Goodbye Everyone!

I just wanted to say how much I have enjoyed this semester. I have meet some wonderful people and made some great friends. I enjoyed doing this blog even though it was a pain sometimes, I am so glad that I did it though because I learned a lot. I think that I will continue blogging after this class because I want to continue to learn and grow with technology. This class also showed me how important it is to use technology in the classroom and incorporate into the curriculum. Students today are all about technology, almost everyone has cell phones, iPods, and laptops, so I think that using it in the classroom can only enhance and help the curriculum and it will also keep the students involved. Who knows maybe we will meet again doing comments for kids in our own classrooms! I hope everyone is very successful in their careers and I wish everyone the best of luck!

New Classroom Rules

I think this is so great, technology is changing all the rules! I know that when I become a teacher this is how it is going to be, so I think I should embrace this with open arms and look at the positives this could bring into the classroom.

14. If you need help raise your hand, but do not wait for the teacher, get help from your neighbors and post your questions to your online Personal Learning Network.

I think this is a good idea, you can get a ton of help from the internet, it would be a good idea to ask your teacher to make sure the help you do get is legitimate.

8. Do not cheat, but remix, re-purpose, and sample other peoples work and ideas and give them credit.

I do this all the time, I think that getting ideas from other peoples work is a wonderful idea as long as you give credit where it is due. This is how ideas grow and become better, people get different opinions on their work and ideas. Everyone is going to see things a little bit differently so I think that this is a wonderful thing to teach students.

Click here to visit a web site where a copy of this article is available.

Personal Learning Network

My personal learning network or PLN consists of a few people, because I am just starting out, but it also consists of a bunch of great websites. As a physical education major I also will be certfied in health and I want to include nutrition into the daily activities for my students. I think it is important to teach you students a healthy way of living and I think that health and nutrition goes right along side of physical fitness and physical education. First on my list is my high school PE teacher Barbara Henry. My mom actually taught at the high school I went to and is good friends with my PE teacher and volleyball coach. Next is another teacher from high school, Julie Barbosa, she actually is a wonderful English teacher but she now coaches volleyball at Baker High School. She was my favorite teacher in high school so I can go to her with any questions that I have. I can also go to my mom, Nancy Mills, who is a teacher at Baker High as well, she is a great help in the computer department and has a lot of great ideas. A great book I use is called Dynamic Physical Education for Elementary School Children by Robert Pangrazi and Aaron Beighle. It has a lot of great ideas for activities to do with children. I use pecentral.org that has a lot of lesson plans, www.pe4life.org has some great ideas as well. As far as health goes I use www.awesomelibrary.com, and www.teachhealth.com because it has health lesson plans. Also I use www.nche.org which is the National Center for Health Education. I want to include as much nutrition as possible into my lesson plans so for nutirtion websites I use mypyramid.gov, and nutrition.about.com, and www.nutrition.org. I think my personal learning network will get me through my first years of teaching and I think that as I grow my personal learning network will grow as well.

Summary of EDM 310

I truly had a great semester, it was my first semester back after having a baby and I thought it was going to be hell but I actually had fun. I took on way too much in the beginning and burnt myself out but I recovered and I learned a lot. First I think that I will use blogs the most, I think that using a blog in the classroom is a great idea, it will get the parents involved and give the students iniative to be creative. I think that I will let the students work in groups on different posts and and we will post something every couple of days. I also enjoyed learning all of this stuff about Google! I had no idea that Google was capable of so much. I enjoyed the presentations, and learning about Google docs. I thought that the comments for kids was really neat as well, I hope that when I become a teacher I can be a part of something like that. My project 11 was on iTunesU and it is a great tool to have as a teacher. You can post lectures and different podcasts for your students. After learning about ALEX I used it quite a bit for other classes. So I think that everything that we did in class I have used or will use in the future.

I do not think there is anything that I know of that I would wanted to learn about in this class. I learned about Twitter and that is what I really interested in that I did not understand.

I think that I will use everything that I learned in this class because I want to be a tech savy teacher.

No this class did not excite me, I came because I had to but I will use what I learned.

I think that a few blog posts and and just the general knowledge you had to have for this class was intellectually challenging. I think that it was intellectually challenging because everything we did in the class was new to me.

I was never bored in this class because everything was new for me, I did not know anything when I started so a lot of it was very challenging.

I think that I would have enjoyed the class more if I was able to prepare for what we were learning in the class today. I never knew what was coming next so I could never prepare for anything and I always felt like I was catching up.

I feel like I am technologically literate right now, I will not stop learning because I think it is very important to incorporate technology in the classroom. I think that right now I am medium with technology.

This is my problem I do not know how maintain this because it is constantly changing, my mom is very tech savy (she is a computer teacher at a high school in Mobile) so I can always learn from her but as far as the new hip stuff I guess I will just have to research it.

