C4K Summary for October

Brenden's Blog

For my first C4K, I was assigned to Mrs. Eppele fourth and fifth grade class, in British Columbia,Canada. My first C4K student name is Brenden C. Pickle. His post was about a story he read. It was a story about a family who gets a new dog. Brenden wrote about how the family and their goldfish named Ollie will adjust to the new dog. He stated, that he liked the book and he gave it almost five stars. I told Brenden, that I am glad that you liked the book you read. Now, I am curious, about how everything turns out, with their new dog. I have included a link to my blog.

NightHawk02 For my second C4k, I was assigned to Mrs. Mclean sixth grade class, in Alberta, Canada. My second C4K student name is NightHawk02. Her post was about explaining the differences between producers, consumers and decomposers. She included pictures for producers, consumers and decomposers. She provided links for each picture. I told her, that I have a blog for my class too. I told her she did a great job in explaining the differences between producers, consumers and decomposers. Also, that I liked that she included pictures of producers, consumers and decomposers.

Monty's Blog For my third C4K, I was assigned to Mr. Warren Grieve 5th grade Medbury School for Boys, in Christchurch,New Zealand. My third C4k student name is Monty. Monty latest post was about a Proboscis Monkey. He gave details describing a Proboscis Monkey. Some of the facts given were that they live on one island called Borneo. The Proboscis Monkey survives on leaves, unripe fruit and seeds. He provided a picture and links to the resources he used. I told Monty, he did a great job describing a Proboscis Monkey.

Ethan's Blog For my fourth C4K, I was assigned to Mrs. Horst 7th grade Language Arts in Oakville Ontario, Canada. My fourth C4k student name is Ethan. Ethan lasted post was titled,"Out of My Mind". He discussed a book; he read titled, "Out of My Mind". He discusses a character named Melody. Melody has cerebral palsy. Ethan writes that this book is fiction. He provides examples for his reasoning. I told Ethan, he did a good job providing some information from the book he read. Also, I told him, to remember to check his spelling and punctuation.

C4T#3

Post 1

For my third C4T, I was assigned to read Jeff Delp's blog, Moles out of Moutains. His latest post, was titled Blogging with Postach.io. Mr.Delp introduced a tool he found called Postach.io. Postach.io allows writers to publish their blog posts directly from Evernote. Writers can write their blog post in Evernote, then add a published tag. The post will appear on your personal Postach.io, as it appears in Evernote. Mr. Delp was looking for a tool, that is simple and helps him to focus on his writing. Mr. Delp, showed how he is using Postach.io. He has another blog titled, The Opposite Way.

Hello, my name is Shernaye James. I am a student at the University of South Alabama. I am taking a class called EDM 310. It is web-based. We blog regularly. So, it is great, when I am introduced to new tools. So, I will add this to my list of tools. I like that it is a simple tool to use. I have included a link to my blog.

Post 2

For my third C4T, I was assigned to read Jeff Delp's blog, Moles out of Moutains. His latest post, is titled The Educator’s “Do and Don’t” List Mr. Delp discusses an article he read; that inspired him to create his own to do list.

Some of the do's are:

1. Know your students and work diligently to make connections, 2. Have high expectations, and a provide a high level of support, 3.Give students choice, and a voice, Take time to thank others, and show appreciation (colleagues and students).

Some of things from his don't list included:

1.Stop learning, 2.Underestimate your power to make a difference–make the most of your moments 3. Forget to smile.

My response was I enjoyed reading your post. As a future educator, I liked the idea of creating a do and don't list. I hope to create my own, in the future.

Project#10: Interview Movie

I interviewed Mrs. Jennifer Howard for my Project#10 teacher interview. She tells us how she uses technology in her second grade classroom.

Project #14 Project Based Learning Plan #2

For my lesson plan assignment, I created a science lesson plan. The lesson plan is for the fourth grade. The students will learn about volcanoes. The lesson starts with an introduction about volcanoes. The assignment for this lesson plan is a group assignment. The students will create a Prezi about volcanoes. The timeline for this project is sixty minutes a day for one week. On Thursday, students will do a presentation on volcanoes. On Friday, students will complete a test, on volcanoes.

