Implications and Teaching Opportunities for Camera Use in Teaching and Learning.

Part A
The most obvious implication of the amount of smartphone ownership will be the assumption of a working knowledge it. With so many people using it, the owners will automatically assume that most people know how to use them. Another major assumption will be that everyone has one. I know on a regular basis now people tell me, "You can do this on your smartphone." That is under the assumption that I have a smartphone. While I do have a phone, it is a very "dumb-phone."

People will want to utilize many of the functions that smartphones have in classrooms, but I doubt that will be allowed. Schools like to keep communication between teacher and students/parents very visible and communication with smartphones will not allow that. I do believe parents will think that the teacher should respond to emails quickly, though. The assumption will be that Jimmy's teacher has a smartphone and will get the email straight to his or her phone.

Link to photo source: Forbes

Technology will definitely be expected to be taught in schools. Maybe not teaching with smartphones, but just technology in general. There will be certain things teachers will be expected to use and teach in the classrooms, just like PowerPoint and other things of that sort were when I was in grade-school. For the students I am sure there will be an even bigger assumption that the children will know the technology.

People assume that me and all the other 20-somethings know technology because we are young and have seen it used growing up. As it was pointed out earlier by Dr. Strange, these children will not know a world before much of this technology. Starting out, Google will most likely be about 10 years older than the children I will be teaching. I know people will assume that they automatically come out of the womb working an iPad. 

Part B
One idea for learning purposes could be for a science class. Depending on what the kids are learning, it can be assigned for them to go take pictures: examples of flowers/trees, basic groups of animals, clouds, or anything identification. Another idea is to video themselves making a "tutorial." There is the saying "if you can teach it then you know it." This could be for something such as math. Whatever are they are working on (ex:long division) have them make a video explaining the steps and working though it as if they were teaching it. Another video they could make could be one related to a theatre type of lesson. They students could work in groups to make a production and then record it.

Link to photo source: Phonedog

The students could also be required to make a portfolio of their work in a subject. It could also be used to simply take pictures on a field trip to aid in a later assignment that could be connected to the pictures taken. If there were a science project the students could do that through technology instead of the stand-up poster boards. Depending on the age, the students could be instructed to write a book and then create or take pictures to illustrate their creation. This could be a great resource for anything that could not be brought into the classroom for children to still get the effect of hands-on.

Project #8 - Book Trailer "Room On The Broom"

My son's new favorite book,"Room On The Broom" by Julia Donaldson.

Blog Post #6 - What do you learn from conversations with Anthony Capps?

In the first video, Project Based Learning Part 1I liked how Mr. Capps said that through project based learning, students are able to "own their own learning." The way he sets up his lesson, the students will learn what is meant for them to learn because of the way he sets up the assignment. According to him they will need to know the content they are supposed to know in order to complete that project.
Mr. Capps  mentions in Project Based Learning Part 2 that student choice is a major aspect of project based learning. Choosing gives them ownership and pride in what they are doing.

Link to photo source: Knovation

In another video, iCurio: Conversations with Anthony, iCurio was discussed.
According to Anthony Capps, this software allows students to search websites that have been pulled and filtered for educational purposes. It also allows for storage. This virtual organization is important in today's world. Through this software, the students can learn this skill. It saves information to where you can leave and come back and start back where you were working when you left. In the discussion of Discovery Education in Discovery Education: Anthony, I liked Mr. Capps comment of it, "brings experts into the classroom via video." That can be very resourceful in a classroom for the questions the students have that the teacher cannot answer.

Link to photo source: Gull Lakes Community Schools

Much of the information in the later videos just seemed like it should be common knowledge to people who want to be educators. I am not sure if that is just because my mother is a teacher so I have grown up around her and her teacher friends hearing their processes and experiences, none of that was any surprise or anything new for me to hear.

