For my post, I decided to do a book report on Rafe Esquith's "There are No Shortcuts". I read part of this book for a podcast on an earlier project, then ended up finishing the book and loving it. Needless to say, I was thrilled when I saw that I would be given the opportunity to write about it.
Mr. Esquith is very clear about one thing in his book - it is not a how-to guide on how to teach. In fact, he talks early on about making sure to explore and finding out who YOU are as a teacher, not him. That said, we can still learn many things from his book. One thing I love about him is that he seems to be fearless - he has stood up to parents, administrations, and certainly students in order to accomplish his task - educating his students. Furthermore, he has pushed through excessive financial difficulty (at points by working multiple jobs) in order to pay for the many field trips and activities his class takes part in.
One thing that I definitely took away from this book was that students WILL sometimes hurt you, even when you are perfectly kind and even go out of your way for them. I find that I will have to develop a tougher shell when I begin teaching, because this kind of behavior will most definitely hurt my feelings quite a bit.
Another awesome point from Mr. Esquith: He puts a huge emphasis on literacy and makes a point to state that he teaches in English. Why? We as teachers must prepare our students (or, as he would probably say, show them how to prepare themselves) for the real world, and in this country, speaking English is a necessity to be truly successful.
I enjoyed reading this book, not only because of what I learned, but also because of Mr. Esquith's wonderfully witty writing style. I'm hoping to purchase and read "Teach Like Your Hair is on Fire" over the holidays - it's certainly a learning experience and definitely keeps me entertained.
Sunday, November 27, 2011
Sunday, November 20, 2011
Additional Assignment 1: Missed the Metaphor
I missed the metaphor in Tom Johnson/John T. Spencer's post. Why? I'm guessing simply because it did not strike me as an odd enough post to think hard about what pencils could be a metaphor for. I found a completely different meaning in the post, was satisfied with my meaning, and therefore did not dig deeper. Clearly, I should have thought harder about it.
Considering I spent the week performing in the musical "Honk!", metaphors were abundant for me. Leaving out the metaphors galore in the script, one humorous one comes to mind. When we give a bad performance, we might say, "That show was a load of crap." Umm, clearly, it was not literally. For homework, I might say an assignment is a pain in the butt. This is not true unless I have been sitting too long working on it.
How can we help students understand metaphors? I feel practice is the only way. For one, I knew what a metaphor was and still missed the point - one has to find sarcasm and context clues like it to consider something as a possibility for a metaphor. Beyond that, it is really difficult to "teach" someone to recognize them, in my opinion.
Metaphors can be used for a multitude of reasons. For one, they can add humor to a subject. Furthermore, they can allow us to say things that we could not politely say. They sometimes make explaining a difficult subject easier.
In conclusion, metaphors can be a valuable teaching tool, and we as teachers must learn to see and understand them.
How can we help students understand metaphors? I feel practice is the only way. For one, I knew what a metaphor was and still missed the point - one has to find sarcasm and context clues like it to consider something as a possibility for a metaphor. Beyond that, it is really difficult to "teach" someone to recognize them, in my opinion.
Metaphors can be used for a multitude of reasons. For one, they can add humor to a subject. Furthermore, they can allow us to say things that we could not politely say. They sometimes make explaining a difficult subject easier.
In conclusion, metaphors can be a valuable teaching tool, and we as teachers must learn to see and understand them.
Friday, November 18, 2011
Sunday, November 13, 2011
Blog Post 12
For this assignment, we were required to come up with our own Blog Post assignment and do it. Because most blog posts require us to read or watch something and elaborate on it, I thought it would be interesting to write a post where our opinion on something was the main central purpose of the post. SO! My assignment would be as follows:
One current hot topic in education is whether or not teachers should be friends with their students on Facebook. What is your opinion? Give at least two benefits and two possible dangers of using Facebook with students. What guidelines should be in place?
How would I respond to this post? Read below to find out:
Many tools in life are wonderful when used properly and a huge danger when used improperly. Take cars, for example. They are extremely convenient when used correctly, but take lives when used incorrectly. Computers are great resources but can be used incorrectly and cause problems as well. I feel Facebook also falls into this category.
