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