Pinterest in the Classroom

Hello Fellow Bloggers,
Recently have have discovered the many benefits of Pinterest. After typing Education in the search box thousands of educational resources popped up that I could use in my classroom. I learned that pinterest is not only a great teaching resource, but you can use Pinterest for anything; from cooking, finding blogs, hoilday activities/ decorations. You name it you are sure to find it on Pinterest. I think I will make Pinterest my go to site for ideas, utilizing it as often as I need to to get ideas that I can play around with and extend for the children that I teach. Like I have previously stated there are many benefits of pinterest, just like there are many benefits there are also some challenges to using pinterest as well; for example; there is so mauch information it takes a lot of time to go through it all to find what you are looking for. I would recommend that you try it out for yourselves. Enjoy and have fun playing around with Pinterest! Until next time happy blogging!

The Disconnection Experiment

Dear Fellow Bloggers,
Recently I posted a blog "Growing Up Online," well at the end of that documentary a young man decided to go to the army in hopes that that move would help him disconnect from the Internet. So last week my professor ask that the class take part in a disconnection experiment. In my own personal life I am very dependant on my cell phone. I use my cellphone to check both school and personal emails, surf the internet, play online games and I use social media. Prepared to take part in this experiment, I decided to disconnect from my cellphone. I was excited and I believed that it would be easy for me. Boy was that not the case! This was extremely hard...Here are the questions that were given to the class to answer by my professor; my answers and responses to his questions are highlighted.

--What day did you choose to “disconnect?” (Month and day, please). I chose Saturday at first but I could not stop looking at my phone. So I tried it again on Sunday. April 13,2014

--What would you usually be doing on this day? How did your plans change because your “disconnected” status? Usually on I will sleep late, get up use my cellphone to play my online game for a while then check emails, use my mobile hot spot to do some homework and listen to Pandora. All of that changed because I was not suppose to use my cellphone. However, I found myself continuously picking it up even when it did not go off. I kept logging into my social media, I did not do any homework and I played the games Saturday over and over again. On Sunday morning I woke up determined not to play with or look at my phone. Lo and behold before I knew it I was playing Hay Day the best Internet farming game every created. When I caught myself I turned my phone completely off, got dressed and left the house.

-- What were your feelings that day? (freedom, liberation, misery, boredom?) Saturday I felt really bad wondering how I had let myself get so addicted to my cellphone and its many distractions. On Sunday I was miserable without it, until I left the house and left the phone there.

-- What media did you miss most and why? I really missed my cellphone. Not the television because most often I record my favorite shows and watch them when I can. But my phone was a while other story.

-- What sorts of things did you do instead? My partner and I went out for a walk , we talked a lot and went to see a movie. Afterwards we went out to dinner with more conversation and back home by late evening.

-- Were you able to completely avoid all media? If you could not, what was the “breaking point”? By Sunday I was able to avoid my cellphone, but I had to leave it at home to do so.  

Growing Up Online

Dear Fellow Bloggers,
I have recently watched a Frontline documentary for my educational technology class, that left me stock and stunned by the impact the internet has on our children. Growing Up Online showed how high school students would use these sites on the internet that would aid them in cheating themselves out of the experience of reading American history books. Instead these sites would give them a brief overview of the story with just enough substance to complete their school work with out it being look at as cheating. There were parts of this documentary that showed how parents were shut out of their teenagers lives as a result of the teens excessive use of the internet. In some instinces teenagers took their own lives as a result of being bullied on social media. Below you can find a break down of this assignment.

1. Why do you think the number of parents who reported the Internet being a good thing for their children has decreased? I think begin to see the effects of the internet. Social media become popular, and at the same time child sex crimes were very real in our society.
2.  In terms of student writing, what are some different types of "cheating"? What are the elements you would include in your definition of "cheating"? I did not realize as a college student, that there were so many writing cheat sites online. One could cheat by copy and pasating bits and pieces of scholoraly journals into your own writing. One could type in a subject area into a sereach engine and get hundreds of papers  written in that subject area, type your name on it and pass it off as your own. There are several elements that I would include in my definition of cheating; taking credit for work that is not your own. Sharing papers amongst friends and copy and pastteing someone elses thoughts and ideas into your own.
3.  Should students feel guilty for using “shortcuts” like this? Why or why not? Students should most certainly feel guilty about using shortcuts. It is not their work, creativity or ideas. 
4. What are the positive and negative consequences of blurring the line between being a celebrity and a regular person? The positive is the popularity that comes with being a celebrity. The negative is losing your own identiy in the celebrity role. 
5. What elements of this FRONTLINE program are likely to increase parents’ fears? What elements of the program might be reassuring? I think it would have to be the fear of not knowing what your child is doing when they are on the various social media sites. As well as the threat of your child feeling so bad about themselves because of bullying that they call themselves. I think parents would be reassured by knowing that most children will not give out their personal information on the internet.
6.  What are some of the short- and longer-term consequences of these types of behaviors for life online and in the real world?    There are many short and long term conquences to bullying and spreading rumors online and off line, the first would be that words hurt people and spreading rumors can cause an emotionally unstable teenager to kill them selves. Long term I imagine how the bully would be able to cope with knowing that they were the cause of the death of one of their peers.  

