Thanksgiving and Philosophy of Technology

Hey Spencer and Hayley,

I hope you guys had great breaks! I know I loved spending some time with my family and friends. Over break I was working on my Philosophy of Technology in Education. One of the sources I found to be very interesting was the one Dr. Jenny gave us by James McNamara, a former student at Grove City College. I thought his essay was very well written and communicated his point accurately. One fact he commented on was the distribution of funds at Grove City College. He mentioned that the Intramural Room has wireless internet. I think that this is an unwise use of school funds and that it would be much more beneficial to have some of the dorms be wireless. I know that I struggle to complete groupwork in my dorm room because only two people at a time can use internet. Additionally, if I want to bring something to show to a friend quickly and the assignment is online, I have to either call my friend to me or unplug my internet, take my computer to my friend's room, and replug-in my computer to the internet. I do however think that it is very nice to have wireless in the academic buildings, library and KetRec, as I often do homework at each of those places.

Liz

VoiceThread on George Herbert

Voicethread on George Herbert

We created a voicethread on the poet George Herbert.

http://voicethread.com/share/755196

Philosophy of Technology

Hey Guys!

I was working on my Philosophy of Technology project yesterday and was thinking about how technology has been used effectively in my personal experiences in the classroom. Many of my teachers in high school used overheads, however, a few used PowerPoint. For example, my Health teacher used PowerPoint. I enjoyed her lectures and found them easy to follow. The pictures were often much clearer than those on overheads used by my other teachers. This is one example in which the development of technology has been an asset to my education. Additionally, we had to write a research paper every year in high school. I found a lot of my resources by looking up information provided through Databases. The computers not only allowed me to find online articles, they helped me to quickly and easily locate print resources in the library. Technology can help to present information clearly and can be a great organizational tool.

Liz

Podcasts

A podcast is a series of digital media files that are released episodically and downloaded through web syndication, which is when website material is made available over multiple sites. Since Spencer and Liz are English majors, we picked the Poetry Foundation Podcast, which would be good because you would be able to hear the stressed and unstressed metric patterns in the poems. Also, we chose the Shakespeare podcast because Shakespeare can be really difficult to understand and hearing it would be easier than reading it because you could hear the voices and it would make it more interesting. For me, I would choose the FrenchPodClass. This could be very helpful because you would be able to hear the pronunciation of words, getting the students used to the sounds of the language and helping them a lot with listening comprehension.
It would be a good idea to use podcasts in the French classroom because there is an advantage to being able to hear words and conversations at normal speed, rather than the students just talking to each other, which would be really slow conversations. They need to get used to hearing and understanding normal spoken French, and the podcasts would help a lot with that. It would be a good idea to use podcasts in the English classroom because they could be used to help the students better understand the English language, and it would be especially useful for students learning English as a second language because it helps them hear how the words and phrases are pronounced and it's presented in a fun and upbeat way.

The links to the websites are found here:

http://www.frenchpodclass.com/

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/journal/audiolanding.html

http://www.shakespearebyanothername.com/audio.html

Education Issues: Reading Problems

When I was reading through the education issues, I found a section about reading problems, specifically in middleschoolers. It discussed the problem of students being unable, or having a lot of trouble reading. In fact, many students are below the 30th percentile in reading. This problem with reading is a key contributor to many students' lack of interest in school. This is definitely a problem that needs attention, and this article suggests that technology may be used in a positive way to effectively help these students who are struggling. Since the traditional methods of teaching has not worked for these kids, the internet may be a useful tool in getting kids more interested and involved in reading. There are many reading software programs that can be used for this purpose.

I think this information could be very useful in my future French classroom because if students are having trouble reading English, they are going to have an even harder time learning to read French. I could use online and reading software programs to get my students to be more interactive in reading and make reading more exciting for them. I could also try to find 0nline programs that would assist students in learning to read French as well. This would help them to learn more outside the classroom as well.


~Hayley


The link to this information can be found here: http://oc.course.com/sc/tdc5/index.cfm?action=issue&chapter=3

Education Issues: Wikis and Education

For the second part of this assignment, I chose a subject under Education Issues. Wikis and Education discusses the importance and detriment of Wikis. Some Wikis have only a few editors and are on specific topics while others, such as Wikipedia, have throusands of editors and encompass many topics. These can easily have fraud, as anyone can edit the content. As a teacher, I would not allow my students to use wiki sources in research topics. I know that as a student, I often go to wiki sources for information, however, whenever my teachers do not allow this, I often find a greater amount of information becaue it forces me to look at several different sources. Although wiki sources are somewhat helpful and can provide great information, they are not always completely reliable.

Liz

"Reading Aloud: Is It Worth It?"

This article discusses the advantages of reading aloud to students. Nancy Lacedonia, a teacher in Massachusetts, created a survey to gauge the effectiveness of reading aloud in a classroom setting. The findings show that classroom reading can enhance a student's reading ability and can create an interest in literature. Students who learn to appreciate literature are often more successful in school, and are often more likely to go to college.

I think that this topic is relevant to my future classroom. As an English teacher, I will be exposing my students to a variety of literary works. By introducing these works aloud, I can help the whole class to participate, and this will encourage class discussion and group learning. Reading aloud is a good way to bring the class together.

Integration Corner

While I was browsing through the integration corner, I found a website about writing activities for the web specifically for the use of foreign language teachers. Since I am a French education major, I found this to be very interesting and potentially very helpful for the future.
The World Wide Web is a very useful tool that can aid students in the mastery of a foreign language. It is useful especially in a foreign language class because it is very easy to find cultural documents and information. Foreign language teachers at the Technology Workshop of the Summer Institute of the California Foreign Language Project created web pages for all levels of students that are great examples to go off of in creating your own web activity. Also, since beginning level students often have trouble with reading assignments, these websites give reading strategies that can help the students in comprehending what they are reading. This can be much more beneficial to the students because they will be able to get help online from the website when they do not have a teacher available to ask for help.
I think these web activities could be very useful for my future French classroom. It will allow the students to be more interactive and they will be able to gain more knowledge, especially culturally, than just simply through in-class activities.


The link to this website can be found here: http://www.clta.net/lessons/writing.html

Integration Corner: Reading/ Language Arts Corner

Spencer and Hayley,

I chose to look at the Reading/ Language Arts Corner since there wasn't a specific English Corner. One aspect that I thought was pretty neat was the discussion on reading aloud in the classroom. A few people i nthe article commented on reading aloud in their own classrooms, one who teaches at the graduate level! Reading aloud helps students to focus and get settled before the lesson begins. In an elementary classroom, reading aloud helps give a visual thatwill later assist students as they learn to read on their own.

I will integrate this into my future classroom as an Engilsh Secondary Education instructor. I will make an effory to read aloud to my students at least a few times a week. If we are working on a book in class, I might choose to read portions of it to them. As we read, I will stop to ask thoughtful questions to keep the students engaged and thinking about the work. If we are not currently working on a book, I will choose either interesting and applicable articles, or a novel that will possibly intrigue the students.

Liz