Blog Post 10

1. Above I have included a cartoon by John T. Spencer. It can also be found in his blog "Adventures in Pencil Integration". At first i did not understand this cartoon at all. Like in the least bit. After staring at it for about twenty minutes I decided to do some research. I found that many other people were also puzzled by his cartoon and were eager to learn more about it. Finally I found a student that had a good explanation for it. Like me, he read the comments below the picture on John T. Spencer's blog post. In the end I found out that Ticonderoga is higher end brand of pencils. Papermate as we all know is a less expensive brand of pencil. The most common difference in the two were the erasers. Many of us would rather buy twenty Papermate pencils before a Ticonderoga because of the price. The point of Mr. Spencer's cartoon is to show that sometimes it is best to splurge on an item that is known for it's quality. In the long run, spending more money up front, may result in spending less in the future. Somehow I feel like this entire blog post goes back to Mac versus PC.

2.As I read Why Were Your Kids Playing Games? I was again confused and searching for the significance on the outcome. The only thing I got out of this was that once again "burp back" does not work. To many teachers focus on this method and it does not work the majority of the time. Before EDM 310 I did not know any other way of learning other than "burp back". I love the structure of EDM 310 because I feel like I am actually learning something. I feel like I am learning the process and the reasoning behind why we learn what we learn and why we do what we do.

4. I thought that Don't Teach Your Kids This Stuff. Please? was a very odd post. I read the EDM310 students comments but was still unsure of what way Scott McLeod was going with this blog post. I was unsure of his position and of mine... I posted my comment below
"My name is Shelby Day from the University of South Alabama. For my class EDM 310. When I looked over this post I was unsure if it was sarcasm or not. I hope it really is because technology can be such a useful tool in the classroom! Shelby Day Twitter: @Miss_ShelbyD Blog: http://dayshelbyedm310.blogspot.com/"

Project #11

C4K March

My fifth C4K is my first one in March. This week the student blog I am commenting on is Aspen H's blog at Iowa Language Arts. He is in Mr. Boylen's eighth grade class. When I looked at the class blog, it was sort of plain but very organized. As I went to Aspen's blog, it was the same way; organized but plain. After reading all of Aspen's blog post, I found that is is very opinionated and sweet.
I commented on Aspen's post titled "Intro to Blogging Partners". This post was about herself and about her life. She described things she enjoyed, her family, and her location of where she lives. She is descriptive for an eighth grader and has an opinion that is strong, which is great. I commented on this post saying who I was and leaving encouraging words. Below is the comment I left for Aspen.
"Hi Aspen! My name is Shelby Day and I am in EDM 310 at the University of South Alabama in Mobile, Alabama. I was reviewing your blog and you have a great opinion of all of the class books and on blogging! I love it! You are close to many states so I am sure you have adventures to tell. I can see you are a very active person, keep it up! I also live RIGHT next to railroad tracks so I understand the loud noises but like you I have learned to block it out! Keep up the good blogging! Shelby Day"

My second C4K in March (sixth C4K total) is on a student named Thomas. He is a sixth grader in Mr. Seyfert's class in Wisconsin. Mr. Seyfert's class blog is organized by students and by date. His students blog often and well.
The blog post I commented on is titled "The Great Braun! (excerpt)" in which Thomas discusses sports and I could tell that Thomas really enjoys baseball. Thomas has a good writing form and is clear in his thought process.
My comment I left on the post is listed below.
"Hey Thomas! I am a student at the University of South Alabama in Mobile. I love that you have MORE THAN ONE POST ABOUT SPORTS! This post has great content and is worded very well! Good Job Thomas! Keep up the good work. "

My third C4K in March comes from a student named Tommy. He had a creative writing post titled "Shon the Walrus". It is a story about a walrus and Tommy list very much detail for his story. He has a setting, time, place, the temperature, character names and much more detail.
I listed my comment below.
"Hi Tommy! My name is Shelby Day. I am from Mobile, Alabama and I attend the University of South Alabama. I love your imagination, it is so creative! The characters have names and that makes the story even better and real. The suits and the details are my favorite parts. I look forward to future post on your blog! What is your favorite part about blogging? Keep up the good work! Shelby Day Blog: http://dayshelbyedm310.blogspot.com/ "

