Project #15 - What's Your Sentence?

Additional Assignment #5

 Tom Johnson's Adventures in Pencil Integration.

~While reading Mr. Spencer’s post, I did realize all the metaphors he uses throughout his writing. Though, I may get the wrong picture from the metaphor, at least I’m recognizing they’re there. I tried to get the big picture from the stories but I could be wrong. The first post I read was “The Medium Shapes the Learning.” In this post Spencer talks about changing the mediums. Mediums would, to me, be the form of technology because he mentions the film studio. It’s a different tool than just using a pencil for example. I think here he is talking about technology in general. Change is good and it should happen but not just for the fun part of it. Learning should be looked at carefully when choosing new tools to add (technology).  The next post was “He Just Likes the Class for the Pencils.” This post was about technology and respect. The child in the story didn’t just like the class for the computers or the “pencils”, he enjoyed it because of the over all class. The Nice Guy Teacher got to know the child and gave him a fun way to experience learning, and that is something all teachers should do
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~“Sketchy Portraits: 8th Grade Identity and Pencils”, was the next post I read. This post became kind of “sketchy” for me. It talked about pencils then it talked about a child being mouthy to a teacher. Spencer goes on to say that it’s not really the kid’s fault, but the other teacher can be angry and he understands. Spencer understands but he also see’s that the kid is in eighth grade and he is wanting to be treated like a child and an adult. His last statement is very good though, “She’s writing the world in ink and I’m sketching it out in pencil”. I think this is talking about how the other teacher is seeing just the black and white . She’s not seeing all the other things that matter besides being literal and permanent things in life. Spencer is sketching the world in pencil because there’s so many different shades and ways you can use a pencil. He’s saying that he learns from his students not just embraces being their teacher.

~The last post was “Just Teach Them to Solve for X “ which was very good. I liked that it was explaining metaphors with X. I like that the kids are sketching pictures to understand X.  The story is about math, the teacher wants them to understand how variables work by using metaphors and sketching. Learning and life is dangerous. They both change beyond our control. I like that the author says he wants them to see that language shapes our perceptions of reality. This post to me is hard to explain, so I’m very sorry if it’s far fetched. I really enjoyed this post though, it was my favorite.

Blog Assignment #13

Alabama Learning Exchange, also known as ALEX, provides teachers with a great safe place to get information.  When you first type in http://alex.state.al.us/index.php it takes you to their home page. Then you will see all the different helpful icons ALEX provides. These helpful tools consist of Courses of Study, Web Links, Lesson Plans, Search, Personal Workplace, Professional Learning, Pod cast Treasury, and ALEXville. When you select the Courses of Study icon, it takes you to a page with a lot of different subject icons. Then you click on a subject and it shows you different lessons for your students to learn, links you to websites, and lesson plans on that subject. The Web Links page is a page with a lot of different resources such as teacher, administrator, student, search, and recommend a web resources page. ALEX also offers a lesson plan page that has a lot of subjects and grade levels to choose from. You can also use the Search icon to find anything that ALEX offers that isn’t on the other pages. Personal Workplace is my personal favorite. You can create an account on ALEX and have your own workplace. The Professional Learning page is also helpful for teachers. It has tips, tricks, and tutorials on a variety of technology tools. They also have a Pod cast Treasury which is super great. You can find just about any pod cast to go with any subject to show your class. Lastly, there is ALEXville. This is the ALEX community with post about important subjects. This page lets you know what’s going on in the teaching world.

I think ALEX will be very helpful when I begin teaching. I really like that it has lesson plans ready to go on pretty much every subject. I will most assuredly be using the Personal Workplace on ALEX to stay organized and professional. The Pod cast Treasury is another outstanding feature of ALEX I want to use. After being in EDM I want to incorporate pod cast in my lesson plans, and ALEX is a safe website to get pod cast to use in my classroom. This website is so helpful and resourceful!

Another website that is great is ACCESS ( Alabama Connecting Classroom, Educators and
Students Statewide program). It’s a distant learning website for the classroom, educators, and students. It has many different features of online learning. I think online learning is great. I personally have taken a lot of online classes and have enjoyed them. This website is great and I encourage those of you that have not looked at ACCESS to check it out!

Progress Report on Project 16

My group , Carly Dougherty and Haley Riviere, and I are doing our project on Technology in Inner-city Schools. We plan to make a video interviewing children and teachers in a few inner-city schools in Mobile. The participants will answer questions about the use of technology in their schools or how they would use technology in their schools if they do not have any access to technology. We have began planning what schools we will interview and how we will construct the interview. It seems to be coming along nicely.

Questionnaire Project: Summary & Results

My survey was on music. I had 22 responses for my survey. I found out that out of my 22 participants 82% listen to Rock/Pop, 59% Country, 59% R&B/Rap, 55% Christian, and 23% Metal, so there is a good variety of music listeners in my participant group. I also learned that many of my participants listen to music while they are exercising, studying, and driving; that was 55% of the results. The other half, consisted of 18%  listen to music while exercising, 5% studying, 36% driving, and 27% other. I asked my participants how they liked to hear their music, and their responses had a tie between radio and ipod at 55%. The other results were 50% live, 41% CD, and 9% other ways of listening to music. The next set of answers were quite interesting. This question could have more than one answer as the questions above. The question was what do you listen for in your music? The responses were 77% lyrics, 23% bass, 64% rhythm, 55% melody, and 5% a specific instrument. I found those results interesting.

