Posts

Blog #10

      For this last blog, I'm going to start out by discussing data collection surveys, and how they can be used in class. As a future educator, I often find myself wanting to be in a younger classroom - elementary school, 1st through 5th grade ideally. These data collection tools can be very helpful for younger students, specifically to get an idea of how they learn well, and what types of lessons they like the most. The students will be interested to answer the questions if they know it will affect the classroom and how they learn, and I think it's very important to design lessons around the students. It's impossible to do that without survey tools.     While reading my classmate's blogs, what I found most interesting was everyone's different experiences with distance learning and COVID-19! Everyone has their own unique experience regarding distance learning, and it was really interesting to read about the different technologies that schools used and different...

Blog #9

      Distance learning has become an integral part of my life, along with many other students my age, and almost anyone who was in the field of education during the pandemic. I graduated high school in 2020, and when the pandemic started around March, school was cancelled for a few weeks at a time, until there was no more school at all. How were we supposed to finish our senior year and graduate? Would I be able to go to college? All of these questions were on my mind, and everyone else's. Luckily, my county switched over to Canvas pretty seamlessly, and I was able to finish out my school year on there. We still use Canvas here at FSU, so I have had an easy transition as a distance learner! Even going to in-person classes now, we still use Canvas as the main hub of information, which has been quite useful to me. As a teacher, I would do everything I could to keep distance learners engaged. I had trouble finding motivation and support for schoolwork during the time t...

Blog #8

      This week, we talked about using assistive technology in the classroom, and different resources that teachers have both here at FSU and in general. Our wonderful classmate Re also was kind enough to share about their own experience with assistive technology. What I took away from the assistive technology topic most is that there are often many resources for those who need them, but they are often not well-advertised, which can make it difficult for students to know they exist. Even here at FSU, there are many resources a student can use, but I for one had no idea that some of them were there until I found out through my classwork. In my own classroom, I hope to have assistive technology as best as I can to help differently-abled students adapt. The goal is to help every child learn, not just a few.     Diigo is a very useful tool, especially in the classroom. I would compare it to other instructional tools that I like, such as Edmodo; because you can post ...

Blog #6

      Diigo is a platform that allows people to share links to resources, as well as annotate those resources and make edits that the whole group can see. This includes adding sticky notes with thoughts & ideas, or simply highlighting. I enjoyed the fact that students are able to "bookmark" a resource to share with the class - it is an easy way to provide a resource with a title, link, and a comment describing the source. It is simple to operate and students of all ages should be able to use it, making it accessible to most of the student population - at least for middle school, high school, and higher education. Other students are able to easily click on the source provided and see a copy of it, along with any annotations shared with the group. I think this is a good resource that could be used in a lot of classrooms in the U.S. and I enjoyed using it this week for the first time.     I have enjoyed using Blogger so far, and there are a few things I specifi...

Blog #5

      Twitter is mostly used as a social media platform, but many people also use Twitter for professional/academic groups, news, and other professional activities. Personally, Twitter has never been a go-to networking site for me, but I have some experience using the platform. I first created an account in high school to follow other school-related accounts, and when I became a senior, I ran the drama club account myself, which mainly just made publicity posts and retweeted/liked posts from other accounts. I have also used Twitter to find information before. E ven though I wouldn't personally use it as a first resource, it can be very helpful for learning information quickly and thoroughly.     The digital divide mostly refers to the level of access that people have to technology and how much it varies. There are many people with less financial resources, or who cannot use technology for another reason - and these people have inequality when it comes to informa...

Blog 4

     The Florida Computer Science standards are a part of the larger CPALMS standards, but exclusively focus on computer science. The specific standard I chose to look at was from the 3rd through 5th grade section - Standard SC.35.CS-CC.1.1 - which says that students should be able to identify technology tools for individual and collaborative data collection, writing, communication, and publishing activities. To me, this means that students should be able to start integrating technology into their learning processes, and use it as an aid rather than seeing it as an obstacle. For example, using excel to collect data for simple science experiments. I feel as though I would be ready to implement this specific standard, because in my opinion it would just take patience and time with each student - and ensuring that you don't get frustrated if some students don't understand right away.     The CPALMS standards mentioned previously are an official collection of standa...

Blog #3

 Happy Friday! :)      Copyright and fair use are important terms, but many people don't fully understand them. These terms relate to people's ownership of their intellectual property, or things they made/came up with. Copyright is a legal type of protection - it gives a person ownership of their property, and makes sure that only THEY are allowed to use and distribute it. A surprisingly-unknown fact about copyright is that it's automatic - although it can be registered with the copyright office, it applies as soon as something is created or recorded. The only two conditions for this is that in order for something to be copyrighted, it must be original (creative - obviously not something that someone else made) and fixed (a person can see or hear it). Fair use for copyrighted materials means that ideally you would purchase a full copy of the work, or gotten permission from the person who owns it (it is illegal not to do so).     There are a few issues that ...