Blog Post #6

Through the conversations with Anthony Capps I was able to truly see the advantages of Project Based Learning and how amazing it can be when used correctly in the classroom. Personally, I loved hearing about the fun and exciting projects Mr. Capps has done with his 3rd graders; he seems to be on the right track towards making learning more effective. 

In Project Based Learning Part 1: Experiences of a 3rd Grade Teacher, Anthony Capps explains why Project Based Learning is so great, he emphasizes the fact that children are stimulated when they can create something and learn as they create and do research.  I thought it was very interesting how Mr. Capps mentioned that PBL is more effective when the students are reaching for a goal and have an audience to be motivated by. Something that Mr. Capps said that resonated with me is, "In Project Based Learning, the most crucial part is the opportunity to revise and reflect on their work" I very much agree that this aspect of PBL is so monumental in the development of a child's learning process. 

With  Project Based Learning Part 2: Experiences of a 3rd Grade Teacher , the second portion of Mr. Capp's experiences with PBL, he speaks about a certain project he did with his 3rd graders involving research of life in Afghanistan and what it would be like to be in the shoes of a 3rd grader currently living in Afghanistan. What I loved about this project is that children learn about real life current events that involve them indirectly. The most powerful thing that I will remember from what Mr. Capps advised is to "create opportunities" for students to go beyond, I can not agree with this any more! I feel like so often, teachers create such military instructions for their students and it leaves the students no room for creativity and enjoyment in the project they are expected to complete. Projects that give the students "ownership" are the most effective. 

                           

iCurio, as explained by Anthony Capps is an online tool that allows students to safely search the internet. I've never heard of this source before, but it is definitely something I'd like to incorporate into my classroom. One neat thing that Mr. Capps pointed out that is that iCurio is great for is helping students organize the information they have found; there is a easy-to-use storage option in iCurio. Lastly, iCurio could be very useful in the classroom, for example if one of my students had a learning disability or even if they weren't a strong reader, there is a function that allows the text to be read out loud to the student so they too, can comprehend the information. 

Discovery Education is another online tool, similar to iCurio that students can use which put up videos that go along with the subjects they are researching. The most important thing that I learned from Anthony Capp's explanation of how he has used this source in his classroom is, that when students have a visual image/ video to go along with what they are reading or listening to then they are so much more likely to retain the information. The point he has made is something that is important to remind myself as a future teacher, I need to make sure I create a stimulating image to go with the subject in which I am trying to teach. 

Mr. Capps gives great advice in, The Anthony - Strange list of Tips for Teachers Part 1 , One of the most eye opening things that Anthony mentioned is that as a teacher, you are constantly learning and you must have the desire to better your teaching at all times! Collectively, it seemed that both Dr. Strange and Mr. Capps agree that Reflecting on your self as a teacher is so vital. Self improvement can only be obtained through realizing one's mistakes and then correcting them. I think reflecting is something I need to start doing in order to become a successful student and eventually, an AMAZING teacher. 

In Don't Teach Tech - Use It, Mr. Capps persuasively speaks about how technology is an almost necessarily tool in the classroom.  I was very surprised to hear him say "Technology should never be taught in the classroom" but he backed up his statement saying technology should be "introduce(d) smartly" which totally makes sense to me. It's seriously so cool to hear about these eight and nine year olds being able to navigate and use iMovie in an educational manner.  

Mr. Capps concludes with Additional Thought About Lessons, he suggests that a Lesson has four layers. The 1st layer being, a Year, and how the lesson will fit into the school year. The 2nd is Unit, how will you as a teacher, teach the lesson so that it corresponds with previous lessons and so it can connect to future lessons. The 3rd layer is Week, how will you divide the week so that every day you can accomplish a lesson. Last, he 4th layer is Day, how will you deliver your lesson so that it is captivating.

All in all, with this weeks insight from Anthony Capps I've learned that learning is infinite and it is truly incredible just how far young minds can stretch if you simply give them the resources to guide them into a world of endless learning. Have a Great Week, Justine.

An Apple a Day Keeps the Doctor Away

My Sentence Videos

Blog Post #5

PLN's, What Are They? Part 1

Before this week, I had never heard of Personal Learning Networks, so I most certainly learned a lot from this assignment by doing research on PLN's. Personal Learning Networks are learning networks that consist of people and resources. PLN's can be made up of contacts who inspire you or even just acquaintances. The goal of a PLN is have a place to grow your knowledge.

