Internet Safety Reflection

For the extra reading I looked on the church website and found an article by President Hinckley called "An Ensign to the Nations, A Light to the World." In it he emphasized that we are all responsible for our own actions and decisions. He said that we each have a sphere of responsibility and we are the only ones that have it. Our personal decisions fall into this category. We need to make good decisons to protect ourselves. Satan wants us to not do this and tempts us. The media is a major way that he tempts us.

I watched a lot of videos about personal experiences that people had. It was shocking to see how many young girls and boys struggle with on-line relationships. I was extremely shocked to see how easy it was for predators to get information from these children/teens. I had no idea how big cyberbullying was either. It was terrifying to see what people did to their peers online. It just shows the insecurity of youth and how Satan has found a new outlet for it.

The biggest thing I learned from this assignment was how much there is out there to educate children on being safe. There were some fun websites with activities that taught percautions that children should take when going on line. When I was growing up we had a tape called "The Safety Kids" that talked about being safe. It had a song to help us memorize our phone number, a song that taught what to do if someone was getting too close to you, a song to help you know what to do if you got lost and a song about the importance of the buddy system. I still remember the songs and sing them with my siblings. I see these websites as being able to have the same affect on the children today. THey have catchy songs about the new threats to youth. I think that it is very powerful.

I talked to a parent about how she educated her children about internet safety. She siad that she just talked to them about it and told them what was okay and what was not. She didn't use any resources when talking to them. Occasionally when there was something on the news about cyberbullying or predators she would talk about it with her children but that is about it. I was able to tell her about all the resources I found on line and on the church website. At first she was indifferent about it. This surprised me. I thought she would have been a bit more excited to know about all the videos she could show her children but she wasn't. I decided to keep showing her stuff anyways. I walked her through a few websites and watched a few videos with her. At the end when we were wrapping up our conversation I thought thta this was a waste of time becasue she didn't really care. But, to my surprise, she said things like "So I can type in these websites and these videos will show up again right?" and she would slowly stop talking to me and paying attention to what I was saying becasue she was glued to the computer. It was so cool to see that her interest had been sparked. I was grateful I decided to talk to her. Hopefully she will go back to the websites and explore some more!

Lets try this again :)

TPACK Report

The Best Cutest Powerpoint you have ever been blessed to see

http://docs.google.com/present/edit?id=0AeQ9Ph9MxdPJZGNuN2NkNzlfOWRqdHhoemZi&hl=en

Mathematics Technology Lesson- projector

http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AeQ9Ph9MxdPJZGNuN2NkNzlfNmM3d2pwdzU1&hl=en

Science Technology Lesson- digital microscopes

http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AeQ9Ph9MxdPJZGNuN2NkNzlfNWZicnRoa2c1&hl=en

Literacy Technology Lesson- powerpoint

http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AeQ9Ph9MxdPJZGNuN2NkNzlfNGZzM3I0MmN2&hl=en

Tres Videos

“I love technology!” I think that it was a great idea to have the students have email buddies in a different state. This teaches them so many aspects of technology in a fun, unobtrusive way. It will teach them how to use email, upload pictures to a blog, make blog entries, use digital cameras, and possibly voice threads. I think it is good because you are teaching practical technology use integrated with curriculum. This will make the concepts taught more applicable and memorable. I also liked how they were able to make comparisons between different parts of the United States of America. This is great because the students need to learn about different parts of the world but they are most likely unable to travel and visit these places. I also liked the idea of the class making a book using a computer. This is a fun way for the children to demonstrate when they know and an easy assessment for the teacher to grade.

Week One in Grade One

I really like the school that I am at. They have a great computer lab with a wonderful technology teacher. All students have the chance to go to the lab on a regular basis and the tech teacher has good lessons planned out for each session. I was impressed at how they have nice, new computers and how most classrooms have at least one computer that students can use. They have cool things like microphone necklaces (I am sure they have a more official name than that) and projectors that each teacher has access to. They don't really have a lot of technology other than that unless the teacher buys it herself so that was kind of disappointing. But for an elementary school I think that it is very tech savvy!