Seven Brillant Things Teachers Do With Technology

2. Creatively find and use resources. I can't believe the technology found in some of our teachers' classrooms. And it was neither provided by our department nor stolen (I don't think). Through personal purchase, through parent-teacher groups, through grants, through business partnerships, through parental contacts, through fund raising, and through classroom supply budgets, brilliant teachers amazingly amass digital cameras and clickers and sensors and classroom computer labs. One of our brilliant teachers MacGyver-ed his own document camera out of an old camcorder, plastic pipe, and duct tape. He calls it his Grover (not his Elmo).

I think that it is amazing the technology that people can find and use so creatively. Through grants and other resources teachers have to dig to find the right technology for their classroom. Right now times are bad and there is no money to be found so now teachers have to be very creative in finding new and innovative things for the classroom.

1. Empower kids with technology. Technology is an amplifier of natural abilities. Brilliant teachers see that good writers become better writers, good debaters become better debaters, good French speakers become better French speakers, good mathematical problem-solvers become better mathematical problem-solvers, and so on. by helping their students harness technology. They do not see technology as a crutch, but as a propellant. Brilliant teachers have experienced the empowering power of technology themselves. Brilliant teachers use good assessment strategies to rigorously determine the quality of technology-enhanced projects.

Technology can only help students, it can help them do whatever they are interested in better. It teaches them how to reach outside of their own world. It gives them all the information they need and more, it answers their questions and helps them to decide on things. I think that teaching them how to use technology in a positive way is a wonderful tool. This generation is learning more and more everyday about technology and we have to keep up!

To read this article, click here.

Seven Stupid Things Teachers Do With Technology

4. Thinking online communication is ever private. Eventually, everyone sends an embarrassing personal message to a listserv. I've heard of some tech directors who get their jollies reading salacious inter-staff e-mails. Your school e-mails can be requested and must be produced if germane to any federal lawsuits. Even e-mail deleted from your computer still sits on servers somewhere -- often for a very loooong time. Think you wiped out your browsing history? Don't bet that is the only set of tracks you've left that show where you've been surfing. Your Facebook page will be looked at by the school board chair; your superintendent and principal know who the author of that "anonymous" blog is. Not assuming everyone can see what you send and do online is stupid.

I think that this is so funny because it is so true! You should never write anything to anyone at anytime that you would not let your mother read on a computer or a phone because it could be traced back to you, any text message, any email, it could all come back to bite you right in the butt! Some of the funniest news stories I have seen lately is college professors having affairs on campus and accidently sending their provacative emails to the whole school! I mean how could you be that stupid!

5. Believing that one's teaching style need not change to take full advantage of technology. Using technology to simply add sounds and pictures to lectures is stupid. Smart technology use is about changing the roles of both teacher and student. The computer-using student can now be the content expert; the teacher becomes the process expert asking such questions as “Where did you get that information? How do you know it's accurate? Why is it important? How can you let others know what you discovered? And how can you tell if you did a good job?” The world has changed and it is rank stupidity not to recognize it and change as well.

I agree with this one totally, I want to be a very tech savy teacher but the problem is that I do not know much about technology. I want to learn so much more, this is the first class that I have taken about technology in the classroom and I think that if I had not taken such a hard class load I would have enjoyed it much more. I just feel like I did not have the time to put in that it takes to master these skills, but I am very interested in using technology in the classroom and I think that all teacher should use some sort of technology in their classroom because it is what kids understand and it is how they learn and what they are interested in.

Click here to read this article for yourself.

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Haley E. Mills
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iTunes University Group Presentation

I had a wonderful time learning about iTunes with my friends for project 11. The University of South Alabama now has iTunesU, it will be up and running beginnnig of next semester. I think that iTunesU or iTunes University is a great tool to have when teaching courses. You can communicate with your students on the go. You can post podcasts of your lectures or you can listen to podcasts from other schools to get ideas for your classroom. A lot of Ivy league colleges use iTunesU so students have access to some of the best professors in world. You can listen to thier lectures and podcasts on the go, maybe while taking a walk or while running your errands. We started our project with a Google presentation that you can view on my blog which has links to different schools iTunesU pages. Next we went to iTunesU and downloaded some popular lectures and podcasts to listen to. I use iTunes on a daily basis, and I am using iTunesU more and more when I am doing research. I think that it is a wonderful tool and I will use it in the classroom because I think it will get students excited about learning!
Here is the presentation:

Comparison of Smart Cell Phones

Click here to listen to our podcast on comparing smart cell phones available in today's cellular market.

