Personal Learning Experience

               Personal learning networks are necessary resources educators should obtain to continue learning in the education field. The three accounts that I created for my PLN were Twitter, Feedly, and Classroom 2.0. All three were successful tools to expand my knowledge in the education field and to begin my PLN journey. 

            I really adore Twitter. I was one of the few in the EDUC422 class who already had a Twitter account. I made a new educational Twitter account, @emilyadlercsusm. I followed about 28 educational accounts and received an impressive fourteen followers back. I followed Education Week, MIND Research, Edutopia, and the Huffington Post Education Twitter accounts. I also followed teachers, such as Carlos Gomez Jr, Craig Gehring, Professor Chen, Lee Kolbert, and Tom Barrett. I as well followed the discussion hashtag of #ConnectedLearning where I learned a lot about technology in the classroom and different technology tools. What impressed me also were the people who wanted to follow me because my account was just made. I have a computer scientist and author of The Curiosity Cycle: Preparing Your Child for the Ongoing Technological Explosion, a neuroscience and psychologist educational science blogger, the San Diego Post, and two educator blogger and entrepreneurs following me on Twitter. MIND Research and a Forbe’s journalist on global education and game-based learning decided to follow me back too. I really enjoy my educational network that I made on Twitter. I benefit from Twitter because of its fast activity and its capability of obtaining such a large social network to make infinite connections. With the connections I made, I was able to read many influential and educational articles. I tweeted a few times and only received favorites, but no replies.

            Classroom 2.0 was new for me and I couldn’t be happier that I made an account. I feel it’s almost as if the library, Facebook, Twitter, and Google were combined in one for educational purposes. I posted a few times and have a classmate, Tracy, as one of my colleagues. It has a wide variety of different resources, groups to join, discussions, and a Learning Revolution project. I watched a video from the Beautiful Nation project called “Connecting Students to their World.” Their mission is to teach and promote global citizenship. With the current situation in South Carolina and the remarks by Donald Trump towards Mexican immigrants, and this year’s police escapade, teaching global citizenship is crucial! They take students on a boat trip and they get to experience and research different countries. It was a beautiful video presentation and I learned how this learning project is teaching young students to become good global citizens as they travel to different countries all while learning about the science and nature of the sea. 

            I really enjoyed Feedly because I felt that it was an organized YouTube, Tumblr, Twitter, Pinterest, and library. When you type in education, Feedly provides many tools educators can read and benefit from such as the Educational NPR. I’ve always enjoyed TedTalks and I enjoy that I can find them on Feedly. In addition, I enjoy how you can search topics by hashtag as like Twitter. I can also use Feedly for my personal use beyond educational purposes. Feedly seems to have a numerous amount of research on any topic.

            My PLN has been really successful. I made amazing connections through Twitter, I have the educational encyclopedia on Classroom 2.0, and the entire encyclopedia with Feedly. I cannot complain, as I am a very happy EDUC422 student. I gained a numerous amount of educational tools for the classroom and feel that I have professionally grown as a future educator. As finding new fun ideas is always going to my mission as an educator, I am guaranteed to continue use with my PLN in my classroom.

