Going With the Flow

Today I helped two children, Santiago and Kevin, research their class project on Moths! They were excited to be in the computer lab and allowed to use the computer on their own. I began helping them by introducing myself and learning their names, project, and where they stood in the completion of their assignment. I then directed them to google.com and helped them search for kid friendly search engines once we isolated that site, we began asking questions, such as, "What are the differences and similarities between Moths and Butterflies?" The kids were supposed to complete a blog about what they have learned about their animal, but unfortunately we ran out of time to do so. Tomorrow is a new day and I will be meeting with the boys again and we will try to complete our leftover agenda. 

Here is their blog!

Frustrations As A Teacher

Today I came to class, EXCITED because i was almost completed catching up on all my homework, everything was falling into place and going right! My friends, however, weren't so happy. They had been downstairs to the 2nd grade class in order to fulfill the service project for our class, and came back quite frustrated. They described the event as a complete chaos and a waste of time, full of technological difficulties and miscommunications. The girls said that neither they, the students or the student's teacher knew what was going on or what to do.
Meanwhile, I'm sitting here not having been a part of this experience thinking, WHAT A NIGHTMARE!!! Then my professor came in and the girls explain the disaster, and Dr. Elwood explains that we are teachers, we have to make sense of the complete chaos and "Make IT Work."
This was a lesson that I needed to learn. It made me realize that in the real world no one is going to hold my hand and show me how to get things done, I have to be able to "think quick on my feet" and do what needs to be done, not only as a teacher but, as a person and a student.

Great Expectations

I began this week by feeling like my entire world was crumbling to the ground. I was behind in my classes and "spinning uncontrollaby." After running around like a chicken with its head cut off I have FINALLY caught up in most of my classes and am ready to begin a new week, with the goals of accomplishing every assignment as it requires.
This next week the assignments I am looking forward to most are meeting the kiddos that I will be helping via my service project. I'm excited to see what animal they have been researching and to see just how far they have gotten on their own. I'm anxious to learn how far they have come in the way of technology and how much they can accomplish on their own.
Here are some of the UNIT questions that I might encourage my student to begin his/her project with.

Digital StoryTelling: Care to Share

Digital Storytelling

Digital Storytelling is a WONDERFUL tool to have in the classroom. As a teacher, I value this tool because I can create the slideshare, voice thread, or slidecast and use and re-use the same lesson plan again and again. From the students point of view, it would definitely change up the daily schedule to have technology weaved into the classroom every once in a while, and the lesson might even “stick” better with me because it is technology and I surround myself with technology on a hourly basis.

Care to Share

View more presentations from tlugirl1707.

Above is a slideshare video that I would use for a lesson plan in my unit plan for Communication:  Conflict Resolution:  Importance of Sharing. The slideshare program is a helpful tool in any classroom. It allows for a smooth transitioned PowerPoint/video with which you might choose to add a voice thread to or to edit to add more interest to.

The idea of the slideshare is to provoke inquiry-based learning, where the students view the presentation and then are enticed to ask and answer questions about what they just learned. The instructor could then advance the lesson by asking the students to role-play, in order to further encourage the lesson at hand.

For more of my idea, check out my Lesson Plan! :D

The Wedding Budget SpreadSheet!

This is a chart I created based on the estimated and actual costs of a sample wedding budget in excel. It was an interesting example, used to show the different ways to utilize excel spreadsheets and charts. To view more, look at my "Wedding Planner Spreadsheat."

Excel is a great program to teach students at an early age but, how young is TOO young? It has been my experience to expose students to grids in the 4th grade and then to introduce the Excel program soon after that. However, the concept of compare and contrast, and charts and graphs should be known by the students at a much earlier age.

Post Secondary Students: You will use EVERY part of Microsoft throughout your collegiate career. My math class has just completed a section covering Excel and all of the different ways to utilize spreadsheets and charts in the classroom. Using the project-based learning method, my professor had us inquire as to some statistics of our choice and then create several graphs/charts in order to illustrate our findings. The charts were very useful to my classmates and to my professor, they were able to view the charts and question them as my group was presenting our findings. 