I do have to admit that towards the end of the vidoes I had to restrain myself. The question was not "what are your thoughts about these conversations," but rather "what did you learn." I still find myself not agreeing 100% with what is said through EDM 310, but I find a good deal of this resourceful. I do think I will use much of this in a future classroom, but that does not mean I have to agree completely with some of the things said.

Project #6 C4K - Summary for September

Asena

The first student blog I was assigned to comment on was Asena. The particular post I commented on was "Netball Prize Giving." In this she spoke on her experience at a netball awarding event. She told about the dinner they ate,  the chants they sang, and the awards that were received. All the players on the teams received certificates, but there were also three special awards that were given. The special awards were most valuable player, most improved player, and best sportsmanship. It sounded like she had a lot of fun playing on this team with her friends.

Above: A few players playing netball.
Link to photo source: SPAR website

After telling her a little about myself, my comment on her post was the following.
"I enjoyed reading your blog, and I even learned something. I had never heard of netball before. After looking it up I learned that netball seems to be similar to basketball. I have never played either of those sports, but I have played many other sports. For the most part, sports have never been one of my talented areas. I have usually received special  awards, though. Even though I was terrible at the game, it never stopped me from trying (something my coaches always appreciated).
It sounds like you had a lot of fun playing on a team with your friends and I hope you continue to do fun activities like that."

Marcellus

My second student blog that I was assigned to was the blog of Marcellus. The blog post I commented on was Life Without Jordans. In this he tells about how sad he would be if he did  not have Jordans. He continues to explain that he would have to wear different shoes and would be mocked by his friends for wear the different shoes. He also used a word that I have never heard before. It was "champest;" when I tried to look it up on Google and Urban Dictionary, neither had heard of the word either.

Above: Four different Jordans.
Link to photo source: Nate Robinson's ESPN Jordan Photos

After telling her a little about myself, my comment on his post was the following.
"I do not feel like I can completely relate to your level of devastation to life without Jordans. Most of my shoes are just simple shoes from either Wal-mart or Payless. I do usually buy very nice tennis shoes, though.  However, that is just for running purposes because I am baby when it comes to my feet hurting."

Mitchell M

The third student I was assigned to for September is Mitchell. The blog I commented on was Hard work. In this he had to answer whether he thought hard work or talent was more important. He said hard work because hard work builds character and self-esteem.

Link to photo source: Tumblr - French Fitties

After telling him a little about myself, my comment on his post was the following.
"I agree that hard work is more important. People who are naturally talented can get big headed about their talent. Those who have to work for it understand the process of gaining skill and tend to be more humble about it."

Project #3 - Presentation

Project #7 - My sentences

"She inspired people to be more than their statistic."


"My passion is my family and my son, Nicholas."

Blog Post #5 - PLNs What are they? 1

Networking is a very useful resource for educators. It can be a great way to steal ideas from other teachers, to gain inspiration for different aspects of the classroom, and to have support from others who know what you are going through. There are resources that are specifically for teachers and others that are not just for education, but can be a great resource for teachers.This includes a PLN (personal learning network). This should be a global, online network.

Link to photo source: Perey Research and Consulting

The video Welcome to My PLE! was about the use of one program; it was Symbaloo. It was not really what I think of with networking because it was not really involved with other people. It is just a way to save information, and it can be a great way to hold the information. Personally I was not really a fan of Symbaloo. It seemed like in order for it to work up to full potential I would have go give access to all of my personal accounts. I am not comfortable with that. If I do not give it access then it becomes just as useful as my "bookmarks" on my computer. The only difference is that I did not have to give my bookmarks all my information in order for it to open my pages to the homepages.


I found My Big Campus while I was looking for some sites through Google. I think that would be a fantastic resource that I would not have access to at this point. It looked like I would have to be a teacher at a school before I could gain access. That will have to be something for me to remember to look back into in the future when I am a teacher.
To take a tour of My Big Campus and see what the advantages of this site are, follow this link.