Blog Post #10

In 2007, Dr. Randy Pausch, a Carnegie Mellon University computer science professor gave his last lecture. I really enjoyed watching his lecture. Randy Pausch, "Last Lecture" was very inspirational. It was sad, funny and thought-provoking. He was upbeat and energetic even though he knew he had a few months to live. Randy Pausch has pancreatic cancer. In his lecture, he addressed things that he would not talk about. These things were: his family, cancer, spirituality and religion. During this lecture, he focused on three topics. These three topics are: Childhood Dreams, Enabling the dreams of others and Lessons Learned: how you can achieve your dreams or enable the dream of others. The last lecture is about achieving your childhood dreams.

Randy talked about his childhood dreams. Some of those dreams were: being in zero gravity, playing in the NFL and being a Disney Imagineer. His dreams of playing in the NFL, and being Captain Kirk were dreams; he did not get to do. However, most of his dreams did come true. There were many valuable life lessons that were given throughout Dr. Pausch's lecture. The two topics that stood out for me was bricks walls and accepting criticism.



I like his quote “The brick walls are there for a reason. The brick walls are not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something. Because the brick walls are there to stop the people who don’t want it badly enough. They’re there to stop the other people.” This was just a simple and powerful statement to me. Brick walls being obstacles that will appear, in my life. Some of these obstacles may be big or small. But, if I really want something bad enough, I will find a way to overcome the wall. I have to work harder to overcome the brick walls, that come my way.

Another quote that stood out to me was "When you see yourself doing something badly and nobody’s bothering to tell you anymore, that’s a very bad place to be. Your critics are your ones telling you they still love you and care." I learned that criticism can be very beneficial. For a long time, it was hard for me to accept criticism. I just thought it was someone being mean. But, looking back, they were just trying to help me. As a future educator, I welcome criticism. It is very important to hear what other people have to say about us so, that we can improve ourselves. There are some great things I learned about teaching and learning from Randy Pausch. As a future educator, it is important that I encourage my students with positive criticism. Also, it is important that I do not give up on my students.

Randy Pausch lecture made me look at my life and value my time here on Earth. Sadly, on July 25, 2008, Randy Pausch passed away from pancreatic cancer. I was inspired by watching this lecture; I will carry these insights and use them as a future educator. Also, I will apply them to my life. I will continue to pursue my goals with great determination and continue, until I accomplish my goals.

Blog Post #9

Brian Crosby’s video TEDxDenver Ed is a really great video. I loved his presentation on the students. Seeing how excited the students were with the balloon experiment and watching them continue to grow in excitement as the project grew. The students began with a small synthetic audience, and then as there blogs gained notice their audience grew and grew. I loved how Mr.Crosby allowed his student to grow as self-learners and encouraged them to want to learn on their own. Mr.Crosby also provided his students with the chance to talk to students around the world. The balloon project became so widespread that the students’ blogs were being viewed by hundreds of students, teachers, and even some scientists who were amazed by the work these young students were doing. One class in New Zealand wanted to do the balloon experiment but their teacher did not know how to do it. So the students in Mr.Crosby’s class studied the language and skyped the students in New Zealand and presented the experiment to them. This gave the students the chance to learn and to shine because these other students were looking up to them and their work. Mr. Crosby included a student name Celeste. She was undergoing chemo. Mr. Crosby used Skype. So, Celeste is now included into everyday learning. Brian Crosby is a great example of a 21st century teacher. He uses every kind of technology available to him and his students to enhance their learning. Mr. Crosby showed how encouraging the students to want to learn can promote higher level learning and provide students who have been labeled because of their home life the chance to succeed.

In the Blended Learning Cycle video, Paul Andersen explains his methods on blended learning. He breaks it down into 6 parts: Question, Investigation, Video, Elaboration, Review, and Summary Quiz. In Question, Mr. Andersen poses a question to interest the students. He uses Euler's Disk as an example for his class. When the disk is spun on a mirror, it continues to spin until stopped. This grabs the students attention and they want to know why it does that. In Investigation, you experiment and see what happens. Mr. Andersen gives his students the Euler's disk and tells them to spin it on other surfaces to see what happens. In Video, Mr. Andersen has podcasted the instructions so that the students can do it independently instead of in a whole group lecture. Elaboration is where the students get into explaining why the disk spins the way it does. It involves the physics, making graphs, etc. In review, Mr. Andersen meets with small groups to ask questions and answer questions to make sure they understand the material. The last step is the Summary Quiz. Each student takes the quiz to see how much they learned. If they don’t understand then they go back and go through all the parts again.

