Blog Journal #9

 My experiences as a distance learner were honestly very good. Distance learning made my school experience a lot better, since it was more flexible. I liked how I was able to stay in bed all day, but I did not like not being able to make connections to my teachers and peers. When I am a teacher to improve distance learning I will make efforts in being engaging through the screen. 

OERs are resources open and accessible to the public for learning and usage. An example of this is a digital library with modules and building tools. This library has a lot of subjects and grade levels for people to search for. When you find the grade and subject you want through the filters, a lot of activities pop up with a variety of different medias. Another cool thing about this is you can filter it to coincide with standards you are following. The link is https://www.oercommons.org 

I acquired a lot of new skills from working with the powerpoints. I learned how to record me giving the presentation which will be very helpful when I go into teaching. One thing I liked was how we had freedom to design, which made it more fun and creative. One thing i did not like was having to come up with 10 slides of information, as I was running out of things to say, but that was just a reflection of the topic I chose. 

(my picture still wont upload)

Blog Journal #8

 The most useful skill I acquired from working with the web design page was the embedding feature. I feel like everything else I used was more basic figuring it out or I had used it before. The embedded feature was something new I had to learn and probably could not figure out alone. This feature will be helpful in the future to create class calendars to keep parents up to date with classroom events. https://sites.google.com/view/ms-aldridges-3rd-grade/home 

New skills I learned from using Diigo include the ability to mark up a text with annotations. This includes the highlighting and sticky note feature Diigo offers. This can be useful in my classroom becasue it can foster collaboration with coworkers and students. I can post an article and see what others have to say about it which is beneficial to all parties' learning. 

Technology and teacher professional development are important factors in a good teacher. A teacher staying informed on technological advancements through trainings can serve as professional development. This benefits learning because the more information the teacher knows the more they can teach students. Technology is a big field in today's world, so it is important teachers stay up to date for the best outcomes in preparing students for the real world. https://twitter.com/home is a website that can help teachers stay up to date with trends of technology in education because it can bring together a lot of knowledgable people to one centralized hub who can learn from each other through live videos, tweeted articles, and more. 

Blog Journal #7

When looking for a teacher run page on a school website it was super hard to find a page run by individual teachers. Instead, I was only able to find broad information about upcoming activities and school wide announcements. I was able to find game schedules, letters from admin, attendance information, and the student code of conduct. All of these are useful tools, however there is no evidence of classroom pages run by teachers, which may have given viewers a better idea of day to day life in the classroom at TCHS.

https://timbercreekhs.ocps.net/

In the future, I see myself using technology heavily to accomplish professional responsibilities. I can use technology to keep families up to date with classroom activities, and also keep my classroom organized with set time dedicated toward technological work. This will make my work more efficient because technology often makes things easier or faster, so dedicating time to use will allow me to use my time wisely. This is effective because taking time to interact with students and their families allows me to create relationships with them which ultimately makes learning better. Specifically, I will use Canvas, a website, newsletters, twitter, TPT, and online learning resources.

Usually, I can navigate canvas very easily. However when completing assignment 2 i found myself struggling to navigate the pages and group work and got very frustrated with it. I did not like how disorganized it was and how much the usage differs from when usually using canvas. In the future, I will probably not use canvas for group work in regards to my students but I do like the other more navigable parts of canvas and will use those.

Blog Journal #6

 This was my first time using Diigo, so i was unfamiliar with it when starting. After playing around with it, I found that I liked that Diigo was fairly easy to figure out on my own. It was clear and straightforward which made using it easy and user friendly. However I did not like the layout of Diigo, it felt straining and was not calm. The layout felt hectic and outdated, but the actual usage of the website was good the aesthetics were the only issue. 

So far my experience with blogging has been good. The blogger website is easy to use and the layout makes blogging simple and easy. I also like being able to answer these questions in more a laid back way as oppose to paragraphs. It is also cool to see my classmates posts in one central website and be able to comment on their ideas too. Overall I am glad we use this tool in class and I have had no bad experiences so far, this is something i will use later in life. 