S'Cool Tools: 5 Great Tools to Perk Up Your Classroom and Engage Your Students

         I believe I found the best article for my last summer reading reflection blog post. The 5 learning tools, not toys, were carefully selected because they were the new, easy to use, to enhance teaching and learning. Lego Education’s WeDo Robotics Construction Set is designed for ages 7-11 that contains 12 different model activities with a motor, a motion sensor, 160 Lego blocks, and icon-based software. Students can make alligators that mouths open and close and airplanes that plays sound when they move. This will definitely be a hit for the young kinesthetic learners. The Smart Table is the new and cooler Smart Board. It is a “multitouch, multiuser (up to eight users), interactive learner center with customizable applications.” The table’s tool kit provides prepared lesson plans where the teacher can also replace his or her own pictures and content.  This fascinating tool motivates and excites children to learn. The AVer Pen can take pictures, record videos, writes on any surface, projects images, forms graphs, and many other cool and unique features. They say it’s similar to the smart board, but no board! It is simply the new board-less and paperless tool of the future! The lesson plans can be projected on to anywhere or anything in the room. Each pen also “has a built-in answer selection keypad that acts as a group response system that displays poll results as graphs and tables.” The next tool is the New Multiuser Virtual Environments. This tool brings the fun into making games that also meet the curriculum. Teenagers love it, because who wouldn’t love to be learning while making video games! The last tool is Google Apps Education Community. The website has links to dozens of lesson plans posted by teachers who use Google Apps in the classroom. The app is purposely for teachers in sharing their ideas, voting on their favorite educational apps, and asking advice. The website is about Google, “reaching out to educators to provide tools for Internet searching, collaboration, and classroom activities…” I hope to be lucky to use any of these tools for my classroom.

            I loved this article because I felt that I finally accomplished finding more technology educational friendly tools beyond iPads, phones, computers, and apps. Although, some are costly, in time the cost will be reduced. I think a lot about what happens when students are no longer entertained and fascinated by iPads and computers? Then what are the next tools to look beyond to as educators? This article really hit on fun and unique tools to extremely excite students and learning. Google Apps Education Community is a real winner too for educators, and it’s free! Again, I hope to be lucky enough where these tools are affordable and can be implemented in to all classrooms!

Brown, M. (November 2009) 5’Scool Tools. 5 Great Tools to Perk Up Your Classroom and Engage Your Students, Learning and Leading with Technology, (37) 3, 12-15.

PE: Bring your sneakers, racket, and iPad?

     

     This article was fun to read because it’s about how resourceful iPads are to a physical education classroom. Unfortunately, I feel that for younger grades, physical education isn’t practiced anymore and that needs to change. PE teaches the importance of physical health and good nutrition. This is so important for the younger generation to know because obesity in children has skyrocketed in the United States. I never thought that iPads could be used in PE class. But with helpful apps provided from this article, it almost sounds silly to not have iPads in the class. The article shares ideas that teachers can easily record grades, take attendance, and even show movies or videos. Apps such as BMI calculator, iMuscle, Fast Food Calorie Counter, Pocket First Aid and CPR, are just some of the few awesome apps to use for your PE class. For all grades, there’s also Yoga HD app and iFiVi, which is a free personal fitness app that includes fun workouts, calculators, and trackers. 

            I remember in high school we had fitness journals that recorded our mile times, heart rates, rep counts, and BMI calculations.  I think that journals could easily be replaced by iPads. I also feel that if children in elementary schools are already exposed to iPads, why not enforce the importance of exercise with taking time of your lesson plan and use the iPads for PE? I think they would all love to do yoga and start their own personal fitness journal. It is never too early to start educating children the importance of physical exercise and good nutrition.  Especially in our country, where obesity in children is extremely rising, so this should be taken very seriously. I think this would be a useful way to bring back the importance of fun of PE. However, I also think it is kind of risky. iPads are expensive and it shouldn’t necessarily be with kids running around.

Felker, K. (May 2011) PE: Bring your sneakers, racket, and iPad. Learning and Leading with Technology, 38(7), 32-33.

10 Tips for Implementing Social Media in the Classroom

       

    

        I found this article to be beneficial for every teacher for all grade levels and setting. Social Media is powerful, universal, and beneficial for the learning and teaching process, as it is for celebrities, businesses, and personal interests and connections. Almost everyone has some account for some kind of social media site. So, why not make the time for your students, while they’re already on the social media site, to learn and become a successful student? Here are the ten ways to incorporate social media into the classroom. Tip 1: Become social media savvy and boost your technology confidence. Tip 2: Get to know your school’s tech support specialists. Tip 3: Beware of buffering…buffering…Tip 4: Get students email access. Tip 5: Can everyone see? Tip 6: Embrace BYOT (or BYOD).  Tip 7: Don’t wait until the last minute to test technology. Tip 8: Set some technology ground rules. Tip 9: Teach students to be good cybercitizens. Tip 10: Follow up to reinforce learning. Today we’re all addicted to our phones or gadgets, regardless of our age. How ideal is it to have a piece of your classroom on their devices, in their hands, at all times? I believe that social media can also help break the norm for younger and older students of not wanting to be engaged in school or learning.