In the video, Making Thinking Visible, it features sixth- grade teacher Mark Church. He teaches at the International School Amsterdam. He had his students work in groups, to discuss a video, from the previous day. The topic was The Early Human Beginnings the Origins of Human Society. The students work in groups and come up with a headline, from what they had been learning about. The students headlines were then hung on the bulletin board. Later on, when the students are doing their final project. After finishing their final project, students were told to think about what their headline is now. The students are to decide whether their thinking has changed. I like students working in small groups because I feel it helps keep students engaged. Personally, I like working in groups, because you can hear the thoughts of someone else. They can maybe better verbalize what you are trying to say. Furthermore, working in groups can help give you a better understanding of a topic. I like being able to reflect on my work, which I did not have in school. I feel that encouraging students to reflect is great thing to teach to your students. Visible Thinking is a research-based approach to teaching thinking; it develops students’ thinking and communicates the idea more effectively. Also, at the same time deepens their understanding of the topics they are studying. Visible Thinking is based on different practices such as thinking routines, small sets of questions, students sharing their ideas, having a discussion and reflecting. After watching this video,we agree with Mr. Church’s approach to teaching and learning. Watching this video encourages us as future teachers to experiment with other types of learning.

Written by: Jacquelyne McKiernan, Savanah Moore, Shernaye James

Blog Post #8

My group and I found many different educational tools that could be very useful. Some of the resources we found are Learnzillion, WatchKnowLearn, neok12, Diigo, and TeacherTube. These are just a few of the many resources available to teachers in the 21st century.

LearnZillion is a website that provides high-quality instructional videos for grades 3-9. The lessons centered around Common Core standards in Math. LearnZillion provides assessment and progress reporting. Teachers can select a lesson for students to review and track their student’s progress, on the topic. LearnZillion is a free site. Teachers need to sign up first. You can search by grade level, topic, or standard. The way LearnZillion will be used, is by assigning videos for students to watch. After watching the assigned video, students will complete practice activities and quizzes. The benefits are: students can practice and review videos to help them understand the content, that they are learning. LearnZillion is great because it helps in providing high-quality instructional content, for each individual student’s needs. Written by: Shernaye James

Diigo is a site that I found through one of my C4T assignments. I had never heard of it before but after it was mentioned in the post I decided to look into it. Diigo is a site that allows you to save information and share articles. With Diigo you and those you shared the article with are able to highlight and put notes on articles, allowing communication right there on the article. This site also allows you to create groups. The groups could be organized by grade level, subject or certain staff members. When you share an article with the group only they are able to view and comment on the article. The articles are saved and stored until they are needed. Diigo is great for when you find teaching resources and would like to share them, and with it being free it could be possible to create a class account that the students are able to use for group projects. Written by: Jacquelyne McKiernan

TeacherTube is a great website I use at work. At most schools, youtube is blocked when using the internet, so when teachers wanted to show their class a video about what they were learning they couldn’t! Teachertube was created so that teachers could enhance their students learning by showing them videos about the things they are learning on a safe website. It contains tons of educational videos that are appropriate for the classroom. At work, I use Teachertube when tutoring kids. Sometimes hearing the information another way in a video, helps the student understand better. Teachertube is also useful for me! The way kids are taught to do math is completely different from the way I was taught so it is useful for me to go on there and learn the new methods of learning! Written by: Savanah Moore

Podcast Project #9

C4T #2

For my second C4T, I was assigned to read Mrs. Vicki Davis’s blog, Cool Cat Teacher. In her latest post, she discussed the different tools, that can be used with the file hosting service called Dropbox. She gave a link to the tool, Sort my box , which can be used to help with organizing Dropbox. Mrs. Davis provided a link, to an app, called Dropvox. It is an app, that lets you record voice memos, to Dropbox. Also, links were provided to the 20 Tools That will Supercharge Your Dropbox. The final link provided was to Dropbox Forms. This program creates a form where data goes into your Dropbox.

