WebQuest Final Product

This is an example of what the students will make as the final product of the lesson. It shows the nursery rhyme on one slide and the next slide is the main character. The final slide are the words that the students would play a matching game with.

Critical Friend WebQuest

My Impressions as the Efficiency Expert

The Top Ten Video Project

The activity does differ from the activities that I engaged in during my education. The teachers based most of my work off of the book, the use of technology wasn't as widely used then as it is now, and the teachers didn't ask me, "How can we fix this?". My learning style, kinesthetic, is addressed in this activity by using a foldable to put the notes on. The teacher also had the students make a painting of an ocean biome, information cards, and an art project that focused on the concept of camouflage. All of these activities are kinesthetically based. I am surprised that this project was done without the use of textbooks. I think that this is a very fun way to give the students a break from the everyday textbook work. I would like to teach in a similar way, because I think it would be very beneficial to the students. Most kids learn better if they have fun while learning. They will remember the activity, concept, and more facts than just lecturing about the topic. One concern I have is that I won't be allowed to do activities like this, because I would not be teaching for the West test. A lot of the curriculum these days are test based and the teachers are having to teach for the test instead of teaching to learn. 4th grade is especially set up this way. I am in 4th grade clinicals now, and they don't have time to do extra fun things in class. They are required to teach information that will be on the West test. I think one barrier for this activity would be more work for me. There are so many aspects to this activity that it would be very time consuming. I hope that I will be able to do fun things, such as this activity, with my students when I become a teacher.

Sharing: The Moral Imperative

I like being able to write short, to the point statements about different topics. I don't like the fact that anyone and everyone can see what I am writing or comment on my postings. Keeping a blog can make me a more effective teacher because I can have my students make a blog and post answers to questions on it. I think kids would like being able to contact me, as a teacher, outside of class if they need to. Students seem to like the blogging idea and letting their voices be heard. I probably won't continue to post to my blog after this course is over just for the simple fact that I don't really have the time to keep up with it. I do, however, think that blogs are a good way for people to tell the world what they think. Keeping a blog has helped me to develop a new media literacy: collective intelligence. This was demonstrated when we had to do the media literacy presentation. Erin and I created "Our Trip to the Zoo" presentation. We collaboratively pooled our knowledge and compared our responses to come up with a powerpoint presentation, which I later posted to my blog. I think this is a perfect example of collective intelligence.

Wikipedia: Friend Not Foe

The class activity about Wikipedia and this article didn't really change my opinion, just let me see it in a different light. I have always liked Wikipedia and found it very valuable, but have never really been able to use it in papers. This article helps me to see that I can use Wikipedia as a jumping off tool for research. By trying to find holes in the articles and using that as a guide line for focusing my research on is such a good idea. It would definitely make for a more interesting research paper than just a redundant factual paper. I think that educators, especially, need to read this article to hopefully change their opinion on Wikipedia. I think that as a future teacher, instructing the students on how to be internet smart is important. They need to know how to research information to figure out if it's fact or fiction. Even though you can't cite Wikipedia, you should still be able to use it. In my classroom, I might have the students be Wikipedia detectives and try to find something that is not the complete truth, research that, then have them edit it on the Wikipedia site. This would be a fun and educational way for students to learn the information!

Wikipedia

Wikipedia is a multilingual, Web-based encyclopedia project, operated by the Wikimedia Foundation, a nonprofit organization. A source that anyone can edit can be reliable if the people editing it are experts on that specific topic. If just a random person that didn't know anything about that topic edited the information, then it would not be reliable. One of Wikipedia's defenders answered this question with,"The problem with Wikipedia is that it only works in practice. In theory, it can never work." The creators of Wikipedia place their trust in "wisdom of crowds," believing that by having many people watching what appears there, errors and vandalism will be weeded out, sooner rather than later. Larry Sanger left Wikipedia because he believed that he should give more authority to experts. Abuse and vandalism on a Wikipedia page would be in the form of misinformation and bias on a topic. The statistics reveal that Wikipedia is a major website and people all across the world get information from it. I think Wikipedia is so successful because it can be created or edited by anyone, therefore people feel more connected to it. Since it can be created by anyone, people can add what they think other people will need, or what other websites don't include. Wikipedia can be a one stop shop for information, you can get information and get references all in one place. Wikipedia's creators don't accept advertising because they rely on donations from visitors and other, indirect commerical efforts. They might not want to accept advertising because they are trying to inform people, not trying to sell products. Wikiscanner helps to increase the reliability of Wikipedia entries by allowing the IP address of anonymous editors of the site to be easily checked. This can quickly expose examples of self-interested editing by prominent businesses and governments around the world. Wikipedia is a wonderful starting place for research!