I did number one and two for the homework (tech inventory and midcourse evalutation)

Science + Technology =

AMAZING!!!!

I think that using these technologial probes and programs for science is such a wonderful idea! I learned so much about what probes are out there and how they can be easily used in the classroom. It is such an easy way to integrate teaching technology and science becasue they naturally flow together. I learned that not all technology related to science is difficult to use and manage. This was probably the easiest assignment for me to complete and I think I will definitely be able to use the ideas I learned in my future classroom.

I watched these videos: Darren P. , Janae B. and Leah B.

pH Mania

Science Can Be Fun!!!

I am working on the Science Challenge with Katherine Kerr and Breanna Stutz.
Students will test six liquids to determine whether they are acidic or basic using the pH probe.
First, students will predict whether the liquid is an acid or base. Then they will stick the probe in the different liquids and record its pH level on a graph. The students will then compare their observations to their predictions. They will then write the liquids in order of pH content, from 0-14.

The liquids we will use are:
Sprite
tap water
lemon-juice
milk
vinegar
dish soap

Content:
ILO's for 4th grade
1. Use Science Process and Thinking Skills
c. Make simple predictions and inferences based upon observations.
d. Compare things and events.
e. Use instruments to measure length, temperature, volume, and weight using appropriate
units.
f. Conduct a simple investigation when given directions.

Pedagogy:
Observing, predicting, measuring, classifying, acquiring and processing data.

Technology:
pH probe

My Travels Around the World

I watched Darren's tour of religious buildings, Janae's adventure through different biomes and Kelli's exploration of volcanoes. It was a lot of fun!

I think that there are many advantages of using google earth tours. It is a fun and different way to teach about geography and social studies. Actually, now that I think about it, you can use this tool to probably teach any subject. There are so many different activities you can use on here that you could probably hit any content area with a bit of creativity. An advantage is that it adds novelty to your classroom. It can be done in a variety of ways: whole class, small group, pairs, or individual. It can be any amount of time...5, 10, 20 minutes etc...so it can be whenever.

A disadvantage would be you need to take time to teach children about the program. This could be time consuming. Also, there could be a lot of problems having the students use it (lots of ways to mess up or not get it right).

Link to My Virtual Tour

http://educationrocks56.pbworks.com/Content-Page#


Enjoy!!!

Okay, so I changed my virtual tour idea from what I posted in here the first time. The standard that I am doing is for second grade.

Standard 2
Students will develop a sense of self in relation to families and community.
Objective 2
Examine important aspects of the community and culture that strengthen relationships.
b. Compare rural, suburban, and urban communities.

I planned this to be a class actvity where the teacher goes through it with the class and leads a discussion. I think this will be best since the kids are kinda younger. They could probably do in by themselves or in groups but Ithink it would be most benefical to them if we did it as a class. I think it would be great for the children to see these communities since some of them may have grown up in the same community their whole lives. Google Earth has some amazing 360* shots of all kinds of communities. It will be good for them to see real examples when comparing instead of me just describing them.

My Virtual Tour

My tour is about different communities. It gives students a first hand view of what each community is like so they will better be able to notice main characteristics of each one and why they are different.

All the info you want to know and more about my virtual tour

For my virtual tour I will be focusing on fifth grade social studies. I am going to be addressing Standard 1, objective 1, letter E. This talks about comparng the geographic terrain of the New England , Middle and Southern colonies. I think that it will be great to do a virtual tour for this since I cannot take my class to these places. I think that a virtual tour will be more beneficial to the students than me simply showing them pictures or a video. It will help them to place where these colonies are at and also help them to experience their differences virtually. I think it will be a success! Google Earth will be a fun way for them to interact with these places virutally and will make their learning more fun for them! Yea for Google Earth!

Virtual Tour of a Lifetime!

