The ITEC Blog

Chapter 9 in “Web 2.0: new schools, new tools”, focused on where we are now as far as technology is concerned and what direction we should be heading in. It states that 40 percent of American households either do not have a computer or internet access. This is unacceptable. How can we have our students “stretch” their brains if there is no continued support at home. I know it’s not the families fault but as a country we can do more to “improve” the technology standards within our homes.

In order for schools to improve the use of technology in the system. Everyone from the students up to the superintendents need to be using technology on a daily basis. Schools need to work with parents and the governments to get smaller models of the technology that is being used in schools in the homes.

And finally we as teachers need to be creativein coming up with ways to integrate techonology into all aspects of education.

There is an social, educational, and technological divide in this country. We all need to step up to the plate and do our part to shrink the divide.

The reading this week were Chapter 6 from the textbook and “New Va. law: Teach web safety
Virginia now requires educators to teach the perils of online predators” article by Robert Brumfield, Assistant Editor, eSchool News. 

The topic was about the role of adminstrators in integrating technology into the schools. The article tells that school systems must develop internet use policies and teach our students about online predators. The superintendants must now create lesson plans that will be incorporated into the curriculum to help teachers prepare their students for sufring the internet.

Chapter 6 focuses more on what a school system has to do to be successful in incorporating technology into the classrooms and their students lives. A few qualitites that must be attained are organizational skills, courage, strategic skills, and operating skills. Once these are mastered a school system has a high chance of acheiving success in using 21st century skills in the classroom. It also helps if adminstrators use the tools they are trying to incorporate into the schools. For instance, most schools now have a webpage where they post pictures and news. Principals could also use a blog to keep parents up to date on school happenings. An adminstrator could also use a wiki to develop an agenda for a meeting by having others add what they need to talk about.

The more technology is used by everyone involved in a school system, the easier it will be to successfully incorporate it into curriculum. 

This week’s reading talked about professional development and teaching digital natives (kids who grew up with technology).

As far as professional development is concerned with information literacy it has to be a continuing effort, not something that is talked about once a year or so. The teachers also need to incorporate the technology into the classroom environments and share how they are using it with their co-workers and what works and doesn’t work. Also, when having professional development classes the “instructor” needs to incorporate as many Web 2.0 tools as possible into the training session.

The VSTE journal discusses digital natives and digital immigrants. Digital immigrants are the teachers who are not “experts” with technology. Digital natives are those who grew up with technology and are more than comfortable using it. The challenge for teachers is finding a balance between learning from our students and actually teaching our students. We have to find a way to teach the students to challenge themselves with technology not just be comfortable with it. Here is one method that will help in this endeavour:

• Search – Search for information in multiple locations including different search engines

• Collect – Collect information you have found for further consideration. Cite all sources as

• Reflect – Reflect on the entire process. Did you accomplish your goal? Should the goal beredefined or reevaluated?

This week’s reading was from Chapter 4 in Web 2.0: “New tools, new schools”. This chapter was filled with tons of ideas on how to incorporate Web 2.0 tools into the classroom. Here’s just a tiny sliver of what they mentioned.

            Blog Ideas:

·        Journals

·        Daily log of activities

·        Way to brainstorm and get feedback

Wiki Ideas:

·        Collaborative projects

·        Literature circles

Podcasting Ideas:

·        Verbal thought processing

·        Response to essay type questions

 Digital Storytelling:

·        Interdisciplinary projects

·        Public service announcements

These are just a few ideas given on how to implement the new tools into your classroom. There are hundreds of more ways and all you have to do to find them is search the internet!

This chapter also breaks ideas into subject areas. By doing this is gives you more specific websites that you can go to for more ideas. For instance, since I’m a science person, I might want to check out http://www.twis.org for some current event podcasting. Or for a broader category of subjects a great place to check out is http://www.thinkquest.org .

 Not only are there already a ton of ideas for implementing out there in books and on the internet, but every one of us is probably come up with some way to creatively incorporate the tools into our classroom. We live in the digital age; it’s time to “think out of the box”!

