I explored YouTube and found that it has much to offer in the way of videos. The important thing is to be watchful of what you search for and what you choose. I happen to love this song by Garth Brooks and I liked watching Dale Earnhardt race, so this is a perfect combination for a video in my mind. There could be benefits from using YouTube in your classroom, but you would need to research carefully and create a library of "safe" videos to use so you wouldn't offend anyone or embarrass yourself!
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Monday, April 4, 2011
Thing # 19
I am a member of a few online communities. I have joined several online communities that are based around education throughout this course. I am also a member of Twitter, which I mentioned in the other exercise. The TeacherPop social network seems like it would be very beneficial to teachers. I just joined TeacherPop, but I think it could be useful in my future career as a teacher. It would be a good way to share and receive ideas about lesson plans throughout the year. I think that the section for others to leave comments is a good way to get feedback on some of your ideas, and a great way to let others know that you appreciate their ideas. I tried to upload my badge from TeacherPop, but I could not get it to work properly. I explored some other social networking sites that I thought would be of interest to me, and it seems like they would both be good sites to join. I explored two sites that are related to music, since it is a large part of my life. The first site that I explored was last.fm, which is a social networking site that allows you to listen to your favorite music and communicate with people who enjoy listening to the same types of music that you do. The other site that I explored was Project Playlist. This seems to be an amazing site. It allows you to create a playlist and then share it with others on the other social networking sites you use such as Twitter or Facebook. This is a great site for anyone who enjoys all types of music, because you can create a playlist and share it with others. This gives others the opportunity to enjoy the same music that you do. I would recommend these two sites to anyone who enjoys music.
Thing # 18
I am the first to admit that I am not the most tech-savvy person in the world, but I do seem to be making some headway through the exercises in this class. I have a Facebook and a Twitter account, but only for a short time. The Facebook account was set up to keep in touch with family and friends and to see photos of grandkids, great-grandkids, great-nieces, etc., and because I have no time to write letters to anyone in order to stay informed. I do not like putting my links out for everyone, but I will say that I was able to reconnect with a very good high school friend that I had lost touch with through Facebook. Just on a lark, I typed her name in one day and lo and behold, there she was with all her kids and grandkids. So, I suppose I can see some good possibilities for the usefulness of Facebook and Twitter.
My Twitter account was set up for this class, and is geared more towards communicating with other teachers and educators. I believe that this type of social networking will be highly beneficial to me as a future educator and along those lines, I added a lot of websites about teaching, education, English teachers and literature. I have learned a great deal from these assignments that are pushing me into the world of technology.
My Twitter account was set up for this class, and is geared more towards communicating with other teachers and educators. I believe that this type of social networking will be highly beneficial to me as a future educator and along those lines, I added a lot of websites about teaching, education, English teachers and literature. I have learned a great deal from these assignments that are pushing me into the world of technology.
Thing # 17
Tagging is a great way to find information and help categorize it. There are unlimited uses in the classroom for these things. I think it is great to know that I can go to one of these sites and find whatever information I want with such ease. There is so much potential for this in the clasroom.
I really enjoyed Del.icio.us and think it will be quite helpful to me as a teacher, as well as being able to see its usefulness to students. I am a pretty organized person, or I try to be, and the ability to share information and links with my peers and students will be extremely useful. It should also help me to stay current on the latest technology and information pertaining to education and teaching.
I really enjoyed Del.icio.us and think it will be quite helpful to me as a teacher, as well as being able to see its usefulness to students. I am a pretty organized person, or I try to be, and the ability to share information and links with my peers and students will be extremely useful. It should also help me to stay current on the latest technology and information pertaining to education and teaching.
Thing #16
My favorite start page would have to be Google, but I honestly had no idea just how much Google has to offer. The online calendar could be very useful, and I do have one set up to try and stay a little more organized, because the only memory loss it has is if I forget to post it. I really think the calendar would be more useful in a classroom setting by a teacher. The Ta-Da list was simple and straight-forward, but I am used to writing things in my planner that I carry with me all the time, and I am not around a computer at all times of the day. I have to admit that I tend to get flustered when I am trying to use some of these tools and tend not to like those tools too well. If it gets too technical, I will just shut it down and go on because I have way too much going on in my life right now to get bogged down in technology. While that is not the expected attitude of an novice teacher, I figure I might as well be honest even if I am not tech-savvy!
Thing # 15
When doing research, Wiki is a terrible reference, but it might be very useful in a classroom. Since the whole point of a Wiki is that many people can contribute, it becomes easy for anyone to go in and change any material that the article may have posted, even if it's wrong! This is what makes Wiki a bad reference because there is no way to be certain what information is coming from a reliable source.
But, while it is not useful for a reference, it would be very useful to set up a Wiki and have it become a class project with all the students researching and collaborating. This could cause the students to gain a great amount of knowledge about a subject. Monitoring would be needed, by all means, but it could become a great group or class project.
But, while it is not useful for a reference, it would be very useful to set up a Wiki and have it become a class project with all the students researching and collaborating. This could cause the students to gain a great amount of knowledge about a subject. Monitoring would be needed, by all means, but it could become a great group or class project.
Thing # 14
I explored all the different mind maps and flowcharts and I believe that the difference between the two is that the flowchart is like different steps in doing something while a mind map is more like a brainstorm chart. I used Bubbl.us to make a chart of the things I need to have a cookout for my grandson's baseball team and it was so easy to use. Going from one bubble to the next was very easy and moving them around to place them where I wanted was easy, too. The site was easy to use and navigate.
I really liked these tools. I think that these charts would be most useful for actual activites in a classroom such as using the flow charts to help students brainstorm ideas for writing a paper and the maps could be use to create different views. For the most part, the charts followed the same basic concepts, but both could be interchanged in a classroom.
I really liked these tools. I think that these charts would be most useful for actual activites in a classroom such as using the flow charts to help students brainstorm ideas for writing a paper and the maps could be use to create different views. For the most part, the charts followed the same basic concepts, but both could be interchanged in a classroom.
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