Blog Post#5 Part 2

Personal Learning Network: Part Two

Through this semester of EDM310 my PLN has expanded. I found that through Twitter I could connect with many teachers and get real responses from them. I enjoy seeing the information shared and the hashtag conversations about education topics. I also use the C4T assignments to find teachers blogs to follow and read. Not all of the teachers comment back but there are some teachers who will take the time to respond to you on their blog. I think it is great to have a large and growing PLN. I hope to continue to add to my PLN even after EDM310. I am glad that I have such easy access to speak to educators who can help me through my journey of becoming an educator and will continue to help me as I start and continue my career as an educator.

C4T #4

For C4T this month we were to choose our own C4T teacher. I chose Sharon Davison and her blog "Kindergarten Life". Davison's most recent blog is 'A Celebration of Learning: Engaging Families Inside and Out!'. In this blog Davison discusses how she involves parents in her classroom. Davison has 'celebration of learning' days were the parents come into the classroom and are involved with the students and their work. One family could not make it to the class so they used Facetime to involve the parents so the could experience this day as if they were there. Davison shared that she believes that technology is a great way to involve parents in the class. By the examples she gave, I agree with Davison. I commented to Davison and introduced myself explaining to her that I had chosen her for this assignment. I shared with Davison that I have began looking into parental involvement in the classroom even though I am not yet an educator and suggested an app for her to use. I thanked Davison for her great idea of 'celebration of learning' day and shared with her a link to my blog.

For my last C4K I commented on the blog of Sharon Davison. The blog post I chose to comment on was titled SKYPE: A Way To Connect, Enrich and Engage. In this blog post Davison discusses how she uses Skype in her classroom with her students. One way Davison used Skype was by having a guest speaker talk to the class through Skype. By doing this the students could have a technology lesson through using Skype and learn information from the guest speaker. I commented to Davison and told her that I loved her idea of using Skype to have a guest speaker for the class. I shared with Davison that I use Skype weekly to speak to my niece and nephew in Hawaii so I love the idea of using Skype to communicate. I enjoyed reading Davison's blog post and will be using this idea in my future classroom.

Blog Post#14

For this post I was assigned to read Teaching Can Be a Profession by Joel Klein. In this article I found three problems and three solutions:

Pick From The Best
Problem: Most people will get hired as an educator by just having a degree.
Solution: Recruit from the top rankings of graduates.

When it comes to creating a competitive job field for educators I agree. The more passionate future teachers are about getting a job, the more they will appreciate the opportunity. In my opinion, this will lead to more teachers who want to teach and should teach. Often you find teachers that seem to not care about being in the classroom, but just want an encome. Hopefully by making teaching into a harder job field to be in, we will be left with more teachers who care about education.

Seniority Distraction
Problem: Teachers with years of experience will always be chosen over beginner teachers, no matter the circumstances.
Solution: Professionalize teaching and treat all teachers as equals who earn their levels of achievement.

Seniority distraction is a very popular situation in the education system. I completely agree with treating teachers as equals and requiring teachers to earn their place. This is also a situation that will drive teachers to push harder to achieve success for themselves and in the classroom. I believe that teachers should not be judged by the amount of time they have spent teaching, but by the quality of their teaching.

Radical Change
Problem: Teachers are not treating their jobs as a profession.
Solution: "National Teacher Examination", one-three year(s) of internship for prospective teachers, teachers will provide and create their own standards, and promotions based on specialty exams.

The solution to radical change is not something I can completely agree with. I do believe that a "National Teacher Examination" and one-three year(s) internship would be very beneficial for future and current educators but I am not for certain in agreement with teachers creating their own standards. In this part of the article, Joel Klein had several interesting ideas for the school system. Radical was most certainly a good choice of wording. I do agree with the idea as a whole. Teachers should have to prove themselves and be able to live up to the standards they should accomplish as educators.

In conclusion, I believe that Joel Klein's idea of professionalizing education is something that must be done. Teachers should have standards that need to be met and checked for approval yearly or when deemed necessary. Teaching should be a profession that is based on hard work and qualification, not just a school degree. This article made me think about situations that I have not thought about before. This made me realize that if I agree with these solutions that I should live up to them. I should work harder for this degree I am seeking and achieve this degree because I earned it.

C4K for November

For this months first C4K I was assigned to Sean. In Sean's blog "Simile and Metaphors" Sean wrote two metaphors and three similes. I believe Sean's work was very good for a fifth grader. Sean also included pictures in his blog to go along with each smile and metaphor. This made his blog more appealing to the reader. I commented on Sean's blog and applauded him for the great work. I also suggested to him that he could try and use his own artwork to go along with his writings.

This week I was assigned to the art blog of Ally. In her blog "Product Design" Ally wrote about her experiment of making book marks that fit the corner of your book. Ally included pictures in her blog of steps for the project and her final outcome. Ally did a wonderful job describing what she had to do and how she felt about doing it. I believe she had a very well written and interesting blog. I commented to Ally and told her I loved her blog. I explained to Ally that I am also taking an art class and I have done some of the projects she posted about. I complimented Ally on her great blog writting skills and cool idea. I hope to keep visiting Ally's blog to see her artwork and learn a few things.



For my last C4K I was assigned to Ben's blog. Ben's post was titled "Razzle Dazzle" and in his post he used descriptive language to share about his first quarter of this school year. Ben didn't seem to like this quarter very much, but he seemed hopeful for the next semester. I commented to Ben and complemented him on his great use of descriptive words. I told Ben that his writing was wonderful and next time he should try to write a longer blog so the reader will be able to experience more of his writing.

Project #12 Part B

Blog Post #13

What did I leave out?
Create an assignment for a Blog Post I should have created in your area of specialty.