Dihydrogen Monoxide ThinkAloud

Dihydrogen monoxide ThinkAloud

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Dihydrogen Monoxide Website Evaluation

I decided to do Dihydrogen Monoxide Research Division. The address to this website is http://www.dhmo.org/. I accessed this page on 4/1/11, because I was linked from another website. The domain of DHMO is .org, which tells me that anyone could have made up this website. In this case, I feel that the domain lessens the credibility, because anyone can make up a .org website. This could mean it's not a reliable source. To even find the author or anything about the website, you have to look in the "Press Kit", this tells me that he is possibly trying to hide something. The author is Tom Way, who is a software consultant, writer, MAGICIAN, marathon runner, public speaker and computer science professor at Villanova University. He doesn't even have a background in science, which definitely lessens the website's reliability. He does have his contact information: director@dhmo.org, http://www.dhmo.org/, http://www.csc.villanova.edu/~tway. He also states in his contact information that he lives in Newark, Delaware. "I am findable if you look." If I was creating a hoax website, I would not tell people where I live. As stated on the website,"The original purpose of the site was as a sort of writer's therapy to blow off steam about all the devious (and sometimes just ignorant) ways the truth is bent to prove a point by some in the media, politics, sales, environmental activism, organized religion, web site authoring, etc." It says that this is not a hoax or a prank, but an educational tool. I think that if you are creating a website, it should educate people with the truth, not to make up a fake chemical and try to scare people. Some people will believe anything that they read online, therefore I think this website simply shouldn't exist because it's fake. Their target audience is a person with some academic maturity and some understanding of chemistry. If you're trying to inform someone, it should not be based off of assumed prior knowledge. I think this website is not reliable and is trying to deceive people with less knowledge. This is, however, a good website for students to evaluate for credibility.

Chart of Google Survey-What grade do you want to teach?

Google Survey

Blogging in the Classroom

When I am a teacher, I will try to use blogging in my classroom often. I think blogs are a very good tool to get your voice heard. Blogs can be made public and the entire world can hear your story. I think students love this idea, because they are not just writing a paper for the teacher, but they are creating a masterpiece for the world. By using blogging as a writing tool, instead of just the traditional pencil and paper, it gives students an opportunity to do express their ideas in a different fashion. Blogging also helps children to learn what to put on the internet and what not to. This is a very important lesson that some children do not know, and blogging could help to teach this. By using blogging in my classroom, the students have a chance to express their creativity. As a future teacher, I think it is a good idea to incorporate blogging into lessons to get children more involved and excited about learning.

Creativity in Education

According to Sir Ken Robinson schools kill creativity by telling students that mistakes are the worst thing that they can do. When children are young, they aren't scared of being wrong. Schools don't prepare kids to be wrong and if you're not prepared to be wrong, you'll never come up with anything to original. According to the reading, schools can promote creativity by encouraging the entire staff, especially teachers, to step outside their comfort zone and try something different. Teachers need to find another way of teaching the same thing. This can be done by playing a game, or making a craft with the material. By using some creativity, the students and teachers alike, will be happier and will look forward to learning. Creativity is not easy, but it will be more beneficial to everyone involved in the end. One thing that I wish my teachers knew about me as a learner, is that I am very hands-on. I would rather learn and explore the material through my hands, instead of through my ears. As a learner, I also like teachers who I feel are approachable. If I feel like I can come up to a teacher and talk about a problem, then I do exceedingly better in that class.

"Our Trip to the Zoo" Powerpoint Presentation

Our Trip to the Zoo

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Learning Style

By doing the learning style test, I have learned that I am both a kinesthetic and visual learner. Having two strong preferences is called multimodal. I have taken a few of these tests before and learned that I am slightly more of a kinesthetic learner than I am visual. I learn best by doing hands-on activities; these help me to understand and retain the information. A few study strategies for kinesthetic learners are: put plenty of examples into your summary, talk about your notes with another person, use pictures and photographs that illustrate an idea, and role play the exam situation in your own room. For visual learners, a few study strategies are: reconstruct the images in different way-try different spatial arrangements, redraw your pages from memory, and replace words with symbols or initials. I feel that this test is pretty accurate because I do learn both kinesthetically and visually.