A web 2.0 tool I may use when teaching later on is Tik Tok. I think this would be a good resource for students because a lot of students already use Tik Tok so they are familiar with how the application works. Tik Tok also has super short videos which ensures students are not zoning out, and can pay attention for 1 min to get the information of the video, then watch another short video with a different layout and still be enaged. A lot of teachers are on Tik tok already which makes it a good tool for students who may need different types of teaching styles, ensuring they can find at least 1 person to learn from. Tik Tok can also be a way for students to complete projects and assignments while viewing the work as fun since they get to be creative and use social media, which most students already enjoy doing in every day life. 

Blog Post #5

 I have been using twitter to interact with people in regards of news and new things to learn. For example, prior to this class i used twitter to learn ab AP exams and saw government officials post about current events. During this course, i have been able to learn about educational twitter through account regarding educational government like the Board of Education. Twitter may helpful in my future career because it can help me connect with other teachers and also see things my district is posting to keep up to date.

The digital divide affects students success in school because it causes a difference in access to resources needed for schooling. Some students lack access to technology which may make it harder for them to complete assignments that require it. Some causes of digital divide may be lack of money or resources. In a classroom, teachers may experience digital divide when teaching a wide variety of students. To help, teachers may urge fundraisers to get a class set of technology. 

Two softwares I would like to use in my future classroom are near pod and blooket. Nearpod is a software that can help facilitate lessons through activities and slide shows, this is beneficial because of its wide variety of uses. Blooket is a review game with many different settings and styles. this is beneficial because teachers can input their own information to create games catered to their lessons, and the games are super engaging for students. 

Blog Journal #4

     1. ELA technology standards are a basis of curriculum to ensure students are on track with the learning of age appropriate technology skills in school. One of these standards suggests that students in 1st grade should be able to understand and comprehend the usage and assistant of a read aloud feature on a story provided online. This standard helps students comprehend audio information and encode information through hearing rather than seeing. I believe I would be able to implement this goal with my current skill set because I feel comfortable with audio technology and assisting students with basic computer technology, which this is. 

    2. The CPALMS educator toolkit seems like a super beneficial tool for educators carrying out the state mandated standards. CPALMS are unique to FL, so all teachers in Florida may have access to these tools to make implementing the standards more smoothly. The standard I choose to look into was in 1st grade science and it requires teachers to teach the benefits and harmful properties of the sun. With this standard, the resources available are a presentation, a lesson sequence, and a tutorial. These resources can be used in teaching by giving the teacher an outline of what needs to be taught so they can ensure they are staying on standard. 

    3. Internet searching is important because this tool helps make researching more efficient. This tool allows you to search for information specifically, and can help ensure you are researching the right thing instead of a possible synonym. The skill I will use most moving forward is the one that allows you to filter your searches by including "-car" for example. This is because often times my searches can overloaded by information that uses the same words but is not relevant, so this tool can help prevent that.     

Blog Journal #3

     Copyright and fair use are two aspects to be aware of when using technology today. Copyright is protection over your own work, so that it cannot be stolen or used without permission. Fair use is a case-by- case test found in copyright law which makes it so that someone can use work that has been copyrighted without protection. As a teacher, it is important to be aware of these terms because these laws effect what you can and cannot use in your classroom, and failure to abide by copyright laws may put your competency in jeopardy. It also important that you can educate your students on these aspects to prevent them from plagiarizing or stealing copyrighted material while under your watch. 

    2 prevalent technology implantation issues today include cyberbullying and lack of funding. Cyberbullying is the harassment of people through online platforms. Cyberbullying can be prevented with an increase in online security and monitoring by teachers. A lack of funding occurs when the schools or students do not have adequate fundings to provide technology in learning settings. A lack of funding can be solved with increased fundraising or encouraging students to bring their own devices. 

    The newsletters taught me many skills and tools I had not realized Microsoft Word offered. For example, the newsletter was the first time I used two columns on a Microsoft word document. In the future however, I could improve my newsletters by using better graphics to make it more appealing to the viewer. I can use these skills in my future career by actually creating teacher newsletters when I have a classroom of my own. 

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