in the room for the students to work and have these areas separated enough to be in different sections of the room, such as a good reading area, large enough for the class to sit comfortably together to listen to the new books that we will read together.
I want the children to have plenty of good new books to read and them to be available in the classroom during quiet time. I want new books for them to work out of, new text books.
Most of all I want my students to have fun and have everything available for me to teach my students want they need to know in order to obtain the best second grade education that I can provide them.