Blog Post #4

I love that we use Twitter in class. It is a great way to get to know other classmates more, and to see how funny everyone is. I have been interacting with Ashely a lot by re-twitting her. I find this beneficial because Twitter allows me to communicate with classmates in a different way. Twitter might be helpful in my future career by following the education accounts. The educational twitter accounts post great information and resources.

The digital divide is the divide between people who have internet access and the people who do not. Students who have computers and internet access at home are at a greater educational advantage then students who do not. The same thing works for schools without computers. The digital divide affects school by the schools with access having higher achieving students. Some causes of the digital divide are that some students can feel ‘less than” for not having a computer at home, and it can also hinder their learning. Being a teacher I must be aware of the digital divide. Depending on which school I work at if there are computers I will have my students working on them in class so that everyone gains experience and knowledge.

The student software I plan to use the most in my future second grade class would be educational games. For young kid’s games are a great way to practice lessons in a fun way. I remember playing educational games in elementary school. The student software I will use the least will be simulations. Simulations provide students with scenarios and circumstances through interaction. I feel that this would not be beneficial in my classroom because I can easily present a situation to my students without the software.

Blog Post #3

The ELA technology standard that I feel most prepared to teach with my existing knowledge would be standard RL.7 “Multimedia:” Literature. In this standard, you must teach students the differences between different medias and how they can change the meaning of different information. For example, different elements can be shown in a movie that were not read about in a book. For example, the movie The Hunger Games has different events happen that were not in the book and vice versa. I know how to compare these elements in all medias and I feel that I could successfully teach them to my class with the knowledge I have now. Standard SL. 5 “Use Digital Media” would be a standard that would require more learning on my part. I do not know how to make audio recordings and display visual presentations with it.  

The applications/software I would like to use with my second-grade students would be search engines. I would use these to teach students how to search for information. For example, the Federal Resources for Educational Excellence is a great search engine that has great resources that are reliable. The digital citizenship concepts I would teach to my students would be all of them but I would not over load them because they are still young. I would teach my students how to properly use the internet and all other computer based resources we would use by showing them how to do it. I would also teach them that what is put on the internet stays there forever, so you should never say rude or mean things on the internet. Also, that is not a good to put personal information on the internet because you do not want strangers to know personal things about yourself. I think the best way for students to learn these concepts would be to practice on a worksheet or to verbally go over good and bad things to do on the internet and have them say what the situation is. If it is bad I would have them explain why it is not okay to do that on the internet.

The new skills I acquired while working on the Newsletter Design assignment was how to make a newsletter have two columns. I also learned how to insert a border to further add to the visual element of a newsletter. In the future, I could use this assignment to send out monthly newsletters to parents to inform them on what is going on in the classroom, and it is a great way to send out permission slips. I enjoyed this assignment because it allowed me to be creative and make something that I could possibly use in the future. There is nothing I did not like or that I would change. The example newsletter that was provided was extremely helpful.

Blog Post #2

As a student, I have used MS Word in almost every class I have ever taken. I most commonly use MS Word to write papers, whether it be a research paper, short essay, or discussion board, I always use Word. I also use Word if I need to print out a picture. I paste the picture on a blank MS Word file, and then print. I enjoy using MS Word because it is simple and easy to use. I have seen my teachers use MS Word mostly to post instructions on how to do something. I have also seen teachers use MS Word to write recommendation letters for students.

My experience with copyright and fair use of materials is very small. When I was in high school I never had a teacher, who went over the fair use of materials. After reading the CSMI’s best practices I did not know this issue existed, but it makes sense to me now why it would. I found the podcast helpful as well to further my knowledge about this topic. When I am a teacher I will be sure to teach my students about copyright and fair use in an age appropriate manner. I will also teach them how they can copyright their own work. I think a good activity would be to have each student create something on their own, or in a group. After they have created something I could walk them through the steps of getting it copyrighted. Once they have created and gotten it copyrighted they could then maybe better understand how other people feel when people use their work without giving them create.

Reflecting on the implementation issues from Chapter 11 I feel that the more people use technology the wider spread these technology issues will become. The three main technology implementation issues are legal issues, social issues, and ethical issues. Under the legal issues category acceptable use and copyright falls under it. A solution to prevent this from happening in my classroom would be to teach students that the information they find on the web is copyrighted. I would also explain how using other online sources without sighting it is plagiarism. Another issue is cyberbullying, there would be a zero tolerance for cyberbullying in my class. If a student was caught cyberbullying another student I would immeditaly send him or her to the principal. I would tell my students how hurtful cyberbullying is and what can happen to students who are bullied. A third issue could be students using freedom of speech in the wrong way. For example, students may think that they can say whatever they want online and nothing bad will happen to them. Students must be made aware that what they post on the internet cannot be deleted.