Monday, March 26, 2012

Excel

Reflection
Before this class Excel was a program that I stayed away from. I thought Excel was for business and math majors. I only associated Excel with formulas. I'm pleased to say that I was wrong. Excel is a computer program that allows you to simplify and organize your life. For example , it is a great for teachers because it allows them to keep track of their students' grades and attendence all in the same doctuments. It also great for keeping track of other things like books or class budgets.

The thing that made me love Excel the most is it allows teachers to engage students who are more visual or kinesthetic learners. A visual learner may understand multiplication if they can see it on Excel. A kinesthetic will enjoy creating charts and finding formulas instead of listening to a lecture.

1. Reading
A students can make a list of goals they would want to accomplish before the end of the month. For example, I want to know 15 high frequency words out of 30 and then every week  they can graph their progress on a pie chart so they can see their progress.
Standards
4. Critical Thinking, Problem Solving,
and Decision Making
Students use critical thinking skills to plan and conduct research, 
manage projects, solve problems, and make informed decisions using appropriate digital tools and resources.
b. Plan and manage activities to develop a solution or complete a project

2. Social students (economics)
Students can research and graph money trends to learn about the great depresion. They can also compare and contrast present till now.  

Standards 
3. Research and Information Fluency

Students apply digital tools to gather, evaluate, and use information.

a. Plan strategies to guide inquiry
b. Locate, organize, analyze, evaluate, synthesize, and ethically use information from a variety of sources and media
c. Evaluate and select information sources and digital tools based on the appropriateness to specific tasks
d. Process data and report results

3. Economics 
Making their own business
Students can get into groups and then create their own business. They can keep track of the expensive and profits. 

Standards 
Students demonstrate creative thinking, construct knowledge, and develop innovative products and processes using technology.
a. Apply existing knowledge to generate new ideas, products, or processes
b. Create original works as a means of personal or group expression
c. Use models and simulations to explore complex systems and issues
d. Identify trends and forecast possibilities

4. Math

They can make pretend schedules to teach time management and then graph how many hours they spend watching tv

Standards
3. Research and Information Fluency
Students apply digital tools to gather, evaluate, and use information.
c. Evaluate and select information sources and digital

5. Music/math
They can survey people and see what is their favorite music genre? Then they can ask the classmate how do they feel on scale of 1-5 when you listen to a certain genre then graph their responses.

1. Creativity and Innovation
Students demonstrate creative thinking, construct knowledge, and develop innovative products and processes using technology.
a. Apply existing knowledge to generate new ideas, products, or processes
b. Create original works as a means of personal or group expression
c. Use models and simulations to explore complex systems and issues
d. Identify trends and forecast possibilities

3. Research and Information Fluency
Students apply digital tools to gather, evaluate, and use information.
a. Plan strategies to guide inquiry
b. Locate, organize, analyze, evaluate, synthesize, and ethically use information from a variety of sources and media
c. Evaluate and select information sources and digital tools based on the appropriateness to specific tasks
d. Process data and report results

"ISTE | NETS for Students." Iste. International Society for Technology in Education, 2011. Web. 25 Mar. 2012. <http://www.iste.org/standards/nets-for-students.aspx>.





Wednesday, March 21, 2012

Copyright for Teachers

I am extremely appreciative that I learned about copy right in my class because honestly I heard of copy right before but I did not know the seriousness of it. I thought it was something that only big companies discussed and worried about. I was very surprised that our social networks could be considered a violation of the copy right law. Another aspect of copy right that I found very interesting is the fact that copy right laws are extremely controversial because the law can be interpreted in many different ways. For example, a case can be a violation of copy right in one state but in another state it is considered okay behavior.

For teachers it important to know that we are allowed to use short part of movies,  copy parts of books, and share music in class only if  it is part of the curriculum and going to enhance the students learning.

Since I learned about copy right, I constantly see people violating the copy right law. First time I saw it when a teacher copied a whole book for the class to take notes from. Another time I observed people violating the law is when a teacher showed a whole movie to their elementary class because she felt they were tired due to P.S.S.A; showing a movie was thoughtful but I do not think it fit into their curriculum.

Out of school, I see people violating laws as well. The most common one is  when a person downloads music, movies, and ringtones for free. Another time is when a songwriter used the instrumental of an India Bollywood movie and did not name the source that she receive the music from. Instead she pretended that she produced the song herself.

Like I said earlier, I am very thankful that I learned about copy right during college because  I do not want to get in trouble by making an honest mistake. I think it is teachers jobs to provide students with information of copy right because information on copy right is not  easily obtained and it is not a topic that is discussed often throughout every day conversations.  I think teachers can first show their students by example. If students see that their teachers always site their source or only copy a certain part in a book instead of the whole thing, they will learn because teachers are role models. Another idea to teach students about copy right is by having them do website on the topic they are learning about. This way you can teach a quick mini lesson on copyright.

Wednesday, March 7, 2012

Smartboard

Evolution of Boards! 
                                          

Evolution of Students

 



One thing in life that is always constant is change; therefore,  the typical classroom is changing  as  you read this blog! It went from chalk boards to whiteboards and now Smartboards. Smartboards enhance teaching and learning because the "typical" students are surrounded by technology unlike other generations. Smartboards are an easy way to connect students outside lives with the different subjects we have to teach. Smartboards make lessons fun and interactive. The best thing about smartboards is they are easy to use. All the tools are self-explanatory and the  interactive tools come with examples. 

Pros

  • They are easy to use
  • Allows students to practice their computer skills
  • Keeps the students attention
  • Quick assessments though out the lesson
  • Keeps up with today's technology society
  • the lessons are easy to make 
Cons

  • It freezes
  • Only one student can use the Smartboard at a time
  • Sometimes it is really slow
  • It's a computer so the normal things can go wrong (not saving property, Deleting, & etc) 

I wish a knew about Smartboards when... 

I wish I knew about Smartboards when, I did my hip-hop lessons. I used boring Powerpoints. I think the Smartboard would have enhanced my lessons! I could have inserted music directly into my slides. I could have drawn on pictures to point out exactly what I wanted my students to see. I also could have included interactive instead of  worksheets

I wish I knew about Smartboards when, I did a lesson on nonstandard units. I feel like Smartboards could have definitely enhanced my lesson because smartboard has non-standard objects in their gallery (for example: paper clip and a pen) It also would have been easier to demonstrate how to measure using nonstandard units. Instead I went to every table and showed them individually

The Smartboard was so much fun to work with and gave me so many ideas for the next time I teach!