Conclusion of the Class

Tomorrow is the last day of my TPTE 486 class. Over the past five weeks I have learned an abundant amount of information I never even knew existed on the internet. I learned information that will be beneficial in my future career as an educator, as well as in general in my future. I enjoyed the majority of the activities we learned in this class. My favorite, although it was very stressful, was the calendar. I will definitely use this in my future. I also enjoyed writing the blogs, and will more then likely use this in my future. I also loved learning about wordle, smilebox, glogster, and animoto. I did not enjoy making the interactive spreadsheet. It was frustrating for me because I had a hard time understanding how to create it exactly as it needed to be. I also really enjoyed making the video. I did not like adding music because I wanted to pick a song that I enjoyed from itunes, rather than one off of a free music website. Overall, I really enjoyed this class, even though it was a lot of work and stressful at times. In the end, I learned a great amount of information that I will take with me and use in my future as an educator of children!

Laura's Adventurous Summer Travel (Digital Story)

Today in class I learned how to create a digital story using movie maker. I learned how to add music, pictures, tranistions between slides, captions, credits, a title page and when to add the text to a slide. At times I became frustrated because the captions I was writing for a particular picture would end up on another slide or picture. With the help of Amy I was able to figure out how to fix this problem. Adding the pictures to the digitial story was the easiest part. I also enjoyed writing the story board. If I were to do this another time, I would take it one step at a time and not become frustrated. Since I know how everything, well most everything, works, I believe I would be much more successful in future uses. I can use this tool in my classroom by telling a story of what the children have learned over a period of time, as well as documenting a class field trip. I can use the students to help create the story board. I look forward to creating another digital story with movie maker in the near future!

Interactive Spreadsheet Kindergarten

I learned how to create an interactive spreadsheet. For me, this has been the most difficult assignment yet. I struggled with understanding how to do everything. Although the directions were detailed and thorough, I had a difficult time locating specific tasks and tools. I did not understand that with each row and column, you had to retype to code that was provided. I figured this out after about an hour of playing around on the spreadsheet. Fortunteatly, once I realized how to do this, it was easy to finish the rest. If I were to do this another time, I would make sure to write down every detail when going over it in class and to ask questions when something goes wrong. I was very satisfied with my final product and happy with the way it looked once the assignment was complete. This could be used in my classroom to ask simple questions or practice subjects we have learned in the classroom. I like how it gives the students immediate feedback by stating whether or not the answer was correct.  

Interactive Spreadsheet Excel Example In Class

Google Forms

Today I learned how to create a google form. I had a difficult time understanding this specific tool. However, with the help of the individuals teaching it, I was able to understand it better. I think it is a great tool to use with older children to answer daily questions. Next time, I would create a different question that my children could answer at home with the help of their parents. If I wanted to learn how many individuals enjoy a certain activity, I could ask the question, and ask individuals to answer the question. I could then view the results and see what people enjoyed and how many individuals answered the questions.

Kidspiration!

Today we learned about inspiration/kidspiration. Inside these tools you can create diagrams for your students, or allow them to create one on their own. I chose to do my diagram on the five senses. I thought this was appropriate because I will be teaching and talking about the five senses in the future. I learned how to add clip art pictures so the children have a visual picture that went along with the words. I also added a hyperlink under the main title for the kids to click on and learn more information about the five senses. I used arrows in my diagram for the children to be able to see what connects to what. (You see with your eyes, and not your ears.) I also included two informative boxes that contained more information on two of the senses. In the top corner I added which NETS-S and Tennessee State Curriculum the five senses best fit with. Overall, I loved using kidspiration. I thought it was simple to create, however, I think it may be a little too advanced for the kids I will be teaching to use. If I were to do this another time, I would chose another area/subject to teach, such as the four seasons or animal habitats. I think it is a great tool that I will use in my future classes to teach different subjects to the children. Below you will see the diagram I made today!

Smilebox

Today we learned how to create a smile box. Like many of the activities we do in TPTE, smile box is free. You can create a scrapbook, invitations, greetings, and slideshows. Today in class we made a single page of a scrapbook. We were allowed to pick our own design. I chose to do a scrapbook page that allowed me to upload seven photos. I uploaded photos of my family and friends and labeled it “People I love.” Smile box will be very beneficial in my classroom in the future. I can use the scrapbook and slideshow part to add pictures for the parents to view of what we are learning in class, or a field trip we took. The invitations can be used to invite the parents to an open house or meet and greet. The greetings can be useful when welcoming parents and students to my classroom. I believe everything went well with this activity. If I were to do this activity again, I would chose a different design and different pictures. I really enjoyed creating the smilebox and can't wait to use it in my future practice. Below you will see the scrapbook page I created.

