C4T

Comments for Teachers
Post by William Chamberlain on September 4, 2012.
At the Teacher's Desk


Chamberlain's post was a video of one of his students, Stephanie, working her way through a mathematical equation. While she is working on her problem Chamberlain begins asking her questions such as, "Where did you get that number, what does H stand for?" This seems to throw the student off her quilter a bit. After a moment of slight embarrassment, Stephanie recovers and she flies through her math problem dictating what she is doing while she is doing it.

I thought this was a great example of teaching. Chamberlain challenged his student and did not hold her hand throughout her equation. He pushed her to figure it out on her own. He also asked questions throughout her thought process to deepen what she had learned.

9th - 12th Grade Search Lesson
Post by Jeff Utecht on September 11, 2012.
9th - 12th Grade Search Lesson


Utecht's post was mostly a lesson plan for high school students. This lesson plan covered how to adequately search for information using a search engine on the internet. Its main focus was the narrow the search by date and how to do so. It instructed students to play with the date range tool and to see how much relevant data they could find to their subjects. It also instructed students to watch three internet videos that he provided the links to.

I replied to Jeff's post saying what a useful skill he is teaching his students. When some of his students make it to college they will realize how important it is to be able to sift through information on the internet for research papers.

C4T #2 - Post #1: October 2, 2012
Apparently, I posted this slightly too early. I initially posted it two weeks ago. I was assigned Mr. Utecht again and he had no new posts. I did, however notice that another student in Mr. Strange's EDM310 class commented on the same post I did. This student's name was Keiko Ito. They raved about Mr. Utecht's post. They said that they "can not use technology tools, including Google well" and they learned how to narrow down their research by using the instructions in Mr. Utecht's post. I found this to be quite intriguing. The material being taught to 9th-12th graders is still relevant to college students. It just made me think that, just possibly, maybe not everything I was taught in high school was a complete waste of my time. Simple tools like learning to navigate a search engine properly are more valuable than one would think. I'm glad that teachers like Mr. Utecht are teaching young students skills that will benefit them in their later years.

C4T #2 - Post #2: October 15, 2012.
Again, I was assigned to Mr. Utecht's blog.

Utecht's blog begins with him saying he's sitting in his hotel room in Ethiopia! He's been traveling and experiencing all the changes that are happening throughout Ethiopia right now. He goes into great detail that Ethiopia is on the fast track to a growing economy. He quotes some of their fiscal progress as well as their progress with construction. Then he hits a major topic: the internet. Ethiopia is in the growing stage. With that, people begin to crave the internet. And with the growing demand for internet, connections have been cut or lost, and bandwidth has slowed down. Lord knows, there's never been an individual to complain that their internet was running too quickly; so, Ethiopia is in the process of expanding their bandwidth, even with its continued growth over the recent years. China and Thailand also experienced this issue when they began growing. It's part of wiring a country. It takes time. Utecht then transfers into a discussion about a few news articles he read while in Ethiopia. Right now, Africa has the youngest population in the world. If that trend continues, in 2040 the population will reach one billion. That will also make it the largest in the world. This links in education and the internet. If all of the young students in Africa have access to online classes over the internet, what does that mean for the future of Africa once its population becomes more educated? Utecht excites in the possibilities.

I commented back to Mr. Utecht raving on and on about what a breath of fresh air it is to have gotten to read his post. It's not often in America you see positive stories about a country such as Ethiopia. If you've read any of my "About me" or my first blog post, you know I have an, almost unhealthy, obsession with all-things-Africa. It was like Dr. Strange assigned this post specifically for me. I loved it.

C4T#3 - Post #1: Jenny's Learning Journey

Miss Jenny She's post was all about the introduction of iPads into her classroom. She said she has been using them for literary and mathematical instruction. She said her students have taken very well to the change and some are even asking for more time on the iPads for good behavior. I commented back telling her what a great idea this was and that I would like to hear back from her and get further detail about the integration. Since I hope to use iPads and related technology in my classroom I was pleased to see that her students adapted so well to the idea. I believe the use of technology gets the minds of student's more involved than filling out a worksheet.

If you would like to read Miss Jenny's blog yourself, please click here.

C4T#3 - Post #2: Jenny's Learning Journey

Apparently, I am having trouble comprehending C4T assignments; but, I continue to read and post as am I told. This time I decided to re-read Miss Jenny's post about using iPads in the classroom. I wanted to think about this more deeply and think about ways I could incorporate this technology in my own classroom. I am aspiring to be a secondary special education teacher. My initial thought when using iPads in the classroom was improved motor skills and hand-eye coordination. Are there apps available specifically for educating special needs children? After a little research I found a website dedicated to special needs educational applications. This is entirely too helpful! The potential lesson plans that could be developed from this website alone are endless. I'm very glad I researched further and found this website. I have it saved on my computer for future use. I know I hardly stayed on topic with this assignment; but, Miss Jenny's blog post got the ball rolling for my small research in finding the website that could potentially help me later on in my career.