My EDM310 Blog Assignments are Now Complete!!

Thank you all for being apart of Dr. Strange's EDM310 TT2 Class!! It was Fun having you all in class w/me. I wish you all the best on your finals, your future classes in college, and especially your classrooms. God Bless you ALL & I look forward to seeing you all in other classes. Thanks!

What Have I Learn In EDM310?

All of these things blogs, presentations, Google Docs, Google spreadsheets, Picasa, podcasts, Twitter, other teachers, and students outside of the region, iTunes, accessibility issues and the use of html tag modifiers to address some of those issues, who I am as a professional, Google forms, data bases, Google Earth, Delicious, ACCESS, ALEX, and Foliotek are useful to me in some form or fashion. Blogging is useful to me as individual and as a teacher. As an individual, I am able to blog for my own purposes and as a teacher I plan to have a classroom blog where my students will be able to get homework and/or their family member will be able to see what we are doing in class. Presentations are important to me as an individual and as a teacher. As an individual I will always somehow be giving a presentation and as a teacher I will be giving presentations everyday when teaching. Google Docs is helpful to me as an individual because I am able to do presentations for class projects and as a teacher I could use Google Docs for powerpoints. Google spreadsheets can be used to teach my students how to use spreadsheets and as an individual I am able to use spreadsheets for my own purposes. Picasa is useful in both areas of my life because I will be able to find pictures for myself and some that I will like to show my students. Podcasts are a big help to me now. I am able to learn alot through podcasts and I plan to teach my students how to do a podcast. Twitter can be useful as a teacher and individual but I would probably just use it as teaching purposes. I dislike Twitter as an individual but it does help with finding activities for the classroom. Other teachers and students are extremely helpful because I am able to find out what others are doing in their classrooms. iTunes is helpful to me as an individual because I am able to download music and as a teacher I will be able to listen and/or show videos to my students by using iTunes. The accessibility issues and the use of html tag modifiers will be good for both purposes b/c they will help those with disabilities know what I have written. Who I am as a professional is very beneficial to me and others. All Google agents will be helpful to me as an individual and teacher because they are free. ACCESS and ALEX will be extremely helpful to me as a teacher. I will be able to help my students and get lesson plans. And lastly Foliotek will be helpful to me as an individual and teacher because I will be able to get my degree and get a job in the field of education.

Learning abt Twitter

I made the effort to learn about Twitter by following those that teach you more about Twitter. I have also watched some of the videos suggested by Dr. Strange and others. I have asked others that I know use Twitter how to do certain things on Twitter like how to send people private messages. To learn how to use Twitter I have done the following above along with using it daily, at least twice a day to get familiar with Twitter. I believe you can't learn how to do something with out asking for help and practicing it. I use Twitter at least twice a day to update my status, send private messages, read others that I am following status, and to add followers. I read the tweet of others every time I login to Twitter. I tweet every time I login into Twitter. I direct a public message just about everyday I login into Twitter, if the person is tweeting about something I am interested in. I send private messages on Twitter about the same as I send public messages. I like the private messages best. I my reaction to Twitter is that I dislike it. I don't think Twitter is necessary. It a valuable waste of time. The only reason I spend as much time on Twitter as I do is because I want to get familiar with it for my EDM310 class, otherwise I would not be apart of Twitter. Twitter could and is beneficial to me as a future teacher. At this moment by using Twitter, I am able to tweet and follow other teachers. Some teachers I follow are veterans and some are new Be's, but they all have good advice to give to someone like me. The negative aspect of Twitter to me that it is boring. You can look at pictures, you can get to know a person without asking questions. Twitter is boring and unnecessary. I probably will not use Twitter after I am done with my EDM310 class. Twitter is a waste of my time as a student and as an individual.

4 EDM 310 Podcasts

The first podcast I listen to was Can Wikipedia be useful to students and educators by Nick Nogueira, Tommy Nguyen, and Laren Mott. These students are not in Dr. Strange's EDM310 class but they are taking the same course at the University of South Alabama. The things I disliked about there podcast was that one of the students continue to second guess his knowledge about the topic and that when they were finish another student told the audience that we were done listening to him. I believe if you are you going to be a teacher you should 2nd guess yourself. If you don't know they material and you tell your students you don't they will not feel secure about being in your class. Your students will be like, "He/She doesn't even know what they are talking about."If you know the material, trust that you know it and stick with it. If you don't know it, do more research. I really felt like this group new what they were talking about, they just didn't have the confidence to say so. Lastly, I didn't like how one of the students told the audience that we (the listeners) were done listening to them. We (the listeners) don't know when you are done, you are the speaker, you are in control, therefore; you tell us when you are done.



The 2nd podcast I listened to was Using You Tube as an educational tool by Thelma Jones, Brittany Jinks, and Cynthia Burnette. I felt like they could have sounded more excited about doing the podcast, they also could have benefitted from this by smiling while they were talking. One of the speakers described using you tube as a tutoring device for math problems. When asked about getting the wrong answer from a you tube video, the students stated that her math book would have the correct answer in the back. This is not true. There have been several occasions were I have been in a math class and my and my classmates have directed the teacher to the back of the book which had an incorrect answer. To this I would have to say, "Make sure you are staying the correct information before you say it." If you're not sure about something, don't say it and/or research it. Ask someone before you state the wrong information. Lastly, I believe these students out off track while doing their podcast. They were suppose to be discussing how YouTube could be used as an educational tool but instead started to speak about YouTube as entertainment.


