Blog Post #4                                                                         9/25/17

Early in the course, I only used twitter as it was assigned to us. Only really interacting with the other FSU main accounts and the few students in the class that I knew. I love to use twitter for social purposes but using it for school purposes was new for me. However, I do see how it can be used as a learning tool especially for members of the 21^st century. Majority of the kids in our class seem to be using and adapting to twitter well. In the future, I could see using twitter as a resource to stay connected with other teachers as well as my students. Keeping them updated with what is going on in the classroom and using it as a discussion post forum for both the parents and students if they have any questions. I do think that Twitter is something that should mainly be used for middle and high school grades and so if I end up teaching one of those grades then I could see using it in the future. Because twitter is a common mean of communication and something that I am familiar with, I found it easy to use and navigate around. I enjoyed using twitter as a part of this class, I think that it added something that a lot of my other class do not include enough of and that is various uses of communication and discussion forums.

Those that are more culturally sound to the digital age tend to do better in schools. Because our school system now a day’s is so set for those that are adapted to the digital age; if you are one of the ones that struggle with using technology there will be issues within the classroom. Classrooms now a day’s use so much more technology and integration than ever before. Students who are not used to this rapid use of technology are falling behind faster than ever and it is beginning to affect their learning. Because a clear majority of students have access to technology outside of the classroom daily they are creating a wider gap for those that do not have access to technology outside of the classroom. Everyone is on a different level of knowledge and ability to use technology that there is a clear divide for those that can use technology outside of the classroom and those that cannot. We are struggling to keep up with the constant increases of technology and the updates that continue to arise. Therefore, we are only widening the gap of the uses of technology because not everyone is aware of what technology is and how it can be used in our daily lives. The digital divide is something that is created and continued out by humans and the use of technology. So the more humans use technology the wider this gap becomes and the same occurs when humans fail to incorporate technology in their daily lives.

 In the future, I would like to teach elementary school more specifically Kindergarten students. Therefore, academic based software, educational games, tutorials, special need and desktop publishing software’s are all things that I could potentially use in my classroom. Desktop publishing software’s are most commonly used to create flyers, posters and any other print outs that I may provide for my students. Special needs software’s could be used if I end up teaching in an ESE or an ESOL classroom for students that may need extra help. Educational games could be used during center time to keep the students engaged in learning and focused on their academics. Any academic software based programs can be used to solidify the information taught during a lesson and help the students if they need any other assistance with what they’re learning. For those that are having trouble, using tutorials and other drill/ practice software could potentially be the best way for them to go. Because I do plan on teaching such young grades, I do not think that simulations or authoring systems will be to of very much use in my future classroom. There is no reason for elementary school aged students to be involved with authoring systems and I think that simulations are above their level of understanding. If required to I could see potentially using integrated learning systems within my classroom, but really only if I choose to do virtual school.

Blog Post 3:

  For the ELA technology standards, I feel very familiar with Web Enhancement tools such as ClassDojo and Quizlet. As in classrooms that I have volunteered with in the past, especially elementary schools have used these enhancement options to promote class involvement and engagement in learning. Teachers often use Twitter and Facebook to share information within the realm of education and communication. Teachers in the past have even used these social bookmarking networks to inform their students of upcoming assignments and what is going on in the classroom. These tools are extremely helpful and relevant because growing up in this generation using social media is a very common occurrence.  While I am unfamiliar with using blogs and podcast in an educational way, so that would be the technology that I would need to brush up on and become more familiar with before I used it in my classroom. Using forums such as Portal as a way for students to check their grades is very helpful and I look forward to using it in my classroom soon.  Videos are useful and I know how to use websites with videos that have already been created. However, using my own videos and creating and editing them for classroom use is something that I need to brush up on.