My last C4K in March is on a student titled "cripcrip40". The students in this blog are two classes of students in Mrs. Krebs’ classes. Krebs’ Class Blogs is a place for the students to report what they are doing in science, history, English and literature. They have published writings, group projects, classroom assignments, and connecting! They are continuing to grow and expand their world of blogging as they create, contribute, connect, communicate, collaborate and curate with others around the world. The students are in grades 7 and 8 in the American system, ages 12-14 years old.
I commented on her post from March 8th. It is a post on religion that Lauren learned about in religion class. I think it is cool that these students have a religion class. It gives them an opportunity to learn about a different subject than many students.
I have posted my comment below
"Hi Lauren! My name is Shelby Day. I am from Mobile, Alabama and I attend the University of South Alabama. I was looking over your blog. I was wondering how you came up with “cripcrip40″? It is very interesting! I love this piece on religion because it is close to Easter and it shows a little bit of your life outside of school. I look forward to future post on your blog! What is your favorite part about blogging? Keep up the good work! Shelby Day Blog: http://dayshelbyedm310.blogspot.com/"

Project #14

C4T #3

My third teacher blog for C4T is on a teacher named Beth Still. Beth teaches Social Studies in Scottsbluff, Nebraska.If you go to her blog you can see that she is passionate about finding ways to help her students get engaged in learning again. She states that, "So many of my students have been disengaged for so long that it is hard for them to get back on track. I believe that by creating a safe, welcoming environment it will help my students succeed." I believe this is a very true statement because it is real life and is actually happening. She is very involved but is not necessarily up to date with her blog. She is also very organized in the blog setup which makes it easier to navigate the site.

My first post I commented on was from December 29, 2012. I am not sure how this post relates to teaching or the classroom but it is titled, 2013 Photo365 Project. Beth discusses how she plans to actually fulfill the photo challenge to take a picture everyday for 365 days.
I have posted my comment I left on her post below.
"Hi Beth! I am a student at the University of South Alabama and was assigned to read your blog. I see you have not posted in a while but this post about a photo a day is an interesting idea. I have heard of people doing it before. It is a good practice because it keeps life interesting and it could give you a little something to look forward to doing at some point during the day. I would love to know how the process is going and where/ if you are posting the pictures online? Thanks, Shelby Day"


The second post I commented on from Beth Still's blog is from March 24, 2013. It is titled "Beyond the Textbook 2013". It was a post about Beth's wish list. She also discussed how if she could, she would create the perfect text book. She describes her perfect textbook and how she would use it.

I commented on my previous post to her reply and then commented on this post. I commented by talking about my perfect text book and how I would use it and how interesting her description was.

Book Trailer - Project #12

Blog Post 9

First off, I can clearly see how the blog "At the Teacher's Desk" would be a critical part of Dr. Strange's Personal Learning Network. These are great resources that would be a helpful reference in the future and to look back on to touch up on basics. Mr. Joe McClung has what I consider an interesting career map as he start teaching in the fall of 2009 in Noel, Missouri. Then soon after his first year he moved to a junior high in Fayetteville, Arkansas. He had a great idea of writing a blog post reflecting on his adventures at the end of each year stating his accomplishments and learning.

After reading Joe McClung Version 4 Post (2011-2012), I was amazed. He is one of the infamous teaches that are under the radar that truly enjoy the job and care for his students. You can tell by the picture heading the blog that his students are the main focus are they should be but that is not the case for all teachers. He offers some good advise in this post. He puts emphasis on focus on/ for the students. The final paragraph has the most effect on me because it discusses challenging yourself. I think it is important to constantly challenge yourself. If not for yourself, for your students.

The second post I read was "Adiós Woodland…". This was a post following the previous post. I chose this post because it made sense to me to follow the next post in the series. He discusses how he has accepted a job as an assistant principal in an elementary school and will not be returning to his previous school. As you can image this is a hard decision for him but you have to do what is best for yourself. Even though he is leaving he still seems so positive and excited for the new life he will be starting which is a great role model for students.

After exploring and reading his blog, I sent Joe McClung a tweet thanking him for his posts @jkmcclung.

Blog Post 8

1. Watching Richard Miller: This Is How We Dream Parts 1 and 2 it was not what I expected. I am not sure what exactly I expected but it was not this. Richard talking while words were coming on the screen became a little difficult. He eventually used a program such a screener to help the audience follow along. He is on the right track about how we have to adapt to technology. It is constantly changing and we have to change with it.