The 3rd podcast I listened to was ACCESS Distance Learning: A Work In Progress by Henryetta Alexander, April Jones, and Ashley Reed. I really like how they stated the history and objectives about ACCESS before they started. The last podcast I listened to was my own. My group did our podcast about ACCESS also. I felt like we could have did better by practicing what we were going to say, and maybe stating the history and objectives like the group stated above did.

Sir Robinsons' Arguments & My Reactions

Sir Robinson poses some extremely great arguments. He first discusses how people do things they are good at but aren't interested in. I agree with him on this because I even find myself doing things I am good at and not necessarily interested in. I and/or someone else may do these things for finances and/or to help others. Sir Robinson stated that "when you find something you're good at and you love, you never really work again." I agree with this because when you're good at something you love, it doesn't feel like work. It's more of a hobby, something you love that you don't mind doing. He states that most people don't have the experience of finding something they enjoy in their lives. I would have to disagree with this because I believe every one finds something they enjoy doing, they just may not take the time out to do it. Sir Robinson also states that, " If you don't know what you can do, you don't know what you can be." I totally agree with this. This is pretty self explanatory. He also talks about mothers having their kids interview so they may attend specific kindergarten schools. He disagrees with this but I agree with the moms. I'm not a mother yet. But when I become a mother I will like my child/children to attend the best schools. If this requires me, as a mom, videoing my child/children and sending in a video as an interview, I will. This will only introduce my child to the advancing world of technology at a very young age. It will also teach my child and show the teachers that they should have high expectations, just as well as I do. I expect my child/children to be the best and to be the best means attending the best schools, then so be it.

(-) & (+) of Blogs in the Classroom

For this particular post I took the liberty to read Christie Love's EDM 310 blog. She had some very interesting thoughts about some of the topics and/or assignments we were given as a class. A lot of which I did not think of and others, whom blogs I have read, haven't thought of as well. Christie made some great points in her blog posts. On some post assignments, she was very straight to the point and on others she was very detailed and lenghty.

I was not able to make comments to her blog posts because of technical difficulties but I hope she reads my blog so she will know that i believe "She Did A Great Job". My blog posts seem to be more detail and lengthy than most of Christie's but I would have to say that they both are equally the same. She seem to have more pictures then I have on my blog.

It seems like Christie had a wonderful experience by doing the classroom blogs. It shows how in the way her blog's layout is. Her EDM 310 blog's layout is very nice and colorful. It's very bright with pinks and reds. But most of all, you can tell her experiences through her posts. They are very exciting and easy to read. I had a wonderful time with the classroom blog as well, which I try to display so in my blog posts.

The pluses to blogging are you can keep up with other classmates/peers opinions and thoughts about different topics, you can stay up to date on classroom assignments and homework, and you can also leave your peers/classmates/professors comments about the good job they are doing and/or any corrections they may need to make. In my opinion there are many minuses about blogging. As a teacher you may make your classroom's blog private, for the class only, or you may make it public, so others around the world may view it. The only minus I see is that if your blog is public, others may try to contact your students and they may try to get to know them on a personal level.

"Growth" vs. "Fixed" Mindset

In the video podcast, Carol Dweck, Professor of Psychology, talked about how some students have a fixed mind set and some do not. To have a fixed mindset is having something just the way you want it before you leave to take a test or head to school, "looking smart". Carol Dweck described how they did an experiment to teach students the growth mindset. They placed the students into two different groups. Each group participated in a 8 session workshop. The two different groups were study skills and growth mindset and just study skills. The group that only did study skills did the worst. The group that had study skills and mindset worked on these such as brain exercises and they learned how to apply it to school work.

When these students returned to their regular classrooms, the teachers could easily determine who had been in the study skills and growth mindset group and who did not. The difference was very obvious. Carol Dweck also said things like you have to have a mind set of growth and to be a good mentor you have to have a growth mindset. This effects me as a teacher by letting me know that it is very important to do brain/mind exercises in the classroom. It teaches me to teach my students to be mentors and good ones. As a teacher I will incorporate mindset exercises into my daily class activities.

K-5 Podcasts

I chosed grades k-5 to listen to because I am majoring in Elementary Education and I will like to know how these podcasts can benefit me as a teacher. The first one I listen to was "A Nigh in the Coral Reef". This video podcast talked about the ecosystem of the coral reef. It describe how different types of fish may live in this environment. It inform me about the different fish that may come out during the night and hide during the day, and why.

The 2nd video podcast I watched was "Energy Flow in the Coral Reef Ecosystem". This video was pretty similar to the first. The difference in the two were that this one really describe a food chain of the coral reef. It talked about how the coral gets energy from the sun light, parrot fish eat coral, parrot fish create sand at the bottom of the reef, sea cucumber eats sand, sea slug eats plants and gets energy from sun, long spined sea orchid keeps algae in checked, and herbivores get eaten by carnivores.

The last video podcast i watched was "What is a Planet?". This video talked about how many planets have been discovered, what is a planet, and why some were defined as something else.

All of these videos will be of tremendous help in the classroom. The first two will help define ecosystems and describe food chains. The last one will help describe a planet and the differences between a planet, asteroid, and comet.