Technology in the Classroom

I think it is extremely important to incorporate technology in the classroom.  We are now in a technologically implemented world that requires it's use in everyday activities.  Because of this children use and see technology being used daily, therefore as teachers it is our responsability to teach the proper use of these different tools.  Not to mention, how technology has only expanded our students learning and ability to learn new things in different ways.  This also gives students the ability to interact regularly with their work and make changes to things they may have gotten wrong in the past.  Technology gives students the tools to make themselves the best possible learners on daily basis because technology is always new and exciting to use.

As for myself, technology is the most efficiant way of keeping records of everything.  Students grades, teaching tools, lesson plans, parent teacher communication, student behavior, and many other things that need to kept track of.  I can also make easy edits to anything that I have learned from my teaching and change things around to make them work better in the classroom the next time I teach a piece of material.  This will help me grow as a teacher and as a person to help me interact with my students and their parents.

There will be challenges with technology regularly.  One of which is, as a teacher, knowning how to properly use it while in the classroom.  Anyone can take the time to learn how to use a software on their own time, but being prepared to use it on the spot in front of 25 young minds who are watching your every move.  When this is happening sometimes technology can fail in your time of need.  So it is important to always have a backup plan in case this happens and never get frustrated when this happens.  Not to mention how expensive some softwares are, a lot of schools out their can't afford to buy some of this stuff, so it is important as a teacher to make the most of the technology you do have and learn about the new technology you school may be getting ahead of time so you have a jump on the competition.

I have taken more from this class than I could have imagined.  I thought Ed Tech was all about smart board use and word documents, but in reality it is so much more.  I have never done a lot of the things that we have in class.  I hope to take everything that I've learned in class and use it at some point or another in every school year.  From photoshop and movie making to portfolio making and word documents.  I just hope I can be in a school district that has all of the technologies that we have seen in our class.

Example 2

http://www.newtechhigh.org/Gallery/samples/pbutts/index.html

This portfolio was done by a high school student for a class project.  His template is very well organized and has great detail about everything necessary to finding a good potential career.  His main tabs are links to his other pages and his tabs down the left side are very informational and useful for any users who might be interested in those particular topics.

Example 1

http://www.personal.psu.edu/rws100/

This portfolio is well organized, but it is very boring to look at.  The maker of this page does not make it easy to gain other information about the professor the class that is being taken.  Anyone who uses this portfolio will struggle to find any information that is deeper from the surface because there are no links from this page that can take you directly to another page.

Copyright

There were a lot of things that surprised me about copyright.  The first noticeable thing I saw was how confusing the laws are and how many different types of exceptions there are depending on what these things are being used for.  I was also surprised to see how many different court cases there are out there that have been brought to the supreme court for final ruling.  This is a very sensative topic and teachers need to be very aware of what they are allowd and not allowd to bring into the classroom for teaching.  They also need to be aware of what the right and wrong ways are of using someone elses materials in the classroom.

I have seen several movies used in the classroom that have had nothing to do with the curriculum that was being taught at the time.  I have also seen teachers take workbooks and materials that they have purchased on their own to reproduce and teach off of in their own classrooms.  Some violations outside of the classroom are when my friends and I make copies and barrow music from each other to save money rather than purchasing the music.  I believe it is an educators job to teach our students about copyright and it's laws, however there is a lot to know about it, so I think it should be taught incrimentally to young students.  Beginning with not pawning off someone elses work as their own.  Then teaching them how to come up with their own ideas, but if they need to use some of someone elses work that they need to give credit to them and gradually increase this as students get older.

Scenario

Content: Nutrition and Making Healthy Choices
Project: Comparing Good Food Choices vs. Bad Food Choices
4th Grade Class

Preperations:  I would have to take several days aquainting the students with the different equipmen that they would be using; Video Cameras, Tripods, Microphones, and Planning Strategies for the students to use to do each step.  Make a good timeline for completion.

Some of the challenges for this age group will be the use of computer technology and showing all of the students how to use each of the necessary tools in Movie Maker.  I will also as a teacher be struggling with providing ample help for each group of students.  It will also be difficult for each group to complete each step as a class and have all of the students move on in each step that I am teaching together.  Set an appropriate timeline

Students will first need to learn about the content area and know the difference between healthy choices and bad choices in their food selection.  Then I will need to show them how to attain their information and places where the students can shoot their footage.  After this, students will be shown how to properly use all of the equipment used to shoot their raw footage.  Once all of the groups have done this I will help the students import their videos and then teach them how to use the different tools in the Windows Movie Maker.  I will then give the students time to edit their videos and make them the way the students want.  Afterwards, I will show the students the correct way to select appropriate music and import it into their videos.  Finally, I will show the students how to upload their videos into a youtube account and present them to the class.  

Video Project

The things that worked well for us were the actual recording of all of our footage and cutting out the proper amount of video for the assignment.  The things that could have improved are; the microphone use during the recording, the use of music in the background of the video, and the lack in animation in our project.  Next time while we would shoot our footage I would check to make sure the microphone is working during our recording.  I would also ask for help with dubbing the music in properly to the scenes in the video.  The skills that I am taking away are using a video camera properly, attaining music links from different websites, and how to save and upload the video to my youtube account.

VIDEO PROJECT

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rbTjGuTnh9U