Interview with teacher about technology

*sorry this is late, I had it saved just forgot to post it*

(1)What tools are their favorite tech and web tools to use in the classroom?

My grandmother is an elementary principal and was a teacher for even longer. When asking about her favorite web tools she insisted on telling me her background and how since she's much older, all of these technological things throw her off because she was never taught how to use them, so she's tried to figure things out, but it's still more challenging. She said that her school has recently (in the past few years) got smart boards in each of their classrooms because of her wanting to educate her teachers. She finds that Smart boards are so cleaver and even fun for the children to learn from.

2. What are their biggest frustrations with technology in the classroom?

   Barbara said that her biggest frustration was that her kids seemed to know more about technology than she did. That was the point where Mrs. Hackney said no more. She wanted to make sure the teachers were more educated with web tools and everything else.

   (3) What is the biggest misconception about using technology in the classroom?

   Mrs. Hackney said that she felt that there was the thought that maybe if there were laptops or other devises the students wouldn't pay attention and they would be searching the web or something else, then they wouldn't learn as much and then the parents would get mad at the teacher.

   (4) What are the biggest hurdles that you face as an educator using technology in the classroom?

   Again, Barbara said that the biggest problem was that at first she didn't know as much as young kids.

   (5) What has been your biggest success with technology integration in the classroom?

   She has encouraged her teachers to explore the new tools, like smart boards in their classrooms. This way, the more newer teachers they higher, they're learning right away as opposed to learning after 10 years of teaching.

   (6) Who/What has been your biggest inspiration in helping you to use technology in the classroom?

   This was probably the easiest question I asked Barbara. She gave me a one word response, “the children”

   (7) Where do you see technology integration heading in the future?

   Barb simply said that she doesn't know where technology will go in the future. She told me that as of right now, she wouldn't be surprised with anything. She said that technology pretty much never has an end to it and anything is possible through it.

Templates. Igoogle. Open office

Family budget planner is a useful tool to use for when you are older with a family or even after high school to better budget your finances. I feel that students definitely need help to organize their finances. Open office is a really cool program. I actually have it on my computer instead of Microsoft word. It has everything that word has, but in its own version.

Igoogle is really interesting and I definitely want to play around more with it, and possibly use it for some future projects. It reminds me about open office, but a bit more elaborate.

I really liked the template on igoogle that's called circles resume. This seems like an amazingly handy tool to have when applying for teaching jobs or any type of organization for that matter.

What a Blog should have

An interesting blog should obviously have a fun or interesting topic. You should definitely include your own opinion on the subject matter. If I was reading a blog I would definitely be turned away if their grammar was poor. Pictures would be nice and pleasant to see, and it would definitely make things more eye grabbing. Blogs should also be about something at least a little bit relevant to life.

applications

I really like the do ink a lot. There are so many possibilities for a creative spirit. It reminded me of the program on computers called paint, but with more options. I don't know how I could incorporate this into a lesson plan, but I feel like I could figure something out.

I LOVE the storybird website. It can do so many different things to create a story. As a teacher you could create story problems for math and make math time a more interesting subject to learn. I feel that math would be the best subject to use this website, you could even use times tables with the storybird.

comics

The websites that you can create comics with were pretty fun and interesting. There are a lot of different things you can do with them, and you can get creative with the different tools on the websites. The toondoo website was probably my favorite one, and you can see the comic on the front page of my blog.

digital story telling

Research:

a. What is digital story telling?

Digital story telling is something that people use to visually tell a story. Because it's done digitally it's more exciting to listen to and people can enjoy doing school projects if they were done digitally, using a computer.

b. How would you use it in the classroom?

You could use digital story telling by starting out in the very beginning of class telling the students what their schedule is going to look like for the day. This can even be used to explain daily activities, or directions for various projects.

c. How would you need to scaffold this activity for the classroom?

You would have to make sure if you plan on publishing anything on the web, you must check the copyrights on the picture or text. Be careful when doing activities like these, just like anything in the classroom. Make sure it's age appropriate.

d. What are the challenges of using this technology in a classroom setting with different age groups? There could be some problems involving parents. Some parents of younger children don't necessarily want their children to be using the computer or technology. For example, kids should not be using a calculator to learn math. They need to learn mental math, it's very important to do so, and once they can do that then they can start using tools instead of relying on technology doing it for them.

e. What tools do you need to make available to students so that they can successfully complete a photo story?

You would need to deliver expectations of what you want to see, the directions of how to start a photo story and finish one.

f. Find five different websites to support your comments and make a bibliography.

1. http://digitalstorytelling.coe.uh.edu/

2. http://www.homeschoolmath.net/worksheets/fraction_calculator.php

3. http://www.theteacherscorner.net/lesson-plans/technology/index.htm

4. http://www.educationworld.com/a_lesson/lesson/lesson285.shtml

5. http://www.lessonplanz.com/Lesson_Plans/Computers___Technology/

business cards

So, i finished my cards, and I'm not going to lie, I'm pretty excited about it. I found a little site that you can create an avatar from your shoulders up, and it's free to create it and it's easy to move around in the website... The website is www.faceyoumanga.com
Still having trouble with the digital story though :(

1st class

A PLN is a devise used to share ideas and collaborate work in order to help each other expand their horizons and knowledge.

Blogger is pretty cool, I'm a first time user and I'm enjoying it so far.

I didn't expect a four hour class go by so quickly, that was cool...

how I used technology from K-12:

Starting in elementary school I didn't use much technology, but in third grade my sister and I learned how to e-mail through aol, and we taught my mom. In the fourth grade my sister and I shared a cell phone and then later got our own. From there I gradually became more computer literate, and used microsoft word a lot during high school to write essays. I now use facebook and email through hotmail, and today I have created a million and one different accounts on the computer. cell phones and ipods are also apart of my daily life.