My Beliefs

My beliefs when it comes to using technology in the classroom, is that using technology is something that will make the entire classroom a better atmosphere. There are proven studies that show that students learn better and enjoy learning as a whole when technology is involved. I really was this for myself when I was in field. The kids absolutely loved when we used technology! They even knew how to use the smartboard when we were a little unsure the first few days ourselves. One experience that was great was we used Google Earth. The kids loved it. They found it to be so interesting and later in our assessment, they remembered what we taught them when we were using Google Earth.
I think that technology in classroom is so important. We need to learn how to use technology no matter what our age because that is where everything is headed. We need to be able to teach our students, who will be the future gerneration, how to be the best possible amongst their peers and technology is a huge key in order to achieve this. I can't wait to use technology in my classroom. It really makes learning more fun, and in my experience it makes teaching more fun.

Lesson Learned

There is always so much to learn when it comes to technoloy. The video that I enjoyed the most was titled "Did You Know." I knew some of what they put in the video, but the majority of it was new information-and the video was made in early 2007! Just think of all the changes in almost 4 years! One thing that is almost mind-blowing is that our world continues to move so fast, technology is getting more and more advanced every year. If you do not stay up with it then you will get left in the dust. I also thought the video titled "Why Integrate" was very interesting. What a neat opportunity for those students to be able to go to a school that offers so much technology. I hope that all schools will be able to increase their technology and realize the benefits of it. I myself learn better with technology and I have seen evidence that students also learn better with technology. They are more engaged and excited to learn. I think some of my concerns is that I won't be able to stay on top of technology or that my students will be smarter than me when it comes to technology. I am also concered about being able to integrate technology, sometimes I think it will be pretty easy, but you also have to be in a school that has technology available. Overall though, I have learned that technology is a very valuable tool that will make learning and teaching a better experience fore all involved.

Strengths & Weaknesses

I ended up being right in the middle in almost every question in the UNI Survey. I feel like I could be able to do everything on the NET STandards. I feel like I have some good strengths. Beacuse I work with a computer everyday at my job, I feel like I have some advantages. I know that technology is a very, very important part of business and if we don't teach our students about technology we are doing them a disservice. Some of my strengths is that I am pretty computer savvy. I usually know how to fix things. I also think that technology is very valuable and so I know I will always use it and learn new technology. I am also able to operate any kind of technology. I also feel like I could teach my students how to use technology totheir benefit.

Some of my weaknesses are that I don't always remember all of the copyright laws. Sometimes they are confusing to me and I forget what exactly you have to do if something is copyrighted or what you can use it in. I also don't think I would be able to adapt technology to students with special needs. I also think I need to make sure the things I find on the internet are accurate, because sometimes it is hard to know what is credible.

Some goals that I have for my future teaching career is to make an effort to use technology in everything possible. I think kids have a lot more fun when technology is integrated into teaching. I also think I need to work on my weaknesses. I will need to study up on copyright laws so that I will be able to know what I can use. I also want to learn how to accommodate students with special needs when it comes to technology, because I will have students in my classroom with special needs and it is important to know what to do. I think one place that woule be great ti imporve my weaknesses is http://www.copyright.gov. I also think it would be great to take an online tutuorial on students with special needs or listen to a podcast.

Reflection #13

Our last week of field was this week. We ended up finishing our two lessons. We used the smart board for our final lesson when we did a review about everything they had learned in the five previous lessons. We decided we wnated to do a virtual road trip. We found a video on youtube that was a video of someone driving through Utah, it also had music to it. IT was really fun to turn that on between pictures that we reviewed. The kids really enjoyed it. We also did a slideshow through google docs and put in pictures that we used in our digital story and reminded them of what we had learned and what landroms and resources are in Utah.

All in all, I learned that if teachers do not use technology, the kids are bored. They are a different generation and in order to reach them and teach them, we must use technology. they use it everyday in their lives and they respond to it. I will definitely use technology in everything possible. If I am lucky enough to have a smartboard, well that would be wonderful because they were so great to use.

Reflection #12

This week in field we taught everyday except Monday. WE were able to show our digital story which I was pretty nervous about and wondered how it would turn out. I went in the back while we were playing it and I definitely noticed that we had the classes attention. I also thought that it went really well with our lesson. We showed it just before we taught Utah's geography. I ended up starting out by just finding lotso f pictures of utah's geography. I did it through photostory and ended up just downloading it on my computer at home. I then used a website that has free musci on it and found a few different songs that I ended up using. I feel like the digital sotry really got the kids attention and it set them up so they were ready to learn. It also made them more interested once we started talking to them about it. Technology truly is something that is so important because kids love it!