![Facebook Logo]( "Source: www.editorswebblog.org border=")
I think teachers can use Facebook with their students as long as they are careful to do so in a responsible manner. Obviously, teachers could not post inappropriate things (and probably shouldn't anyway). Teachers would need to maintain an extremely high standard of conduct.
Benefits? Well, for one, students could easily get in touch with their teachers at any time for help in classes. Furthermore, if students are having personal problems, and they get serious enough, teachers could let the counselors and/or parents know. Furthermore, teachers would serve as possible role models for students.
Dangers? For one, people other than you can post on your Facebook, causing issues with guilt by association. Some people also feel that getting on a personal level with one's students is quite dangerous and could be considered inappropriate.
Guidelines? Teachers should either have a seperate Facebook for school and personal use or have an extremely limited filter on what students can see. Schools would need to set extremely stringent standards of conduct on how teachers can communicate with students online.
All in all, communication of this sort is a wonderful resource if and only if it is used correctly.
One current hot topic in education is whether or not teachers should be friends with their students on Facebook. What is your opinion? Give at least two benefits and two possible dangers of using Facebook with students. What guidelines should be in place?
How would I respond to this post? Read below to find out:
Many tools in life are wonderful when used properly and a huge danger when used improperly. Take cars, for example. They are extremely convenient when used correctly, but take lives when used incorrectly. Computers are great resources but can be used incorrectly and cause problems as well. I feel Facebook also falls into this category.
I think teachers can use Facebook with their students as long as they are careful to do so in a responsible manner. Obviously, teachers could not post inappropriate things (and probably shouldn't anyway). Teachers would need to maintain an extremely high standard of conduct.
Benefits? Well, for one, students could easily get in touch with their teachers at any time for help in classes. Furthermore, if students are having personal problems, and they get serious enough, teachers could let the counselors and/or parents know. Furthermore, teachers would serve as possible role models for students.
Dangers? For one, people other than you can post on your Facebook, causing issues with guilt by association. Some people also feel that getting on a personal level with one's students is quite dangerous and could be considered inappropriate.
Guidelines? Teachers should either have a seperate Facebook for school and personal use or have an extremely limited filter on what students can see. Schools would need to set extremely stringent standards of conduct on how teachers can communicate with students online.
All in all, communication of this sort is a wonderful resource if and only if it is used correctly.
Final Project: Progress Report
Our group, London Plays, has decided to do a research type project for our Final Project. We will be composing a survey of approximately four to ten questions regarding technology use in the classroom (such as what teachers use, how it helps, etc.) and distributing it to multiple area schools. We plan to use an online Survey Software and e-mail the school principals in the area with our survey, requesting it be handed down to the teachers. The survey will be anonymous, and at the end, we will compile data from the survey and write a report on our findings. We are planning on limiting to Baldwin and Mobile counties.
Saturday, November 12, 2011
C4K #10: Special Assignment: Ms. Yollis' Blog
For part one of my 11/13/2011 C4K assignment, I visited Ms. Yollis' classroom blog. Ms. Yollis has taught for twenty-five years and seems to really love her job. She teaches twenty-two children in Los Angeles this year, and they blog together as part of the classroom assignments.
One link out of her blog leads to her webpage, another very impressive website. She has multiple links on the left-hand sidebar, and by the description on her welcome page, they include links to various games and articles for students to practice with at home. Students can even check their homework online, a resource which is probably great for parents as well, especially when students are less than honest about the work they need to do.
Back on her main page, she has all sorts of neat gadgets, but the World Cluster Map stands out. At the time of writing, she had over 72,000 visitors! Wow! And that is in less than two years. Our webpage has had 48,860 visitors since the same time, which is also a rather impressive number. Her visitors are from literally all over the world, which is very impressive. Students participate in many different technology activites, such as skyping with a group of students in Australia. I wish I could have done something like that in Elementary School!