At the Teacher's Desk

I actually really enjoyed this blog! It seems like a great place to get information on exactly what I am looking for. Taking EDM 310 has opened my eyes to the kind of teacher I want to be. I want to incorporate technology into my classroom but I am struggling because I do not know how to keep learning after this class is over. Well this website is one of my answers because it has a lot of posts that are about technology in the classroom. I really liked the post about Twittering. A teacher had been out because she was sick; she returned the next day still sick because she thought her students would be testing in another room. Turns out most of them had completed the test the day before. Mr. Chamberlain came to the rescue and tweeted to everyone that he needed some websites for students to do probability games because a sick teacher needed some help and within twenty minutes he had some really great games to keep the students occupied. I think that this could really come in handy especially since my major is physical education, I could use this if I ever needed a quick idea about a class or in case it was raining one day or something, now I am intrigued to learn how to use twitter. There are some great posts on this blog about technology in the classroom and hopefully it will be kept up to date so I can use it in the classroom. For others that would like to view this website, click here to be taken to the blog "At the Teachers Desk"

The Machine is (Changing) Us: YouTube and the Politics of Authenticity

I think that this speech on YouTube by Michael Wesch was actually very entertaining and fresh. I had never really heard my generation be called the MTV generation. The MTV generation is known to have short attention spans, be materialistic, narcissistic, and not easily impressed and he used this quote to describe us: "In the midst of a fabulous array of historically unprecedented and utterly mind-boggling stimuli....Whatever." I think that he makes a great point when he compares his students in his class to the audience of American Idol. Why is society including myself so wrapped up in this show, but in class we are so disengaged. I have no idea what the answer is! His class did a research project on YouTube and found that there are 500,000 videos uploaded everyday and about 99% have no use. Most of the videos loaded onto YouTube are home movies but if that movie becomes an internet phenomenon there is no telling how many people will view it, remake it or even make it into a rap song. Look up Charlie bit me on YouTube. It is a very cute video of two brothers but what people have done with it is the funny part. "Some of the comments on YouTube make you weep for the future of humanity just for the spelling alone, never mind the obscenity and the naked hatred." -Lev Grossman. I thought this quote was really great and it is so true! Click here for further information.

Dear Kaia

This blog was so wonderful! I recommend anyone who has not seen it to take a look ASAP! First off let me say how beautiful the photos were. The photo of Kaia picking up dirt in the dessert was my favorite. I have a daughter that is two so I understand why he wants to record so much of his daughter's life, you do not want to miss a thing. I think that keeping a blog of her life experiences is such a good idea. One day she can look back at the blog and cherish all of her memories with her father and relive her childhood. It is almost like a very modern scrapbook. I think it is such a great idea. To visit this blog yourself, click here.

ACCESS

ACCESS is the Alabama Connecting Classrooms, Educators, and Students Statewide. ACCESS is an online center for students and teachers to be able to take and teach online classes. This site is available to all Alabama public high schools to provide "equal access to high quality instruction to improve student achievement through distance learning opportunities". ACCESS is available for grades 9-12 and helps fill the demand for needed AP courses for students that do not have access to a lot off AP courses. It also allows students to dual enroll which means that students can still be in high school but also take a college course to get ahead. Also certain AP courses can count for college credit. This site provides opportunities for high school students that do not have access to the resources or learning environment that AP courses require. I think that this site will help students get ahead and achieve their goals at a young age. Overall I think that this site will be very useful to students and teachers, who knows maybe online high schools are in our future. Click here to visit the Access Distance Learning Information Page.

ALEX

ALEX is the Alabama Learning Exchange, a system that incorporates all of the Alabama state standards and objectives into one website for educators. It is categorized by grade level, subject matter, author, title, school, and other areas such as character education. It offers all kinds of lesson plans from teachers all over the US according to these objectives you have to go by. You can pick any course of study taught in public schools and it will give you the standards that you need for each grade level. ALEX also offers Alabama department of Education websites for teaching and learning tools you might need throughout your career. Another neat thing that ALEX offers is a place to store things you access frequently or would like to save for future use. You also have access to games for your students, podcasts on topics you are interested in and the Alabama Virtual Learning Library. I think that as a teacher I will refer to this website a lot for help! For your own visit to ALEX click here

Anthony's Blog

I love how Anthony comments that this blog is not yet completed and it is so great! I love that he is so passionate about his work and post production, it is very compelling. I do think that all of the clips he has posted on his blog are definitely worth watching. I really love what he says about everyone has something to contribute. "The more people are exposed to, the more their wheels turn. The more ideas that are calculated, the faster our communities can change and our thoughts can flourish." I think that this quote is very true, and I think this is what these videos that he has posting are trying to somewhat convey. I also love That he says "I believe it is an educator's responsibility to help their students discover what they love". I truly believe in this, that it is our responsibility to expose our students to all of the wonders we have access to so that our students can find what they are truly passionate about. I sometimes feel like I am still looking for what I am truly passionate about, I know that I want to be a teacher, but I am truly meant to be a teacher? To view his blog, click here.