How will you use technology in your classroom to keep parents involved and informed? What will you do for parents/guardians without internet access?

Read the following:
-A Guide to Involving Parents in Your Class Blog
-Keep parents in the loop with a class website
-Using a classroom webpage to communicate with parents

-After reading the following, find one type of technology to use in your classroom for parents/guardians to be added to this list. Explain how you will use this in your classroom and what you will do for parents that do not have internet access.
Answer the question in a post that adheres to the standards found in the ACCRS and in Writing A Quality Blog Post.



For the assignment I chose the app "Homeroom". This app allows parents to be involved in the classroom and have access to their child's class at all times. To view this app and your child's classroom you must have a password so only family and the teacher has access. Parents can get updates on their phone when new information is added and even comment and 'like' pictures that have been posted.This app is available on any device so parents have a range of options to view this app. When I begin to use the app in my future classroom I would like to have a meeting with the parents of my class to share with them how the app works and why I want to use it in my classroom. During this time I will have computers and iPads set up so parents who may not have a smartphone will see how the app works. I will provide the option for parents to visit the classroom on certain days or at the end of the day to come and use the technology in my room to view that app to see what their student is doing. Parents who do have smart phones will have access to this app at all times and will be able to check what their student has been doing throughout the day or week and be able to ask them questions about what they are specifically doing in class. I plan to use this in my classroom on a daily basis. I will allow students to post their own pictures from class on the website of projects being done in the classroom. When going on field trips I can create a specific album with the pictures taken from that day and parents can add pictures from the trip to that album so that everyone will be able to view what the children did on the field trip. Projects, activities, and school events will have albums so that pictures can be added so parents will feel more involved even though they were not there. I found this app to be very useful and it is a free app that is easily accessible.

C4T #3

I was assigned to the blog of Marc Prensky. In Prensky's blog video "How do we help children be brave to be wrong and ask questions?" Prensky and Stephen Heppell discuss ways to motivate children to talk in front of a group. One suggestion Prensky gave was to get students to record each other giving an interview and answering questions. This activity will help students become more comfortable in front of a camera and speaking in front of people. It was said by Prensky that it is important to give people an opportunity to answer. This is something that needs to be addressed by many teachers. We must give our students room not answer and not just give the leading questions to say what we want them to say. As educators, we need to make everyone answer and give students a chance to share their opinion behind their answers. I commented to Mr. Prensky and told him I loved his video and would use his suggestions in my future classroom. I also discussed the importance of allowing children to share the opinion behind their answers. This video blog really makes me think about the importance of student involvement in classroom questions.

In Prensky's blog "What's going to happen next in education?" Prensky and Heppell discuss where education is now and what they think education will start becoming. One thing that was said is that school is not about teaching but motivation for learning. Students have so many resources to learn everything they need to know and teachers should motivate students to want to learn. For example, Prensky does 'open-phone' test. Students can find so many answers from one click on their phone but they need to know to use that phone as a resource and to want to search for that information. 'Open-phone' test were something I had never heard of before this video. I commented to Prensky and questioned him about how he uses this technique to his advantage and how he creates the test. Even now, I am not allowed to have a phone out during a test but if it has already started happening elsewhere how long will it be till it is a common thing? Prensky and Heppell both agreed that changes in education were moving at a slow pace, but I do not agreed with that. Elementary school is completely different than it was when I was in school. Students have computers, iPhones, and iPads in the classroom everyday.Teachers all over use pbl to provide their students with life long skills and more teachers are straying away from multiple choice test. I believe with technology today and how well students adapt to using technology it will be amazing the changes that will occur year by year.

Blog Post #12

This blog post was created by Jessica Thompson, Makia Ghsid, and I.

Project #10

In this video, Mrs. Bosarge spoke about using blabberize in her classroom with her students. This would be a great tool for current and future teachers to use. If you have time, I would suggest taking a few minutes and playing around with the website to see how it works.

Project #14 PBLP #2

In this lesson plan Makia, Jessica, and I created a lesson plan around the 1st grade life science standard ALCOS #4: Identifying developmental stages of plants and animals.
Check out our lesson plan!

Blog Post #11

What can we learn about teaching and learning from these teachers?

An important note to take away from these videos is the importance of teaching your students to want to learn. In every video the teachers explain how to grab the attention of their students and how to begin each lesson. This is very important when it comes to making your students want to take part in the lesson. During the video "Back to the future" Brian Crosby would use small fun activities to create the bigger lesson to be learned. By doing this Crosby kept his students attention and gave them a reason to want to learn. Mr. Paul Anderson in the video "Blended Learning Cycle" used an acronym to get his students attention and keep the students focused on learning. Anderson used QUIVERS: QU-Questions, I-Investigation, V-Video, E-Elaboration, R-Review, S-Summary quiz. Mark Church in his video "Making Thinking Visible" allowed students to discuss topics in small group to get their ideas out and get them wanting to know more about the topic. "Super Digital Citizen" showed us how Sam Pane got the attention of his students and made them feel in control of the class to make them want to learn. Pane explained to his students that they were in charge of protecting themselves on the internet. The children loved the idea that they were the boss of something and by doing that the students were eager to learn more and complete the lesson. In Dean Shareski's video "Project-Based Learning" several teachers discuss how they will engage their students with PBL. In the video three different classes are combined to give the students more time and opportunity to learn. By having three teachers review your work and having peer reviews done it motivates the students to give their best in class. At Roosevelt elementary PBL is highly encouraged. In the video "Roosevelt Elementary's PBL Program" teachers discuss the importance and the great results of PBL. These teachers discuss what they do to encourage the students in their learning and how to keep them curious to learn more. What can we learn from these videos? As a teacher, your goal should be to make every student want to learn and want to discover more. If we as teachers can not make the students motivated, who will?