Philosophy of Education Voki

Edmodo Reflection

The number one reason that the fifth grade students liked using Edmodo to publish their writing was that they could have other people, including their friends, read their work. They liked the collaborative writing activity the best. This is where they wrote a paragraph, and we added another, to guide them in a direction with their stories. I personally loved this project! It gave me a chance to work with fifth grade students on their writing skills, and to see how they react to me as a future teacher. I learned that there is a wide range of writing levels in one grade. Some students are already very creative in their writing and others need some guidance. This helps me to realize that when I get out into the classroom that I will have students of all abilities. I will have to learn to accommodate different learning styles and levels, while trying to help each student be the best that they can be. I might implement a collaborative science project in my classroom, where the students would come up with ideas and have another group critique it and give feedback on how to make it better. The students would then create the project incorporating the ideas from the other group. I would then have each child take a picture of their project and post it up on the microblogging site and have the other group comment on them. I would finally have a possible skype session with the students and other group, so the children would have a chance to see who commented on their project and what they think about it.

President Obama Pictures

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In the top picture, President Obama seems to look more concerned. I can tell this by the look in his eyes, lines on his forehead, and pursed lips. It looks like he has a lot on his mind. He is hunched over with his head tilted down, which to me, is a sign of doubt and worry. The picture is also close up, which shows the concern written all over his face. The photographer wanted us to focus on the president, and did this by making the background blurry and the president clear and in focus. In the bottom picture, President Obama looks to be more in control. He is walking with men who look like they are all experienced in this situation and know exactly what they are doing. This picture also makes me feel more confident in the president's abilities to respond to the diaster. He is standing up tall with is shoulders back, and his walk is that of a person who can fix the problem. He looks like he is very confident in his plan of action. The bottom picture was taken further away than the top picture was, which doesn't show the concern on his face like the other close-up picture did. In this photograph everything is in focus, which says that we as viewers, are supposed to focus on the entire picture, not just President Obama.

Media Literacy vs. Traditional Literacy

Traditional literacy skills and media literacy skills go hand in hand. They both require the students to read and comprehend the article, use prior knowledge, and make predictions. However, with media literacy skills, the students need to know how to check the validity of the online article to make sure it is a reliable source. They also have to interpret visual images, read URLs, use search engines to find information, etc. If students only have one set of skills they may struggle either in the classroom or online. I believe that having both sets of skills will benefit children the most because the internet is not going away any time soon, so we, as teachers and students should embrace it.

Education Quarterly

Teacher Quote Video

I chose this quote by Christopher Reeve because I believe that teachers really are heroes!

Digital Stories

I do not believe that digital stories promote the same kind of learning as writing an essay or research paper do. I think they promote more. Digital stories promote creativity and cause me, as a student, to think outside of the box with learning. While writing essays and research papers are fine, digital stories help those students who are very artistic, to express their creativity. This is important because every student learns a different way, and by using other methods to tell a story, it allows students to break free of the "paper writing mold". Digital stories are also an easy way to get a point across without having to read a very long and involved research paper. Digital stories are short and sweet, but very powerful. I think digital stories should be incorporated into every area of teaching.

No Books, No Problem: Teaching Without a Text

I read the comments to "No Books, No Problem: Teaching Without a Text." I think the main point that most of the people were making is that students have to have a balanced education. Meaning it shouldn't be based all on textbook, and not all on other resources, but a little of both. I completely agree with this because having only one resource to go by limits the teacher, as well as the student. If teachers would take some information out of the textbook, research other materials, and get some hands-on activities; teachers could tailor their curriculum for that set of students. Some students learn faster than others, may already have that knowledge, or may need a little more help in a subject. By tailoring the curriculum to the students and using a combination of the textbook and other resources, it allows for maximum learning.

Intro Post

Hi! My name is Kathryn Weaver. I am from Shinnston, WV and am currently attending Fairmont State University, majoring in Elementary Education. I hope to teach Kindergarten someday, because I absolutely LOVE children! No matter what kind of day you are having, children can always put a smile on your face! I believe that each child learns differently, and as a teacher, I hope to have the tools needed to help each and every child to succeed in life. As a teacher, I will incorporate music, art, and physical education into my lesson plans. I want to help every child to learn while still having fun! I believe that if the students have a good influence when they are young, they will have a good outlook on school and life as they grow older. I hope as a future teacher, to influence the children in a positive way so they will grow up to be successful adults.