 I intend on teaching at the elementary school level of students soon, therefore the level of technology advanced software that would be used by the children would be at a minimum. However, as a teacher of young children, the more technology and interactive software that is used within the classroom more than likely the children will be supervised always while using any technology device.  But children, no matter their age are never too young to learn the importance of being safe on the internet and learning the proper netiquette. There are ins and out to the internet and these things will be part of the lessons that I teach my future students so that they can always be safe online. Working on a computer is a doorway to a new world, and it is very important that students learn and are informed about this digital citizenship/ presence that they have online. Talking to my students about copyright and giving credit to a source is something that will be useful for the rest of their lives. Overall learning just how to navigate the internet for both personal and educational purposes because there is a difference between the two. Acting in a responsible and polite manner with anyone and everyone that they encounter with while online. The choices and things that a child does online, right or wrong will follow them for the rest of their life.

    Working on the newsletter assignment was very intresting for me, I had never created a newsletter before especially not one that pertained to education and my own classroom. I really enjoyed this assignment because it made me feel like an actual teacher that had my own class. This assignment allowed me to use techniques on Word that I do not commonly do such as shading an area and using columns within the letter. Next time I would like to add more color and more relevant clip art images. Maybe even one day I can include images from my own classroom/ students in the newsletter. I feel that a newsletter is going to be very helpful and informative for the parents of my students. I wish that more parents would use newsletters to communicate what is going on in the classroom and share it with everyone. The more informed parents are I feel that they will be more comfortable sending their students to school every day.  

..\OneDrive\Documents\EME Newsletter.docx

Blog Post #2

As a student, throughout my K-12 years I found Microsoft word to be an extremely useful tool in my learning development. Especially in the higher grades such as middle and high school; I was using Microsoft word all the time. Typically, I used Microsoft Word when I had to write a report for one of my classes or sometimes even as a spell check database that helped to correct my grammar before I turned in any assignments. Whereas my teachers would use Microsoft much more often than I would almost every day because every worksheet or print out that they would give us used word to create it. I believe that out of all the software’s that are included within Microsoft, Word is the easiest for both teachers and students to figure out. For teachers Microsoft word is a tool that can assist them in teaching in the most effective manner.

    Within the past twenty years, the school systems have started to incorporate so much more technology than ever before. With this newly incorporated technology comes the ability to come across or even copyright material yourself whether you mean to or not. Personally, I do not find it that difficult to not copyright another person’s work, all the student must do is cite where they got the information from. If an idea is not common/ basic knowledge and was not throughout without any help than that information needs to be cited properly. There are so many ways to cite information and give credit to the source that everyone should be able to find one that meets their style. Taking outside information from various sources helps to strength the argument that you are making. From an educational standpoint using other people’s information to make the argument that you are making stronger is okay if there is citations and credit being given to the original author.

   As a teacher dealing with the issue of copyright, for their students there needs to be clear guidelines that go over the amount of uncited work or what should and should not be cited. Especially when doing a multi-media project there are of course going to be a lot of outside resources being used. If the information is properly being accredited and cited to the actual source this is fine. When talking about essays and including in- text or out of text citations to avoid there being an issue of copyright should clearly be expressed to the student. Teachers should stress the importance of giving credit to the actual source when using outside information to their students and if they follow through with that there should not be any issues.

   Considering the Implementation Issues that take place within the classroom many of them could be fixed or prevented with the help of a teacher. The purpose of implementing technology within the classroom is to use it as a facilitating device for student learning in every aspect, socially, ethically and legal diversity as well.  Nothing is every perfect and as with implementing technology inside of the classroom, there are going to be issues. However, I do not think that these issues should prevent children from being able to use technology. Instead I think teaching both the teacher and the student to use technology in the correct manor is the way to go. If teachers and students were to use a laptop and social media outlets in the right way and for educational purposes cyberbullying may not be as big of an issue because it is being used for the right reasons. Some teacher may attempt to pirate movies to show to their classes, which in most cases may be inappropriate movies to be showing to students anyway. If teachers or schools would purchase educational movies or subscriptions to movies that are approved to be shown in school this would not be as big of an issue. Teachers would then be setting a good example of the renting/ barrowing movies system to their students instead of doing something illegal.  By promoting citations and giving outside sources accreditation for their work, students would be promoting freedom of speech and academic honesty. Students would be able to say whatever they want to say in the correct manor that it would not be hurting anybody's feelings or breaking any rule. I believe that by making citations a bigger part of the English classes in middle and high school this would solve a lot of the issues that we are having.