Chapter 3, in “Web 2.0: new tools, new schools” is loaded with ideas and sources of help to make a classroom more interactive with the new technology that is out there. This chapter covers almost all web tools that are out there to use and it also give a description of what they are and the pro’s and con’s of them. It talks about podcasts, wikis, blogs, photo editing, video sharing, social bookmarking, etc. This chapter gave me a through understanding of each Web 2.0 tool.

 I’m very interested in trying out these tools the next time I get into a classroom. I know the students would be interested as well. The other source the chapter gave out was some websites that have interactive activities and modules that students can use to help them understand a topic, such as http://phet.colorado.edu/new/index.php, which has virtual simulations that you can “play” with.

One warning the chapter puts out is that some of these tools do need to have monitoring by an adult, such as with MySpace, and others need to be evaluated for accuracy and appropriateness of content, such as with Wikpedia.

So, I just finished reading Chapter 2 in “Web 2.0: new tools, new schools” by Gwen Solomon and Lynne Schrum. The material in this chapter really wasn’t a surprise to me. They say that the students we teach today are the technology generation, well I must fall between them and the “do it the old school way” generation. I am very comfortable with technology, but I still learn some tricks from the younger generation!

Our kids today are constantly doing something involving technology, texting, IMing, playing video games, etc. All of these activities involve communication and interaction. So, how are we going to get our students interested in what we teach them??? Hmmm…I wonder!

The best way to teach our students and keep them engaged is by using a constructivist method. This allows students to take the problem/topic at hand and discover more about it in their own methods, wether it be using the internet, textbooks, or library and presenting it in any number of ways, videos, websites, paper-based, etc. In order to be able to use constructivism in the classroom, we must have connectivism. We have to have access to the technology that will support our students dreams!

The chapter closes by warning us of two dangers that we must be on the look out for(p.41):

1) Not measuring what really matters even if it will matter more in the future

2) Not narrowing the instruction to the exclusion of anything more than test materials

I love using constructivism in my lessons, because it allows for flexibility in all areas: disablities, learning styles, intelligences, and abilities. It allows for the success of all students and this is what we want isn’t it?

Here’s my Twitter address: http://twitter.com/ChristineBounds

Should be fun!

Here’s the link to my social bookmarking site: http://ikeepbookmarks.com/Christine_Bounds

Not too much there yet, but I’ll work on getting more there. Enjoy!

Here’s my wiki address: http://washdigitallit.wikispaces.com

There’s not much there now, but I’ll get it going shortly!

This week, we read Chapters 1 & 7 in “Web 2.0 new tool, new schools”. Chapter 1 basically emphasized the oppurtunities Web 2.0 gives to everyone. As teacher’s we need to be able to give students the most recent tools available to prepare them for challenges and to make them competitive. The new tools that are available easily engage and motivate students. We need to use these tools along with creativity, collaboration, and communication to ensure our students are well prepared for the extremely competitive world. As a country we must teach “using a flexible approach rather than teaching what will be tested” (p. 21). For the most part our students know more about technology than we do. They are the technology savvy generation. ”Today’s education system faces irrelevance unless we bridge the gap between how students live and how they learn” (p.19). Web 2.0 also allows for interconnectedness and collaboration like we’ve never had before. We don’t have to do anything alone anymore. One thing I found interesting was how other countries have integrated technology into the main framework of their schools and in the U.S., we might say we are going to do that, but the money seems to keep vanishing from the technology programs. As educators we can have an influence and that is what we’ll have to do in order to make the change of direction in our education systems.

Chapter 7 focused more on the safety issues of using Web 2.0 and its off-springs. As far as districts are concerned they should have filtering and blocking programs installed on ALL computers in the district. They also must implement an Internet safety policy that all administrators, staff members, students, and parents understand and agree to follow. As individual schools and teachers we must open the lines of communication to ensure that students understand what is right and wrong to do on the computer. One thing that constantly has to be reinforced to students is to give credit to everything you use on the web. I think that is one of the hardest things to get across to students. As they get older they tend to get lazier and just don’t “care” about it.  The key to Internet safety is for everyone to be vigilant!