Wednesday, June 22, 2011

Monday, April 4, 2011

Thing 10: Screencasts

Screencast is a very cool tool to use in the classroom. I can use this in various lessons for teaching computer/technology lessons. I made a screencast on how to change the theme of your Google email just to see how to do it. It was so easy. I am going to work on making a lesson for my 4th - 6th grade students to use this. I think they would really like it.

Thing 11: Slideshare

I really enjoyed viewing the different videos on Slideshare. I chose the video "Teaching with Technology no longer belongs in a lab" because I am a stand-alone computer teacher. I like the idea of going into classrooms and helping the teacher to intergrate different levels of technology in their classroom curriculum. I agree with what the video says about stand-alone computer lab classes becoming obsolete in the very near future. A lot of teachers today do not know much about technology or feel insecure about using it so they do not experiment with it with their students. If the computer lab teacher was able to assist them, I think they would become comfortable and find that they can do so much more in their classrooms.

Tuesday, February 1, 2011

Thing 9: Videos

I have watched lots of videos on youtube, but have never really looked at teachertube or schooltube before. I found the video below called "A Vision of 21st Century Teachers." It was pretty interesting.

I feel that anytime a teacher can use something that was developed by another person, they should do so. By using something already developed, they are saving themselves time and allowing more time to teach their students.

I know of several teachers that have saved videos from youtube at home and then used them in their curriculum at school. I believe that sites like schooltube and teachertube should be allowed for teacher use in school. Teachers would need to research the videos in advance to keep from having a possible inappropriate video slip through.

We are in the age of technology. Our students live and breathe every aspect of technology and we as teachers need to learn to live and breathe it too. We have to keep our students engaged in what we are teaching so that they will learn and the way to do that in today's world is through technology.

Video: A Vision of 21st Century Teachers