Digital Technology

This past week we were assigned to research different types of technology used and/or issues/controversies surrounding technology in the classroom. In class last week we were able to play around with a lot of different types of technology, like iPods, iPad, digital and document cameras, interactive whiteboards, etc. Playing around with them, I thought of many ways to those things that would be so fun and amazing, like recording a book reading so the kids to listen to at a listening station or while reading out of a novel project it on the screen with the document camera so everyone can follow along without having to have the book in front of them. The interactive whiteboard was cool, too. I imagine it would take some training to learn the most effective was of implementing that into a classroom, though.

With so many topics to choose from, it was hard to choose. I wanted to spend time learning about all of them, so I did a little on everything. But what interested me the most and what has been on my since the beginning of the semester was the One to One Computing program and controversy. In this class I've been giddy about all the fun we have with technology in the class and I would really like to be able to send that fun home with my students, but worry about not all students having access to a computer. This program eliminates a lot of that hassle. It also creates a way for parents to have more access to the classroom as well. I understand that there are legitimate arguments against the programs such as cost and effectiveness, but overall I think it would be a great thing!

Week 11

The new program for this week is Publisher. Again, I've always used Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop or a word processor for these kinds of projects. Using these programs include a lot of work, which usually I don't mind because I like being original, but Publisher is nice because it's meant to create projects like flyers and brochures and newsletters so the formats are already created for you and you just have to plug things in where you want them. The downside to Publisher that really was an inconvenience is that it's not accessible, like Picassa. When I bought my computer I wanted to make sure it had all the software I would need, but my Microsoft bundle didn't come with Publisher. I tried finding a trial version online, too, but couldn't find one. Hopefully it's a program that most school have available.

I was happy to be able to use Publisher for a project for another class this week, too! Yay! And it saved me like four hours!I love being able to still use a template that already been created and mix it up just a tad by changing colors, adding extra images, etc..., and making it very original. That's always nice.

Week 10

This week in class we learned about and played around with GoogleDocs, a program I've never used or even heard of. It's amazing! It was so fun to do our assignment all together just right there online, working together to discuss things and layout every one's ideas. It made it possible for everyone to contribute. I could see this working well with students possibly working on a group project so that they don't have to spend so much designated time outside of class to get the project done. They could just arrange a time to all be online and work on it from home. So nice!

Week 9

Picasa is a beautiful thing. I've been using Photoshop for years now and love it, but there is something very attractive about the simpleness of Picasa. For quick, great-looking fixes it's perfect! And the ability to upload quickly to the web to boot!! Amazing, great software! Can't wiat to play around with it more.

Week 8

The articles I read about cameras in the classroom really opened up a whole new world to me! I think it's great! I loved all the ideas about what you could have students do with them. Some of my favorites for students were to define vocabulary, spelling words, or parts of speech; illustrate a story; and make a photo collection of books they've read. Also there was a list creative ways for specific teacher use. I've always been a proponent of class websites. I love it when my kids' teachers have one and use it regularly. I love how it is an easy tool to keep families involved and informed about classroom happenings. But also, displaying pictures on the website would be a great way to show parents all the wonderful things their child is doing in the classroom, kind of a personal lens into a part of their children's life that they don't get to see very often. I also loved the idea of using photos to "catch" children doing good and displaying them as an example to others, as well as letting the parents know. I think it would be a great idea to take a photo of each student the first day of school and use those photos to assist in taking attendance as you get to know neames and use them throughout the year in projects that require graphing and voting.

I appreciated the articles that suggested ideas and tips in taking better pictures. I've heard of the rules of thirds but had never seen it illustrated and now it makes much more sense. I think I might be a bit more adventurous with the camera and play around more with lighting and angles. Children love to see themsleves in pictures and the suggestion to get up close and personal made me giggle as I thought of my own daughter once when she wanted me to take her picture. She kept telling to come closer so I could "really" see her.

