Comments For Kids 1, 2, & 3

Measurement

My first comment for kids was Ms. Naugles 5th period math class. Their class uses kidblog.org and my specific post that I posted on was about measurements. This is what I had to say:

We are constantly using measurements in our everyday life. Buying groceries at the grocery store you measure several things. How much money you will spend all the way to how many gallons of milk you will need? You always have to measure amounts when cooking. If you go to the gym and work out you have to measure how many pounds you will be working out with. How would you know how long you needed your pants to be or what size shirt you needed? We could not build huge buildings that are sturdy and strongly supported. Measuring is something that we could not live in our society today without. That is why we are taught measurements at a young age in schools.

KPE Episode 339: Fantastic Mr. Fox

My second comment for kids was KPE Episode 339: Fantastic Mr. Fox. It was a podcast done by two young girls on the book Mr. Fantastic Fox. The girls names were Kayla and Sylvia and they are from Pt. England School in Auckland, New Zealand. This is what I said:

Hello Kayla and Sylvia,
My name is Justin Hyde and I am a student in Dr. Stranges EDM 310 class at the University of South Alabama. I felt that your podcast was very well put together and you did a great job explaining this interesting book. I like how you did not only just come out and tell details about the book , but you asked informative questions as well. The fact that your images were keeping up with the story telling really kept me entertained. I like the great work KPE keep it up. This is the link to my class blog,http://hydejustinedm310.blogspot.com/, if you would like to get into some interesting discussions about technology in education.

Antonio’s 5th Grade Blog

My third comment for kids was to comment on Antonio’s Blog. He is a Student in the 5th grade at Pt England School in Auckland, New Zealand. He did not have any post from this year so I chose to comment on his last post from the previous year. This is what I said:

Hi Antonio, my name is Justin Hyde. I am an EDM310 student at the University of South Alabama. I read some of your year 4 blog post. I thought that you wrote some really interesting posts. Hopefully I will get to read some more of your posts from your year 5 blog.

Blog Post 6

The Networked Student

Watching this video I felt like I was hearing a summary of our EDM 310 class at the University of South Alabama. Almost everything they talked about in the video we have either already done or plan to do in the near future. I think that learning will be similar to this in class rooms of all ages, it might not be like this in every class a child takes but I honestly think it will be in most. I have said this several times already and I am going to say it again “technology is the key to the future”, whether it is being taught in the classroom or not.
The big question seems to be “Why does the networked student even need a teacher?” Some people just think that kids can learn anything from blogging and exploring the internet. The way I see it is that kids can learn a ton from blogging and exploring the internet but they needed to be guided in the right direction. So my answer to this question is a definite YES!!!! If children get stuck and cannot find the information they need to do their research they need a teacher to give them resourceful web pages. Also for many of the other questions or problems a child could come across, who will they ask if there is no teacher?

A 7th Grader's Personal Learning Environment (or PLN)

I thought that the 7th graders personal learning environment was very similar to our personal learning network. Her personal learning environment was very well organized. She had a great bit of knowledge for someone of her age. This is just another example of why technology should be used in the classrooms. It showed how you can be doing school work while listening to your favorite music. All your basic needs for education and wants for social interaction together in one easy to access place.

SmartBoards

I actually found several web pages describing the benefits of the SmartBoard in classrooms, here is the link to one of them http://www.waukeshaschools.com/WIT/smartBoard/benefits.htm . I had SmartBoards in my high school but many teachers did not use them to their full potential. One major disadvantage of the SmartBoard is the simple fact in cost. SmartBoards can be expensive if you are trying to put one in every class. I feel strongly toward using them in classrooms for many reasons. One of these reasons being it is an easy and fast way to get kids involved in physical and visual learning.

Project 9B - Instructional Timetoast

Project 9A - Individual Timetoast

Blog Post 5

Eagle Nest Radio & Class Blog

This specific podcast that I watched was a 3rd grade class interviewing a shark diver. I think that the kids in the 3rd grade class had fu with this interview. They had a lot of educational and entertaining questions. They asked Mr. Ward one question and as soon as he finished the asked him another. This just goes to show you how much technology in education is changing the way we learn today. In the 3rd grade I could barley work my way around a computer and had no idea what a podcast even was. You could tell that this podcasts was very well thought out and produced extremely well for the age of children that were involved. This is a great way to teach kids at a young age that technology can be used in learning, it can be fun, and also that it is easy.