Posting work on Blogs

I think that posting your work and posting what you are interested in onto your blogs is very important because it allows an outlet for a development of ideas. When you start to blog, ideas begin to grow, your mind starts to work and change and ideas begin to blossom. Posting your work to your blogs also allows the sharing of your thoughts and ideas for other people who enjoy the same things you do, you can talk and share with people from all over the world for free, it is a very unique and amazing way to talk about your ideas and simply just to get ideas. Also I think it is important to share pieces on your blog that truly move you, stuff that really make you think, posts that change the way you live your life. If a post had an impact on you maybe it will have that impact on someone else, changing their lives for the better. Also I think it is important to post information onto your blog to get it out into circulation, by posting on your blog and using the internet you can reach so many people in a matter of minutes and get what is important to you out there for the world to see.

View this blog for further information

Disaster at the Mills' House

About two weeks ago my daughter Cami was dancing around the house to Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and fell, she broke her distal tibia . It has been quite a huge ordeal because she cannot walk or put any pressure on her foot at all so she has not been able to go to daycare. I have had to take a small break from school, work, and homework to take care of her so I have fallen behind on my blogs. I just wanted to say thank you for understanding and I will catch up ASAP!

Comments 4 Kids

This week on comments for kids I commented on a 6th grade class blog. The blog that I had to read about was about a holiday that you would like to add. The holiday that the student wanted to add was International Drawing Day, where you would sit outside or go to your local museum and just draw all day. I thought that I would enjoy reading the older kids blogs but to see a 5 year old adding to a blog I think is a really great thing. I think that the younger they get into technology the more they will want to learn as they get older and the more they will want to be involved in their class because they will want to post things they are proud of on their blogs. I also like the older student's blogs because they are a little easier to read and are easy to comment on.

The New Media Literacies by the NML Staff

I just watched this video on Youtube and I think they are absolutely right, to survive and flourish in today's tech savvy society there are a whole new set of skills that must be learned to participate in what is going on around the world. If you watch this youtube, think about these questions that I have posted, I have answered them as well.....
1. What do you think of them?
I think they are very smart and right on, I wonder if they have other videos that teach you these skills???
2. Are they really the 21st century skills that will be needed to be effective artists, citizens, and workers?
I think so, it is true that a new set of skills are needed to be involved in all of the innovative things that are going on around you. I think that workers will especially need these skills in order to keep up in today's society.
3. How many of these skills do you possess? Which ones?
Not many, I am learning more everyday though. I think that I have pretty good judgment.
4. How will you acquire the others?
I do not know. I am going to have to do some research on that but I do not ever want to stop learning. I want to understand all of this new and interesting technology and if I cannot teach myself I will find someone who can teach me.
Questions courtesy of Dr. Strange.
To view this video, click here to go to YouTube.

This Is How We Dream Part 1 & 2

I thought both of these videos had some great points. This is how We Dream Part 1 & 2 was done by Richard Miller. He is a professor in the English Department at Rutgers. Both of these videos are about the internet and how you can basically do anything you want as far as books and research on the internet. Richard Miller says in these videos that he dreamed of books, where he works he is surrounded by books and he finally wrote a book. The book is now on sale at amazon.com for 59 cents, but it lives forever on the web for free. Everyone works now on a laptop because that is all that you need because all the riches in the world as far as research are stored on the web. People are no longer looking to newspapers and print for their information they want visual information such as during the election, you could see on the web the states changing colors to figure out how everyone was voting and who was going to win the election.
For example Richard Miller did a piece on violence and teaching after Virginia Tech. He did all of his research over the web using images, film, and archives. People do not want just print anymore, so he came up with a document that had print, images, and sound, it was a very visual yet very informing piece. I thought it was great. He got all of his material from the web and a few things that were being passed out around the college.
It is amazing how popular academic lectures are on iTunesU where ideas are being shared freely. Teachers are now able to "push ideas into our culture" for free. Richard Miller said in the video that a friend of his is working on an emotional profile of the world; you will actually be able to tell which city is the "happiest" city in the world! This is a little hard to believe for me! Richard Miller is inspiring teachers everyday I know he inspired me.
Click here to view the two videos on "This is How We Dream Part One & Two"

The Networked Student

I just finished watching a video on YouTube, actually it is a YouTube video that I watched on one of Dr. Strange's blog, called The Networked Student by Wendy Drexler. It is basically about a student that sets up a great personal learning network and learns all kinds of new information and meets some experts in field. In the video they ask the question "Why does he even need a teacher?” They are asking this question because most of the student’s class is online and he is getting all of his information from the internet and his personal learning network. Who do you think gave him the assignment to set up the learning network in the first place? Just Kidding! The video ends by saying all of these wonderful things about his teacher and why he needs one.
I think this is great for students to have their own learning network. This is my first semester back at school after a couple of years and my first semester ever to make friends in my classes and have my own little personal network for each class. I think it would be great for my students to have a personal network but I know I am not ready to teach someone how to do this, I am still learning about the internet and all it is capable of. I want to be able to teach this to my students but I feel like I have a lot of learning to do as far as being able to incorporate this into my class.
EDM 310 has taught me that I want to incorporate all the technology I can into a classroom and I do not want to stop learning once this class is over. I think that if I continue to learn and build my personal learning network once this class is over and keep building and learning even after I graduate I will absolutely try to teach my students how to network and use technology to their benefit.
Click here for link to Networked Student video.

