Week #10


And we are back again. 
I liked Avrahams' blog, especially because of his etymology of the vocabulary.  I couldn't stop reading.  I also like the mix of humor, education and technology.
http://avraham-uo-aei.blogspot.co.il/2011/10/flabbergasted-flab-er-gast-id-adj.html


I also found this sit very interesting. It offered almost any search option. Narrowing down terms, very precise and efficient.

http://www.noodletools.com/debbie/literacies/information/5locate/adviceengine.html

Week #7

Innovative Educator by Lisa Neilsen

 Is boredom the real epidemic in our school?

 
Lisa attended a conference of about 1000 people.  When asked what came to mind when thinking of high school, they answered in unison boredom.
She claims to have been bored herself thought her school years.  She showed little interest and was labeled retarded.  Luckily her parents knew different in the tests she proved to be the opposite.  It turned out she was bored.  The school system doesn't offer non passive students a stimulating enough environment.
Lisa gives the example of Aaron Iba who, as the school claimed, would have difficulty achieving academic progress.  The school reached this conclusion when he was nine.  Several years later he invented EtherPad which he later sold to google.  Maybe his school was wrong and he was just bored.  Luckily his parents continued on and supported him.
Lisa develops the notion of boredom in the schools and raises issue of ADD diagnosis and over medication or medication in general. She of course is against .
Her conclusion is that we need to rethink our children's learning environments.  We should make our school more exploratory, exciting and challenging.  Be more in tuned to our students needs and less busy labelling them.
I strongly agree.

Think like a teacher by Candace Hackett Shively

Candace talks about the media and humor furthering and stimulating students to learn.  She raises the idea of using humor to grab their attention.
Once educators and parents worried about the effects of TV and now they worry about the Internet.  The Internet has brought multitasking to a whole new level.  She thinks that teachers have became multitaskers themselves therefore resulting in poorly attentive adults.  Will these adults be able to teach students, maintain their attention and concentration, if they themselves are jumping from one thing to another?  


Purely Paperless 
Kate has gone on Sabbatical therefor I have decided to mention a blog cited on Janice Mizrahi's blog; Homeroom.
This blog cautions against the trappings of the Internet.  It deals with the exposure and permanency of the information posted.  I think it is important to remind students that the exposure of the Internet is vast and almost uncontrollable.  Although exciting it is also scary and dangerous.

 
 

Week # 6: Internet education tools

Week #6:

I have very little Internet/web abilities and therefore found almost all the sites fascinating.
I really liked the immediate feedback available when using the computer as an educational tool.  The computer promotes self learning which can be motivational as well as self exploratory for students at any level and age.

http://homeworktips.about.com/od/speechclass/a/debate.htm 
http://www.learner.org/interactives/spelling/index.html

http://www.spellingcity.com/

http://www.funbrain.com/spell/index.html

http://www.kidsspell.com/

http://www.eduplace.com/kids/hmsv/smg/

 http://thinktank.4teachers.org/
http://storybird.com/
online interactive printing 
 Ten Additional Ideas on How to Use Technology to Teach Writingpress.  

The first site regarding debates was a wonderful low tech idea. My educational agenda being; to further students abilities to form thoughts in English fulfills itself fully in this method.
I like the idea of team work within strict debate rules and then the chance to proceed with an open class discussion involving all students.
I feel this method will provide the students with; persuasion skills, debating skills, research skills, public speaking and most importantly confidence when expressing themselves in English.
The next tool I chose was Skyp. I think it is a great way to create inter-school debates as well as international relationships between students in different countries. Maybe even tolerance, but I may be taking this a little too far....
I thought the sites that taught spelling were a wonderful way to encourage self learning in the classroom as well as at home. They motivate the student to plow forward by competing against themselves without feeling the pressure of their peers. I will choose not to disclose what level I reached. Ha Ha Ha
I am not sure about the "thinktank" site. I feel it might be too high a level for students of ESL. I don't remember being at that level in grade 12?!
I thought the story maker was "WOW" but do not know how it promotes writing, the process or the ability of the student. 

Week #4 (second post)
I wanted to add that from all the tools provided in this unit I liked the painting tutorials on Youtube and the picture incerting instruction units the best.  First because they were informative and second because seeing the instructions on Youtube made the whole concept much easier to understand.
I think that when I start teaching the idea of visualizing my lession (as much as possible) with video tools would be a great idea.  The visualization of the instruction and picture explanations make understanding much simpler.

Keeping in touch with my education blogs: Week #4

Candace Hachette Shivley:
First, I must say that her name was spelt wrong in the charte as well as her blog sit;
blog.teachersfirst.com 
This week she wrote an obituary for a web tool and I have no idea to which tool she is alluding to?!
Candace says that Edsurge noted it in their blog but again I don't know what she is talking about.
Purelypaperless:
Did not update her blog....
Innovative educator:
Lisa is dealing with the connecting of home schoolers with texting.  Lisa has chosen two options; twitter and Remind 101.
She lists the pros and cons of each:
Twitter: helps teachers and parents get to know each other.  " Twitter fast follow" allows recieving twitter without setting up an acount.  The drawback is that this is a form of public engagment and not all parents or schools are open to this formate.
Remind 101: more personal.  It is a one-way  notification system verses the two-way twitter system.

I forgot to call this last entry "Week 3".  My short term memory does not seem to exist.

keeping intouch with my teaching technology sites Social Media

Innovative Educator (23.2.2014)
This entry raised the topic of social media.  Lisa believes that social media, specifically Facebook is not a threat.  Given  the right tools, Facebook can be used as a positive tool in teaching.

Purely Paperless:
Kate mentions new classroom tools she will expand on in the coming weeks; CatterPix, Animaoto, Google Research Tools, and Kidblog.

Think like a Teacher:
Candace uses the "Cat in the Hat" and Dr. Seuss's birthday as a metaphor to relay a situation a college encountered.  As wrote in Purely Paperless, Candice tells of a teacher who was given a grant to introduce Learning of Science via a free and safe social Internet network.  The school declined the offer.  Candace feels the school administration has chosen to remain behind closed doors...