100 Ways to Use Your iPod to Learn and Study Better

100 Ways to Use Your iPod to Learn and Study Better is a website that literally gives you a hundred ways to increase your learning and studying ability. It has numerous apps and programs that you can use to make your iPod a extremely resourceful thing. It defiantly shows you that an iPod can be used for educational purposes and not just for listening to music. I thought this website was very interesting and I could see it being helpful to me in the future. It should be a website every teacher informs her students about.

The benefits of podcasting in the classroom

The benefits of podcasting in classrooms is a video that shows several different examples of reasons why teachers should use podcast in schools. One example shows a girl that is sick and cannot make school, but if her teacher used podcasts she could just get online and watch the lecture. I talks about how you can easily keep parents involved in what their children are learning in schools by simply posting podcast on a website. The children can listen to the lecture again after hearing it in class to help them for studying purposes. I think this is a great way of improving children’s ways off learning and also teach them a little about technology.

Project 8 - iTunesU

My Sentence

Blog Post 4

Don't Teach Your Kids This Stuff. Please?

In this poem it is basically pointing out all the negative aspects of the use of internet in schools. It touches on the idea students will just use the internet for porn. It say's pen and paper are not going anywhere, but I beg to differ. Pen and paper may still be here but they will not be used nearly as much. The world is growing to new times and technology seems to be the key to the future. Sure some of the negative things that were mentioned may happen but everything has flaws. If people do not ever take chances and try something new they can not be open for advancement. If everyone always played it safe we might still think the earth was flat. The internet can be used for so many great things that I do not see how people can use these few negative reasons as an argument to not use the internet in school settings.

Scott Mcleod has several different prestiges titles and awards. Dr.Mcleod is an Associate Professor in the Educational Administration program at Iowa State University. He post on several different blogs about technology these include dangerouslyirrelevant.org and occasionally at The Huffington Post. He also is the Director of the UCEA Center for the Advanced Study of Technology Leadership in Education, which is the nations only academic center dedicated to the technology needs of school administrators.

The iSchool Initiative

Schools are always looking to save money due to the fact that they are government funded. So why not look at the iSchool Initiative? The iSchool Initiative is based off every student in the class and the teacher only using an iTouch. All assignments are turned in using email on the iTouch. Books will be downloaded to the iTouch. The internet will be restricted to only allow academic use.

Now that you know a little about the iSchool Initiative let me tell you some of the instant benefits. For one by downloading the books to their iTouch they do not have to carry around a bunch of heavy textbooks. They have instant access to communicate with their teachers and classmates with email and texting at their finger tips. Students can not use the excuse that they forgot their homework. Now some people may say its too expensive to buy everyone an iTouch but these people have not ever bought a classroom set of textbooks, which are quite expensive and not to mention go out of date every couple of years, and this will be instantly saving the schools money.

Watch The Lost Generation

I think in many ways this video is very true. People in our day and age go out of their way to destroy the environment. I feel a change does need to be made in the way people are living their lives. Since when is your profession more important than your own flesh and blood. People need to step back and look at the way they are living their lives. a Change can be made if enough people do something about it. The way her video was delivered was interesting. She stated a list of facts that were scrolling downwards, when she got done she said "all of this will come true unless we choose to rewrite it" then scrolling upwards she rewords everything she just stated but in the opposite order it was said in the beginning. This was a really creative way of getting her point across.

Eric Whitacre’s Virtual Choir

In this video it just goes to show how the internet connects people from all over the world. I thought it was amazing how these people have never met but can get together on the internet and have such a wonderful performance. It also makes you wander what all can we accomplish on the internet. I cant even imagine how they got everybody together to perform something to this extent. I know that i still have a ton to learn about using the internet to it's full potential.

Teaching in the 21st Century

This video makes you think, are our schools teaching students what they need to know. What teachers are trying to teach the students can be found easily on the internet. Should we teach our children the facts or how to find the facts? The world is changing constantly and everyday we become more technologically equipped. I think we need to teach our kids on what they will need to know when they graduate, which is technology.