I could tell Dr. Miller put a lot of time and work into these videos and preparing them. They were very well thought out and planned. We as educators will eventually need to build our cirriculum around technology/ multimedia one day I believe. The idea of sharing ideas freely is great if people used it for the right reasons and cited the work. Creating an educational system is key in the classroom. Teaching the fundamentals then excelling from there is key.

Writing with multimedia does not scare me. The part that scares me is that students will be looking up to me and watch how I do things to see how THEY should do things. Even if I make a simple mistake that could become a terrible habit for my students. I believe that my students could learn to write with multimedia. It is not about the age or the level of the skill the students are doing but it is about how well the students are progressing and understand the tools being used. It is all in how the students are taught and as long as they are taught the basics and how to explore then I see no reason as to why these students will not be able to excel with multimedia.


2. Carly's blog post #12 is VERY extensive and detailed. Carly is a very hard worker and excels in her blog and school in general. She is an overachiever which will get you far in life! I like the video at the end of her blog because it brings life to the post and is interactive. I like videos because they teach in a new way and are more useful than reading a paper or out of a textbook. I do agree that she comes close to Dr Miller's multimedia guide. I like how she gives tips for how to improve the assignment given. Assignments always have room for improvement or clarifications and Carly does just this. She included so many links in this post that are resourceful. The links are borderline overkill but are worth it. I am grateful to have her as a lab assistant to EDM 310!!


3. The first student video is interesting in the sense that many of these topics do not affect me personally. For example, I do not procrastinate. I can completely see where Chipper is coming from in the "Teach me so I don't have to learn" portion. Many people in EDM310 believe this work is filler and not teaching us anything. I on the other hand think these are great resources that we as future educators could use in the classroom. Whether we update weekly or monthly it does not matter as long as we are getting the students involved in technology. It is unfortunate that so many people actually have to go through a situation similar to Chipper's to realize they really do need school and a degree to get through life.

The second video EDM for Dummies would be a good resource closer to the beginning of the semester so that we as students could have a little bit more insight on the class and how to excel in it. I did not have that strong of negative feelings toward EDM310 but I was not ecstatic about the class. The class is not hard it is time consuming. You have to figure out a system and stick to the system. I was not able to send @jamielynn519 a tweet becuase the twitter account did not come up when I searched for it.


4. The Learn to Change, Change to Learn video gets straight to the point. The most shocking thing to me was that the U.S. Department of Commerce ranked 55 industry sectors and education was ranked 55. This is the lowest, even under coal mining. The control in order in the classroom is where many teachers are stuck. Students need technology to learn. Technology is not a choice in society today. Students are going to have the technology so why not teach them how to use it effectively and educationally? Technology can be such a great resource for social networking, connecting students to new opportunities, and so much more. I personally completely agree with this video. Teachers need to change and adapt to the new classroom today and possibly tomorrow. Technology is constantly changing. We may not always be able to keep up but we can surely try. Students may be fooling around on these sites but they may not know how to properly use them. I for myself am still trying to figure out how to use Twitter a a resource rather than a simple social media site to update my every move. If the teachers can get the students involved and excited about a simulated classroom in the beginning them the students are more likely to stick with it and grow.


5. Scavenger Hunt 2.0
-You are to locate 3 of the 5 items on the list and follow the instructions.
1.) Locate a tool that is similar to Twitter/Facebook and provides a social platform for teachers, parents, and students. Create an account as a Teacher and write a paragraph or two about how you could use this site in your classroom.
2.) Locate the tool that most likely created this presentation. Once you find the site, look at the top right and click Pricing. Write a paragraph about the nice deal they make for students/ teachers.
3.) Find a tool to make-your-own comic strip. Create a comic. Post a picture of it in your blog.
4.) Find a video tool that you have never used. Summarize some it's special features.
5.) Find a tool to create a poll anywhere and at anytime. Create your first poll and post it here.

I was very interested in this part of the post because it has tools that I know I will use one day. After looking through the tools I decided to find one for each of the five instead of one for three of the five.

