Wiki - NETS III & V

This is a wiki page that I contributed to a technology class wiki using WetPaint. It is a discussion of a tool that I researched for the wiki through another wiki called Cool Tools for School.

Geometry Crossword - NETS I & II

This is a crossword that I created using Microsoft Excel. The crossword was completed by following a tutorial on atomiclearning.com. The completed crossword is on the first sheet and the clues are on the second sheet.
Spreadsheet

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Copyright Assignment - NETS III & IV

This is a copyright assignment that I collaborated with two others peers on Google Docs. The assignment is based on the Fair Use Harbor website.
Copyright Assignment

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iMovie Software Proficiency - NETS I & III

This is a movie created on iMovie featuring the campus of Cal State University, San Marcos.

Journal 10 - NETS I & IV

"MySpace Can Be a Learning Tool" -Liz Kolb

Kolb, Liz (December/January 2008-2009). MySpace Can Be a Learning Tool. Learning and Leading with Technology, 36, Retrieved April 6, 2009, from www.iste.org/Content/NavigationMenu/Publications/LL/LLIssues/Volume3620082009/DecemberJanuaryNo4/L_L_December_January.htm

This article is about how educators can use social networks like MySpace in the classroom. MySpace can be a great learning tool to motivate students to learn. Educators can now utilize a tool that a majority of students are familiar with and use on a daily basis as a tool for their creativity. There were several pitfalls of using MySpace in the classroom that were discussed that educators can easily overcome. One of the them was advertising. Educators can turn this negative into a positive by using it to teach older students about advertising. There are websites (Disney, Imbee, or Club Penguins) that educators can use for preteen students that do not display advertising. A topic that most educators and parents are apprehensive about when speaking about using MySpace is the issue of predators. Research has shown that a very small percentage of users, less than 10%, have encountered predators while online. The issue of predators can be avoided by teaching students how to create a safe profile, like not providing information about where you live, and having parents more involved in their children's MySpace pages. Most educators can be apprehensive about using MySpace in the classroom because of their worry that the parents might not approve. If parents are worried that their students are being exposed to social networking too early, educators can create a class page in which the students can participate in and the teacher can supervise all activities on the page. Educators can also lessen parent's apprehension by hosting a parent education night where students can teach their parents how to navigate through the MySpace page or even create one themselves.

There are many ways to incorporate MySpace into the classroom which will be beneficial to both the students and the teachers. One way to incorporate MySpace into the classroom would be to have students create a page around a historical figure or a favorite character in a book that the class is reading. Everything on the page would be fictional but relevant to the historical figure or the novel's character. This assignment would allow for students to express their creativity in a different medium. They can post blogs as if they were the historical figure or the character in the novel. Another assignment that students can do on MySpace would be to create a fictional literature piece and create their page around that literature. Students can invite friends and families to view and comment on their work. MySpace is a popular site for well-known authors of teen literature. Students can communicate with their favorite author and ask for feed back as well through MySpace. MySpace is not only a great tool for socializing but it is also great for educational purposes. There are tutorials and help pages for students who are having problems, either academic or personal, there are resources through MySpace that can assist the students in solving their problems. I think that MySpace is a great tool to use in the classroom and can definitely make learning a little more relevant to students.

Question 1: How can educators make parents feel more at ease about their children using MySpace in the classroom?

Educators can make parents feel more comfortable with the idea by hosting a parent's night where the teacher and students inform the parents about the different resources that MySpace offers. Students can show their parents pages that have been created by similar students. Parents will feel more at ease when they are better informed about how MySpace is being used in the classroom, especially if it motivates their children to learn.

Question 2: What is one way that MySpace can be incorporated into the classroom?

MySpace has a ton of resources that both educators and students can use. There are an unlimited number of curriculum ideas for teachers and resources for students. Students can use MySpace to create a page around a historical figure or a character from a novel. Everything on the page, from the profile to the blogs, is created from the historical figure or the character's perspective. Basically, the students have to pretend that they are the character. This is a really cool assignment and it also gives students room to be creative.

Journal 9 - NETS I & IV

"The Kids Are All Right" -John K. Waters

Waters, John K. (March 2009). The Kids Are All Right. T-H-E Journal, Retrieved March 30, 2009, from http://www.thejournal.com/articles/24104

This article is basically about how educators can take advantage of the fact that children are very skilled at using new digital tools such as the internet for self-directed learning. It all started with the study "Kids' Informal Learning With Digital Media: An Ethnographic Investigation of Innovative Knowledge Cultures", funded by John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur. This was a study conducted on over 800 young people over a period of three years. Data was collected on how these young people use digital media tools and how they developed social skills through online websites such as FaceBook and MySpace. This study can be very beneficial to educators who wish to lessen the gap between them and their students in regards to using new digital tools. It was suggested that educators should participate in these social websites such as FaceBook and MySpace so that they can get a feel for how their students are learning and what their students use on a daily basis to continue communication with others.