Week 7

Can I just tell you - I'm so excited about this upcoming assignment! I love photography. My family and I just love to take pictures. And I don't know why, but I've never thought of using a camera in the classroom, but it seems a natural thing. I know how my own children love using the camera and the pictures they take are amazing - sometimes. Our teacher shared with us about how she used a camera and had the students find and take pictures of shapes in everyday objects. How fun would that be for kids! And especially to get them observing and seeing that shapes actually are a part of our lives. I've already thought of ways I could use the camera in subjects like earth science, geography, and math. I haven't made it through all the reading yet, but I'm excited to read through more materials for more ideas.

Week 6

This week in class we worked with a program called Kidspiration. What a fun program! I could imagine so many things you could use it for. I love all the math application, especially the fraction boxes. It's so much easier to teach (and understand) fractions when you can see and manipulate them for your self. I also liked how you could create your own writing tree and how you can add your own notes in the writing view. That's something that's very hard to do just on paper when you're trying to keep all your thoughts organized! It's also neat that you can totally create your very own "worksheets" and make it interactive for the kids. So much fun!

We've also been working on our CultureGrams page. That is a really fun resource as well. I've been playing with the comparison tables and graphs to compare different countries. It's quite interesting to see where different countries stand in certain categories and sometimes very surprising. I've also enjoy reading the different culture facts of different countries. I think I might even use this for a culture presentation I have to do in my Spanish class! Great information and some really great photos, too!

Week 5

No assignment this week, but with the substitute teacher we talked about PowerPoint, which we will have to use for a future assignment. I love PowerPoint! It's one of those programs that I just enjoy playing around with. I worked for the Church a few years ago on a custodial crew and was asked to create presentations for the safety committee. I had fun with them and learned a ton about PowerPoint as I messed around with those projects. I don't know how much I'd actually use PowerPoints in the classroom though unless it was to show pictures or lyrics or something like that. I just can't imagine that form of teaching would be very interesting to children. But, I'm sure using the right media and other catching things you could use them effectively.

I will have to be careful though because I do have a tendancy to get a little carried away with my presentations and they become more of a movie then anything else, and apparently that's not really an appropriate use of PowerPoint. I don't like all the annoying transistions and animations that are available and think those are definately overused, but then again, kids might LOVE them!

Week 4

First off, I have to apologize for my "little" outburst last week. I pretty frustrated, but getting the video up wasn't the point of the assignment. The fact is, overall, I had a wonderful, very positive experienence using the UEN site along with other resource sites like eMedia and Thinkfinity, researching information on my chosen core topic. In fact, I've already used these sources for other classes and also in helping my own kids with assignments. So I apologize for the rant.

This week's assignment has been lots of fun exploring the Pioneer Online Library. I love having access to all the articles, videos and music. I don't know how much I would actually have the kids work with these site unless I was requiring them to do research themselves, but I would definately use this as a resource with my own research in preparation to teach something specific. Some of the sites seem to be a bit too "grown-up" for children in elementary school and as I've been surfing I've come across articles that I'd be concerned about my own children just happening upon without me there. Both my girls love travel, culture and animals so we really enjoyed the World Book Kids site to learn about new places, people and animals. I think in this digital age and the kids being so consumed by media it would be a great idea to use videos in your lessons and eMedia is full of educational experiences! I was fun to see how many videos I could find about Utah (my daughter is currently studying the land formations of Utah, lakes, rivers and geographical history).