1.) When I was looking for this tool I found edmodo and knew it would be perfect! Edmodo is like Facebook exactly but ALL educational resources. The teachers can create groups for the students. I would use this to separate my classes to keep my resources divided for each class if I needed to. Teachers can also post assignments or even take polls on this site. It is a site solely created for parents, teachers, and students.
2.) Prezi is by far my favorite presentation tool. This site is free for students and educators and is a great tool! It is an alternative to Microsoft PowerPoint. Prezi is like PowerPoint only more interactive and fun and it doesn't hurt that it is free.
3.) MakeBelifsComix is a site that you can make your own comics. I do not see this being a huge resource in my classroom but I would most likely use it for a project a few times throughout the year. One things I did like about this was that you could write in different languages. If the class was learning a foreign language or a student was in the class who did not speak English, this could be a communication tool.
4.) There as so many video tools out there. A Mac is an incredible video tool with iMovie if you have access to it but I understand not all schools do have access. animoto seems to be the most popular video sight. It is free to create an account and with an account you have access to additional resources. "Animoto provides an array of tools for creating videos in your classroom." I think this is great because animoto focuses completly and totally on the classroom and the teachers/ students in it. You can add these videos (that are simply to edit and create) to your class blog, facebook, or other websites.
5.) Poll Everywhere is a site that you can create real-time survey experiences at events using your mobile device. It's fun, fast, and an easy way to get live responses in any venue.

Blog Post 7

I remember us having to watch a video about Randy Pausch during Blog Post #1 so when I saw his name again for this assignment, I was intrigued as to what this video would be about. When I read over the blog for this week about Randy Pausch’s Last Lecture I was not very excited though. Most of our blog post contain many different parts and are broken down so that we do not spend a large amount of time on one topic and get bored. With Pausch's lecture I was not bored I just thought some of his other videos I explored could have been just as efficient.

Randy Pausch's speech did not displease me by any means. He is a professor at Carnegie Mellon and as I can image I very brilliant one. He is well known for his speeches/ lectures. He is an inspirational teacher as well as an inspiration speaker. You can tell he is a hard worker and puts his heart and mind into everything he does. He is such a positive individual about his life and his situation with the cancer and such.

Right as he introduces himself and begins I like that he starts the lecture off with topics that will not be discussed. I believe this is a very smart idea especially in his situation. The three things he named are the exact things most people would want to talk to him about. And like he says, he constantly talks about those and he doesn't want to talk about them which makes sense. Then he brings up three topics that will be discussing during the lecture. The three topics are his childhood dreams, enabling the dreams of others, and Lessons learned (how you can achieve your dreams or enable the dreams of others).

Randy discusses his childhood dreams and how he was able to achieve them and how fortunate he has been to be able to achieve them. He explains that he had a very happy childhood. He had high hopes as a and very specific dreams as a child. After the first dream he mentions about the zero gravity experience, I could tell he was very strong willed and will do what he needs to, to get what he wants. He shows that even if you do not achieve your dreams that you will always learn from it. "Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted". This is a quote that he discusses and it stuck with me very much. He explains it further and it is a great quote for life. His examples he give are such an inspiration and almost make you forget about failure being an option. Failure will always be there, whether you let it take over is a different story but if you try your best then there is no room for it.

Secondly Pausch discusses how he believes he has enabling the dreams of others. He describes how he was was so impressed with his students work but you can never tell them good job and be done. You can never set the bar, you have to always make the students guess and keep reaching and pushing higher and higher. By pushing others, you give them the best experiences and advice they can get because you make them a better person and can change their life.

The last topic of discussion was that of lessons Pausch has learned as a professor, and how you can constantly gain knowledge to learn from and use in the future. Somewhere in life you have to ask yourself what let you get to the outcome and how you got there. The people in our lives impact us for the rest of OUR lives. We can learn so much from other people and by helping others. In my opinion, experience is the best was to learn. When you are gaining experience you are gaining both knowledge and examples to refer back to later in other situations.

After watching the lecture, it was not as bad as I thought it would have been. Randy Pausch is a very interesting and inspiring individual whose speeches I have grown to enjoy. He has such a positive attitude and has a incredible sense of humor that keeps him going. Although they might be long they are still worth it just as Dr. Strange told us.

Project #9 First Post

First Post: A summary of your progress in developing your PLN.

For this project I was pretty strongly against having any tool to help me build a PLN. I thought Facebook is good enough then I realized these are completely different programs/ resources. I did not fully understand the PLN concept so I asked questions and researched it. Then I watched the videos attached to Project 9 in the Project Instructions Manual. These videos helped me understand the concept more but still not fully. I have decided to use Symbaloo as a tool and to organize by boards and websites.
Using my set of PLN tools I have found hopefully this will help me connect to a more wide range of people throughout different areas. I will continue researching what new PLN I can find and use or add to my PLN.

