Monday, October 26, 2009

Motivating student learning Post 9

Increasing student participation is very important because many times if we can get the students to participate we can also get the students to learn. The main problem though is motivation. Motivation is something that has to be within a student. We as educators job is not to motivate them but to get the intrisic motivation out of them. THe way that my group is tryign to get it out of them is by helping the students see the use of real world application. Many times students have to try to figure out why they have to learn a certain subject. They may ask, why do I have to learn this, I aint gonna never use it. THis is untrue. My group looks to influence the students motivation by showing them how they will use certain things they learn in real life.

How to Motivate

Motivating students can be a very difficult task because in many ways learning can be a cumbersome task. Students have to learn the skill then practice and study before they can really understand it. A lot of times practice can become boring even to the most studious student. Therefore teachers have to be inventive in the ways that they motivate students. Students have to be in structured environments and project based learning environments are the most innovative ways to create motivating experiences.
Projects help students to do something that is just not out of the book. It helps students to create meaningful examples of their learning. Egbert (2009) believes that project based learning helps students to become more motivated. I agree that when students are involved in hands on activities they seem that they are more open to participating. Participation is the first battle. Therefore, to conclude I feel that this was a very good point to motivate students by using the correct methods of project based activities.
Egbert, J. (2009). Supporting learning with technology: Essentials of classroom practice. Upper Saddle River: Pearson Prentice Hall.

Saturday, October 24, 2009

Critical thinking Post 6

I think a new technology that supports critical thinking would be the new ways that teachers are using computerized programs to differentiate student k learning. One of these programs is called IPASS. IPASS is a math program that the students can log into and develop a plan based on what they know already and build off of that. The first thing the program does is test the student to see if the student is on a certain level the teacher can log in to see what level they are on and cater to the students needs. At the same time the math program questions and tests the student the entire time. It supports critical thinking as well because it uses real life examples in the math program. This is good because students can see how they use math in their everyday life.

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Moviemaker

The moviemaker activity was a dificult activity because it was too much about timing and seemed to technical for me to let let the kids use. I think it would take a very long time before the kids were able to get the hang of moviemaker. It deals with very large files and seemingly endless photo and movie uploads.

I did learn that I as a teacher can use it to create instructional actitivities, These activities can be instructions for the child to follow and the movie to show the students the step by stop process.

It can also be used to introduce a lesson to the students. This is to get the students thinking about what will be discussed.

Monday, October 19, 2009

Turning Point Promoting creativity Post 8

I think that turning point software promotes creativity and productivity. Turning point is a program that allows students and teachers to create slideshows with questions embedded in the slides. Embedding them in the slides allows the students and teachers to promote productivity because the people that are reading the slides are paying a lot of attention to detail because they want to be able to answer the questions on the upcoming slides. Also this promotes productivityfor the teachers because they are able to grade work quickly and get things graded fast. In the system we use at our school when the kids answer usign the clickers the grade can go directly to the gradebook.

Monday, October 5, 2009

Internet safety Post 5

Egbert, J. (2009). Supporting learning with technology Essentiels of Classroom Practice. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Prentice Hall

Chapter 3 discussed interenet safety and its importantance in the classroom. Many times i dont think that teachers take interent safety seriuosly for many reasons. One of the main reasons is because most school systems have in place some sort of internet blocking software that does not let the students get on certain websites. This should not be depended on though by teachers because students know how to get around this software and onto sites that are innappropriate. I have first hand knowledge of this because in my classroom I have 30 computers and I wa surprised when I saw one of my children on facebook. Before i made them get off the program i made sure I looked at how they got on the site. They used a proxy website. That site tricked the computer to think the student was somewhere else. This could have been very dangerous because students could be talking to strangers and this could cause problems. Therefore it is very important to discuss safety rules with students early and often.

New Technology that supports collaboration Post 4

I think that the best technology that I have seen that supports collaboration would be Google Docs. We have been usign this in class and I am not afraid to say that it excites me to be able to work online at different times t get work done on the same assignment. In my class we have boon using it and everyone seems to understand the imporantce of collaborating. It also allows everyones voice to be heard. In a regular group setting. some people get left out because there voice is not heard in google docs everyone has a chance to do some part in the editing process. The other group members may redo or erase the editing but they are forced to read it. THis tyoe of shared document is the future and it really excites me.

Thursday, October 1, 2009

ComicLife

I know your students will enjoy your ComicLife. There are so many things you can do with it. I like how you left out the names of the planets and just gave the description. You did a great job.