The next set of results started with the question how many hours a day do you listen to music? The answers were 36% 2-3hrs, 23% 1-2hrs, 23% 3-4hrs, 14% under an hour, and 5% 24/7. My participants then answered what time of day they listen to music. I found that more people (82%) listen to music in the morning rather than in the afternoon (64%). There was a tie between evening and night (50%). I also asked the 22 participants if they liked cross over music such as Taylor Swift which is country/pop.  Out of the 22 people 16 said yes, 5 maybe, and 1 said no to cross over music.  I found in this questionnaire that most of my participants listen to their favorite song to make them happy (71%). The rest of the results were 43% excited, 14% romantic, 0% sad, and 0% depressed.

The last two questions I have skipped around to put the results together. The last question was have you heard any of these songs: Hey Soul Sister by Train, Kiss from a Rose by Seal, Something Beautiful by Needtobreathe, Sweet Child of Mine by Guns and Roses, or None of the Above. The top song that has been heard by my participants was Sweet Child of Mine by Guns and Roses at 82%. I am also proud to say that Hey Soul Sister by Train was the second most heard at 77% (I love Train by the way).  Then  Something Beautiful by Needtobreathe has been heard by 36%, Kiss from a Rose by Seal 59%,  and only 9% chose none of the above. The next question was a fill in the blank that asked my participants favorite song. I found that most of the results were in the Pop/Rock genre. There were very few Rap, Christian, and Metal genres of songs but I did even have one Classical song. I found my results very interesting and I hope you do as well.

Blog Assignment #12

As you watch RSA Animate - Drive: The surprising truth about what motivates us think of the video in terms of education. After watching the video answer the following questions: ~Do you think grades are a reward? ~Do you think people/children do better when there is a reward present? Why or why not? ~
Why do you think people/children do worse on creative task rather than straight forward task? ~Do you like Mr. Pink’s points on autonomy and mastery? ~Do you agree or disagree with Dan Pink’s final statement about if we can get past the ideology of treating people poorly, we could make the world a little bit better?~What do you think of this video in terms of education?

Do you think grades are a reward?  
I think after watching this video that grades , in a school situation, are rewards for good deeds. When I say deeds I mean a good assignment or test. Sometimes rewards can be over used though.
Do you think people/children do better when there is a reward present? Why or why not?
I think for simple task, if you get a reward you do tend to do better because you know you’ll be getting something. But when it comes to creative task, sometimes people don’t do as well because they aren’t pushed in education to become creative thinkers.

Why do you think people/children do worse on creative task rather than straight forward task?
Kids do better on straight forward task because it’s easier and inside the box, but when a child has to be creative sometimes the task becomes hard. This is because kids aren’t learning much creativity in schools. Sure some schools I’m sure are more creative than others but as a generation a lot of kids have issues with being creative.

Do you like Mr. Pink’s points on autonomy and mastery?  
I did like Mr. Pink’s points. Autonomy stuck out because he said “If you want engagement self directed is better.” I liked that sentence. When you get money out of the picture and then let people collaborate they seem to do a better job. This is because they are self directed. They get to choose who they want to work with and what they want to create.  Mastery is so very true. We all do have the urge to get better at things. Mr. Pink had an example of a person playing a musical instrument. People play music not always for the money but because it’s fun and satisfying to get better at it. I liked they way he mentions mastery as being a purpose motive, and I also liked when he mentioned the founder of skype and said “Our goal is to be destructive but in the cause of making the world a better place.” I think in many ways that statement is true.

Do you agree or disagree with Dan Pink’s final statement about if we can get past the ideology of treating people poorly, we could make the world a little bit better?
I agree with Mr. Pink on making the world a little bit better. I think if we do treat people like people and let them be self direct they will be more creative, productive, and successful.

What do you think of this video in terms of education?
This video has a lot to do with education. We as teachers reward our students with grades instead of money, but it has the same effect. Students may would do better if we cut grades because then they could do something they would be proud of not just to get a passing grade (I am a fan of grades but sometimes they aren’t necessary). I also think autonomy and mastery is also very big in education. Kids do like to be self directed and do things on their own. They also try and try until they master a task. We as teachers are there to push them to succeed! This video was very educational and I really enjoyed it.

Blog Assignment #11

First Graders in Ms. Cassidy's Class & Skype with Ms. Cassidy

I think Ms. Cassidy’s approach was great. The video of her students really explained a lot. After watching the video and listening to the children made me appreciate technology more. Her students seemed so exited to share what they were doing in class. This video made me want to learn more about technology to bring it to my future classroom so my students will have that excitement as well.

Ms. Cassidy’s approach that I might would use in my classroom would probably be blogging and skype. I thought the kids blogging and commenting other students was great. That gets the students involved with other students not just in their class but at another school or even another state. I think blogging is a great opportunity. I also really liked Ms. Cassidy’s idea to use skype. Skype is a great tool. I thought it was so great that her students skyped a geologist. It’s great to think if your studying a certain subject with children that you can skype an expert and let the kids hear about it first hand. There would probably be obstacles when and if using technology in the classroom. But I would keep pushing forward and would not give up. If I give up on technology my students might do the same, and it’s too important for their future to give up so early.

The benefits that would come along with using Ms. Cassidy’s approach would be getting children ready for whatever comes next. Technology is a big deal today, and if teaching a child to blog is a step toward the future then do it! I think using technology in front of us is a great benefit towards the future. I’m not saying that I want the future to be all technology , but I think it would help future generations to already be one step ahead by using technology.