Project #8 Group Podcast

Our group is entitled "Ball Till We Fall" or as Dr. Strange has us labeled, "Bail Till We Fail".

Our assigned book is by Rafe Esquith and is called "Teach like Your Hair Is on Fire" and we are assigned the Prologue, Chapters 1, 2, 12 and the Epilogue.

C4K February

My first C4K was an eighth grader who is in Mrs. Behm's class. Her name is Teresa and she is from Mexico. She has only posted twice. One was a short autobiography and the other was about "The Giver". Judging by the post, I believe the assignment was to either make an alternate ending or guess the actual ending.
I commented on the post about "The Giver" and told Teresa that I have not read the book in many years but that she seemed interested in the book. I also left my blog link and told her I was interested in what her class read next!

My second C4K is a student in Ms. Muhammad's fourth grade at Robbins Elementary in Prichard, AL. She has only posted twice but her latest post was about the AR book she was reading in December called "To Market, To Market". She said it was one of her favorite books and said a brief description of the book.
I left a comment on this post encouraging her to continuing reading so that she will become a better and more accurate reader. I also left my information and blog site so that she may visit it if she would like too.

The next C4K I did in February is a student from named Dartanian who attends Pt England School in New Zealand. She is a student in Room 14 with Miss Ouano. She has just started the fifth grade. I am a little confused as to how the grade levels work because as of December she was year 4 and February she is year 5. She is pretty active within the month of February with her blog. I did explore the class blog and I did like how excited the students were about using the netbooks and what all they could accomplish with them!
In my comment I left my information and told her how I noticed many differences between New Zealand and the American students. I mentioned how I liked that she included her family in her post. She also was pretty descriptive in her post with I complimented her on.

My final C4K for February is Teresa again from Mrs. Behm's class in Mexico. She has added a new post since my last visit to her blog and it includes what I believe is a wordle in the shape of a heart! As I mentioned before, Teresa is in eighth grade. Her latest blog post is entitled, "My New Vocabulary". Judging by looking at the paragraph and the title, I can guess what the assignment was. Most of the words are white but a few stand out in magenta and some in black. The words in magenta and black are the words that Teresa (and her class) were focusing on. Her paragraph was about a boy named Alex and his life.

I left Teresa a comment telling her I enjoyed her story about Alex and her high vocabulary word usage. She also had commented on my last comment I left and thanked me for visiting which was a nice surprise to see!

Project #10

Finding the Right Tool

For project #10 when I first began thinking about a technology tool I thought about what and whom I would be using it for. What would the purpose be? After I went through a few that are on my "favorites" list, I decided on one that I thought would be useful for this purpose that was not covered in this class. This was a little difficult because three of my top five tools are already covered in this course. My tool is called Groopt. Groopt is used to create free groups to privately communicate, schedule and share with the people and groups that matter most to them! This site can be used from a study group, to family, or any other group that wants to connect while still being private. It is a site that also has an app through the Apple Store and it is free! I currently use this site for my sorority (Alpha Omicron Pi). When I imagine what I could do with this tool for students or student's parents, I was excited! This site could be used for class information, updates, field trips, how the students are doing, and all while still being private. I did not have to do much searching because this is a tool that I already actively use almost daily. When I looked through some reviews they were positive (not a surprise)! I asked other members of my sorority how they felt about the site and everyone thinks it works better for us as a group compared to other sites we have tried in the past.

In order to be a part of this site, all you have to do is sign up. If you go to the website then click sign up then you select the kind of group you need. This site is free but there are options to upgrade available. I do not have the upgraded version. I use the free version and it is plenty.

C4T #2

My second C4T is on a teacher named David Truss. Right when I go to his blog I can see he updates it often and there are many interesting sites and information within his blog. He is also active on Twitter @datruss.