            Before this class, I really wasn’t sure how social media could help a classroom. My boyfriend even asked about how could twitter work for careers in education? And so I showed him. As I explore myself, with my new educational twitter account and Classroom 2.0, along with the other tools that were presented to us in class, are beneficial to the students’ learning process. If everyone is already so adjust to using social media, it seems only logical to implement educational use to it. Collaboration and communication are very important elements to the ISTE standards for students. With the use of blogs, twitter, and other social media sources, students will learn about responsibility and being good digital citizens, another element for the ISTE standards for students. With these 10 helpful tips, I know now how to successful implement social media into my classrooms.

Ertmer, P. (March/April 2014). 10 Tips for implementing social media in the classroom. Learning and Leading with Technology, 21(6), 32-24.

Universal Design for Learning and Assistive Technology

       

     In this week’s article and video on universal design for learning, provided me with great ideas and tools to help all students with diverse learning, and particularly those with special needs. In the video, Universal Design for Learning, it discussed the three main components to universal design: representation, action/expression, and engagement. Representation is important for teachers and students because it shows students information in different ways. Action and expression allow students to challenge themselves with learning tasks and perform what they know in various ways. Engagement offers options that engage students and keep their interests. This is important for all teachers to perform in their classrooms for their students’ learning success.  In the article, I found many helpful tools and ideas to help all students, such as, Bubble, ieSpell, and Microsoft office 2007 Smart Art Plug. I also learned that it is good to keep a healthy communicative and understanding relationship with your IT department at your school because it is important that your students’ needs are met. This will also help by creating your school into a successful AT environment that students will love to learn. Before reading this article, I never knew what disk imaging was. Now I understand how helpful resources are for students with learning disabilities and how easily accessible it can be too because of disk imaging and Microsoft Installer. 

           

            I worry that because that I went to private school all my life, I lack the experience of having special needs students in the classrooms. As a future educator, I do not want this inexperience to make my teaching in special needs a weakness. With the help of assistive technology and universal learning design, I can make teaching special needs students a strength. My boyfriend has learning disabilities and he excels in online courses over traditional classroom setting. I have great faith of what assistive technology can do for students with learning disabilities. I understand that I also need to create a great relationship with the IT department. I can also use assistive technology and universal design for all students in my classroom. In addition, I feel that I will also use the provided educational tools and sites for my future classrooms to provide diverse learning for my students. Lastly, I felt that the universal learning design video very much reflected my philosophy as a future educator.

Ahrens, K. (2011). Build an assistive technology toolkit.Learning & Leading with Technology, 39(3), 22-24.

Is BYOD the Answer to Our Problems or the Worst Idea Ever?

Resources are limited at some schools and some cannot even afford the technology resources. BYOD stands for Bring Your Own Device. It is thought that BYOD is the future because some schools lack funding to buy technology resources and some lack the knowledge to implement technology. However, BYOD can cause high teacher anxiety and unfair for students who don’t have the top of the line technology. Others say that BYOD permits collaboration and sharing of resources. To deal with fairness, they compare that it is the tough reality of having luxury and standard/basic. BYOD still helps technology be incorporated into almost all classrooms because not all students really need the same device to use the Internet. Students can find the right tools and assess their learning needs without adult intervention with BYOD. Others complain about the image of having all thirty students with all different devices and not knowing what to do. Today, teachers desperately encourage students to have their cell phones powered off during class. However, with BYOD the key is a cell phone.  They promote to have the cell phone ban removed in schools and to instead have the cell phones connected to the internet and involved with the class lesson.