Blog Post 3

Michael Wesch: A Vision of Students Today

This video was made by a class at Kansas State University. I believe the purpose of this video was to show that kids are not interested in learning. It showed that kids are studying for a test and forgetting the material. They forget the material because they do not feel it is something that they will need to know in life. The teachers don’t know who they are and do not care if they pass or fail which is way different from when they were in high school, so some students don’t get motivated.

When students are not getting motivated they lose focus and start playing on their phones or doing other stuff and stop paying attention all together. A lot of kids just do not go to class, even though they are paying for it, because it is not required to make every class in some classes. In the video it shows how much time students spend on activities other than their school. Students are not getting motivated and they feel that schools are just trying to make money off the. One example is making students buy textbooks for a class and then not even using the books.

"It's Not About the Technology"

This article by Kelly Hines I found to very interesting. She has a very good point technology plays a big part in everyone’s everyday life but not everything is about technology. If you put the best technology in a bad teacher’s class then their teaching skills are not going to get any better, they are going to still be a bad teacher. Technology can make learning easier though if used in the right ways. Also technology is interesting and can make learning fun so that students will want to get involved.

Another good point that she had was if teachers are teaching lessons that their class is not grasping maybe it is not that the kids cannot learn, but they need to take a different approach to the matter. All students don’t learn the same either. Some students get bored just listening to lectures day after day and cannot stay focused and then don’t learn the material. The teacher could solve this problem by just doing hands on activities or just simply get the students involved in learning.

Karl Fisch: Is It Okay to Be A Technologically Illiterate Teacher?

Do I believe that teachers can be technologically illiterate and it is okay? I think that the answer to this question is yes and no. Honestly I do not think it is and should be okay for teachers to technologically illiterate. I feel that teachers should know at least to a certain extent how to teach with technology. The simple fact that they don’t want to learn or don’t like technology is not an excuse because whether they like it or not technology is becoming used more and more every day.

The other side to this argument is simply this there are teachers all over the world that are technologically illiterate and nothing is being done about it. In my high school we had Smart Boards in every class. Now with that said I only used the Smart Board in maybe half of these classes. In some cases the teachers would use an old chalkboard right next to the Smart Board. Either they were afraid of breaking the new expensive equipment or they did not know how to use it. Regardless the point is nothing was being done to change the fact that the technology was not being used.

Gary Hayes Social Media Count



As you can see from the image above Technology is growing at a crazy fast rate. As a matter of fact faster than it has ever grown before. It makes you wander what the future has in store for us. I think that technology can be used to keep kids interested in learning and that it can be beneficial for both teachers and students. In this way students can be motivated to learn and for teachers it can be a easier way to teach if used in the right way.

C4T #1 Jenny Luca

My C4T assignment was to comment on Ms.Jenny Luca's Blog page. Ms. Jenny is Head of Information Services at Toorak College in Mt.Eliza, Australia.
For my first comment was on her blog post about wanting to become a Google Instructor.Her blog post was a video interview for a Google instructor an she was discussing how children do not use books for finding information, they just Google it.This was my comment:

Hi my name is Justin Hyde and I am a student in EDM310 at the University of South Alabama. I do feel that education is being changed more and more everyday. Where you would once have to go to a library, find a book, and then read the needed material, you can now do the same thing on the internet in a fraction of the time with a simple Google search. This opens a whole new window of education and learning. It makes you think what if one day students will not even go to class and everything will be done over web chats and online videos. Good luck with becoming a Google Instructor.

I have been assigned to follow your blog for the next month and after the month is up I will be writing a blog on what I have learned. You can follow my blog at hydejustinedm310@blogspot, our class blog is edm310@blogspot, and also you can find me on twitter @jchyde01.

The second blog that I commented on was a post about Twitter and how it is being used more and more everyday.She explains that Twitter is becoming a vital component in education and that technology is becoming increasingly more popular each and every day. Twitter, if used correctly, can be a professional tool and helps you stay connected with people from all around the world. This is the comment that I wrote her:

I am starting to myself find out that Twitter can be useful for staying up to date with valuable information. At first i thought it was a extremely overrated way to see when friends are doing their laundry, but now I am starting to understand it is all about who you follow. Following the right people and you can have all kinds of useful information.

How I Ended Up Here - Google Presentation