Assignment #2

I plan on teaching secondary social studies and some of the sites I found that I thought would be helpful are listed...

http://www.worldhistorycompass.com/ This website is really interesting. It is full of a huge amount of information pertaining to world history, and contains topics that range from very specific to very broad.

http://www.historyplace.com/unitedstates/revolution/index.html  This site specifically deals with the American Revolution. I like this site because it has pictures, timelines and descriptions of people and events during this time. 

http://www.history.com/minisites/lincoln Learning about the U.S. presidents will be present in every social studies classroom. This website is all about Abraham Lincoln. It describes his accomplishments, struggles, and his personal life. 

http://www.edhelper.com/geography/geography.htm This site has different activities for teaching geography. Not only will these activities teach students about geography, but it makes it fun to learn about. The site also has links about different continents and countries so you can look at each one more closely.  

del.icio.us is a very useful tool. One way that I could use this tool in my classroom is to have students in groups make their own del.icio.us accounts when working on a project together. Each student could find helpful sites and bookmark them on a shared account so that all of their work is combined at one location. Another way to use del.icio.us is with other teachers. This would be most helfpul with teachers who instruct the same subject as you, depending on what items you bookmark on your site. In my case, if other social studies teachers (and me) look on eachother's sites, we could help one another with lesson planning and ideas. It would make our job a little bit easier and maybe even more creative.   

Reflection #2

Today I played with the site spell with flickr. This is a really fast and easy tool to create a title for a webpage or project. Sorting through pictures that people have taken and posted to the site to spell any word that you submit is a great way to present appealling and fun titles. I can definetely see myself using spell with flickr. 

Reflection #1

Through high school, the main piece of technology used was an overhead projector. Although classrooms still have them in college, it is not used often anymore. There were many problems with this equipment. One is that they are very bulky. Whoever sat right behind the overhead could not see the board. They were also very noisy and this was distracting. Another problem was that the lightbulb in it always seemed to burn out. Lastly, the teacher had to adjust the focus per overhead sheet. This didn't take up too much time, but it is less time that the teacher has to instruct. While this invention was better than nothing, I am extremely glad that we have advanced and moved on to bigger and better things. 

Generation IM

Our generation has advanced far in technology. I can't imagine what it is going to be like for the children in our classrooms. We will have many 'Jacobs' in class, but on the other hand we shouldn't assume that all of the students have access to technology. Some may not be able to afford a computer or television. 

I think it's important to keep an open mind about change and really consider the best way for relating and applying information and our lessons in the classroom. A balance of new and old technology is necessary to give a round perspective of learning for children. We need to get students active for obtaining information like going to the library and not just researching via the internet. 

One thing that surprised me in the article is that "67 percent of preschool children use computers. In fact...children under 6 spend an average of two hours a day in front of the screen". That sounds crazy to me! What could they be doing on there at such a young age? I honestly think that this is why the rate of obesity in this nation is increasingly. 

I liked that the article included ways of how to include technology into the classroom. I like the idea of having a class blog so that the whole class can interact inside and outside of school. A wiki is something that I can see myself using as well. I think this would be really helpful for students working together. Like I said before, I think it is important to advance technologically within ourselves and the classroom, but it is equally important to incorporate other means of educating students. 

SMARTBoard

I think that the SMARTBoard, as well as all of the Interactive Whiteboards out there, are so cool. I wish that my classrooms had had one when I was growing up. They are very engaging and teachers can do so much with them. I really like that the whole class can interact, either by discussing out loud and the teacher touching the board, the students coming up and using the board, or using the 'remotes' to send their answers to the board. I hope that when I have my own classroom I will be able to use an interactive whiteboard. With Social Studies (my endorsement), this board will really help students get interested. Even if they do not necessarily like history, if there was a fun game we are playing, they might be interested anyway. I do think that regardless of the subject area, this board will benefit every classroom.   

Assignment #1

In all of my previous high school classes, the technology used was a computer, overhead projector, and rarely the television. Usually lectures were the most popular form of teaching. For me, I think using the SMARTBoard will be a very useful tool in the classroom. Because I will be teaching Social Studies, the students will need an engaging form of not only lecturing, but something that they can use and interacte with as well. Another way I could use technology in my classroom is using video segments to aid the lecture and subject area we are talking about. This will include the visual side of learning and hopefully create a better picture of history for the students.

The article I read was title "The Impact of Cognitive Organizers and Technology-Based Practices on Student Success in Secondary Social Studies Classrooms" by Richard Boon (Journal of Special Education Technology 2006). Cognitive Organizers are an alternative method for textbooks. In this article, twenty-nine general education students and twenty students with mild disabilities were randomly chosen for an experiment where they received instruction using either a cognitive organizer or a traditional textbook. The students were given both a pretest, as well as a posttest to assess the effectiveness of the technology. The Cognitive Organizer is an outline of the lesson given to each student. The teacher has a copy on an overhead slide that he or she fills out as they go. The students fill out the organizer along with the teacher. Overall, both the general and learning disabled students that had a Cognitive Organizer for their learning did better than those that did not have a Cognitive Organizer. I really like this tool. I think that with an outline and guided notes/questions, the students will be able to focus more on the learning than frantically writing everything down that the teacher says. 

For teachers, the NETS explain that inspiring creative thinking through using up-to-date tools is necessary. Understanding digital culture will be used to grow in our knowledge of technology. These guidelines are important because as educators, we need to be aware of what is expected of us in our classroom. We need to use modern technology and tools, and always strive to grow in our profession. The NETS outline that students need to be creative above all other things. Communication and interacting with others is next, followed by using research methods and critical thinking, being able to solve problems, and making decisions. Last on the list for students is the use and understanding of technology. Knowing your students expectations is also important so the teacher can match that level. The requirments for teachers and students are clearly different, so looking at these standards is vital for the classroom.    

Improving Instruction with Interactive Whiteboards

I think it is interesting that although the Dennis-Yarmouth Regional School District is in a decline, Lory Stewart thinks that the interactive whiteboard will be the key to the district's success. It's great that this woman found something that she thought would work for her schools, and was not afraid to try a new piece of technology. 

The one piece of equipment an interactive whiteboard needs to operate is a computer. I can see this being a problem in schools that cannot afford even one computer per classroom.  Also, these boards seem like they would cost a lot of money. Stewart brings up a good point. If we did not put as much money into textbooks anymore and rethought our budgets, we should be able to afford this system. 

I do think that with some training, teachers will be able to use this board with ease. It seems that it will ultimately save teachers time during their lessons and will keep the students engaged and interactive. I wish that I had had a SMARTBoard throughout my education because I think it would have really helped. This is a great, new technology that I hope will catch on quickly.