I also found Teachers.net. This site has chatboards, discussions boards, accessibility to lesson plans, chatrooms, posts, and more. This seems like it can be a truly useful site if used to its full potential.
Another site that is very similar to Teachers.net, is The Educator's PLN.

Link to photo source: Telford Mind

Finally, Pintrest can be an amazing resource for educators. Through Pintrest, the user can follow education boards and individual people. There is also the function  of message; this can be used easily on this site. The users can also put their own pins on this site. Also, the links from the different pins can be followed back to mother site where more ideas can possibly be found.

Blog Post #4 - Asking Questions

Many times teachers can fall short in the questions they ask, the way they ask them, or even to whom the questions are asked. I remember growing up, most of the questions teachers would ask required short answers for the answer. In addition to that they were directed to a select few students. It was always the students who were deemed the "smart kids" who usually had the answer that were called upon. There were several articles and videos that I reviewed which address this problem.

Link to photo source: AndyHanselman.com

In  The Right Way to Ask Questions in the Classroom by Ben Johnson the idea of TPR (total physical response) was mentioned. This is a language teaching tool developed by Dr. James Asher that is based on coordination of language and physical movement. The article did not go into detail as to how to implement this nor did it mention how to ask or answer questions using this. I did like the idea of this though, so I looked into it. After reading over a lecture from Dr. Asher from TPR World, I learned that TPR is for language learning (such as a foreign language). TPR could be useful when teaching younger children, even those speaking the same language as the teacher.

Link to photo source: Right Question Institute

There were several ideas that I liked in Asking Questions to Improve Learning. The first idea was that questions calling for a yes or no answer were not bad questions, they are just questions that need to be followed up with "why?" The second idea I liked from this article was working through multi-layered questions with the students. Asking a multi-layered question in a discussion setting could become too much for the students to answer at once. Breaking the questions down will help the students to answer them. Also, when it comes time for the test, the students will be more capable of answering more complex questions (such as essays) because they worked on that skill in class. The third idea I liked was using specific types of questions to do specific things with the students. For example, closed ended questions should be used to test the student's comprehension and retention. Open ended questions should be used to create discussion or deeper thought. Finally managerial questions should be used to make sure students understand an assignment or have the appropriate materials.

Link to photo source: Leading with Questions

Questioning Styles and Strategies also had some useful ideas. One of the ideas presented was student calling. This is where a student will call on another student to answer a question. This presents the opportunity for the students to have some control in the classroom as while the teacher still maintains overall control. Giving some control to the students can eliminate some of the feeling of the dictator classroom feel. In this video the students were reviewing the book "Bridge to Terabithia." The questions they were asked were things such as "describe Terabithia." These types of questions could work on the students' descriptive skills and use of descriptive words. There were also questions that were answered in things other than words. The students were told to draw what they thought Terabithia looked like and were then to discuss it. Also one of the children were called upon to use him body to demonstrate what he thought one of the monsters would look like.

Project #15 - Search Engines

According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, a search engine is "a computer program that is used to look for information on the Internet." For this dictionary's full description of "search engine," follow this link. There are many different kinds of search engines with specific purposes. Here are eight in alphabetical order.

Dice
This is a search engine for jobs. It is specific to technology professionals. There is an area where employers can search for potential employees. This site brags that it is a good resource for employers because the potential employees that can be found are very talented. Also it is efficient to use this means because there are many potential employees that can be found here. Persons seeking a job can also search for jobs by company, skill/title, location, and employment type.
This seems to be a valuable resource since both employers can look for employees and employees can look for employers.

Link to photo source: NewsWadio

Dogpile
This is a metasearch engine. This type of search engine that searches other search engines and databases to find information on what the user searched. Dogpile in particular uses Google, Yahoo, Yandex, and other search engines.
This site seems to be about the same a Google in usefulness once the user gets used to this particular site.