This free collage personalized with Smilebox

Glogster

Today we created a glogster. A glogster is a website where you can create an interactive poster. On glogster I created a poster that I can use in my future practice as a teacher. I was able to add different tags to my page. Tags are simply a design that looks like a real life tag, or sticky note. On these tags I could have a section about myself, a calendar of what my class does on a daily basis, and important dates for parents to remember. I could use a different design on each of these tags so it would not be the same and each tag would be eye catching. On glogster, I also had the opportunity to upload pictures, videos, and chose from different graphics on the computer to add to my page. I decided to add a school bus and the numbers “1,2,3.” I thought both of these graphics would be appropriate for my future classroom, either kindergarten, preschool, or special education. I felt as though they were all child friendly. It was pretty simple to create the glogster with the detailed instructions from the individuals who taught it to the class. I didn't find anything difficult, except for the fact I didn't have enough time to create and put as much information as I wanted to on my glogster. All the information I learned was beneficial and will be used in my future when i am teaching. Below you will see the glogster I created in class. It is bare, as I did not have an abundant amount of time to create it. I hope to go back and add more later!

Hunt

Today we went on a scavenger hunt. My activity was to find things outside that began with the letters A-L. Some of the letters were challenging to find objects that began with that specific letter, such as I and J. I eventually found different items around campus that began with all the letters. Below you will see my slide show that I made in google presentation, as well as Picasa, both of which are tools used to upload photos and create slide shows. I never knew either of these two tools existed, and have learned how I can use them in my classroom to show parents what we are learning about. Once I was taught how to use both of these, I found them easy to use. I prefer google presentation over Picasa, and I feel that new beginners would think the same. Overall, I enjoyed creating both of these slide shows and hope everyone who views them enjoys them as well!

Teaching Wordle!

Today in class, Kayla and I taught our classmates what worlde is and how to use it. In simple, a wordle is a website where you use text to form "word clouds." The more you type a word, the bigger it appears. After typing up all the words you would like in your worlde, you click "go." Once your wordle has been created you can play around with the font, color and layout. After showing the class an informative video, we showed them an example of the wordle we had created. Next, we walked through the steps with the class and taught them how to create a wordle. We then asked all of our classmates to create their own wordle about themselves. I believe they all found it educational and beneficial to use in their future class, as I did myself. Worlde is a website that can be used for entertainment or educational purposes. It is a website I would suggest to other educators to use as an outline or even a study guide in their classroom. I believe teaching the class went well. I thought we walked through the steps very throughouly. In the end, I believe everyone thought they could go teach worlde to other individuals if need be. I learned how to teach individuals about something and that I need to use details and not just assume people know how to do things. This tool can be used in my classroom when teaching children about a certain subject (animals, ocean, seasons, etc.).

Reflection of WebQuest Activity

Today in class we viewed WebQuests dealing with our field of study. I looked at an Elementary Education WebQuest. Unfortunately, I did not enjoy viewing WebQuest. I think part of it had to do with the fact that the WebQuest I looked at dealt with elementary education, and not prek-k, which is my specific field. I do not believe I will need or use WebQuest with my children. Although, from an elementary teachers perspective, I could see how the specific WebQuest would be educational and beneficial for older elementary students. With another partner, we completed a worksheet that looked at four different categories: technophile, altitudinist, efficiency expert and affiliator. This helped me understand WebQuest from an educational purpose. We also stated strengths and weaknesses of each WebQuest we viewed. As far as the activity as a whole, I did not find it enjoyable or beneficial for my future teaching. I did however, learn about how to look at webquests from the fourt different category point of views, which was interesting. I will probably not use this tool in my classroom, as I don't think young children will benefit from it.

Reflection of Website Evaluation

Today I conducted my first website evaluation. I followed a template from the book, Preparing to Use Technology, by marking "yes" or "no" on specific questions based on the author, publishing body, bias of information, accuracy of information, currency of information, design of interface, accessibility, and if I would recommend this webpage. The website I chose was "ABCya.com." As far as what went well, everything did. I enjoyed looking up the information and learning about the website. I learned an abundant amount of information regarding the author, the website content, and information on the website. This website can be used in my classroom because it is beneficial and educational for young children, which I will be teaching. The page I looked at closely was kindergarten. This page had games on counting numbers, learning shapes, letters, and connecting the dots. I believe this website and the games on it would be a great reward for children. Not only are children playing engaging games that are interesting to them, but they are also practicing and continuing their knowledge of what they already know. I plan on using this website in my classroom in the future and would recommend this website to any teachers who plan to teach kindergarten through fifth grade and also inform parents of the website.

Welcome to Laura's Technology Blog!

Hello! My name is Laura and I am a senior majoring in Child and Family Studies with my progression into the prek-k program. This is my first time I have ever worked with blogs. I am somewhat confused with blogs, and technology in general, but I look forward to learning more about blogs and technology, which I believe will be beneficial to myself and my classroom in the future. Unfortunately, the majority of my technology use comes from social networking sites (facebook and twitter), as well as my email, weather, and news. My goals for this course are to learn as much technological information as I can and take it with me in my future career as a teacher. With my blog, I hope to provide information that interests my readers. I also hope to learn more about vital information on the internet that I can integrate into my classroom in the future.