Hello Mrs. Davis, My name is Shernaye James. I am a student at the University of South Alabama. My major is Elementary/Special Education. I really enjoyed your Daily Education and Technology News for Schools 9/18/2103 post. I liked the links you provided. Also, I learned about extra tools that can be used with Drop Box. I had never heard of Sort My Box. Also, I did not know that there was Voice Memos app. These are great tools that I can use in my teaching field.

Mrs. Davis second post, Daily Education and Technology News for Schools 09/27/2013 . She posted information about an app called Educators App. In this app, it helps coverts teacher’s classroom website into an Android or Apple App .

Thank you for the great post! I like finding out about new apps. I especially like the educational apps that I can use in the classroom.

Blog Post #7

In the video, Project Based Learning Part 1 Anthony Capps discusses his use of Project based learning in his 3rd grade class. Anthony gives a really good point when he says that the projects should not be just in class. He explains that they should involve a real audience and include the community; this encourages the students to do better work and to really care about their project. Anthony also talks about using project based learning as a teaching tool rather than just an accessory to your lesson. He gives an example of having his students write letters to the governor Jo Bonner about women fighting in combat. This project was content driven and met reading, writing and social studies standards. The project also was community driven and the students were able to learn information from their community. I really enjoyed listening to Anthony Capps talk about his experiences in a classroom, and it is really neat to see what we learn in EDM310 in a classroom.

In the second half of Project Based Learning, Anthony discussed how not all projects have a great outcome. Anthony gives an example of how his class was studying Afghanistan and learning about the culture. Anthony explains how one of his parents who had served in Afghanistan did not want their child to do the project, and they wanted to keep their child sheltered from that culture. This example is really important because it shows how that not all projects are going to be an absolute success, Anthony's students learned a lot from this project and they had excellent reviews. I really loved when Anthony said "create an opportunity for your students to go beyond what you expect." I think this is a great quote to live by when it comes to creating activities for your students, allowing them to learn and go above and beyond is a great way to motivate them for higher learning.

In this video title iCurio, Anthony Capps moves on from his discussion of Project Based Learning to iCurio. Anthony explains how he uses iCurio to help his students become organized and teach them virtual organization, and to keep track of all of their notes and information. I really enjoyed learning more about iCurio, Anthony explains how iCurio is very kid friendly and blocks out sites that are inappropriate for kids. I found the historical figures feature to be very interesting, and how you can search with categories. I feel this could be very useful in my future classroom, when my students need to do a research project or assignment.

In the video, Discovery Education we learn about the site Discovery Education. In this video, Anthony uses the quote "If a picture is worth a thousand words, then a video must be worth a million" I agree with this quote, and also in the use of Discovery Ed. I really liked Anthony's example with studying plants and using Discovery Ed to enhance the study and viewing pictures and videos about the plants

Written by: Shernaye James, Jacquelyne Mckiernan, Savanah Moore

In the video, The Anthony - Strange Tips for Teachers Part 1 Dr. Strange and Anthony Capps give tips to future educators. These tips covered key topics, that any new teacher should think about. The first thing that Dr. Strange and Anthony suggested, is to really be interested, in learning yourself. Anthony says that work, is not separate from play, in teaching. He says teachers learn the craft of teaching, in their free time. Another tip that was suggested, is to be flexible. Anthony emphasizes the importance of keeping students engaged. He encourages the listener, to have a goal of 100 percent engagement. Anthony also says that it is important, to include information the students care about. Lastly, Anthony discusses the importance of reflection, revising and sharing. As a future educator, these are great tips to use and remember.

Written by: Shernaye James

I really agree with everything Anthony said in the video Use Tech Don't Teach It. Gradually adding in the technology and focusing on one specific tool at a time is a great way to help the students understand how to use them. Anthony uses the term scaffolding as a way to describe how he uses technology and introduces it into his classroom. This means that he adds on each week, he uses the example of starting with a research tools, and then having them use the video tool and by week three his students were able to do research videos where they are recording the information that they researched. I really enjoyed watching this video and learning from Anthony about different ways to use technology.