Another thing that I thought was neat was how her class trick-or-treated for UNICEF, an activity I actually took part in during high school. What a great way to teach children service to others!
One link out of her blog leads to her webpage, another very impressive website. She has multiple links on the left-hand sidebar, and by the description on her welcome page, they include links to various games and articles for students to practice with at home. Students can even check their homework online, a resource which is probably great for parents as well, especially when students are less than honest about the work they need to do.
Back on her main page, she has all sorts of neat gadgets, but the World Cluster Map stands out. At the time of writing, she had over 72,000 visitors! Wow! And that is in less than two years. Our webpage has had 48,860 visitors since the same time, which is also a rather impressive number. Her visitors are from literally all over the world, which is very impressive. Students participate in many different technology activites, such as skyping with a group of students in Australia. I wish I could have done something like that in Elementary School!
Another thing that I thought was neat was how her class trick-or-treated for UNICEF, an activity I actually took part in during high school. What a great way to teach children service to others!
Sunday, November 6, 2011
Blog Post 11
"Little Kids...Big Potential" & Kathy Cassidy's Skype Conversation
In this video, we get a glimpse into Ms. Cassidy's first grade classroom. For one, there seem to be several laptops throughout the classroom. Children are already blogging at the tender age of six and seven. The teachers seem to edit the posts to help with spelling, but leave the original mistakes as well, to keep a portfolio of work. Students learn etiquette through commenting on other students' posts.
Parents (along with other family members) are encouraged to comment on blogs to encourage the students. Students also use websites during center time to encourage independant learning. To promote cooperation among students, they use wikis to have conversations with each other. Former EDM 310 students even worked with the students on their wikis about the alphabet.
Students also use Skype to chat with reading buddies and experts on various subjects to help them learn about topics. Finally, she uses Ninetendo DS consoles to promote sharing and decision making.
In the interview, Ms. Cassidy discusses many interesting technical aspects of her classroom. One thing that I loved was how she said that generally, administrators and parents have been quite supportive. She says that no administrator has discouraged her, though some have simply not cared. Some teachers seem to be naysayers, but that is to be expected. Parents love seeing the work when they have free time as opposed to only during the teachers' convenient time.
She also heavily encourages using a Personal Learning Network and gives a few sites with which students can set them up (Twitter, Clerk, etc.). She, like Dr. Strange, originally disliked Twitter, but came to love it as a valuable educational resource. She also discusses the frequency of blogging. She also discusses how students can use technology in courses, even such as Physical Education. She also mentions that for safety, students do not post pictures of themselves or their last names. Furthermore, students are also instructed not to click on links around webpages, as not to take them to inappropriate sites. Ms. Cassidy specifically gives websites for students to go to and learn.
Ms. Cassidy's classroom is certainly innovating and exciting! I hope that I can one day have access to such wonderful technology. I feel that the biggest impediments will be cost and fear from administration of embracing the online learning experience.
In this video, we get a glimpse into Ms. Cassidy's first grade classroom. For one, there seem to be several laptops throughout the classroom. Children are already blogging at the tender age of six and seven. The teachers seem to edit the posts to help with spelling, but leave the original mistakes as well, to keep a portfolio of work. Students learn etiquette through commenting on other students' posts.
Parents (along with other family members) are encouraged to comment on blogs to encourage the students. Students also use websites during center time to encourage independant learning. To promote cooperation among students, they use wikis to have conversations with each other. Former EDM 310 students even worked with the students on their wikis about the alphabet.
Students also use Skype to chat with reading buddies and experts on various subjects to help them learn about topics. Finally, she uses Ninetendo DS consoles to promote sharing and decision making.
In the interview, Ms. Cassidy discusses many interesting technical aspects of her classroom. One thing that I loved was how she said that generally, administrators and parents have been quite supportive. She says that no administrator has discouraged her, though some have simply not cared. Some teachers seem to be naysayers, but that is to be expected. Parents love seeing the work when they have free time as opposed to only during the teachers' convenient time.
