exit slip.... NOTES for October 14th

Professor Boyer believes in  “Just in time learning”.

I like how the presenters used the thumbs in the air trick for when we were all ready. I also liked how he qouted himself. There are 3 different types of schooling: Distance learning, home schooling, and traditional learning. For distance learning you sit with your classroom and you have a teacher from a distance on a computer. distance learning is a lot like skype. Home schooloing is the use of computers or having students learn at home. Then traditional is the classic school system.

I liked how we commented on the blog to compare what different groups thought was the most effective way of schooling. In my opinion, homeschooling is the most effective way to learn. The most people chose traditional schooling. Their biggest debate was based on socialization. This is not a matter of effective learning, but social learning. Children in home school get the highest test scores out of all students. Look on Chris’s blog (http://boomingreflections.blogspot.com/ ) to compare the pros and cons of each.

Technical certifications are better because you can learn specifics of topics. But I believe that Adult education is necessary. A student becomes better rounded at an average adult education. Although if you want to learn a specific, such as sailing, than technical learning would be the way to go. So a technical certification would be in high school more specialized towards what they want to learn. This would have been terrible for me. I am a mind changer. I cannot decide what I want to do with my life. If I had to decide in high school, I would have been in an absolute pickle. Go to michael’s blog to find out more about the differences in schooling.

“Education is what remains after one has forgotten everything one has learned in school” –Albert Einstein

Reflecting on the presentations:

1.       Thumbs up good, but make sure everyone does thumbs up before progressing.

2.       Anticipate size of small groups.

3.       Cntrl + increases size of text Cntrl- decreases size

4.       Too much is better than too little (regarding information)

5.       Blog responses was cool

6.       I like that they had the option to look at additional resources

7.       Blended or hybrid learning is more effective than online learning is more effective than brick and mortar learning (side note….. proven)

8.       Works best in online environment (self-disciplined, written expressions, willing to work with strangers)

9.       Don’t use the word better…. Choose different. What truly makes something better? Talk more about perspectives when using the word better.

SCRATCH!!!!!!!  Putting together our iRLO

·         We have to see him when we are working on this to make sure we understand it.

·         How to download scratch to a campus computer

o   Go to scratch website (scratch.mit.edu)

o   Click on download scratch

o   Don’t click on any of the top options. Instead click on the link under “Having trouble with windows installer?”

o   Save to documents folder

o   Go to start button

o   Click on documents (under name)

o   Right click on file and choose extract all

o   Press extract

o   Click through documents then and click on cat button

·         How to go about doing this….

o   3 steps to designing an iRLO

§  Pick content

§  What will my students do to interact with content

§  Open up scratch and do the work

o   3 things in scratch

§  Create any object I am going to use in my project

·         Anything I want the students to see

·         Create a new sprite 3 buttons under the big cat

o   Question mark= random sprite

o   To get to library of sprite

o   Star with folder= library of sprite

o   Paint brush= make your own

§  T is the text tools… this can be used for labeling (you still need to use it on the make your own)

§  Go to costumes after you click on sprite (esp for words) put an outline around word so the whole object is movable

§  Rubber stamp tool to clone part of the plant

§  To delete use the scissors on the top of page and click on sprite

§  Select a stage

·         Selest white box= stage= and follow same rules as before

§  Do scripts now

·         Select sprite

·         Select control button

o   The ones with the wavy top are triggers

·         Then choose looks to do actionand add to script

·         Left click on object for explanation

o   On file –open- examples has ideas of what other people did

Read chapter six for the next chapter and do blog post. He wants a working prototype for SCRATCH…. Similar to the IWB lesson…. Post in discussions. Attach scratch project. Make sure to address the notes. Look on interactive white board lesson to see if he posted notes. email the scratch to him when we come to see him for help. Look at 3 of my peers IWB to review. go to class organization wiki to find peer review groups. provide feedback.... make sure it is constructive and ways they can improve their project. Find their work in D2L IWB forum. don't forget to search for inquiry question and add resources to delicious account.

Chapter 5: The seeds of a new system of education

It is understandable that homeschooling has ultimately led to better testing score. Parents know their childre better and many distractions that are in schools are not at home. Although the same thing can be said about home.  But the true reason why homeschooling may be so successful is because it is a video and computer based education program. The students have to rely on themselves more and are ultimately in more control of their learning.

Computer learning appears to  be the new way of advancing knowledge across the board. For example, In the business industry people are learning the basics for the company they are employed by, or certain aspects of the job. They also may advance their learning to help them progress in the company through online classes. Companies have also realized they need to constantly re-educate their employees so their workers can learn to handle more complex equipment and solve novel problems.

All the different opportunities offered for both student's and adult's is affecting how teachers are needing to teach. Because of the success of these programs, people may no longer need the teacher in the classroom environment. That means that teachers are going to change their whole teaching style to truly benefit the student to the greatest extent. Whether it be offering more activities via the internet or helping students take online courses that your school doesn't offer. Online courses offer a lot of variety that may not be present in school.

Chapter 6: The Social Web

Twitter is a tool I would never have considered using for the classroom. That is until I read this chapter. In my opinion it has always been a website to keep track of  famous people and what they are eating for lunch, not world events or learning links. But guess what, it is just that. It is a website for sharing ideas about learning, or trouble shooting ways to incorporates technology in the classroom. It even goes to the extent of helping a person reflect on the little things in life from Innertwitter.com. Twitter makes it possible to talk to people across the world and hear about their latest advancement in the classroom with under 150 words each. It could also be a way to keep parents aware of activities the school/ classroom is doing throughout the day. This website is a touch and go for direct classroom use, in my opinion. But in regards to bettering your teaching style, this is a great resource.  There are also websites that are a little more student friendly but are still similar to twitter such as edmodo.com.

