Sunday, February 15, 2015

Blog Post #4

There are many things to know about asking questions to students to being an effective teacher. After watching the "Open ended questions" video, I found in my opinion the best way to ask question are to leave them open ended. By changing the question just a little by word choice, it makes the students think more critical about their answers on what they learned. Instead of giving a definite correct answer, it allows the students to put into their words, their understanding of what they learned. I think it would be best to avoid asking questions that could be answered with one word.

Sunday, February 8, 2015

Project #15: Search Engines

1. www.bing.com - Bing, previously known as Live search, is a search engine from Microsoft advertised as "a decision engine". Bing was introduced to not only search for the person's needs but also provide them with related searches. What I found that was interesting on Bing, was how the background changes daily. The background is mostly of locations around the world, and when you scroll over it, it gives details of this location. I also liked how on the bottom of the screen it gives actual pictures of what news was trending rather than words.

2. www.wolfamalpha.com - This search engine is a computational knowledge engine created by Wolfram Research. It gives access to world facts, data, and calculates answers across a range of topics. It will not answer questions that would require a narrative response but will answer factual or computational questions. What I found interesting about this search engine is how if you ask it a mathematical question, it gives the answer as well as different ways to find the answer to better understand the question.

3. www.ask.com - Ask, formally known as Ask Jeeves, was founded in 1995. Ask.com is notorious as malware because it secretly installs a hard to remove toolbar that harvests a user's personal information without the users knowledge. What I like about Ask is that the answer are from real people, but they did this due to their competition, so its strictly a Q&A type search engine.

4. www.yahoo.com - Yahoo! is an American multinational internet corporation. It was founded in 1994 and formally known as "Jerry and David's Guide to the World Wide Web." It is globally known for its web portals, search engines and related services. What I like about Yahoo! is that not only is it a search engine but also a web page that you can change to your interests.

5. www.dogpile.com - Dogpile was founded in 1995. It gets it results from the top search engines and combines the results into one. It is supposed to make a search easier since it piles all the results from the websites together. What I like about dog pile is the mascot, Arfie, readily awaiting to help you.

6. www.duckduckgo.com - is a search engine that protects the user's privacy and avoids filters. It gets it's information from the best sources rather than the most sources, which is what I find most interesting.

7. www.blekko.com - blekko is stated to have  a better search engine than the prior ones stated due to having results gathered from over three billion trusted websites. It also searches by using "slash tags" that are supposed to make it easier allowing ease to categorize searches.

8. www.yandex.com - This search engine is a Russian internet company, founded with roots back to 1990. It is the largest search engine in Russia and also has internet services and products. This search engine is very useful if searching for things for another country, it is pretty much a google but used in other countries.

C4T Assignment: Brian Bennet

blog.ohheybrian.com/can-doesnt-mean/

Brian Bennet 's blog was about the problem with introducing stuff to children with no real reason behind it other than "just because we can". More specifically tech in the classroom, and is it really worth it to take the time and learn all the new products to get children engaged in a way that we weren't doing before. He wants people to think more critical on what is introduced to students rather than just throwing the newest thing in front of them and giving it into the hands of engineers to teach the students.

My comment to Brian Bennet:

I agree with you, the reasoning of just because you can, does not necessarily mean you should. Hindsight is 20/20 though. Although sometimes it is nice to have a student's lesson plan online, with the idea that they will actually do it, it is sometimes better to have that one on one contact with the student and teacher instead of everything going through technology.






Monday, February 2, 2015

Blog Post #3

  Peer editing is a pretty important tool because it gets the opinions of people the writer's own age, and may give advice on something the writer may have missed. The best way to approach peer editing is to do it with a positive outlook. It is best to be encouraging, the main point is to help improve a person paper, not make it your own. The first thing I would do in peer editing my classmates blogs, is to point out all the stuff I like and what they did well in the blog. Secondly, I would give suggestions on what I may would change or a different word choice on some things. Lastly, I would point out, if any, corrections. Corrections such as grammar, punctuation, or misspellings.
   I believe the importance of peer editing is helping a fellow classmate improve their paper or vice versa. Sometimes it takes a double look to find mistakes the writer made themselves. Another important thing is complimenting the writer, it could make a person's day by hearing that their topic was interesting or a great read. I found the resources to be very helpful, especially the first video "what is peer editing?". The children's video was very funny but also made a great point to show what to do and not to do.

Thursday, January 22, 2015

Blog Post # 2

1) Mr. Dancealot was not a very informative instructor. I think the central message of this video is a what not to do while teaching. He is teaching a dance class but does not allow the students to interact in class or to practice the moves. He is also showing the students how to do the moves from behind a desk, that is obstructing their view from actually seeing the steps. Lastly, he was not clear at all what they were supposed to do for their final. I found it really odd how he zoomed in on one person, so there would be no way to grade the other students...
2)I believe Robert thinks it is more about your skill in teaching things rather than facts and the content. Students can learn this content from anywhere from all the resources available. I.Resources available to students A.Most popular resources students use. II. How to include these resources to engage the students A. Ask colleagues on their experience with these resources. III. Take risks and notes on experience with students from the assignments using resources. I agree with Robert, educators have to stay one step ahead of students just to keep up with them. This will affect me as an educator by being more adaptive to new trends, just to be able to find more things to keep the students engaged in what I would be teaching that day.
3)This video makes an excellent point to what teaching looks like for the 21st century. Again, this video emphasizes all the resources available to students and where educators stand in it. It is the role of the educator now to teach the students how to use these resources properly, to decipher between facts and opinions. Also how to use professionalism when interacting with the world.
 4)The thesis behind Ms. Davis' video to encourage more teachers to take on the use of technology without necessarily knowing it all beforehand and that it is ok for the students to teach the teacher. Her argument is valid, although personally I would like to know my resources and technology before attempting to teach it.
5)I think the elementary level is in the lead of the race. It's like the saying, " you can't teach an old dog a new trick." Children are so malleable, and are sponges. At such a young age, so many resources and technology are being introduced to them.
6)Flipping the classroom is new to me, it was not like that when I was in high school. The teacher would teach the lesson then you would go home and do homework and practice what the teacher taught that day. I think it would be effective in the sense that the students could come in the next day with prepared questions since the lesson has not been taught yet. It also gives the students to interpret the lesson in a way that best suits them, by how they use their resources to look up the lesson.

Tuesday, January 20, 2015

Blog Post #1

I have heard several things about EDM310, some good, some bad. The main thing that concerned me was all of the assignments only being for Mac computers. I have or had a toshiba... Well now I have a Mac because I was afraid of failing by not having a computer that did not work with everything. Although I do love the computer, it was quite an expensive investment. I think the difference between EDM310 and other classes I've taken at South is the amount of time I have to devote to the class. I have not found a comparison yet. The most difficult thing, I think, will be the extra time for the assignments to do outside of class. The best way I think to address this would be to manage my time like crazy. The only questions I have left for the class is how helpful is it to attend class on days that are not mandatory, or if there is even class on those days or is it just lab time?

trial run

test