Welcome to My PLE, A young lady in 7th grade presents a great example of how she uses a Personal Learning Environment in her science class. She shows how she uses Symbaloo to her best advantage by organizing her social media and other fun sources across the top of the Symbaloo homepage and then she has her educational and school related sources across the bottom. I think this is a great idea! Separating social media and educational sites I believe is a great way to stay of task and create less distraction. I was honestly blown away to hear about the many way that this 7th grade student is accelerating her education through different sources. Especially hearing that she skypes a science teacher from another part the country to ask questions to, that is so awesome! My favorite thing this student said was "It can be distracting, but because there is so much freedom, you have the inclination to be RESPONSIBLE.

Developing a Personal Learning Network in EDM 310, In Dr. Strange's post he gives great instructions on how to build your own PLN. Essentially, you become a detective when you build your PLN.

• Formulate Questions
• Ask Yourself, "What interests you?"
• Find your subject(s) 
• Search! (people, places and activities)
• Communicate with people who are also interested in your subject
• Form a team of people nearby
• Share Work

Now, I must ask myself, How will I develop my Personal Learning Network? I have always been interested in Photography, I find so much joy from capturing moments and taking photos of people that can make them feel great and overall I just love preserving memories through photography. My next step is I should research photographers and find ideas and inspiration from others and finally, I'll contact people and eventually I will form a group of people within mobile and together we can create endless possibilities. 

Blog Post #4

As our EDM 310 class motto states, "Questions are more important than answers" but how could that be, I asked myself. After truly thinking about the statement, I understand that it is true. Questions are more important because they are sparked out of a person thinking deeper and being more engaged into a subject.

The driving question for this week is "What do we need to know about asking questions to be an effective teacher?" 

I found it so interesting to read about Ben Johnson's theories in the classroom with his article The Right Way to Ask Questions in the Classroom. Mr. Johnsons emphasizes the fact that we teachers need to realize "we really do not know everything" and we need to come into the classroom with a humble approach and open attitude almost like a perfect student who is eager to learn. We also must be willing to learn from our young students.
Overall, what I concluded from the example videos and articles is that, so many times classrooms become dominated by a few students who always answer the questions and who also ask all the questions that the other percentage of the class easily drift their attention away from the teacher and the subject matter. What I've learned is that it is extremely important to create a learning environment where the students are more likely to pay attention because they know the teacher might randomly call on them. I know first hand, that this method works, I've definitely had my share of teachers who ask the class as a whole a questions and teachers who directly call on a student to ask a question. Although I get more nervous in the classes where I never know if my name will be called all of a sudden but, I also pay more attention to my instructor because of that innate fear of embarrassment that I wouldn't want to face if I had no idea how to answer the question asked. I guess you could say it is a positive pressure.

Project #15 Search Engines

Discovering the vast world of different Search Engines can be life changing! People out there have taken the time and invested so much into making certain search engines, just to make our lives, as Internet users, better. The sad thing is, many people and students don't even know about these different tools that are available to them to make their research projects and overall lives easier. Unfortunately, I'm guilty as well, I'm one of those students who hasn't fully explored the possibilities that Search Engines have to offer, but thanks to this weeks assignment, I was able to introduce myself to a simpler more efficient way to search with the Internet.

• Wolfram Alpha: What I concluded about this search engine is that the information is presented in a very organized way. I searched "alabama" and the information was displayed very neatly and easy to read and decipher essential facts. 

• Sweet Search: This search engine appeals to individuals because whatever you search, you will only find information from sources that have been validated by expert researchers. I searched " Where did Mardi Gras originate?" and the first two sources that were displayed were CNN and al.gov., so I would say those were two credible sources. 

• Pipl: This is good for searching people, it could be good to reconnect with old friends or even help dig out skeletons because the reports can pull up criminal activity and even traffic violations. I searched myself and went through a few pages to eventually download my report and when I tried to access it, it asked for my credit card, and that's when I left. 

• Internet Archive: The neat thing about this search engine is, it is able to pull up older sources and sites that google would probably have listed on a far far away page.

• IxQuick: If privacy is your main concern, this search engine is what you need. The site informs that you're searches are not saved in your history and neither is your credit card information, which in this day and age with identity thieves being so frequent, this seems like a great idea.

• Bing:  What I enjoy the most about Bing, is the visuals, everyday when you pull up the search engine, the picture is always different and I find it very stimulating, but besides from that, I hardly see a difference between Bing and google.

• Duck Duck Go: The main slogan of this search engine is that the site doesn't track you, for example if you buy a pair of shoes somewhere, sometimes you will see ads pop up with relevance to the shoes you purchased, but with this search engine, that kind of information is not tracked.

• Blekko: At the homepage of this search engine is an array of vivid images of trending people, I like that, because I am interested in popular culture and I would be interested in using this engine.  

C4T #1 Dare To Care

Dare To Care is a blog written by a current kindergarten teacher, Denise Krebs.