For my first comment I browsed through the blog and decided to comment on January 25, 2013. This post was about "7 Ways to Transform Your Classroom". He further explains the ways to transform and gives his incite on the topic.
For my comment, I introduced myself to David and then noted that when I first came to his blog, I noticed that he is very up to date. More up to date than many other blogs I have commented on which is great! I commended him on finding the time to teach, blog, and have personal time. Then I left my name and Twitter: @Miss_ShelbyD and Blog: http://dayshelbyedm310.blogspot.com/

Below is my first comment
"Hi David! My name is Shelby Day from the University of South Alabama. For my class EDM310 I was assigned your blog to follow. When I first came to your blog, I noticed that you are very up to date. More up to date than many other blogs I have commented on which is great! I commend you on finding the time to teach, blog, and have a personal time. It took me some time (and re-reading) to fully understand some of these concepts but once I understood, they were great! I look forward to future post on your blog! Shelby Day Twitter: @Miss_ShelbyD Blog: http://dayshelbyedm310.blogspot.com/"


For my second C4K comment I commented on David's post "Still the same conversation". He discusses if we need change in the schools. Then he list questions related to if we need change in the schools. At the closing of the post is a video that is a great resource to changing in the schools!

On my comment I left for "Still the same conversation" on David's blog, I reintroduced myself and stated how I felt about education and the technology associated with it. There was also a video that was interesting that I commented on. I left my blog information and my contact information.

Below is my second comment
"Hello again David! To reintroduce I am Shelby Day from the University of South Alabama. For my class EDM310 I was assigned your blog to follow. I agree that education must change! A reason instructors may be afraid of change is because they may not know where to start. I think that education should be more technology based and more interactive with online tools. The video is great and so spot on! Thanks David! Shelby Day Twitter: @Miss_ShelbyD Blog: http://dayshelbyedm310.blogspot.com/"

Blog Post 6

1. When I pulled Wendy Drexler's video "The Network Student" up to watch it, I honestly had no idea at all as to what to expect. As I watched it the fist time, I could only think how it related to EDM310. Then I realized it is EDM310, but only a different subject. At first I as not all about courses set up such as EDM310 but I knew I had to do it. Now a few weeks in, I believe it is a great learning process that should be a standard for all teachers not just South Alabama students. These course are a great way of learning about resources and how to find them rather than reading a chapter and being tested on it. These courses teach skills and knowledge rather than memorization and reading a textbooks, which makes it all the more interesting.
The first thing I realized is that this is a high school not college student. I could not imagine doing a class like this in high school. I would not start such a heavy course in high school, I would have to wait until college. Comparing this course to EDM310 again, I think it is to much to ask for from a high school student when the student has many other classes and other activities they are a part of. This class only meet three days out of the five, what about the other two days? It is high school, legally students have to be at school five days a week.
As I watched the video a second time I was thinking of the question "Why does the networked student even need a teacher?". The teacher is necessary to be a learning tool between the student and the online resources. For the first couple of weeks students will be learning how to operate the networking systems and since it will be new to the students, they will need help on navigating through the site. In conclusion, the teacher is there for guidance and a communication as well as a resource tool. She is teaching him skills rather than useless information he will not remember in two years.

2. After watching A 7th Grader's Personal Learning Environment I found that everyone does things differently. The student in the video was very organized with her bookmarking and keeping things on track. I personally use my history and a bookmarking bar to keep track of items/ links. I also like Google Drive to save documents so that you are able to view them from any computer with internet. Dropbox is also a useful site to store files so that they are viewable from any internet server.

Project #6

This is my sentence.

Project #5

Blog Post 5

1. After reading Krissy Venosdale's post, If I Built A School it opened my eyes to new ideas. Krissy Venosdale is a teacher who is very passionate about, well everything. She wants students to always have excitement and fun while learning in her classroom which is ideal for all teachers but most teachers are not this passionate about everything they do.
Once again, I can tell that Mrs. Venosdale is very passionate about this idea and would LOVE for it to happen to her. This school would be for the students not just an institution of learning. Everything from her Tree house Library to the lunchroom informal chats would be based around the students and their way of learning.The idea of how the classrooms are set up is also something I like.
For my school I would look into Mrs. Venosdale's idea of how classrooms are separated. I think this is an interesting idea but it also could create problems because there are no standards in place. I would make everything possible very hands on and lead/ teach by example rather than lectures in the classroom. I would focus on life skills not dates and information students will not remember or relate to. Students would be able to sign up for courses they are interested in and have a passion for rather than trying to teach them information they do not have a desire to learn.

2. Watching Eric Whitacre’s Virtual Choir I was simply amazed. I had no words on how this group of people could have and did complete this task. I subscribed to Eric's page on YouTube and watched about 6 videos about Virtual Choir or the Virtual Choir itself. This videos are simply amazing. My reaction to the video was shocked. I never even thought about how this could be done much less from 12 different countries and people that do not even know each other. I feel like if life had a song, This would be it.