The second part of this chapter regarding social bookmarking just really helped to enforce what we are already doing in education 331. One thing that I think I will have to start doing is making notes about websites (almost as a summary about what it does). Not only will this help me, but it can help anyone that is using my delicious account as a reference for other good web pages.

Diigo, a site for helping to organize all sorts of websites on the internet for classroom use, is even more helpful than delicious. This website allows you to annotate and highlight things I find interesting. I can then share these with colleagues or as a reference later for myself. You can create groups to share specific information to. Ultimately all this information can lead to your RSS fead.

oct 7th exit slip

Ok. So the iRLO is going to be crazy. I better prepare myself. Plan on coming in after class to work on the project. It is going to be a rough ride.

The group today made a sliderocket presentation on chapter 4. They used the cool Polleverywhere.com website to take an in class poll. I liked this scenario they used about the farmer having the old tools. This was controversial for me. I like the use of old tools and going back to when life was simpler. In the same respect, I have to keep up with the times because children don’t necessarily share my beliefs. Doing things with older tools is important but not always the best for the classroom. But a student will always need to know how to write with pen and paper.

Now how did the group do overall? They did a great job of student to student interaction. The polling allowed the presentation to be interactive. They said it wasn’t easy at first, but what truly is ever easy. They did end the presentation on a question to consider instead of just saying “Ok… we are done”. We need to remember to do wait time. Their longest wait time was 4 seconds. It felt like forever even being a spectator, so I can’t imagine how long it must have felt for them. Ten seconds self. REMEMBER TO WAIT TEN SECONDS! Remember to ask students for when they are sharing:

                                                Who wants to answer the question first?

                                                What are your thoughts?

                                                Point out a student to answer the question first.

You really have to consider how to ask the question and what you want them to answer. They walked around to check to make sure we were all getting to the right place. Work on word choice for the scenario. Make sure that what you are comparing to teaching is valid in all respects.

The iRLO is going to basically be a video game for my students. And interactive game that the students can use to help enforce what I am teaching. It is supposed to be specified for a single student and meet specific standards. Look on the requirements to figure out how to do it.

The Development of American Schooling

• How does this reading impact your thinking about technology's role in teaching and learning?
• What will you do differently as a future teacher as a direct result of this new thinking?

Schools have changed a lot over the century. From doing apprenticeships to universal schooling, small social changes made big differences in schools. This really helps to enforce my belief that technology is our future in the school system. Hopefully that does not mean that teachers will no longer be needed, but it definitely is the next step in the schooling evolution. This chapter didn't really expand my knowledge of technology as much as it informed me of the history of education. It really shows how history is constantly repeating itself in some form. This knowledge revolution is very similar to another industrial revolution. So the question now is at whether I should be ahead of the times or just go with the flow and learn and evolve as the education system evolve. Most likely the answer will be both. I think I need to stay ahead of the times but there will always be things I can not predict. 

chapter 5: RSS

I have never heard of RSS before reading this chapter. I have seen little links on web pages saying RSS, but i have always just disregarded them. I had no idea how this could help my web searching. I have about fifteen web pages that I visit every time I open my computer. Having the ability to have updates all in one place, instead of fifteen (which I am sure will just keep increasing as I get further into teaching) will be amazing. I especially like the idea of being able to get information from resources that you have not subscribed to yet, but they have relevant information on a topic I would be interested in. As my RSS feed starts to increase, I will have to make folders for different subjects of information to better keep everything organized. When I started setting up my RSS, it was a little confusing, but quickly became rather manageable. There is a lot of information that I am still sifting through, and that the book will come in handy when trying to figure out the different aspects of RSS.

I like how I can help students set up a RSS feed for the classroom. The teacher who said that we are like a personal guide for the classroom, made a good point. We are supposed to feeding students the most accurate up to date information possible. By having a good RSS feed, endless amounts of information is at my finger tips without overwhelming me with pointless ads and junk. RSSmix. com also seems like a real asset for the classroom. By being able to take all of your students RSS feeds and feeding them to this one that you can then attach to The teacher feed. You can continually see what your students are doing to update their RSS. This is a lot of information, but maybe with an RSS feed it will be manageable.

chapter 4: Wiki's

• How does this reading impact your thinking about technology's role in teaching and learning?
• What will you do differently as a future teacher as a direct result of this new thinking?

I dont think I have ever realized how many wiki's are in existence. From the first 5 pages I have found two new wikis that will now be one of my frequently visited web pages. With younger children I am always worried about their safety, especially when dealing with the internet. One problem with wikis in elementary classrooms is how public the work is. Luckily, as the chapter stated, there are several other options you can use. For example, there are now wiki's that need a password to edit the information. Another option is some new software that has been created. It mirrors a wiki, but it can only be seen on local computers with the software. These alterations considered, I still prefer the idea of the "real" wiki that anyone can edit. One activity that was done using a wiki was one teacher collaborated with a teacher from a different country. The joined together to create a wiki that their students were in charge of editing. Information, pictures, files, videos and many other things were uploaded. Activities like these really help to broaden the children's view of the world because they are dealing with so many different people. Wiki's are a great way to give the students the responsibility of editing. They will have to keep their eyes on the wiki page, and continually update it with the most current information. I think wiki's are a great way to encourage class participation, and collaboration. 

While wiki's are great to use for class, I will also have to be weary of them. There is always the worry of students copying information off of wiki pages without citing them. This puts the whole academic dishonesty thing into play. Teaching students how to correctly use a wiki will be key in classroom success. Also, Having to check over wiki pages before using them is a good way to ensure that the page is accurate. Although, wikipedia, as steve jobs believes, is supposedly one of the most accurate encyclopedia's today.