Sunday, December 25, 2011

Merry Christmas!!

Hope you all had an amazing Christmas! Happy Birthday to Jesus and hope we all got what we wanted :)

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Blogger for iPhone

So I just got Blogger for my iPhone and it is so cool. It truly is amazing the amount of apps we can use on smart phones for making a simple blog post! I will definitely be using this more often when I am away from my computer.

Monday, December 19, 2011

End of Semester!

Soooo it is the end of the semester for me as of last Monday!! Our grades were posted tonight and I passed all my classes thank goodness :) As for now, we await Christmas day and have a nice break from school and stressful classes. I have all my shopping done finally, and now for family to come down from Pennsylvania to celebrate the holidays with us! Everyone is excited to see each other after about a year of not seeing anyone. Hopefully it will be a peaceful holiday with minimal dysfunction...

 

Thursday, December 1, 2011

Blog Post 14

Jose Picardo's blog: Box of Tricks (Technology and Education)

Well, I have got to say "WOW!!!" about this guy's blog site. I absolutely love it =D. Mr. Picardo has pretty much given us everything we could ever use, and even little extra hints to use these internet tools. His 'Top ten tips for using technology in the classroom' video is great information. Plus, he gives little video examples for each tool we can use. Video streaming sounds like an excellent way to get a student interacting with the lessons, and noone feels embarrassed about singing or anything. I actually have heard of many, many teachers incorporating music into their classroom since everyone loves music and what better way to memorize something than with your favorite song (Miley Cyrus did it in Hannah Montana with "The Bone Song"). I can definitely see the draws of using teleconferencing. You can see the people and have a semi-live conversation, and the classroom becomes more aware of what is going on since they can see the person. Plus this is good for interviews with historians, other teachers and classes, or people whose profession is the subject you are teaching. Interactive exercises sound like a great idea for younger and older students alike! It is so cool that we can make exercises for students online and they can have fun but also understand and really learn a subject better. I already know a bit about interactive white boards since we have one in all my classes, and Dr. Baggett lets us experiment with hers when the room is clear. Using them makes teaching so much fun and also gets the kids physically and mentally engaged, but also helps their stage fright too by using them for presentations. When it comes to podcasts, I have seen a couple of them, and heard of people using them to teach and watched videos of teachers using them for their blogs and wikis. So I plan to use podcasts as well....why not using something that experienced teachers can vouch for? Ahhh, blogs and wikis; considering we are in EDM 310 I am VERY familiar with them. I like how he shows his own blog and kind if points out different uses: post ideas, thoughts, events, anything you feel others should know or at least take a look at. In my opinion, social networks are pretty good to have in any field. As Mr. Ricardo points out "having other people's thoughts on something can be helpful"; and as teachers, doctors, scientists, etc. we can use these connections to find new resources, tips, or recommendations on places to go to for more. Internet tools: if you are still out of the loop on them, get cracking on finding out about all the essential tools. I have never heard of Voki or Animoto but I do plan to look into them; they look really entertaining and students would really motivated to learn phrases and little facts. Google, Bing, Blogger, Symbaloo, Facebook, Twitter are all important!! Research, finding people, having all your favorite sites and connections in your mobile phone or computer saves us all trouble. Gadgets are everywhere now, people have phones and iPods that are permanently attached to them. Utilize your students cell phones and have them take pictures of educational places they go to such as museums, or let them record videos in class with their phones or iPods and put them on a blog or a wiki.

As for Mr. Ricardo's blog itself, I think it is a fantastic place to find a ton of different internet tools and downloads for your computer, and apps for phones as well. Actually, I decided to put his blog in my Personal Learning Network after looking at everything he has on there. The list he has of sites, downloads, and apps is so nice to have so that you can look into different video makers, picture makers, even voice to text!