3. It was interesting listening to the NPR interview of Eric Whitaker on making the Virtual Choir. To listen to the different voices separate and then together.

4. When I watched "Teaching in the 21st Century" by Kevin Roberts (John Strange version)it was pretty insightful. The title in itself is intriguing. I love that Prezi was used to create this presentation because it is already such an interactive presentation tool. Robert emphasizes the use of technology and all of the different sites that educators could use for resources. I agree with the video mostly. The slide that says "Teachers are not the main source of information, we are a filter" is very true in today's classroom. This presentation is accurate in the sense that teachers are there for questions but the way educators teach is being changed dramatically.

5. The flipped classroom videos were very informative and each one in its own way.
a. Katie Gimbar's video "Why I Flipped My Classroom" begins with introduction of herself and that she has been teaching math for 5 years and that is the reason why she flipped her classroom. She begins with the demonstration of how class time was not being used effectively in her classroom. This information would be very helpful in my classroom considering it is true. This is a great theory but i would like to see how the outcome was because I think this could only work on some subjects and grade levels.
The FAQ section was very helpful and answered many of my questions.
b. Dr. Lodge McCammon's video is more of teaching educators how to Flip a Classroom and the benefits but it is still fully effective in the lesson. This video is very similar to the previous video but more to the point.
c. Ms. Munafo's "Flipping the Classroom" is very busy on the slides. It is almost to busy to pay attention to everything. I like how she explains the definition and tips for flipping a classroom. She names the benefits of flipping so that parents and other educators can understand.

C4T #1

My first C4T was on Becky Goerend.

Becky is a fifth grade teacher she can be reached by Twitter @MrsBMG or by her blog.
Her most recent post is about a checklist her and her students created that they will use for writing. Instead of using a rubric for grading, Mrs. Goerend used the checklist that the class created. After the class completed the checklist the students each went over the narratives using the checklist to find and fix mistakes. After the students realized they needed to write with this checklist in mind, Mrs. Georend assigned another writing assignment. Giving the checklist to the students before they turned it in was helpful because they were able to compare their writing to how the teacher would grade it. In the post she list an example of her checklist the class created.

On her post I commented about how I think the checklist instead of a rubric is easier for students to understand. Sometimes when you give students an assignment to be graded, they will become nervous. With this checklist students will be focused on what to look for and fix so that they will receive a positive grade in the end. At the end of my comment, I thanked her for the helpful resource.


My second post for the first C4T was on a later post by Mrs. Goerend. In July 2012, her post was about how student always asked "How long does it have to be?" and teachers always think this means students are trying to do the least amount possible but what Mrs. Goerend found was that her students were only trying to get more information about the assignment and wanted to excel on it.

In my comment I introduced myself and told her how I always thought students were only trying to get out of the assignment without doing a lot of work rather than trying to improve their work. I also noted that this is a good point to think about.

Blog Post 4

My first podcast I viewed was Langwitches 1st Graders Create Own Read Along Book. As I listen to these first graders read the “Dinosaurs Before Dark” script, I could tell that they were trying to get into the story. It is great that at such a young age students are introduced to technology. The podcast was rather long for first grade but they kept the energy up! These could be a good tools to use to read books to students without actually reading. A teacher could play this podcast while showing the "Dinosaur Before Dark" book and then possibly make their own podcast with the class.

The next podcast I listened to was Langwitches Listening-Comprehension-Podcasting. First thing I noticed was that the video included another language other than English. I believe this was Hebrew. I can not speak or understand Hebrew but these young second graders do a great job of getting involved in the story and having such emotion. The second graders amazed me at how well they speak Hebrew for such a young age! The only word I really could understand was Ester but the students were great with such a new language and energy in the recording.

The final podcast I watched was Langwitches Flat Stanley Podcast. This was my favorite because these first graders are so energetic even in reading! The students speak so clearly and have such emotion in the recording. They used great description and I learned many new facts from their travels. This project is great for younger students because it is very creative and they can use their imagination. I liked Flat Emily who went to the University of Alabama and she learned to say "Roll Tide". She described the beaches and how the sand felt on her feet. This is a great project for the classroom and a way for students to use there imagination.

I would love to be able to use all of these ideas in a podcast for my classroom. I would even use these as examples to encourage my students to be enthusiastic and have such a positive attitude.