Reflection #11

Field has been pretty interesting. We had a substitute teacher for the first 3 days and it was really interesting to see how they do things. They didn't really have control of the class at all and they also didn't get much done. Now that the teacher is back, it is really fun to see him and how he teaches. He is a great teacher. The whole school is lucky enough to have smartboards in every classroom. We have used the smartboard the 3 times we have taught so far. It also works as a projector and we have used that too. Technology definitely makes things easier. I also think the kids enjoy it too rather than writing on a regular white board. The teacher uses the smart board with almost every lesson. It would be really neat to have on in my future classroom.

Reflection #10

This week was our first week of field. Yay! It is really fun to be around all of the kids and just see what the future holds. I have been really impressed so far with using the technology available. Going up and down the hallways, I can see that every class has a smart board. It really makes the school not so boring. The teachers all have Macs to use. The teacher has also used quite a bit of music. In the afternoon half of the class goes home and the other half stays. At this point they have a schedule that they follow pretty closely. When they are done something on the schedule there is a ding and then probably 15 seconds of music that lets them know they are done and supposed to move on to the next thing. It makes it really fun and the kids absolutely love it. It is really fun to be with a teacher that it seems so far uses the technology a lot in his classroom.

Reflection #9

This week we really worked on our digital story a lot. We finished up getting the pictures that we wanted to use. We also made sure that we had pictures available for all of the landforms and regions that we would be teaching the students about. It was fun to see all of the neat pictures of utah. I also worked on the music. I listened to so many songs!! It was really fun to listen to them and then find the songs that would work best with the digital story. I found probably 10 that I haven't decided on yet but that I think would work good together. We also worked on putting the pictures in to photostory and came up with our questions that we wanted to use in the beginning of the digital story.

Reflection #8

This week we met in class and decided to work on a few things for our upcoming field experience. We ended up deciding on our lessons that will be teaching and then decided what would be the best idea for our digital story. We decided that because we will be teaching geography and maps of Utah, we want to do a digital story with lots of different pictures of Utah's geography. We think that it will really get the kids excited to be able to see all of the many different things that Utah has to offer. We also decided what art projects we wanted the students to do. We are going to do a visual art and also teach them a song about Utah. We think the picture that they will draw for one of the art projects will be really fun. The song is one that we did in our arts class, and it really fits perfect with what we are teaching.

Reflection #6

Hue, Value, & Intensity

Standard 2

The student will analyze, reflect on, and apply the structures of art.

Objective 1
Analyze and reflect on works of art by their elements and principles.

a. Describe the three properties of color: hue, value, and intensity.

We chose to pick Visual Arts because we thought creating a vidcast would be a fun way to look at art. We chose the paintings in the vidcast by using a list of painting and artists at the bottom of the 6^th grade visual arts core. The paintings are for that age and are good to teach the things that they learn in their respective grade. I also think the students will have more fun and be more interested in the paintings by watching a vidcast then just showing a painting in front of the class.

This podcast connects to many of the NETS standards but the one that fits it the best is:

1: Facilitate and Inspire Student Learning and Creativity

Teachers use their knowledge of subject matter, teaching and learning, and technology to facilitate experiences that advance student learning, creativity, and innovation in both face-to-face and virtual environments.

Teachers: promote student reflection using collaborative tools to reveal and clarify students’ conceptual understanding and thinking, planning, and creative processes.

This podcast connects to many of the INTASC standards but the ones that fit the best are:

2. Planning curriculum and designing instruction to enhance student learning

A. Demonstrate knowledge of content.

C. Design and articulate instruction aligned with Utah Core Curriculum standards.

E. Use appropriate resources to facilitate individual student learning.

Potential drawbacks for the series in my future classroom could be that they vidcast is boring to some of the students. They also might not learn well listening to someone on a video where as if the teacher was instructing in front of the classroom, the students could raise their hand when they have a question. Also the vidcasts are more time consuming then just showing a painting to the class, so depending on the time available it might not be realistic to use a vidcast.

My future plans for the series of vidcasts would be to create some more vidcasts and I’m sure with time I would be able to get faster and know what works best on what to say for the students. I think this is a great way to teach many topics though so I definitely plan on continuing to use vidcasts in many ways.

Reflection #5

This week we learned about vidcast's. It seemed like it might be a little complicated when we first discussed it but by the time we went over all of the different things we could do I got really excited. I am excited to use the programs that we learned about. I had never heard about some of them and every time in this class I am amazed at all of the technology available to anyone.
All of the resources we talked about would be great to use in the future classroom. It would be good to create a vidcast for explaining an assignment, teach a concept, talk about upcoming assignments and events. I think it would be a great tool to use. I think it would also be fun to make learning more interesting and get the students excited about a topic.
As I think I have said in all of my posts, I hope that I can integrate technology into the classroom because I really think that students learn better and get more excited when you teach in different ways. Learning to do vidcast's just make me more skilled and makes it so I can do more things in the classroom.