Location	Activity Description	Google Earth Content
1. Vermont	look at pictures and read paragraph. writed down what you think life would be like if you lived here. what would make living here hard and easy back in this time period? What does the terrain look like?	Terrain; picture of a factory
2. Pennsylvania	look at pictures and write down what kinds of jobs you think people would have living here. What would make living here hard and easy back in this time period? What does the terrain look like?	terrain; picture of a home back in the Civil War era
3. South Carolina	look at picture and read paragraph. What would it be like to live on a plantation? What is the terrain like? What woudl make it hard and easy to live here in this time period?	terrain; picture of a plantation house and description of a plantation
4. Washington DC	look at pictures and record where Washington DC is located and why this is a good location for the capital of the nation. How is the terrain similar and different to Vermont? Pennsylvania? South Carolina?	terrain; map of thirteen colonies

Rah Rah Rah!

I enjoyed watching the different videos that were made by my classmates! They were all so good! The ones that I commented on were: Rebecca F., Mariah, Leah, Carol, Brett, and Kaitlin. I think that although it would be fun to implement this activity into a classroom it would have its complications. I think that it would be hard to get all the students through the project. It is kinda complicated although the program is very straight forward. There are just a lot of little details that go into making a book. It would just be hard for one teacher to be there to supervise the students and answer all their questions. You would definitly need a lot of volunteer support. Plus, you can't really just tell the studetns to go home and finish what they didnt do in class. You would have to complete the whole project in class. I think that it is a task worth trying though. Especially in the older grades. They could probably handle it better and it would run smoother. It would be a great assessment tool for like a social studies unit. It would be a fun way for students to demonstrate what they know. I had fun doing it!

Body Language

Storyboard...Body Language

They loaded in reverse order. It is going to be cute!

TPACK

I think that it is very important for teachers to have a basic understanding (at minimum) of TPACK. They need to know the CK of the grade they are teaching or they will not be a teacher for very long. This CK is vital for them to have an understanding of so they can help their students understand it as well. Teachers also need to be firmly grounded in PK becasue this is what qualifies them to be a teacher. They need to kow how to relay the information that they know to their students in way that will help them to internalize and apply it. Finally, teachers need to have a basic understanding of TK because of the day and age that we live in. The job of a teacher, beyond teaching the core curriculum, is to prepare her students to succeed in the world. Our world is very technological. Children need to understand how to use this technology to their advantage...beyond how to watch a movie and microwave popcorn. If they do not, they will be passed up in the employment opportunities they have and they will not be able to compete or succeed. Giving students the skills and knowledge they need to make it in this world is what I believe is the role of a teacher. We cannot do this without TPACK. This is the integration of all the things children need to learn and truly understand these skills and knowledge. TPACK is how we will prepare our students for their futures.

Most Important Thing I Learned...

Okay, so this week's assignment was ridiculously hard! It took me forever to figure out how to do all of this stuff. I never realized how un-literate I am when it comes to technology. I think that the most important thing that I learned was how to do the video communications and also how to post more things on this blog. The whole website thing still really confuses me but if I ever have to do one for a school that I am teaching at I feel much more prepared to do it. I think even then I will have to make a friend with someone who really know what he is doing and have him help me. But that is okay because we can all use more friends and opportunities to bake them cupcakes when they help you out (thanks Tyson!).

synchronous video communication

asynchronous video message

Oh Technology...

My parents are very different when it comes to technology. My dad is way tech savvy and my mom is not. It isn't that she doesn't like technology but it just takes her a little longer to understand how it works. So growing up I had a mix of "old school" and "new school". I liked this because I learned about computers and how to use them but at the same time I learned valuable skills that technology has replaced. I think that it is important to learn how to do things without computers and all this modern technology so that if something were to ever happen we can take care of ourselves. Don't get me wrong, I sure do love my computer and digital camera and cell phone. I totally think that we should take advantage of what technology we have been blessed with and use it to enrich our lives and have a lot of fun!