ed talk live tonight-textbook free school

Ed tech live talked about google wave and its comparison with google docs. They were saying that google wave is complex and will take awhile for people to understand. Not something that I am ready to use. They were also questions about video and using it to tape the students. They were saying not to use video and use audio with pictures instead. Video is something you have to master. It takes too long to edit and put together. If you want to use video, just tape it and post it to Utube and mark it as private or public. The subject that interested me the most was the discussion about whether textbooks were obsolete. They said we should pay teachers to write textbooks. Textbooks are more for reference anymore. Teachers only use part of textbooks, jump around chapters and use supplements. There was someone in the chatroom talking about how Vail is working without textbooks. Their website is beyondtextbooks.org. I looked it up and it sounds like a great idea. It seems to be working for them. This is a low income community. They used money to buy laptops instead of textbook adoptions. Everything is done from online. Teachers access resources that are organized by state standards and assembled in a instuctional calendar. They have formative assessments developed by teachers, have resources available including weblinks, powerpoints and more, and utilize professional sharing with their peers in their school or across the state. I will definitly read more about this. Sounds like the wave of the future.

evaluating websites

I have read many of your blogs tonight and researched this subject for about 30min and the information out there is great. I have to admit that I did not think much about this topic before this class. My kids are young and have yet to surf the web. I only surf on a limited basis and they are sites that are very popular. Now, how many parents out there are like me? This is a subject that we need to tackle head on, not only with our students at school but with information sent home for parents to read. Giving parents these tools will help the students at home when they are working on projects or researching a subject. Parents need to be just as diligent but without the proper tools how are they to know? Education has to be done at school as well as at home. Yes there are parents out there that just don't have time or are not around, but we still need to cover all our bases and spread the word. We need to educate ourselves, the student and the parent.

Providing equal digital access to all students

Is this possible? When I first thought about this question I thought this isn't possible. There are too many variables that prevent it from happening. Some students don't have access to computers or have parents who can help them. There are special Ed children who need help or more time with computers. I started to think about what we can do in the classroom and take the outside variable out of the equation. We may not be able to provide equal access outside of school but we can help them better prepare for the future in the digital world in the schools. All the students should be taught the necessary skills of the digital world and how to manage all the information that is available to them. They should get a digital education from teachers so when they do have the access they will be prepared and educated on how to use it properly, efficiently and responsibly. Equal access will be in the form of preparation to the digital world and each student will have the skills when they are needed.

Ok, so who hasn't taken Spanish in high school? Can any of us speak it? Livemocha is a wonderful idea. I have always struggled with the pronunciation. It uses podcasts and other lessons to help with the immersion of the language. I am going on this site this weekend to check it out. I always say it is important to learn another language. It amazes me that I never thought to go online to find help in brushing up my Spanish skills. Looking forward to it.

Learning at your service

Social networking has opened up many possibilities for education. You can share ideas, videos, pictures. You can comment on them and have others comment on yours. It connects us with people who have our same interests and ideas. Blogs enable us to post ideas and even create hyperlinks so the reader can delve further into the topic you are discussing. I really like this idea of hyperlinks. Some students may not understand fully what is being discussed and if they are able to use the links to get more information they are more likely to remember the topic and understand it fully. I also like the idea of using Skype to have a teacher or a person of interest from another country talk to students in the classroom. Collaborating and having discussions with people from another culture is amazing and there are endless rewards from this. Our students need to learn more about other cultures, not from a book, but experience it.

Making a Contribution

Who are the teachers of our world? Education majors who go to school to become a teacher? Not in the world we live in today. Everyone can be a teacher. The internet has made it possible for anyone to post a video or blog about something they love or are passionate about. Not realizing they in fact can be teaching us something important. I love the story about Matt Harding. How he took something so simple as dancing in all those countries and turned it into a job is crazy. He did not do it to get a job but to find himself and in turn he found that using his skills to teach was what he really enjoyed. Now he is going to other countries to train teachers how to use the laptop in the classroom. All this was done via YouTube. The other story about the computer teacher in Colorado making the video for his teachers and how it become a world wide hit is awe inspiring. You Tube has become a great information tool. Another great tool is using video conferencing in the classroom. This gives access to teachers and classrooms all over the world. Children can see and learn first hand about different cultures and countries. Scribd is another great tool. It is something I have never heard and is fairly new. The idea that people can share documents, comment on them and be able to look them up years after they were posted is incredible. All this information is very overwhelming to me who does not use a computer on a daily basis. I am starting to realize that this is the future and I need to get on board. I my children to have to best education that is out there and the internet is a great tool to have in the classroom.

To Search and to Scan

Who knew fingertip knowledge could be such a great tool in our education. The idea that two men could create such a great charter school all based on inquiry and creativity is amazing. This idea of keeping the kids interested by exploring personal interests and having large audiences for their products is genius. This knowledge can be used to connect to anyone in the world and create endless oppurtunities.
One question I had earlier was how to use the information we find in the best possible way. There is so much information out there. How do we find what we need in small yet understandable chunks. Google helps us search and find knowledge. As the book says "the world is now Google-ized." There is everything from book searchs, maps, images and blogs that is powered by Google. Google wants to organize all the world's informatin. Can you imagine? How is this helpling education? Learning is no longer how much knowledge we have but how we can access it. With information constantly changing we can't expect our kids to memorize information that will be obsolete in 3 years. This is very interesting and exciting to comprehend. How will we move from traditional teaching to web-based learning and teach our children to research, think for themselves and how to take all this knowledge they find on the web and use it in their studies and everyday lives.

We all learn

This whole blogging idea is very new to me. This class has opened my eyes to a vast knowledge that awaits me and everyone in this world. The fact that you can ustream a conference and see it while it is happening or view it later is great. You don't have to be constrained to timeframes and places. The world is a whole possibility when it comes to learning. Textbooks and lectures are becoming just tools in our learning process. The web of learning has endless possibilities. The only thing I would be concerned with is the fact that there is so much information out there, where do you begin and how do you sort through fact and fiction? This information is available world wide. You can blog with someone in Africa or Asia. You can watch a conference in Alaska and then watch one in England. These possibilities can enhance the subjects we teach and give our students a broader view. Gone are the days of going to the library and researching book to book. You can narrow down research quicker and easier with the use of the web. Teaching our students to use this efficiently will be a challenge. With the amount of information I can see spending an entire day researching a subject. This, I think is a potential problem.

About me

I just started my path to becoming a teacher. I am working on my masters in education at southern new hampshire university.