Technology Self Assessment: School 2.0

I chose to investigate NETS-T 4 (I involve students in opportunities to develop cultural understanding and global awareness through digital-age communications and collaboration projects with students from other countries) because it was the section that was indicated I could use more knowledge in.

I visited the site for the organization Global Education Motivators. http://www.gem-ngo.org/index.php?option=com_frontpage&Itemid=1

This is a non-profit organization that was created in order to help students meet the challenges of living in a global world. Through this site, you can have access to live lectures that will be streamed to the students in your class, but not only can the students hear the lecture, the guest lecturer can interact with the students and hear their questions and comments. I think this is a cool idea to get speakers in your class who you would otherwise not be able to schedule. They have lectures that cover a wide array of topics, and because I aim to teach high school science, I found a couple on climate change that seem like they would be interesting me. I was a little put off by the price, they seem to be around $175 for a 45 min-1 hour lecture, but there might be ways to apply for a grant or raise funding if you found a lecture that was particularly appealing and appropriate. I think it would help with the NETS standard because not only would the students be hearing a lecture from someone in another part of the world, but class’s from other parts of the world would also be listening, and the students could hear questions and comments from these other areas as well.

Journal #3

100 Things that make me happy, in the order that they came to me...

1. Hershey’s chocolate
2. Ocean Spray Cran-Apple juice
3. Sweet Tarts
4. Family
5. Friends (should I feel bad that I thought of these two after the others?)
6. My iPhone
7. Words with Friends App
8. Spaghetti
9. Backpacking trips
10. Taking photographs
11. Astronomy
12. When the weather shifts from hot to cold in the winter
13. When the weather shifts from cold to warm in the spring
14. Bill Murray movies
15. Watching my MacGyver complete series dvd’s
16. Zombies
17. Family Guy
18. When I fry a perfect egg
19. Breakfast for dinner
20. The feeling of when I finish working on a website and it is uploaded
21. Coming up with a new design to draw for a t-shirt
22. Hitting all green lights when I drive
23. Quaker oatmeal
24. Cream of Wheat
25. Scrambled eggs with toast
26. Irish Breakfast Tea
27. Hot Chocolate
28. My dog Lem
29. The smell of a new pair of shoes
30. Wearing a new pair of socks
31. Watching the odometer in my truck roll over to a round number
32. Sons of Anarchy
33. Star Trek: The Next Generation
34. Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (I formally announce my nerdness)
35. Jaws
36. Jurassic Park
37. Quoting random movies and having people get it
38. Singing songs loudly at work to irritate my co-workers
39. Hearing my co-workers do the same thing above to me
40. Taking the shrink wrap off a new video game
41. Playing Call of Duty
42. Setting complicated concrete forms right the first time at work
43. Glass bottled Coca-Cola
44. Guy Ritchie movies
45. British crime movies
46. When you get a second vending machine item on one spin
47. Family Guy
48. Double-Stuf Oreos
49. Just about all 80’s music
50. 80’s movies
51. The really bad Saturday night SyFy original movies
52. Waking up and knowing I don’t have to get out of bed
53. Reconnecting with someone I haven’t seen in a while
54. Eating the chocolate off first on a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup.
55. Then being able to just eat the peanut butter part
56. Starting a new book and realizing I’m going to like it
57. Cheese in general
58. Especially Feta
59. Comic book movies
60. Steve McQueen movies
61. When people tell me I look like Steve McQueen
62. Chicken flavored Top Ramen
63. Bologna, mustard, and mayonnaise sandwiches
64. Pulled pork sandwiches
65. Wing’s n’ Things 10 piece wing combo with side of bread
66. Jameson Signature Reserve whiskey and ginger-ale
67. Buying Christmas gifts
68. Putting up Christmas lights
69. Buying more Christmas lights for the house every year
70. Making the stuffing for the Thanksgiving turkey
71. Thanksgiving with my family
72. Thinking about the vastness of space
73. Seeing a shooting star
74. Going camping
75. Every once in a while being away from the technology for a weekend
76. Seeing a new country
77. The rain
78. Catching lightning on camera (very difficult, even more so in SoCal)
79. Falling asleep to music
80. Welding
81. Any of the first three Indiana Jones movies
82. Any of the first three Star Wars movies (release date, not title number)
83. Putting together something from Ikea (I call it grown up Lego’s)
84. Putting together a Lego set
85. Arby’s roast beef sandwiches
86. Sushi
87. Hitting a clean shot in Golf
88. Driving to the desert in the summer so I have the golf course to myself
89. Any High-Definition tv show based in Alaska
90. Paying off a credit card
91. Finding cash in a pair of pants
92. Knowing what the other players are holding when playing cards
93. Being able to help others
94. Getting a new lens for my camera
95. Buying new clothes
96. Being able to dress up
97. When I don’t let stress make me sick
98. Red or pink Starburst candy
99. Saying “that’s what she said” in a perfect scenario
100. Finding Waldo! (I’m very good at those)