Link to photo source: A Better Pet

DuckDuckGo
With this search engine there are three main things that they brag about themselves. They claim to give real privacy because they do not track their users. The description that they give of this is to not collect or share personal information. They also claim to be able to get the user the answers desired in fewer clicks and that they have fewer ads and spam.
This site does seem to give resourceful information to the users. It does not seem to be any better than some other cites might be, but the main thing I think would be going for this site is that they claim to provide privacy with their answers.

Link to photo source: Wikipedia

mySimon
This site compares price for the user from different websites. The user searches what they wish to purchase and from there the site will direct the user to where he or she can purchase that item. This site will send the user to sites such as Amazon.com.
If the user knows what he or she is looking for, this could possibly be a useful for him or her.

Link to photo source: mySimon

Mocavo
This search engine is for genealogy and ancestry. It searches things such as census from the past to find ancestors.
It seems that in order to start making this site work effectively, the user has to know a good deal of starting information to narrow down the resources to know if Macavo is on the right family.

Link to photo source: Google+

Realtor
This site is for real estate purposes. This site can help the user find a home to purchase or to rent. The search can be narrowed by a minimum and maximum price range, the number of bedrooms, and the number of bathrooms. The user simply puts in the area he or she is looking for and then narrows down the search if so desired.
This site can be very useful for someone looking for a home who does not know where he or she should start looking. It can even be valuable for a user trying to figure out the price of an area.

Link to photo source: Youtube

WebMD
WebMD is a medical search engine. It is an American corporation that provides medical information. This site is accredited by URAC.
This site can be a good source for users who are willing to read what is on this site.

Link to photo source: Wikipedia

WolframAlpha
This is an answer engine and a computational engine. One of the most impressive things I found that this site can do is to answer, including showing steps, math problems. It can also provide a good comparisons between two topics and other impressive functions. It will not lead the user to another site if that is what is needed.
This is a valuable resource, but depending on what the user is searching another engine could be a better choice.

Link to photo source: AndroidGuys

Project #4 C4T - #1 Commenting on Jeff Utecht's Blog: "The Thinking Stick"

I few days ago I read "Privacy" from Jeff Utecht's The Thinking Stick. In this post he brought forward and answered some of the questions he is asked about privacy. They include, “If I put something in Google Drive is it safe?” and, “If I put something in Google Drive can anyone see it?”

He also points out that we have to trust someone and our love/hate relationship with technology. We love all that technology knows about us when suggesting things we would like, but we hate that they know all of that about us. Part of this love/hate relationship mentioned is that we love how the "bad guys" (as he put it) can be caught by us giving companies access to accounts, but we hate that they can see what we are doing. 

He sums it all up by saying we became public the instant we signed up for different accounts: Facebook, email, or even our cell phones. As he puts it, there will always be bad guys who will try to break in, but we just have to trust who we feel is safe and do our best to protect ourselves. 

My comment on this blog was the following.

"I enjoyed reading this post, especially how you addressed people’s concerns about different aspects with technology. I really think most people worry about things that do not really matter. I can imagine nobody at Google actually cares about most people’s every day emails about whatever they are doing at that point. They just have to have access so they can catch the bad guys as you put it.
My thought on that is just if you are worried about someone reading something, then you are either being too sensitive about it or you are doing something you probably should not be doing. I also like your point that you have to trust someone. It does come with a little bit of intelligence from the user’s side, you would not put your bank account information on your Facebook page, but it comes to a point where we just have to trust someone with your information. It is just a fact of the world we live in now."

I also read his post "What Happens When We Forget The Mind Shift?" This post was Mr. Utecht's thoughts on why a school district, the Hoboken School District, that tried to implement all students having individual computers failed and then threw them all away. In this he identified what he thought were the five problems that caused this to fail. They were "1) The funding cycle," "2) The need to invest in PD," "3) Technology is personal," "4) No district wide plan," and "5) The exit plan."

Problem 1 focused on the schools having the money to start the programs, but not keeping their technology updated. He says the schools are not thinking in the long term when creating the programs. This can be remedied by hiring employees, teachers and higher leveled positions, who "get it" according to him.

