Wednesday, May 5, 2010

Petch Kutcha Presentation "Childproofing Your Home

This is a presentation that offers helpful advise on how to and what to consider when childproofing your home. I have embeded 2 videos, one from google docs and the other from voice thread. I choose this topic to talk about because I am a future teacher, and not only do I worry about the safety and well being of my students at school, but also at home. These few helpful tips, if used can help change the percentage of unintentional accidents or deaths at home.




Sunday, April 25, 2010

Google forms "what is your major?"

This google form I created was not used my any of my peers. I made this form viewable by all, but for some reason no one replied to the questions; but I was able to send this form to some of my friends that happen to be in the education field too. I asked 10 people to submit the form to me via email. The first question "What is your major," 8 out of 10 are Early Childhood Education majors, the other 2 are Elementary Education. I have been in the Education program for a few years, and most if not all my friends are Education majors, so choosing people to fill out the form was not hard! The second question "Why did you choose this major," was a very fun and interesting to read all the responses from my friends. For the most part they all said "because they love kids" but a few said more to "my family is full of teachers, and I grew up in that environment so I felt comfortable choosing this major." It was interesting to hear why people choose to be a teacher; despite the horrible salary. I personally love children and love the way it feels when a child has learned something new and or work a problems all on their own. This is the best feeling, plus I get paid for being creative! The next question was more out of my curiosity; "Where are you wanting to teach when you graduate?" These answers were more random and different than the other questions. Almost half of the answers (including mine) were to teach in the Deer Creek district; 3 people choose choose the Edmond district, 2 person choose "somewhere in Tulsa," and 1 person did not know where they would want to teach (unknown). Overall I enjoyed reading the responses of my peers, and really loved to read their reasons for becoming a teacher. Its nice to know there are soon to be wonderful and dedicated teachers that will be teaching our future leaders!

Orientation in Second Life

This video tutorial is very interesting and also very confusing at the same time. I don't know if it was just me, but it took me awhile to understand the meaning to this video and exactly what they were talking about. Second Life, from what I understood from the video, is a software that is basically a virtual message world. It contains avatars, of yourself, and you can communicate with others in the system. But the point of the video was to explain a few issues that are being fixed to make Second Life easier to use; such problems include keyboard functions, language barriers, and information processing.



The most significant takeaway form this video is just how amazingly detailed this software is! I have never, until now, have heard of Second Life, but I assume it is not expensive. To have a software with that good of picture and be inexpensive is amazing. The whole idea of Second Life is understandable, but I wonder will communication become more a video game than a chat line?
As far as schooling, I never have come across anything that is remotely close to this! Yes, I have computer games and yes I chat with instant message, but to put both together is amazing. There maybe something out that is like this software, maybe even better and I may just be technologically behind!
I see this software being used more in the home environment, but not in the schools. Communication is a great aspect but this software makes it more of a video game (and a lot of focus on images rather than the content of the conversation) than a message board. I may be totally off but from what I got from this video, I don't believe this could be useful in the classroom.

Screencast

This is my screencast for T4T. I had a great time doing it and I hope others can benefit from it as well. I decided to do my screencast on a facebook task. I gave instructions on how to create a group and to manage your group to allow others to become members. Groups on facebook can be a great tool for socialization and meeting others with similar interests! ENJOY





For some reason my video is not showing, but if I don't get this fixed in time for you to access it from here go to the link!

Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Wizard of Apps

This video was very entertaining and cheesy at times! But the information on the other hand is important and crucial went working online. The basic theme to this video was to learn ways and to find apps that will allow students and adults even, to explore and collaborate safely online.


The most significant takeaway from this video would be the multiple apps available to anyone. I would have loved all these apps available to me when I was in high school. I can't even imagine the time these could have saved me! But knowing they are they ready for me to use, I will most definitely use them for college research and even research that I do when I graduate and become a teacher.
One great aspect of the video, are the multiple sites and apps you can use to see your digital footprint; to see what your employees might see, or what is seen of you online (where you have been). One major aspect that I though could be helpful to students of all ages, would be the multiple sights citations. This was a major pain for me in school; citing resources was difficult to the lack of know how and the overwhelming supply of information to use in the work cited. These apps (noodletools, Bibme, Easybib, and creative commons) help with forming citations and how to make sure you use the correct information on the work cited.
Like I said this video was fun to watch, maybe a tad bit to long, but entertaining. This was a good way to get information that maybe difficult to understand, across to all people. The helpful sources and sites that are offered in the video provide many opportunities for students to share information and collaborate on newly found material (great opportunity for scaffolding).
I was able to access a sight called Citation Machine. When watching the Wizard of Apps video, this site caught my attention. I was and still am having trouble with citing certain resources. This website offers many formats to choose from; all the student has to do is choose a format, plug in the general information, then the site does the rest! Its little things like this that make all the difference! Ill just say that now I have found this, I will definitely be using it in my up coming research papers!

Saturday, March 13, 2010

Whats your major?

This is a survey that I made to find out what my classmates are majoring in! I am in early childhood education and would love to find out what other education majors are in T4T with me! So far I don't think anyone has taken it, but I hope they will soon!

Sam I am!

This video is about a 13 year old named Sam (Samantha) and how she uses technology in a day to day basis. She explains how she how much time she spends on the computer or cell phone. She enjoys helping and teaching others about digital media.





The most significant takeaway from this video is how much time the average teen is spending on the computer or cell phone these days. Sam, for instance spends (on a school day) about 2 hours on the computer, and on a non school day she spends roughly 12 hours on the computer or cell phone. To me, that seems like a lot of time to spend on the computer. Yes she needs to do homework, but I don't think she is spending time 0n the computer at home, on a non school day doing homework! She is spending time playing games and chatting with friends on facebook or myspace.
I know facebook is popular, and I even spend time on the computer, but not near 12 hours! That seems a little extreme to me. Before high school I can say that I didn't spend much time if any on the computer. Yes well, facebook wasn't not existing yet, but myspace was and many kids just weren't into computer catting. I think the reason for that is because cell phones were becoming more and more popular then.
Like I have said before, scaffolding is predominate factor in this video. Sam takes the opportunity to help and teach others her age, and even older. She exchanges information with others and even learns something new in the process.