She also heavily encourages using a Personal Learning Network and gives a few sites with which students can set them up (Twitter, Clerk, etc.). She, like Dr. Strange, originally disliked Twitter, but came to love it as a valuable educational resource. She also discusses the frequency of blogging. She also discusses how students can use technology in courses, even such as Physical Education. She also mentions that for safety, students do not post pictures of themselves or their last names. Furthermore, students are also instructed not to click on links around webpages, as not to take them to inappropriate sites. Ms. Cassidy specifically gives websites for students to go to and learn.
Ms. Cassidy's classroom is certainly innovating and exciting! I hope that I can one day have access to such wonderful technology. I feel that the biggest impediments will be cost and fear from administration of embracing the online learning experience.
Thursday, November 3, 2011
Project 7: C4K (Month of October)
For the first week, I visited the Wiki of Room 32010, a wiki that seems to be the collaborative effort of the students in classroom 32010 of a school in New Zealand. I was assigned to a student named Gina, and I introduced myself as a United States University student, and then commented on the difference in the way our education system works (grades for us vs. levels for them).
For the second week, I had two commenting assignments: first, I visited the blog of Aliya by assignment. She had a post entitled "Why are Flamingos Pink?". I left an introduction, then told her how much I enjoyed reading her post. I found it to be the most fascinating post yet out of all of my C4K assignments, probably simply because of my love for Science.
Next, by use of the random name generator, I visited Sydnie's blog. Sydnie wrote a post about the history of the joke "Why did the chicken cross the road?". After introducing myself, I told her that I found her post very interesting. It was great to hear the history of such a common joke.
For week three, I visited Rhiannon's Blog. She is a 3rd grader at Leopold Primary School in Victoria, Australia. Her most recent post chronicled her trip to Melbourne, Australia, where she visited a lego convention. I commented that I've always wanted to visit Australia and that I loved to play with legos as a child. I asked her if legos were a popular toy in Australia, informing her that they certainly are here.
In week four, I visited the blog of Room 9 at Pt. England School and enjoyed Taimana's animation and informative video about leprechauns. He told facts about the myths regarding them (such as that each coin represented a year in their life) and made a quick animation of a leprechaun, rainbow, and pot of gold.
Finally, I visited Ms. Gwaltney's 10th-12th grade History class in Portland, Oregon, and read a post entitled "The Power of Research". It was enjoyable to read a blog of students only a few years younger than me. The student (Elliot) was talking about an independent research project he participated in. I commented, agreeing that such a project would be very interesting and could easily help benefit one's research skills.
For the second week, I had two commenting assignments: first, I visited the blog of Aliya by assignment. She had a post entitled "Why are Flamingos Pink?". I left an introduction, then told her how much I enjoyed reading her post. I found it to be the most fascinating post yet out of all of my C4K assignments, probably simply because of my love for Science.
Next, by use of the random name generator, I visited Sydnie's blog. Sydnie wrote a post about the history of the joke "Why did the chicken cross the road?". After introducing myself, I told her that I found her post very interesting. It was great to hear the history of such a common joke.
For week three, I visited Rhiannon's Blog. She is a 3rd grader at Leopold Primary School in Victoria, Australia. Her most recent post chronicled her trip to Melbourne, Australia, where she visited a lego convention. I commented that I've always wanted to visit Australia and that I loved to play with legos as a child. I asked her if legos were a popular toy in Australia, informing her that they certainly are here.
In week four, I visited the blog of Room 9 at Pt. England School and enjoyed Taimana's animation and informative video about leprechauns. He told facts about the myths regarding them (such as that each coin represented a year in their life) and made a quick animation of a leprechaun, rainbow, and pot of gold.
Finally, I visited Ms. Gwaltney's 10th-12th grade History class in Portland, Oregon, and read a post entitled "The Power of Research". It was enjoyable to read a blog of students only a few years younger than me. The student (Elliot) was talking about an independent research project he participated in. I commented, agreeing that such a project would be very interesting and could easily help benefit one's research skills.
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