ORC Lesson Plan

Hello Fellow Bloggers,
I would like to take a moment to introduce you all to a great teaching resource that I have found to be useful in my lesson planning. The Ohio Resource Center has thousands of lesson plans for grades K-12. These lesson plans are based on the Ohio Learning Content Standards. As I am in the early stages of acquiring my Early Intervention Specialist license on the moderate to severe track, I understand my teaching needs to be intentional. I also understand that the first days of school is important for setting a classroom atmosphere that is welcoming to children. Searching this site I came across a very interesting lesson plan to teach kindergartner's how to relate to each other and build a community within my classroom.  Recognizing by laying this foundation of community is critical to my children's success in the classroom throughout the school year.
The children will be expected to listen to the story My Teacher's Secret Life, they will discuss the content, and make predictions about what the teacher and their peers do when they are not at school. Students will chart both the responses of their peers and teachers activities. Students will then work together to draw their personal lives that they will later share with the class.This lesson plan covers several different Common Core Standards list below.

OH.CC.RL.K.		Reading Standards for Literature
		Key Ideas and Details
RL.K.1.		With prompting and support, ask and answer questions about key details in a text.
RL.K.10.		Actively engage in group reading activities with purpose and understanding.
OH.CC.W.K.		Writing Standards
		Research to Build and Present Knowledge
OH.CC.SL.K.		Speaking and Listening Standards
		Comprehension and Collaboration
SL.K.2.		Confirm understanding of a text read aloud or information presented orally or through other media by asking and answering questions about key details and requesting clarification if something is not understood.
		Presentation of Knowledge and Ideas
SL.K.5.		Add drawings or other visual displays to descriptions as desired to provide additional detail.
W.K.7.		Participate in shared research and writing projects (e.g., explore a number of books by a favorite author and express opinions about them).

I feel the most challenging part of this lesson plan, is having children who do not what to participate because of shyness. For these types of children I plan to work directly with them using scaffolding techniques and encouragement. Another challenge could be the time that it would take to complete this lesson. I plan to make this a two day event, starting with reading the book. Then moving into the children making predictions and charting their responses. On day 2, I plan to begin with a recap of the story and the charted responses, then introducing the drawing portion and by the end compiling our booklets and then sharing our books the the classroom.









http://www.readwritethink.org/classroom-resources/lesson-plans/getting-acquainted-activity-using-174.html

Ohio DL Schools

Dear Fellow Bloggers,
I have recently discovered that not all children are getting up early, waiting in the cold for their school bus to transport them to their preferred educational institution. Instead more and more parents are opting to educate their children via the Internet. Thus know trending fade here in Ohio, is offering families 5 great virtual institutions to choose from. These types of schools are geared towards children who may have experienced bullying or maybe an alternative to to home schooling Please read below for  I have created a brief summary of all five schools with a link to their individual websites..

http://www.connectionsacademy.com/ohio-eschool/home.aspx

• Connections Academy Ohio- is an online tuition free public school. This academy gives students the opportunity to learn at their own pace from the comforts of home.The k-12 curriculum meets the states education standards they are accredited by North Central Association of Colleges and Schools. This online school offers study tables with online group tutoring where teachers work directly with students in their subject area. The method of instruction is live stream video sessions in each subject area as it relates to the Ohio Education Standards.

http://www.ecotohio.org/

•  The Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow(ECOT). This online school is a fully accredited public school for students throughout the Ohio region. Learners must be at least five years old and the oldest is twenty-one years old at the beginning of the school year and they must be an Ohio resident. ECOT expects student to complete 25hours per week. The method of instruction is live stream video feeds. In order to graduate from this virtual school learners must pass the Ohio Graduation Test better known as the (OGT), in order to receive a diploma.

http://www.k12.com/ohva#.Uz2dA_ldXAk

• Ohio Virtual Academy- uses an individualized K-12 curriculum that covers the core subject areas and electives. Ohio virtual Academy is appealing in the respect that teachers are always available weather by telephone, video chat or home visits. Parent involvement(learning coach) is the key component to success at the Ohio Virtual Academy, they also believe in flexibility, support and structure.

http://virtualschoolhouse.org/

• Virtual Schoolhouse-Is a free online charter school located in Cleveland, Ohio. That offer offers mulitple educsational opttions that allow students to meet individual goals by using differentiated instruction in a safe and least restrictive environment. What is great about this charter school is that, they customize the program to a learners individual needs. This K through 12th grade online school is the best alternative to public school for young learners who may suffer with special needs or disabilities. As well as students who for any reason do not do well in a large group or school setting.