Problem 2 focused on that the teachers were not knowledgeable enough to properly implement the change. He says the educators need the time, space, and freedom to learn this technology so they can teach it. His solution is to set aside 25% of the funds aside for PD (professional development). This should also be programs that are not just one day and then done; they should change mindsets. Although it would take the money from funding the technology; it would create better programs through knowledgeable teacher in his opinion.

Problem 3 was that the computers were made impersonal to the students. They had blocks for certain sites on them, which according to Mr. Utecht, was forcing the students to be "hackers" and "rule breakers." If you make it more personal to the individual, then he or she will take better care of the piece of technology.

Problem 4 was the idea that the schools did not have a common plan. The schools and principal did what they wanted without a uniform plan. His idea was that the school districts should all have the same plan and goal in order to be effective.

Problem 5 focused on the idea that this will not be a one time cost. The idea behind it has to be that the cost will recur every 3 or so years. The budget needs to grow and change with the program.

Above: Students using a classroom set of laptops.
Link to photo source: edcetera

My comment on this blog was the following.
"I agree that schools should update their technology on a regular basis such as in problem 1, but every 2 or 3 years would take a great deal of funding (funding that most schools do not have). The high school I graduated from had good funding, but would not even be near able to afford a personal computer for everyone.

I definitely agree with problem 2. In order for teachers to teach a subject effectively, they must be knowledgeable.

Problem 3 mentions that if individuals are allowed to personalize something, then they will take care of it. I do not know how much I agree with this. From my experience, for example when my friends and I were turning 16, people do not take care of things that they do not have to work for. Most of my friends who were given cars and were allowed to do what they wanted with it (including personalization) wrecked it due to negligence within a year.

Problem 4 addresses unity across school districts. I do agree that schools should have some unity, but there is no one solution for all schools in the school district. If counted from the county's public school website, there are 90 public schools in my area. There is no way a unified program that can be created for all of them.

Problem 5 mentions possible dropping textbooks and replacing them with laptops. No matter how much I love to read off of my Nook, I know from personal experience for myself the best way for me to learn is to have a hard copy of a textbook. I know I am not the only one, so ditching the textbooks would not work for all. I have been a straight A student the entire time I have been in school, the only classes I have had any trouble with included an online only textbook."

Blog Post #3 - How Can You Provide Meaningful Feedback to Your Peers?

Peer editing is an important aspect of the learning process. It is simply working with someone your own age to improve and revise his or her writing according to Adriana Zardini's Tutorial Peer Editing slideshow. It involves three major steps. They are compliments, corrections, and suggestions. I have always heard that the proper way to critique is the "compliment sandwich." In this method one gives a compliment, a critique, and then another compliment. I do like the switch in the format, though.  It creates room for more detailed and specific editing and if the editor so chose, could still be followed up by a closing compliment. One of the main things to stress with peer editing is to "Stay positive!" This suggestion also comes from Ms. Zardini's slideshow.

Link to photo source: Enggroup1

The compliments section of the peer editing process should be an easy one to understand: say what you like about the piece. After that is where the editor has to remember to stay positive. Nobody wants to be edited by the "Mean Margaret" that was mentioned in Tim Bedley's Writing Peer Review Top 10 Mistakes video The suggestions portion is where the editor has the opportunity to comment on the author's "word choice, organization, details, sentences, and topic" as recommended in the above mentioned slideshow. After that the editor will have the chance to correct the author's spelling, grammar, punctuation, sentence structure, and whatever errors may be found. This is the  suggestions portion of peer editing.

Link to photo source: Meredith Anderson's Blog

As mentioned previously, peer editing is an important opportunity for people to learn from others and from their own mistakes. Ms. Zardini closes out her slideshow by reminding us when we peer edit we must, "stay positive, be specific, and complete all three steps."

Above: Students participating in peer editing.
Link to photo source: Mrs. Brooks's 3rd Grade class blog