Using iPods in Instruction

I did quite a bit of research on this topic and found out that a lot of schools are trying to incorporate this technology in the classroom. One school started by allowing iPods to be used in music classrooms and another school is even providing the iPods for foreign language classes. For the foreign language classes the students download their lessons to their iPods, the school has included downloadable files on their websites for the students. This allows students to study and learn away from class, like when they are driving home or on a long trip.
The first school to use this technology was Duke University. Duke approved a grant that gave each and every incoming freshman a 20 gig iPod. Professors had a plan to upload class notes and make them available for students to download on their iPod. This would make it easier for them to study on the go. Class lectures and presentations were also made available for the students. Many students used them correctly but other students decided to use it for other reasons and it became more of a distraction then a learning tool. Because of these few students who used their iPods the wrong way only freshman that are enrolled in music or foreign language will be able to receive an iPod their freshman year. Those few students ruined it for everyone else!

Comments 4 Kids

The blog that I had to read this week was very interesting. It was a little bit more grown up than the last couple of blogs I have read. It had some great photos from Katrina that struck close to home. The blog is all about Fredericksburg,and why people would want to move there, such as:"Some people moved to the Fredericksburg region for jobs, schools, housing, economy, safety, climate, natural disasters, farmland, religion or to leave huge cities." It is a very well put together blog with a lot of great features. I enjoyed reading it and looking at the pictures.

iTunes University

Students today are constantly connected, between laptops, cell phones, and iPods they have constant access to everything they are interested in. Which is why iTunes has developed a way for teachers and faculty to distribute digital lectures and lessons to their students through their iPhones or iPods, so students no longer have to come to class so frequently. You can access iTunes by using your cell phone or Wi-Fi networks to watch or listen to your teacher's lectures. Teachers are discovering "Mobile Learning Networks" where they can teach a class over the phone or on their student's iPods. Teachers can customize their curriculum and deliver it straight to their student’s iPhones or iPods.
The next question is of course.... Can Professors require students to have an iPod or an iPhone? They are kind of expensive, but I am all for it. I would love to be able to listen to lectures on my own time, there are only so many online classes offered. Audio and video podcasts allow students to go to class at their own pace, when and where they want. Teachers are using iLife and iWork to create these digital lessons on their Macs where you can create customized educational materials.

Dr. Christie's Site

Wow what a great site, she is very passionate about technology in the classroom! I like a lot of her ideas and could use them all in the classroom. She has a lot of great articles about learning through technology, virtual schools, and one article that I really liked called "New Times Demand New Ways of Learning". She also does a lot of podcast that could help teacher in the classroom as well. She talks to a lot of different guests during her podcasts and they talk about all kinds of interesting things such as the purposes of digital stories and podcasts, using 21st century skills to increase student achievement, and how one principal has made learning irresistible for his students. If you have time you should give these podcasts a listen.
Dr. Christie has another great idea about using multimedia in the classroom. She thinks that you can increase student engagement and motivation for learning by incorporating multimedia tools into your curriculum. You can use digital cameras, digital photography, video, and podcasting to keep your students interested. You can do different projects for your students and incorporate all of these things into how the project must be completed. She had a lot of other great about using the internet in the classroom too!

What I Learned This Year

First off I loved what he said about his goal for the year is to “stay positive”. I really need to work on applying that in my daily life. I think it was a really great idea to blog about his first year of teaching to helping other teachers that are just starting out. He was young and inexperienced when he began his first job as an elementary school teacher. One of his first mistakes was thinking that it was all about the teacher. He was so worried about how he was being assessed, and he did not make the lessons student centered. He said that a big mistake teachers make is that they become so concerned with the delivery and they are not checking for student comprehension. In order to be affective you have to be able to let your audience drive your instruction. Another piece of advice he gave was to always be flexible, no lesson is perfect. Communication is the best medicine; it is the best way to resolve an issue in the workplace and in the classroom. Another great piece of advice is to always be reasonable. Sometimes teachers build expectations to high for students and when they do not reach them they become upset. Also you have to worry about setting the expectations to low, the student will not reach their full potential if they are set to low. They are not perfect and neither are we. Also do not be afraid of technology it is a great teaching tool and it will keep students attention. I think it would be great to have a class blog and include technology as much as you can because it will be beneficial for the students. I think the best piece of adv ice he gave was to listen to your students. It is so important to listen and make them feel comfortable around you. Listening to your students will help them in a lot of ways. I really enjoyed this blog, it had some great advice that I will use in the coming years.