Reflection #4

This week we learned how to do our own podcast. I honestly thought a podcast was something entirely different than what it is and I also thought I had never used one. haha How silly of me. A few examples of a podcast could be a youtube video, any video, radio or talkshow, and many others. I learned that I use podcasts all the time! I thought this would be a hard assignment when I first looked at it but it ended up being really easy and I can see why podcasting has become so popular, anyone can do it. The assignment was to create a public service announcement podcast lasting 1 -1:30 min long. It was pretty easy to come up with an announcement and then it was just writing down what we were going to say and recording it. It was pretty neat to learn of the many different ways you can record voice. I didn't know of all the devices available that I already had myself.
I think this would be a really good idea to use in the classroom. There are so many ways you could use podcasting in the classroom. I came up with a few ideas myself and ended up deciding almost anything you orally present in the classroom could be done with a podcast. I thought a fun idea was to create a word of the day or word of the week. You could say the word, pronounce the word, spell the word, say the meaning of the word, and use the word in a sentence. You could also have your students create their own word of the day or word of the week.
I think it would be a good idea to do the monthly announcements for the class through a podcast so that parents could listen to them and know what is going on. I think another fun idea would be for students to do interviews or role-plays and podcast them.
I am excited to use this awesome tool in the classroom. I think it will add variety and make things more fun and convenient in a lot of areas.

Reflection #3

This week we learned about creating our google site. I was really excited to learn how to do this because I enjoy being on the computer and learning how to do things on the computer. I'd like to learn as much technology as I can. We learned how to create multiple pages, and different kinds of pages: like lists, file cabinets, calendar, etc. I thought it was really neat that we could go into our Google calendar and add things to our class calendar and then those things show up on our google site. I also thought it was neat how we could add assignments for the week. The announcements page is also great to let parents know of things coming up. All of the pages we added would be extremely helpful in the future classroom.
I think it makes you more efficient and organized as a teacher if you have something like this in place. It helps students stay on top of their work when they are not able to come to school and it also helps parents know what is going on and what is due so they can encourage their child to do the assignments. The resources page is also really neat, instead of sending home a piece of paper with links on it you can just direct students to look at the class site and they will go directly to the page you want them to go. I think that will add a lot of convienence and save a lot of time for students and also for the teacher in the future. I am really excited to use this tool in the future. People are using technology so much these days and this is one of those kinds of technology that should definitely be taken advantage of. I think not only will I as a teacher love this tool but I also think the parents and students will really find it useful.

Reflection # 2

Last class period was a lot of fun to learn more about what Google offers. I already use some of their tools but did not know they had power point, excel, and I had never tried the calendar so I am really excited to try using that. Our assignment for this week is to pick a topic that we would like to do research on for our Digital Story.

I think this assignment will be very beneficial to me as a teacher. First of all I used UEN's website to do research and find the core curriculum. It was good to familiarize myself with the website and I was astounded with all of the resources available! The website will definitely be used in the future.

I think this is a good project because I will be learning about invaluable resources in the process and it will also help me as a future teacher because I will use more technology. I also think this is a great idea to introduce a topic to future student's. It is always good to know how to use more technology because our world uses technology in so many ways, so the more we know the better off we will be.

I think this technology will be a great tool in the classroom because it will make the student's more excited to learn about the topic in the digital story. I think this will also make me have more credentials as a future teacher because I will know how to use different types of technology. Technology can be such a great tool and make things much more interesting.

I always get excited to learn new technology, sometimes it can be hard in the beginning to understand how to do everything but once you get through the hurdles it is so neat the things that can be done. I really hope that I will be able to use technology in my future classroom because I really think that kids get more excited to learn when it is used correctly. I also think taking advantage of the tools available in Google will help me be better organized for my sake and for my student's sake. Even though this assignment somewhat intimidates me I am excited to learn the new programs that will help us create our digital stories!

Reflection #1

Favorite Teacher/Education Hero
It is hard for me to pick out my favorite teacher because I have so many of them! I will focus in on my 5th grade teacher. Her name is Mrs. Anthony. I remember being excited for her to be my teacher because one of my brother's had her for a teacher and they really liked her. I too instantly loved her as my teacher. She was always so helpful and kind to the students. Even when she had to be stern about something she never raised her voice or got very angry. She taught me so many things that year, but most of all she taught me that I was smart and that I could go on and do anything I wanted to in this life. I think the teachers that I look back on with the most fondness are those that not only helped me learn what I should learn, but sent me on with life lessons. I feel like I am a better person today because of so many of my teachers.