A Digital Snapshot

What? This week the question was posed. How can teachers use digital cameras in the classroom?

Now What? I have had a digital camera for six years now. I can honestly say I have never, until now, used it in my career as a student. This is not to say I don’t love my camera, because I do. As a mother of two children it has been a wonderful tool to document every step in their lives. With its instant viewing and the expandable memory digital cameras are so much better their film counterparts. Needless to say digital cameras are almost fool proof.

There can be a few problems with the cameras. The one that haunt me most is batteries. Digital cameras eat them. Some have their own rechargeable batteries and others, like mine, take double A’s. I need to make sure I always bring extras. It is so sad to miss a prefect shot because the camera’s battery is dead. Another problem can be resolution. Make sure the camera is set at the highest resolution for the best photos. I will need to remember these when I have digital photography as part of a lesson plan.

So What? There are hundreds of ways digital cameras could be used in a classroom setting. My children have come home with a few assignments that involved camera use. One that comes to mind was when my daughter had to go on a photo scavenger hunt. The subject was science and she had to take pictures to represent things like evaporation, condensation, and dew. Another was a Power Point my son did for Spanish class. He had to take picture of family members and list what they would be called in Spanish. Both assignments are ways that I could use photography in my classroom of the future.

I can think of a few more ways to use digital cameras. I could document the entire year and give each student a binder of memories. Okay that might be too much, but I might have one student be a class photographer and the picture could be used in the school’s yearbook. The students could switch off each week. That way everyone gets a turn. I can just imagine the pride they will have when they see their photos published.

There are also problems with children using the cameras. First digital cameras are expensive and care needs to be given so they do not get broken. Also the children need to know what they can and can photo. They need to remember others privacy and personal space. I will have to supervise my students when they are using the camera. Even with these problems I can see how digital cameras could be used to enrich the learning process.

Video: Mashups

The video of the band formed from people around the world shows us how small the world can be when the internet is used for good. People can bring their collective talent together and make wonderful music. Problem is how can I use this in my teaching career? I could use prescreened mashups in lesson plans, but I do not think I could make my own.

Internet Safety

What: Before teachers let their students fire-up a computer they must teach them how to safely use the Internet. From the simple rule, never give out personal information to the more advanced, watch out for cyber bullies, the safety of the children online is as important as their safety on the playground. We as teachers and future teacher must do all we can to make sure our student know all the rules and can use the Internet with security and confidence.

Now what: I did not realize how much Internet safety has changed in the past few years. As the mother of two children I see this week lesson as the most important our class has had so far. As parent, future teachers, and student I need to keep up with the changing ways of technology. I am grateful for the opportunity to see the new danger that out in cyber space. I will be able to take this new information in to my home and teach my children how to properly use the Internet.

More than personal safety was talked about this week. I also will need to teach my students how to proper search for information on the web. They will need to ask themselves many questions before they use the information found on a website. Questions like, who is the author of the site, when was it last updated, is it an ad masquerading as a factual site, is it a blog, and many others. I have to be able to answer those questions and guide them to safe and factually correct websites.

So what: Before I use a website in a lesson plan in my future classroom I will need to ask myself the same questions, plus many others. I cannot get overwhelmed by all the information out on the web. The Internet can be a wonderful tool for educators, but I have to realize that I cannot just pick a website and plan to use it as part of a lesson. I have to check and make sure it is appropriate for use in school, are there copyrights, does it fit with the core curriculum, does it load quickly. You would think that using the Internet would make our jobs easier, but really it has just made them harder.

Video: I liked the Internet safety rules talked about in this week's video. Problems with Internet safety have changed drastically from the days when parents and teachers needed to worry about child predators and porn. As if that was not bad enough. We still have to also deal with those plus, cyber bullying, identity theft, plagiarism, Myspace, Crag's List, viruses and many more web dangers. It has become so easy to make ourselves vulnerable to all kinds of predators on the Internet. We have to educate ourselves and our students how to play safely online and this video is a good straightforward way to do that.

UEN Reflection Paper

Using the Utah Educational Networks (UEN) website has been eye opening. The most useful part of the website is the ability to make your own web page. Once I got the hang of how to post bookmarks and messages I realize the potential of the site in my future as a teacher. The two sides of the web page public and personal were kind of nice. I could put all the bookmarks need for one school term on my personal page and on the public page only show my students the ones needed for the first week. I could stay organized, but not have the webpage too confusing for my students. The webpage feature could be a wonderful tool for a busy teacher.

Another wonderful resource for teachers and student on the UEN website are the interactives. These are educational online games. As a future teacher I will need many interactives to keep my modern, tech savvy students interested in the core curriculum. UEN also gives students and teacher safe place to surf for these games.

UEN is a great source for complete lesson plans. I will definitely use these. I will not have to reinvent the wheel. I will just need to take the lessons and fix them to meet my students’ needs. The lesson plans are organized in to subjects and grade levels. This will save me time as a busy teacher.

The only thing I did not like about the UEN site was The Pioneer Library. This site was very user unfriendly. First the site made my resign-in every time I went to different page. I also found it confusing and overwhelming. I had to surf the site for ages to find what I needed. Another thing I noticed was a slightly one sided view of subject matter. Maybe that is just me. But you don’t have to take my word for it. My twelve year old son and fifteen year old nephew saw me using the site and said they hated it, too. There were a few things I liked about Pioneer. Searchasaurus was interesting and Emedia will be great for finding video to use in my classroom. Even with Pioneer Library being hard to use, the UEN site is a wonderful tool for students and educators to get the information, lessons, training, and educational games in a safe and well organized website.

Video: "Do Schools Destroy Creativity"

I whole heartedly agree with Sir Ken Robinson. He said that too much focus is made on math and too little on the arts. Even when they do it is never on the art such as theater and dance. School are sending children the wrong messages. Grades are important. Imagination is not. Where will we get the dreamer of tomorrow if we kill all spark of creativity in our children.

UEN: Utah Education

What: This week our class explored the UEN website. The Utah Education Network’s website gives teachers the opportunity to build their own website. They can also get videos, lesson plans and games off the UEN site. It also offered continuing education classes.

Now What: I don’t know how this will affect my life yet. Maybe by the end of next week I will realize the potential of this website. The site does seem to be a treasure trove of information and applications. The first thing I noticed was all the educational games that could be accessed from the website. It is always important to get kids interested in learning and some of these games can do that.

As a student I can find current articles on education and stay informed and up to date. These articles would have come in handy last semester when I took an Intro to Education class. I had to search the internet to find news stories about education today. If I known about UEN it would have save me time. As I use the website more next week I am sure I will find many more uses for it.

So What: I can already see more applications for the UEN website in my future career as a teacher. I can use the online classes to further my education and possible raise my salary and employability. The classes will also keep me well informed about new technologies and teaching techniques. So I guess the website could make me a better teacher.

I think the UEN site might be more than just a simple internet site. It could be a place where teachers would come together, gather lesson plans, games, videos, links, education and information all without leaving their home. Hopefully I will think the same thing after next week.

Video: President Obama's Speech to America's Youth. I thought his speech would upset me, but was pleasantly surprised. He said nothing controversial. This is good. Today youth does need to stay in school and work hard. Motivation to stay in school isn't a bad thing. I just hope they make their own choices and base their lives on what others say.