Summary Post 1.
In her latest post Finding My Way in the Kindergarten Genius Hour Denise shares about her experience of transitioning from teaching secondary levels of education to teaching kindergarten. Something that Denise loved and her students in 7th and 8th grade loved was a portion of class called Genius Hour, the main goal of genius hour is to give the students FREEDOM! The students decide what they want to learn; surprisingly enough, the students typically get very involved into projects and many become inventors during this time. Mrs. Denise brought this tradition of Genius Hour into her new kindergarten class hoping it might produce the same great feedback as when she did it with her older student. She was right! The young six-year-olds had an academic blast with this hour. Some examples of projects created by the children are a couch and chair made from recycled soda bottles.

My Comment Post 1.
I’m a student at the University of South Alabama as well, I absolutely enjoyed reading your thoughts and insights as an educator in the classroom, I think it’s so great that you've encouraged these young children to expanded their imaginations and let them become mini inventors. I’ve recently started blogging as a requirement for one of my courses, EDM 310, I will definitely continue blogging as a student teacher and then as a teacher and I’ll save your site so I can spark ideas.http://spiccianijustineedm310.blogspot.com/ This is my blog for my EDM310 class if you’d like to view it.

Summary Post 2
The second post I read was Reading About Learning, Brains and Metacognition. In Denise's post she starts out talking about Metacognition, this was my first time learning about metacognition. Denise defines it as "thinking about thinking" in a dictionary it is defined as " Awareness and understanding of ones own thought processes" (Webster). The main point of Denise's post to share about how greatly her teaching methods were impacted when she realized it was very crucial that her students think about their own thinking and thought processes as they read.

My Comment Post 2. (The "leave a Reply" button wouldn't work for me, but if I was able to comment I would have said,
Hi Denise, thanks so much for visiting my blog and commenting. I hope you're doing well, I found this post about Metacognition to be very interesting! You most certainly brought up a crucial point about the importance of recognizing and analyzing our thought process while we think. The link you included, 12 Questions to Promote Self-Knowledge in Students was refreshing, I honestly think these questions are ideal for any person to ask themselves,
Justine.

Blog Post #3

"How Can You Provide Meaningful Feedback to Your Peers?"

My peers and I. Central Park, NY (2012)

Throughout my years I've learned so much from others around me, whether its been with harsh criticism or through tender reassurance, I believe there is so much we can learn from our peers and I also believe we have so much we can teach others using constructive feedback.


What Is Peer Editing?
I now have a better understanding of what Peer Editing is and why it can be very beneficial after watching the Prezi presentation "What is Peer Editing". As stated in the video there are three important factors in effective peer editing, the first being, give COMPLIMENTS. I consider myself to be a person who thrives in an environment where sincere compliments are given and received so I would say I agree with the presentation that the first and most important step in peer editing should be compliments. The second step is to give SUGGESTIONS. In order to give constructive feedback its crucial to give suggestions and ideas to help a fellow peer become better at what they are doing. The final step is to help make CORRECTIONS, To effectively correct a peer, you must give an explanation of why the corrections need to be made so that they can learn.

Peer Edit with Perfection Tutorial
What I took out of viewing the slideshow of "Peer Edit with Perfection Tutorial" is the importance of being SENSITIVE. It is all too true that giving criticism can be a tricky task, and that is why it is extremely vital that when peers review each others work they do this being very cautious of their words and how they present them in order to provide their  point but in a respectful manner.


Top 10 Peer Review Mistakes
This last video was my favorite, starting off with the fact that the whole video was narrated by a bright late-elementary or early-middle school student. My first reaction to the video was that this assignment must have been a great project for these students to work on because it involved interactive learning and was a project where everyone participated. What I was able to take away from the video is the do not's of peer reviewing and through clever examples from people like Whatever Will I see the importance of caring about your work being reviewed and through Jean the Generalizer I see the importance of being specific about mistakes made and directly pointing out where they have been made.

To summarize this weeks learning:

Peer Editing is suggestions, comments, compliments, and changes to writing.

I believe the best way to approach peer editing is by being thoughtful towards your peer's feeling but also with the attitude to want to better them in their work.

In this EDM310 class I will go about peer reviewing my classmates blog pots with the help of a theory that my fellow class mate, Corinne Shirley brought up to me, the COMPLIMENT SANDWICH, which in short, means to make sure you squish useful criticism and suggestions between two thoughtful compliments Because we all know that what is inside a sandwich is what makes the sandwich so great but what keeps the sandwich together is, in fact, the bread and in this situation the bread would be the compliments.

I feel that what makes peer editing so important is the fact that your work is being criticized by someone who is on the same level as you. Therefore, because they are on the same level as you it can be more powerful and meaningful when they give you suggestions, comments, compliments and changes to your writing.

Until next time, have a great week!
-Justine