Who is Changing What on Wikipedia?

According to the NPR article on Wikipedia and the NPR podcast you cannot trust Wiki! I had no idea. Everything I want to know I turn to Wikipedia. Instead of saying just Google it, I say just Wiki it if you really need to know right now! I cannot believe this, I did not know that Wikipedia could be changed. Also according to this article they can track who is changing Wikipedia and it is not who you think. How did everyone know about this but me? I must have been living under a rock for the last 5 years! The companies, bands, or movie stars you are searching may have enhanced their wikipedia page to make their lives or music sound better or to cover up some of the bad things said about them. Even Wal Mart is making changes to their page! I really do feel quite dumb. My whole family knew about this. I am so glad I never used wikipedia in any of my papers my teacher would have laughed in my face.

Comments 4 Kids

This week my comments 4 kids assignment was quite funny. It was a young boy describing a beach scene that he saw in a picture that he remembered. He seemed like a very sweet little boy and the blog's design was so cute. It had a flower border in these different bright colors and palm tree's all over the blog. It was very eye catching, I really liked it. The content was great too though! I really enjoyed comments 4 kids this week.

Click to visit Shalom's blog.

Practice

Comments 4 Kids

Comments for kids was fun this week, I really enjoyed the blogs I got to read and the videos I got to watch. I am really enjoying this project and I hope the kids receiving the comments are enjoying it as well. The kids this week were very creative and so smart. My daughter enjoyed looking at all the pictures and listening to the students tell their story.

Randy Pausch's Last Lecture

The length of this lecture truly scared me to begin with; I thought I would never watch the whole thing. I thought I would skim through it enough to do my assignment and be done with it, but once I started it I realized it was actually going to be pretty motivating. He starts off talking about how sick he is, he has quite a few tumors and from what I understand they have spread throughout his body. He actually turns his sickness into a pretty funny joke and says sorry to disappoint but he is actually is great health, probably healthier than you! He then tells everyone with home remedies and supplements to stay away that this lecture is not about cancer or his family this lecture is about enabling the dreams of others and your own dreams.
He starts out talking about his crazy childhood dreams and how many he has had come true. There is actually one part in the lecture where he is showing a video of zero gravity where students get to see what it feels like to be up in space. They are all floating and suddenly they shut it off and everyone plummets to the floor. He also adds great quote when he is talking about one of his childhood dreams of being in the NFL. When you are screwing up and no one is saying anything to you or correcting you that mean that they have given up on you which is so true. If people are criticizing you they still care and love you.
Randy Pausch is a professor who has a class where they use virtual reality or virtual worlds to do projects and in the classrooms. The first project that they did using virtual reality there were only two rules no porn and no guns and killing. The boys were out of ideas! When everyone turned in their projects he was blown away because the work was outstanding. The students had five projects and they kept raising the bar with each project. There were 50 students in the class and the day they were presenting their projects there were 95 people in the classroom wanting to see the projects. Kids can have fun while learning something hard. Everyone should be helping others.

Did You Know?

Wow! I think I like this one better than the first one, it speaks my language, cell phones! I already knew that pretty soon everyone will have a smart phone that can surf the web because I work for Sprint and prices are going down on smart phones it almost standard on most phones these days. Your mobile device connection tool or cell phone fits in your pocket now, but in 25 years it will fit inside a blood cell? That is very hard to believe but very cool! One million books are published each year, but a lot of people who have iphones just download their favorite’s books onto their phone and read them there. 93% of adults have cell phones and I believe it! I cannot believe that there are 65,000 apps for an iphone! That is a ridiculous amount! It is insane the amount of text messages teens send a month, I would have never guessed over two thousand. I can believe that 250 million people visit YouTube and that these web sites were not even around six years ago. I think that everyone has been rick roll'd, that was funny! I cannot believe that 2 million people have T.V.'s in their bathrooms; I have to admit I would like one in my bathroom as well. I can imagine that print circulation is going way down, a lot of magazines are going out of business and I think our local paper is struggling if I am not mistaken. I really enjoyed this video! They are always very informative and enlightening!

How to Appear Technologically Literate....

Is It Okay To Be A Technologiclaly Illiterate Teacher by Karl Fish

This award winning blog regarding teachers and their technological abilities states emphatically that teachers need to be tech literate, that the administration and boards governing schools should be held accountable when teachers are not tech literate and universities or colleges graduating teachers that are not tech savvy should have their licences revoked.

His take, obviously, is that it is not okay to be a techologically illiterate teacher. Members of the educational community stating proudly that they are technically stunted and expect others to pick up their slack only slow the progression of education. Teachers need to be responsible for what goes on in their classroom including content, management and technology.

It's Not About Technology by Kelly Hines

Mrs. Hines makes many good points regarding how to use technology within the classroom. Her major point to me is that no matter how much technology is poured into any one classroom or on any one student, unless there is content being taught, learning will not happen.

