Vocaroo :)

This Is How We Dream

This Is How We Dream by Richard Miller

These videos opened up my eyes to many new things involving technology. In this presentation, Miller showed what could be done when " writing with multi-media." Evolving from a reading/ writing culture to a listening/ watching culture may be a bit challenging for teachers. This could be challenging for students because they will have to learn to create multimedia rather than just consume it.

This is very important for people who take reading and writing seriously because we now have the capability of communicating instantly, globally. This is a critical time to be engaged in the work of literacy. You can do anything from a computer using the internet, allowing you to connect to the world. You are able to acquire access to any information in the world in a matter of seconds. You can share knowledge infinitely.

"Writing with multi-media" rather than simply using pen and paper, makes it possible to collaborate using this networking technology and to compose not only with text, but images and film also. I cannot say that I am fully prepared to write with multimedia, but soon hope to be able to. Once I have mastered this, it will make it easier for me to help my student write with multimedia.



The Networked Student by Wendy Drexler

After watching this video, I honestly asked myself, "Why does the networked student even need a teacher?" I thought, if all the materials you need to learn are right there in front of you, you can just read about it and learn it yourself. But what if you needed help? Yes, one can blog and research to find an answer, but you would have to wait to get an answer and it might not even be the answer you're looking for. The benefit of having a teacher is that he/she can guide you and show you how to understand this networked learning. The teacher is there to support you and show you how to take advantage of learning opportunities.

Although, I do still believe that networked learning is an efficient way to learn. The student is learning so much more than just reading from a book. Students are able to discuss topics with professors, connect with people all over the world, and even listen to lectures by the best teachers in the world. Being a networked student also allows for independent discovery. In some classrooms, students are spoon fed the material by the teachers because all they have is a book to read from. This networked learning allows for students to discover how to do things on their own and provides them with many tools to do so.


Toward A New Future of Whatever by Michael Wesch

I hope that in the near future people WILL be saying, "I care. Let's do whatever it takes...by whatever means necessary." Because this generation is so caught up in saying "whatever" to things such as life, religion, school, work, opportunities, etc., it will cause pure destruction and chaos. Taking steps to this new future of whatever requires critical optimism. Optimism is an attitude towards reality that affects ones actions. A critical optimist has respect for the facts: both in knowing them and in the attempt to change things. Optimism is predicated on the fact that things have to change. This has spoken a lot to me because if I say "I don't care. Whatever." about my schoolwork, it will get me nowhere. If I don't care about school, I will not be able to get a job anywhere. So taking steps toward a new future of whatever can create a very positive outcome!

Dr. Christie's Site

Dr. Alice Christie

I believe that this site can be very useful to me as a teacher because it provides many extensive resources, links, and examples for questions that I may have when beginning my teaching career. The Educational Technology Guide has many links that you can click on to help you further understand technology in order to help the students enhance their learning as well as enhancing your own knowledge as a teacher at the same time.

If I ever have a question about technology or how to help my students understand it better, this is a great site to refer to. It has everything broken down so you can understand it very easily. This comprehensive resource for educators provided by this site is very useful and helpful for educators because we can learn from her experiences.



iTunes University

iTunes University would be a huge help to me as a student and later on when I become a teacher. As a student, it can provide information right at my fingertips. It is easy to use and very accessible. Because I already use iTunes for songs on my iPod, I already have it set up on my computer and I am very familiar with how iTunes works. Because iTunes U can make lectures come to life, it can help make learning more interesting and fun. Being able to put these lectures on my iPod making it to where I can listen to it anytime, makes it very convenient and saves time.

This can help me as a teacher because I will always be wanting to continuously learn more and be able to share new facts and information with my students. It is also exciting because I will be able to reach out and share my knowledge with everyone. Making the lectures available on iTunes will also allow my students to be more engaged in the classroom.

iPods

The iPod is a portable digital audio player that can hold large amounts of music. They are pretty easy to use and have a clear goal of speeding up the effective production, transfer and dissemination of digital audio and video.The border between education and entertainment is now being deconstructed by iPod. iPods are becoming study aids for students, allowing them to fast-forward to a part of a lecture they may not have understood the first time or review complicated themes before exams.Some K-12 educators and schools have also started using the iPod to enhance their curriculum and to support learning objectives in content areas such as – mathematic, science, reading, foreign language, and history among others. This site showed me that iPods have become good devices for instruction and can be very helpful to students.


Click Hereto access this website.

See Who's Editing Wikipedia..

See Who's Editing Wikipedia

For years, I have been told to never use Wikipedia for information. My teachers would tell me that it was not a legitimate site to get essential information from. Therefore, I have never used that particular site to look up information. Although, I had never done enough research on it to truly know what the site was about.

After reading this article, I still feel that way because of the ongoing changes made by anonymous users; one cannot firmly know that the information is correct. If someone believes it is legitimate information, they can use the database to track down the digital fingerprints left behind by the contributor.

What I've Learned This Year by: Mr. McClung

I believe that was a great reflection by Mr. McClung. It put alot of things into perspective for me. I am one who likes to have a plan and follow that plan to a T and if one thing veers off course a little, I am a nervous wreck. I know that I will have to work hard on being a flexible person when it comes to teaching a lesson. He also hit the nail on the head with me when he said that teachers need to be reasonable. We are humans just like the students, and we make mistakes just like they do. It is our job to encourage them to never stop trying. If they do not get encouragement from us, they will have no self-confidence to tackle the situation by themselves.

I believe that listening to the students and creating a student-teacher relationship is vital in earning respect from the students. This way, the teacher can learn the strengths and weaknesses of each student. If the teacher has a good understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of each student, it will make it easier to teach a lesson because he/she will know the high and low points to hit in the lesson leaving less room for confusion in the classroom.