            I think BYOD is an interesting concept because almost everyone has a smart phone or tablet, laptop, iPod, or iPad. There is also a huge funding problem for schools that cannot meet every teachers’ and students’ need. As a society, if we were all already so connected to our smart phones, wouldn’t it be smart to incorporate the device in your learning and teaching process? Personally I haven’t used my smart phone for the learning process but I can definitely see how I can incorporate it in the teaching process. In classes today, I’m usually researching something on my phone, although I have student computers in front of me! Preference of technology is important to a student’s learning process. I know funding for schools is difficult and it seems that this could be the answer to our problems.

This article connects to ISTE standards for students and teachers. ISTE Standard 6 for students is Technology operations and concepts and is when students “students demonstrate a sound understanding of technology concepts, systems, and operations.” With BYOD they all are responsible for their own technology learning experience. ISTE Standard 3 for teachers is Model Digital age work and learning and is when teachers “communicate relevant information and ideas effectively to students, parents, and peers, using a variety of digital age media and formats.” With the use of multiple technology learning devices, the teacher will be able to transform her lesson plan to suit all devices for the benefit of the student and his or her learning process.

Do you think BYOD is the answer or the worst idea ever?

McAnear, A. (2012 February). Is BYOD the Answer to Our Problems or the Worst Idea Ever. Learning and Leading with Technology, 39(5), 5-7.

First Graders with iPads?

          

 
          Although some schools are hesitant to give elementary students iPads, they should hesitate no longer. iPads are a great technology resource to improve reading results in students, along with other subjects. However, for this article purpose, we are focusing on how iPads can benefit students’ literacy. They help teachers as well by creating new and fun lesson plans and strategies. After research and focusing on 6 different groups, their research showed improved scores for students with daily iPad use. For teachers that are hesitant, the authors claim that it was very easy to manage the first grade class with iPads. They even provided useful tips and techniques to get the teacher started and have the students under control when first introducing iPads to their classrooms. The article contains a list of multiple educational apps that improve a student’s reading. These teachers were also capable to incorporate in their teaching, digital citizenship and digital age skills. The article continues to describe some of the downfalls because nothing is perfect. However, the overall there are definitely more benefits than risks to bringing iPads to the classroom. It brings an enjoyable learning environment for all grade levels. iPads take learning beyond the classroom and meet the needs for students who are visual learners and will improve reading.

            At first I was very skeptical about iPads in the classroom because I am no fool to what students can do with technology. I was one of them in high school with my own tablet playing video games during a history lecture. However, when I observed 1^st and 2^nd grade with Chromebooks and the kindergarten with iPads, I found hope.  They understood digital citizenship and skills incredibly faster as when I did while I was in school. If I had resources like these, I am sure reading and writing wouldn’t be weaknesses of mine like they are today. Today, getting students to enjoy reading can be difficult. With the luck of iPads they made reading fun and enjoyable. iPads can turn reading as a weakness and develop it into a strength. As a future middle school or elementary school teacher, I feel that I will use iPads in my class. It brings a fun learning environment to the classroom.

            This article focuses on both ISTE standards for students and teachers. Standard 5 for students is Digital citizenship and is when students “exhibit a positive attitude toward using technology that supports collaboration, learning, and productivity.” These students eagerly wait to play educational reading, writing, and vocabulary app games. Standard 2 for teachers is Design and Develop digital age learning experiences and assessments and is when teachers “design and adapt relevant learning experiences that incorporate digital tools and resources to promote student learning and creativity.” iPads not just improve students, but help teachers as well!

Will you have iPads in your classroom?  

Getting S. & Swainey K. (2012 August). First Graders with iPads. Learning & Leading with Technology, 40(1), 24-27.