Her first point regarding teachers must be learners is very true. Just because you receive a degree in any one area does not mean that more learning and investigating will not benefit you as a teacher. Using technology to gain more knowledge and be a continual learner is the correct use of the tool.

Always looking for new and innovative ways in which students learn is important. But that means the teacher is actively pursuing new technologies, methods and directions. That is what being a 21st century teacher means, with or without the use of technology.

Michael Wesch: A Vision of Students Today

I thought that this video was really good because it talked about some of the struggles we go through as college students. College is expensive, hard, and time consuming, but it is supposed to be hard and time consuming to get a college degree. This is my first semester back to college in two years and it has actually been a wonderful experience. I love all of my classes and my classmates, but I do have an extreme amount of homework in each class and I am trying to work part time. I work probably 38 hours a week so it is like a full time job, oh yeah and I also have a 2 year old!
My teachers are great, and most all of my teachers know my name. I am in specialized classes so the class size is going to be smaller. My books were very expensive but what has really been the most expensive for me is the fee's I have had to pay to take a couple of tests to apply for candidacy. It is rediculous! I really enjoy coming to school everyday, I have learned to take only a few classes in a row so I do not get burnt out over a long time period. I do own a laptop but I do not bring it to class, but I can do facebook on my phone. I do play on my phone sometimes in class, but I try not to. I could only add good things to the movie because I am having a good time, it gets me out of work and I enjoy anything besides going to work.

Comments 4 Kids

I really enjoyed the blog that I had to read for comments 4 kids. It was very funny and creative. I think that the blog that I read was written by a boy in middle school. It was was about police and fingers being cut off, but it had a little bit of humor in it as well. I really like this assignment we are doing, I think it is really neat. I hope I have more interesting blogs to come!

Comments 4 Kids

My daugher and I really enjoyed commenting on the blogs. They were really cute! I think that those students are very lucky to be able to learn about blogs and technology at such a young age. They were able to post science projects, pics from their school fair, and games they like to play to help them remember their times tables. I think it is a really fun way to learn and hope these kids enjoy our comments. I know my daughter and I enjoyed the blogs and we are going to continue looking at the blog and commenting on the stuff we like.

Should all Teachers be Technologically Literate?

I think this podcast was very good. It would be great if they had opposing views on the podcast and maybe a teacher that is tech savvy and one that was not to talk about why or why not they want to use technology in the classroom. I think it is very important for teachers to be technologically literate. I think it is great that everyone introduces themselves and tells a little bit about themselves and their major. I think it great that they site everything and say where this question kind of originated from. I think that resources are important because some schools do not have the same resources as others. They need to have the equipment and if the schools cannot provide it they said in the podcast where you could find it. I think this blog is great because they are having a discussion about it, and they all have great points. I like this podcast much better than the other one I just listened to because they have different views and they are voicing their opinions and it is very interesting. I like it how one person expressed the opinion that if you are not technologically literate you will not survive as a teacher which I think could be true. I like how they are stating their arguments and then discussing them. You just have to be creative in the classroom and I think keeping up with technology is very important. I actually really enjoyed this podcast.

Use of iTunes in Education

I think this podcast was great. It was a little monotone and they repeated the information they were giving a couple times but it was great information and I actually did learn quite a bit from it. They made some great points such as that itunes is free and it is also interesting to students. I think it would be a great way for students to learn and it would also keep their attention. In this podcast they all introduced themselves and told their major. It was great how they said everything that itunes is capable of, and how to get it if you do not have it. Giving websites is a great way to help teachers find the information they need to create a podcast. I would make this better by maybe throwing a little humor or something to make it a little more interesting. I think that using i tunes in the classroom is great because kids are always wanting to learn about new technology and I think it is so wonderful for teachers to keep up with the latest technology and use it in their classroom. Also if you do lectures your students can put it onto their ipod and their parents can be involved as well. They also mentioned that podcasts are great for group projects and they are cheap! This podcast has a lot of information and I think it was very good.

This Week in Photography

Alex Lindsay is running the show and Frederick Van Johnson is the host. They have guests each week that are experts in photography. They talking about when they shoot, there likes and dislikes and what they use when taking pictures or are in a shoot. This blog goes over the latest news in photography and the latest cameras that are coming out. They talk about different ideas in photography while having a normal conversation. This podcast is very informative because I can tell that the people are young but they have a lot of experience. It is just people using life experiences to better their craft which is photography.

Technology 4 Teachers

This podcast offers different topics for teachers and looks at technology and education and how the two connect. The podcast that I listened to was about personal health. Sean Martinson thinks that you need to be physically and mentally healthy to to have a long career and excel in what you teach. He says that first you need to understand your obstacles, and then suck it up and overcome your obstacles. In the beginning he quit everything because he had no clue how to effectively work out and did not have time and did not have the money to hire a trainer. It sounded like he was afraid of contracts but his iphone came to the rescue because it has applications for health and fitness. Actually once he finally did the commitment it actually helped go. He does not like to work out around other people so he would go around dinner time. Whenever he gym only needed his iphone and a bottle of water and he could suck it up and get healthy!