As a future teacher, I might use the Excel program to have the students create spreadsheets, and charts/graphs in order place a visual on their progress in the classroom. By having them do this I am able to see the progress in my instruction and their progress in the assignments. A guiding question for them to use would be:

• What was the difference between your math homework grades in September compared to your math homework grades in October?

I might use the program to have the students create a circle graph, through interactive writing, comparing a ratio of students. A guiding question for this task would be:

• How many students are there in this class? How many boys? How many girls?

Another example of an assignment would be, comparing TAKS testing scores by grade level and by specific test. This will help them to not be as stressed about the state exam and to make it a more positive experience. A guiding question would be:

• What was your class score on the 3rd grade Reading TAKS test compared to your class score on the 4th grade Reading TAKS test?

An Interesting View

Today I read an interesting blog by David Warlick. The blog was entitled 2Cents Worth .  and then to Don't Like Learning Alone? After going through a few weeks of this course i have realized that we, the students, are doing the exact same thing as Mr. Warlick was... learning by ourselves. It seems as though our professor gives us a "To Do" list and expects us to learn it on our own, but by using the blogging system we are able to view other classmates work and to learn from their experiences in order to influence our work. 

I can definetly see this being used in a classroom, but it depends on the age level on who will use the system, parents or students. In a high school setting I feel that the blogging system would be most beneficial to me as the teacher, it would provide a link from student to teacher to parent. The student, by this time, should be well rounded in the ways of technology and will be able to comprehend exactly what it is that he/she will be doing and with a few short lessons on blogging and by giving a COMPLETE understanding of what we will be using the blog for, he/she will be confident in the task at hand. 

However, the student will not participate in the blogging during the elementary years of their schooling. I see the blogging system being most beneficial between parent and teacher. This would allow me to communicate swiftly between parent to parent, in order to share the lesson plans for the week and give updates on their students status.

As a teacher I realize that not all parents are literate in the way of technology, therefore there will have to be several night courses on the blogging system, where all parents meet together to learn about this intriguing system. I also realize that not all parents and students have access to the internet, much less a computer. This throws a damper on my plan, only to be corrected by the use of previous methods, such as the notes sent home or the phone call. 

Internet Resources

There are many different types of resources for the student, the teacher and the parent. With the internet, today, we; teachers, students, and parents; have many modes of learning, there is communication via e-mail, instant messaging, and skype, there are plenty of search engines to question and choose answers from, you can read books, articles, and acquire a plethora of knowledge from the WWW.

As a student becoming a teacher, I am watching myself learn and it's quite the experience! I'm learning about how students learn and am noticing myself doing exactly what my professors are saying. So, I do see how my future students will be able to find their own resources, as I have had to do the same for this very assignment. We all, teachers, students, and parents use search engines, and task bars, but what I have learned by experiencing this class is that students can learn by each other's examples, especially by using the blogging system. 

For the Primary and Secondary students and their TEACHERS: Knowing that the WWW is not always the most kid friendly place, I have used a few more "adult" search engines, such as GOOGLE and Ask.com, to access some kid friendly resources. These are:  

- Kid Friendly Resources - which lists several websites classified by content and grade level for the student to sort out which site he/she might want to look at first. 

- Ivy's Search Engines for Kids - lists several different search engines, along with a text bar for the student to list several key words to search for what they need.

- Blog Catalog  - Allows students to blog with their families in order to connect with others across the nation or even world. It gives the students and parents a chance to regulate and assimilate the protocol of internet citizenship.

These resources are just a few that the WWW offers. 

As for the Post Secondary Student (such as myself):  Some of the resources that I am urged to use are those such as, Google Docs, Edublogs, 21Classes, and TAMUCC uses WebCT as it's University blog, which customizes itself to each students personal course load. 

For more information check out my Work Cited list.

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