  THE  ^{level and degree of standard's that both teachers and students are held to increases there is more of a need now to use technology than ever before. Common Core, ISTE, NETS and the pressures of the 21st century all meant to promote student learning and higher performance only end up adding more stress onto the students and the teachers. With learning it is obvious that there needs to be a level of expectations and requirements that both the teacher and the student should be meeting in order to track their progress in the year. For most classrooms in the United States according to our Textbook Technology Standards for 21st Century Learning on page 3. the ISTE is a way for schools to receive more funding for their technology needs and wants.  Resources provided by the NETS allow for students to be life long leaners and promote educational practices in everything that they do; advancing in skill with each grade level that they advance to. while the NETS standards are not the same for every student in every state, there are certain standards that are similar and fluid no matter what state the student or teacher are in. Some standards are more catered towards the area and grade level of the student; however others are the same no matter where in the Country the student is in. Now a days all of the students learning within the classroom is geared towards the future and their future career while simultaneously incorporating things that every student needs to know and the basics. Technology is one of these basics where there are certain things that every child, K-12 needs to be aware and fluent with.}

       ^{The Teacher Preparation Accreditation standard within the NCATE and ISTE located on page 5 of our textbook, talks about the endorsing of technology and facilitation of skills to be used towards the preparation of a science or STEM field which I feel is  a really important standard to project onto students. Any job located within the STEM field is extremely important and the facilitating of those skills at an earlier age is way better than only teaching these skills once a child gets to high school. The earlier the exposure the more time the child's brain has to adapt and learn more things that will only help them later on down the road. I have considered a field as a guidance councilor at an elementary school or even a classroom,/ literary assistant but I am not really too interested in the Administrative side of  education. Therefore any of the ISTE standards put in place for Administrators mentioned on  page 10  of our textbook is something that is very unfamiliar for me. Within the ISTE'S NET standards there is a lot of mentions of technology leadership and just overall leadership of the school that administrators must have to show that they are in control and aware of what is going on at their school. Administrators work on these skills through various educational leadership skills that have been advanced and perfected over  a course of time.}

     ^{As the newer generations enter the realm of education it is more clear now than ever that todays youth can be viewed as digital natives is totally correct. Todays Youth is growing up in an age surrounded by technology in almost every aspect of their life. For those that are digital natives such as todays youth or even a vast majority of students in college such as myself; we are used to technology and have almost adapted our lives around it. From the moment we are born, we are used to having and including technology in our lives in almost every aspect. Technology is viewed as a helpful tool that majority of digital natives use to make their lives easier or simpler on a daily basis. Majority of teachers in todays society, while they are beginning to adapt and learn the ways of technology can be viewed as digital immigrants. Because technology is something new and innovative to them, it is not something that they grew up with and them must learn how to adapt to it. In most cases this affects the students where as the teacher may not be as proficient or knowledgeable about a certain topic as they should be revolving technology so it may decrease the potential for learning or close a learning opportunity. Such as if a teacher does not know how to use a smart board of a new learning game software, they may chose to just not include it in their lesson plans. Therefore they are withholding a learning opportunity from their students. I know that I am more knowledgeable about technology than most of my teachers in high school, however when I am a teacher there is a possibility that those students may be smarter than me when it comes to technology. With how technology is always changing by the time my future students are born and in my class the way that I learned things in elementary school will be completely different than the way that they learn things. Technology is something that is constantly changing and improving there is no wonder why it plays such an important role in education and the way that digital natives learn and digital immigrants teach.}