Kidscast UK

In this podcast there is a lot of music and songs to entertain kids, my daughter is dancing to the music. They use cartoon and character voices in the beginning of every podcast to I guess draw the children in and make them want to listen to the rest of the podcast. These podcasts are made with a lot of music, jokes, stories, and lots of fun. They have stories about sci-fi, a hyonotist is in one episode, pirates, strange meetings, tours in London and sherlock homes. These are all great topics I think kids would be interested in and could learn a lot from.

The Kidscast podcasts seem to be more engineered rather than talking so much. There are lots of sound effects, characters and digitized music that makes them seem very interesting. These podcasts could be used in the classroom as a regular lesson on reading or language development.

Teaching with Smartboards

These different podcasts show how to use the Smartboard within a math class. They are different lessons two teachers use that get students more involved with the lesson through a new technology that students do not usually get to have hands-on experiences with. The podcasts seem to cover topics such as just getting started, to all different math classes, to innovative lesson plans for math classes.

These seem to be recorded in a very casual format including personal information as well as technical tips for using a smartboard.

Vicki Davis: Harness Your Student's Digital Smarts

This is a great video for new teachers to see and learn how other teachers are engaging and empowering their students in new innovative ways. With technology used as it was originally meant, as a tool, students are collaborating with others from other nations, they are teaching their teacher as they learn themselves, and they are building social networks that will increase their global thinking.

This teacher spoke to how she designs her class to be customized for the group of students she is teaching. Customizing a technology class is a great thing to be able to do so that the really advanced students do not get bored and the average student has the chance to learn and grow as well. The class seemed so excited about everything they were doing.

Sir Ken Robinson: The Importance of Creativity

Sir Ken Robinson: The Importance of Creativity by Sir Ken Robinson hits close to home for me because I have a daughter about to start school. I think that Sir Robinson has a lot of good points about children and creativity.

He begins by stressing the importance of creativity. He thinks it is as important as literacy and should be treated that way. I agree I want my daughter to learn to read and write, but I also want her to be creative with everything she does and think outside the box. Sir Robinson believes to be creative you cannot be afraid of being wrong. Kids are very creative because they are not afraid of making mistakes or what other people think.

Sir Robinson says if you are not prepared to be wrong you will never come up with anything original. As you get older and more aware, I know that I started to care what other people thought and was scared of being wrong in a classroom in front of other people. I worried about what other people were going to say about my work. I think that this is what we need to change. Children do not need to be afraid to express how they feel and be creative. Being creative is a wonderful blessing. Sir Robinson believes that kids grow out of creativity because of this reason. Also another great point he has is that a lot of kids are not allowed to become a rock star or be an artist because they will not make enough money or maybe will not succeed and cannot find a job.

Did You Know? 3.0 and Mr. Winkle Wakes

Wow! Have you ever watched Did You Know 3.0 by Carl Fisch on YouTube? It is definitely an eye opener. This video has many different pieces of information that will make you scratch your head or your jaw hit the floor. One thing that stood out to me was that there are 31 billion searches on Google every month. Who were these questions asked B.G. (Before Google)? Another statistic that I thought was really neat was that 1 out of 8 couples that were married last year met on the internet. Maybe I should try one of those websites….. I work for a big cell phone company and I had no idea that the first commercial text message was sent in December of 1992. Did you ever realize that today the number of text messages sent and received everyday exceeds the total population of the planet? Now that is crazy!

On a more serious note, this taught me that the top 10 jobs in demand in 2010, did not exist in 2004 which means we are currently preparing students for jobs that do not exist. The U.S. Department of Labor is telling me that I will have 10 to 14 jobs by the time I am 38. I hope this does not come true! Also it is hard for me to believe that Bermuda is the number 1 ranked country in broadband internet penetration and that the U.S. is number 19. That is wild. The last bit of information that I thought was really cute on this YouTube video is that 67 babies were born in the U.S. while I was watching this video and 395 were born in India that is quite a few more than in the U.S.!

Welcome to my Blog!

Thanks for visiting my first ever created blog! Learn something new every day!

My name is Haley

Hello! My name is Haley Mills. I am a junior at South this semester. I am 24 years old, from Mobile and am working toward a degree in Physical Education.

My classes so far this semester seem to be great! I am taking a pe course, this educational media course, an online course in Human Development, and also a special education course.

My current job is full time at a local cellular phone business as a customer service technician, but hopefully with the amount of homework that I have already been assigned I will be able to reduce my hours dramatically.

I have one daughter, Camille, 20 months old. My sister is a senior in high school this year.