Week 3

This week's assignment was a little bit tougher than the previous ones. I really didn't like the bookmark and document manager at first, they both were giving me a really hard time. I think I've finally mastered it, though. Now, I can't figure out why it was so hard to begin with! Well, first off, our assingment was to make basically a resource page for a core topicon our UEN page. It needed to state the core objective and initiative we chose. I chose to do 4th grade science on the water cycle (I've always been so fascinated by it!) and that's Standard 1, Objective 2, Initiative b. Then we were to include two links for lesson plans, two links for interactive activities, two links for further exploration and two images. For extra credit we could link a video, too! Well for the links we were suppose to use the bookmark and document managers. For some reason I could not get my links to work! Still can't figure it. I had to clean the whole thing off and start over. After I did that I was able to get my bookmarks to work. So I started in on finding the perfect video. Well all the videos I wanted to use weren't .wmv files...darn it... so I went searching for others. I found a list on emedia that could be downloaded as .wmv files, so I picked one. Bill Nye the Science Guy! I was excited about that. So I clicked the download button. I searched for it on my computer for THREE hours!! Finally pulled my husband in just so he could tell me it didn't download an actually file, but a link to Window's Media Player. RRRRG. So we messed around with it a bit and finally figured out to right click on the download button and save it the "long way" : Save Target As, blah, blah, blah. So we finally get an actual file. I go to upload it to my "Document Manager", browsed for the file, named the file, wrote a description and clicked "UPLOAD". I waited and waited and waited.... and waited and waited and waited... watched the green arrow go around and around and around. After an hour of that I decided to try a different video, thinking Bill was corrupted or something. Found a Magic School Bus episode - and who doesn't like Magic School Bus???!! - so right clicked, save target as... ya ya ya... UPLOAD... and wait and wait and wait... wait and wait and wait... watched the green arrow go around and around and around. Clicked stop. This time it gives me an error message that my request could not be completed because I ran out of storage!!!! WHAT??! I have a whoppin' eight bookmarks - how much room can those take??? So, oh well, I say and went on a search for a smaller - MUCH smaller - video file. Found one (a full 15 seconds long). And it worked. And now I'm done.

Week 2

This past week in class we've focused on our All About Me UEN page. It's been a fun little project, but I don't really like to talk about myself that much so that part has been hard. I'm hoping we'll be graded more on the technical stuff like creating the links, adding pictures and formating the portlets rather than the content so much. I was wondering though if all webpage hosts are the same when it comes to that. Just like how in Blogger you just click the add picture, browse and upload; to create a link you just click the highlight what you want linked, copy the URL, click the Link button, paste the URL and wha-la! It's pretty much the same thing on UEN. Is it a pretty standard procedure or do these websites just make it easy? I don't like how you can't wrap text around images in UEN, though.

Anyway my UEN page assignment was to create an All About Me tab. I love to dabble in digital design so I implented some of that into my page. We were asked to create 5 portlets (About Me, Family, Education, Schools and Favorites), insert 5 images and create 3 links. I'm pretty sure I met the requirements using 5 portlets, 20 images and 14 links. I really enjoyed doing this project and being able to make it my own. I just wish we weren't limited in some formatting techniques like wrapping the text and being able to manipulate images (i.e. rotating, minor editing). Also I would have appreciated more font choices.

Week 1

I think I'm going to L-O-V-E this class!! As if I need a reason to blog, now I'll HAVE to! I'll admit I'm not a great blogger - I usually don't have the time - but I do love the chance to write down my thoughts once in awhile. I'm currently managing four blogs: my family's blog, my parent's mission blog, my design blog and this blog for class. I know the design is slightly boring as of right now, but I'll play around with it and make it super. In the past I have messed around a bit with the HTML to manipulate the design of my blog. I know this isn't an "HTML class," but I'd love to learn a bit more to really be able to make it more personal. Also, I've tried to import new fonts, create a signature, customize sidebar titles and create buttons but haven't had much luck. So, if you have any tips that might help me out in those areas, I'd love to try them!

As you can see, I'm fairly comfortable and familiar with using a computer, but I realize I have a lot to learn. I'm excited to see what I can do! And after reading the assigned articles for our Technology Reflection Paper, "Maine’s Laptop Initiative Improves Student Writing" by Anne Miller, "The 21st-Century Digital Learner" by Marc Prensky, "Risks Involved in Integrating the Internet into the K-12 Curriculum" by Bernie Poole, and "How a New Generation of Teachers Will Change Schools" by Monica Martin, I have decided that using technology in the classroom is essential in order to be able to reach today's students. I am constantly amazed at how my daughters instinctively know how to turn on a computer, navigate the internet, text on my phone, take digital pictures, upload music to their ipods and everything else that, for me, usually requires at least an hours' worth of step-by-step instructions. I must have missed that class in the life before!

Anyhow, I can't wait to learn more! Bring it on.