Journal #2 (NETS-T 5)

Ferguson, H. (2010). Join the flock. Learning & Leading With Technology, 37(8), Retrieved from http://www.iste.org/learn/publications/learning-and-leading/digital-edition-june-july-2010.aspx

Miller, S.M. (2010). Enhance your twitter experience. Learning & Leading With Technology, 37(8), Retrieved from http://www.iste.org/learn/publications/learning-and-leading/digital-edition-june-july-2010.aspx

Summary:
The first article Join the Flock gives a brief overview of Twitter and PLN’s (professional learning networks.) It discusses the basics of using hash-tags to mark a certain subject or group, and how to ease your way into the conversations that happen online. The author talks about how you won’t be getting the most out of the PLN’s until you become a contributor to them as well, not just someone who sits back and observes only.
The second article Enhance Your Twitter Experience gives some tools that can be helpful to get the most out of Twitter. TweetDeck is named specifically as a desktop tool that helps you organize your Twitter stream, beyond the single column used in Twitter itself. The article also mentioned HootSuite, which is a tool that allows you to easily share a website you find on the internet via Twitter. The tool will give the URL and compose the Tweet itself with a single click, allowing you to add text or hashtags before you tweet.

Question 1:
How specifically might you use a PLN to add to your teaching of your students?

I would like to teach high school science, and with this subject comes a lot of projects that the students work on. I would like to move beyond the standard projects that we have all done and don’t retain much from, and try new things. I would join a PLN that focuses on science in the classroom and ask for suggestions that other instructors have done and had success with in the class. I would seek ideas that the teacher saw the students both enjoyed, and retained the knowledge they were learning.

Question 2:
How is a PLN through Twitter different than meeting with peers in your community?

By joining a PLN through Twitter, you have access to information, tools, and teaching styles from not only your specific subject matter and age level, but also from differing cultures and communities around the world. With this type of exchange you can not only get the tools you need to grow as a teacher, but also gain insight into other cultures that can help you grow as a person. This is not to say that you shouldn’t meet with actual colleagues within your community, but you could invite those colleagues online to share their ideas and thoughts as well.

Journal #1 (NETS-T 1-5)

Light, D. (2011). Do web 2.0 right. Learning & Leading With Technology, 38(5), Retrieved from http://www.iste.org/learn/publications/learning-and-leading/digital-edition-february-march-2011.aspx

Summary:
This article examined the ways in which technology, and more specifically in the article, blogs, can be incorporated into the classroom. The article highlighted three important elements that need to be considered when implementing such technology: instituting daily practice, carefully considering the audience, and teaching and enforcing appropriate behavior. The teachers that were interviewed found more success with blogs/wikis when they weren’t assigned as a once in a while assignment, but rather a continuing process that was utilized more often. Considering the audience of the blogs/wikis is another important element, many students felt uncomfortable having the entire class reading their work, so some teachers used the blog as a private journal that the student could give his thoughts about the class to the teacher. While teachers were more concerned about other adults reading and commenting on the students work, the greater fear of the students was having their peers in the school read their work. Lastly and most importantly was teaching the students appropriate behavior for how they interacted with each other online. It seemed a wise idea was to build up a sense of community in the classroom first, and slowly integrate this community online; that way the students felt more comfortable and had a greater respect for what the online community was for.

Question 1:
How might you stress the importance of proper online etiquette to your students?

I would explain to the students that the same rules that apply in class also apply online. The online community would be an extension of the physical classroom, and that I expect the same behavior in the classroom to be online as well. I would also be careful to fully monitor the online activity and step in if any incidents happen or look as though they may happen.

Question 2:
How could you use this technology in the grade/subject you aim to teach?

I would like to teach high school science, and I think one of the first things I could use it for is for students to create a blog to share their data from whatever projects we might be doing. The scientific method is often used, and students being able to share their results and experiences from a project can help other students who may be having difficulty to find a solution.