Written by: Jacquelyne McKiernan

In the video, Additional Thought About Lessons Anthony made some very good points on how there are four tiers in lesson planning; the school year, the unit, weekly, and daily. You start with everything you need to cover in the whole school year. Then you break it down into units, which would be about 6 weeks long. By the end of the unit the students should be able to do X in that subject. When looking at your unit, you should divide the lessons into weeks. For example if our unit is plants, week one may be all about what is in the dirt and what needs to be in the dirt for something to grow, week two could be focusing on the roots, week three could focus on the stem and leaves, and so on. At the end of the unit the students should know all about plants; how they work, what they need to survive, etc. Your weeks then need to be divided into days.The days to week act just like the weeks to unit. On Friday, your students should know X about that subject. If we continue with the plant unit, in week three the students should know all about stems and leaves and their functions. So Monday the students should learn where the stem and leaves are on the plant, Tuesday they can learn why the stem is important, etc. On Friday, the students should know all about stems and leaves. My biggest fear about teaching is not having enough time to cover all of the material well enough that the kids understand it, but I think that this tier lesson plan idea will help.

Written by: Savanah Moore

Project #13 Project Based Learning Plan #1

For our collaborative assignment, Jacquelyne McKiernan, Savanah Moore and I created a lesson plan for second grade students. The tile of our lesson plan is Hurricane Charting. The lesson plan lasts for a week. Here is a copy of our lesson plan. The lesson plan starts off with a video, about Hurricanes. The main assignment is a group assignment. The students are to create a Hurricane Tracking Chart. The duration of this activity, is 30 to 60 minutes a day, for one week. On Friday, students will do a presentation, on their tracking charts. After presentations are done, students will take a test, on the material and a fun weather related movie. Also, we created a website for our lesson plan.

PLN Project #2

Before taking EDM310, I was familiar with a few sites like: Twitter, Facebook, Google and Pinterest. By taking this class, I have been given many new tools to use and keep, for future reference. I have been using Symbaloo and it is turning out well. I now have set Symbaloo, as my homepage. Symbaloo has links to websites, that I visit daily. I have links to Edm 310 blog, my blog, and my C4T blogs. I like that it puts, everything in one place.

C4K Summary For September

Michelle's Blog

My first C4K student name was Michelle. Her essay was titled, “This I Believe.” She plays softball. She wrote about believing, in teamwork. She describes being a left fielder. One day, she missed the ball but, her teammate helped her. In addition, she describes her teammates encouragement. I told her, I agree that teamwork, is a great way to help a person succeed. Also, I told her, I liked how, she used baseball, as example, Lastly, I told her, I think people sometimes forget, that every teammate, has a specific role to play, on the team. Michelle provided an audio recording, of her reading her essay.

Ale's Blog

My second C4K student name was Ale. He is a fifth grade student. His post was titled, “Broken Foot.” He wrote about playing a game, of soccer at P.E. While at P.E., he hurt his foot. At the time, he thought he just sprained his ankle. However, later it was confirmed; his foot was broken. I told him, that I enjoyed reading his essay. Also, I told him, I hope his foot gets better.

Taliali

My third C4K student is Taliauli. She is a student at PT Elementary. Her post is on, things she has learned this week. She has learned some new things, in math. So, she created a picture titled "Things I Learned This Week." I told her, she had a nice post, I like her weekly reflection. Also, I said it is great that you learned new things in Math. Keep up the good work!

Lauren's Blog

My fourth C4K student is Lauren. She is a student, at Mike Gwaltney School for Girls (High School). She wrote an essay titled, "The American Dream." She discussed the American Dream created by our forefathers. She discussed that we are leaders, in our own right. Lauren ponders, what is the real American Dream? Lastly, she discusses that being a leader is "The New American Dream". I told her, I enjoyed reading her post. I told her, she was a very good writer. I told her, that I liked her perspective, on the American Dream, her ideas were very clear and to the point. The history of the American Dream, is great to read about. I told her, to Keep up the Good Work.