The study identified three genres of participation with new digital media tools. The first genre is "hanging out," which is basically when students are communicating with their friends and keeping in touch with their friends through the websites like MySpace since public space for children to hang out now are more restricted than they were in the past. Through this, children are learning the social skills through they online interactions with one another. The second genre is "messing around." This is when the kids are just exploring on their own. They might jump from website to website, checking things out along the way, or browsing for information that are of interest to them. This is an example of self-directed learning. The children are seeking out the information and absorbing in what they discover. The third genre is "geeking out." This is when the children are seriously interested in the new digital tool. They are taking their time to investigate the new tool and to learn more about it. It is here that they develop expertise in their topic of interest. Through this research, it is founded that "the internet is empowering a tech-savvy generation to pursue a central element of 21st century education-- self-directed learning, performed on kids' own terms and time schedules. It's a finding that compels educators to disregard any lingering notions that the internet is strictly unproductive playtime" (Waters, 2009).

This article has really changed my perspective on kids and the internet world. I think that it is a great idea for educators to use the children's passion and skills for computers and bring it into the classroom as a way to facilitate their learning and creativity. It is very true that technology today is totally different from that from 5 years ago. I realize that the environment in which I learned will be totally different from the way in which my future students will learn. As an eduator, I believe that you have to utilize what is out there so that your students will have the best tools possible when they leave your classroom. I also believe that an educator must never stop learning, whether it be from their own peers, the news, or their students; the yearning and willingness to learn new things is an important quality for educators to possess.

Question 1: What are some ways that educators can reduce the technology gap between themselves and their students?

One way to reduce the technology gap would be to learn about the new technologies yourself. There are a lot of resources out there and a lot of different social networks that you can join to get updated information on how to utilize the new digital tools in your own classroom. Another way would be for educators to allow their students to teach them a few things about these new digital tools. Students are a lot more tech-savvy now-a-days than most educators and most of them easily pick up on how to navigate through these new digital tools like nothing. This would definitely make the students feel like they are contributing something valuable to the classroom.

Question 2: Name one of the participation genre and describe it.

One of the genre of participation is labled "geeking out." This is when the students are extremely interested in the digital tool. They invest a lot of their time investigating and learning about the new tool. They participate in self-directed learning. They learn to eventually become experts at the new digital tool.

Journal 8: Internet Telephony -NETS V

Internet Telephony: "A category of hardware and software that enables people to use the Internet as the transmission medium for telephone calls. For users who have free, or fixed-price Internet access, Internet telephony software essentially provides free telephone calls anywhere in the world. To date, however, Internet telephony does not offer the same quality of telephone service as direct telephone connections.

There are many Internet telephony applications available. Some, like CoolTalk and NetMeeting, come bundled with popular Web browsers. Others are stand-alone products. Internet telephony products are sometimes called IP telephony, Voice over the Internet (VOI) or Voice over IP (VOIP) products." (http://www.webopedia.com/TERM/I/Internet_telephony.html)

Internet telephony is basically telephone calls through the internet. There are different web programs like Skype that provides the medium to make telephone calls through the internet. These phone calls are usually free of charge and can be used worldwide. There are some programs that even allows you to make a video phone call if you have a web cam connected to your computer.

I followed a discussion about internet telephony but it barely provided any information about how internet telephony works, instead I learned that there are a lot of different ways that you could use a web cam in your classroom. I saw some really extremely cool stop-motion animation movies that students made with the web cam. The videos portray specific vocabulary words used in literature like foreshadowing, personification, and morphing. You can have students make their own short story film in almost any subject. One of the educators filmed a science experiment that his students were conducting.

A suggestion from one of the educators was to have students create a tutorial using the web cam. This is both fun and educational for the students. Another educator films himself replaying the day's activities and assignments. He then uploads these videos onto a class website for students who missed class. This was a way for him to motivate his students to keep up with class work and to continue participating in classroom activities even if they are absent for the day. Another educator used the web cam to connect with another classroom from a different country. This allowed for his students to collaborate with students from a different culture within the classroom. Overall, I learned that there are a zillion different ways to use the web cam in your classroom to motivate student learning and create an environment for creativity.