http://jpenwell.webs.com/ColorsoftheRainbowPage1.html
I chose rainbows because I wanted to do something that I could really experiment with the color with. I like colors better than black and white so I like websites that use lots of colors.
Friday, July 8, 2011
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
Chapter 10- Digital Citizenship
Describe the characteristics of a model digital citizen. How well do the adults and students you know meet your definition?
The characteristics of a model digital citizen is one that respects themselves, respects others, respects the privacy of others, and respects outside limits. Respecting them self is when the student is careful about what they post about themselves. They will not post things that might put them in danger. They have enough self-respect to be careful not to post anything that would make them look bad or hurt them because they understand that anything that is posted on line is not necessarily private. They do not post things just go gain the approval of people and look cool in order to impression them. Respecting others means that they do not dehumanizes another individual they may communicate with on line or anonymous online contacts by attributing qualities and characteristics to them that may not be true. They talk to and post things that are appropriate, kind and respectful of the other person. Respecting the privacy of others means that the digital citizen do not post information about others without their permission. They do not post videos, photos, or written material that would invade the privacy of others and possibly cause trouble for them. They do not post things that will hurt another person and may be misleading about what is actually going on. A good digital citizen does not cyber-bully other people. Finally, they respect the rules and laws associated with the use of the internet. They are aware of the policies on cheating and plagiarism and do not participate in these things. They follow the user policies and codes of conduct that are established by their school when ever they go on the Internet to just surf or work on some project.
The characteristics of a model digital citizen is one that respects themselves, respects others, respects the privacy of others, and respects outside limits. Respecting them self is when the student is careful about what they post about themselves. They will not post things that might put them in danger. They have enough self-respect to be careful not to post anything that would make them look bad or hurt them because they understand that anything that is posted on line is not necessarily private. They do not post things just go gain the approval of people and look cool in order to impression them. Respecting others means that they do not dehumanizes another individual they may communicate with on line or anonymous online contacts by attributing qualities and characteristics to them that may not be true. They talk to and post things that are appropriate, kind and respectful of the other person. Respecting the privacy of others means that the digital citizen do not post information about others without their permission. They do not post videos, photos, or written material that would invade the privacy of others and possibly cause trouble for them. They do not post things that will hurt another person and may be misleading about what is actually going on. A good digital citizen does not cyber-bully other people. Finally, they respect the rules and laws associated with the use of the internet. They are aware of the policies on cheating and plagiarism and do not participate in these things. They follow the user policies and codes of conduct that are established by their school when ever they go on the Internet to just surf or work on some project.
Many prosecutors are charging students who participate in sexting with felonies. What do you think of this practice, and how would you handle the situation at your school?
Sexting is a serious offense that need to be dealt with seriously and charging them with a felony I feel is appropriate. Sexting is one person sending sexually explicit material to another. This is participating in the distribution of child pornography and even if they are kids they need to understand that this is not appropriate. Students need to be educated in the fact that this is against the law and if they chose to participate in it then they will be charged with a felony. Since I hope to teach in the grades K-2 I hope to never have to deal with this because they are so young but children are learning things younger and younger now and some students have home lives where they are exposed to these things so I think anymore it could possibly be an issue at any age. I think I would handle it though by sending the students to the principal and working with the principal to decide how to handle it. Even if it were a young student participating in this, they need to learn that this is not appropriate and that their are consequences for their participation in this type of activity. Older students, such as middle schoolers and high schoolers, should understand this is not appropriate. Whether they know they will be charged with a felony or not, I feel they know that sexting is not appropriate to do and so whether they understand the full extent of the consequences or not, they know that it is wrong to do this.
Chapter 8- Creating Content- Images
What personal experience do you have accessing and viewing photographs and videos posted online? Have you downloaded photos or video clips to use in some way? Explain.
I have accessed and viewed photographs and videos posted online a few times for the purpose of oral presentations in my undergraduate classes. I viewed them to do research on my topic. I have also viewed videos in atomic learning and other information sites to learn how to use different types of technology. I have not downloaded and views. I have only attached links that could be clicked on to go to the video I wanted to share in my presentation. An experience I had in downloading photos is when I did my Live Text Portfolio and downloaded pictures I had taken in the classes during field experience to the computer and then downloading it into Live Text. I also downloaded photos in Dr. Templar class before this one when we created iMovie, Frames, Animato, Photo Story, and Picasa from pictures we took.
I have accessed and viewed photographs and videos posted online a few times for the purpose of oral presentations in my undergraduate classes. I viewed them to do research on my topic. I have also viewed videos in atomic learning and other information sites to learn how to use different types of technology. I have not downloaded and views. I have only attached links that could be clicked on to go to the video I wanted to share in my presentation. An experience I had in downloading photos is when I did my Live Text Portfolio and downloaded pictures I had taken in the classes during field experience to the computer and then downloading it into Live Text. I also downloaded photos in Dr. Templar class before this one when we created iMovie, Frames, Animato, Photo Story, and Picasa from pictures we took.
Do you have personal experience in uploading and sharing photographs or videos to the Internet? What has been your purpose for posting photos and videos online (or for not doing so, if you haven't).
I do not have personal experience in uploading and sharing photographs or videos to the Internet. I have not done this because once again I have had no reason to so I have not learned how to do it. I do not have a Facebook account or YouTube account so I have not posted any pictures to these. These are the main accounts most people post to in general and since I do not use either one of these I really have no where to upload or share to.
Find and record a definition for the term creative commons. Explain how the concept of the creative commons impacts teacher and student use of photographs and video clips created by someone else.
Creative commons is an organizations that supplies individual creators, large companies and institutions with tools that help them to protect their copyright on any work they have created while allowing others certain use of their work. The organization issues licenses to users that allow them to copy, distribute, edit, remix and build upon the works of these individual creators, large companies and institutions work with out infringing copyright laws. On the website, "creative commons.org." it states its mission as "Creative commons develops, supports, and stewards legal and technical infrastructure that maximizes digital creativity, sharing and innovation." The concept of creative commons impacts teacher and student use of photographs and video clips created by someone else because it allows them to use these in projects or presentations with out breaking copyright laws. It allows them to expand their creativity in their projects by using videos or photographs made by some one else as a source to complete their projects. Teachers can also use photos and videos in their teaching of lessons without violating copyright laws. This gives teachers and students access to more pictures and videos they can use when creating lessons, projects, or presentations that they may not have been able to use with out the creative commons license.
Chapter 7- Creating Content- Writing
Explain the differences between blogs, wikis, and web-based word processors. Identify one classroom based utility for each type of tool.
Blogs are an on line writing tools that allow people to express their feelings or raise a question. The last blog written is the first one in the list. With blogs people can respond and make comments on what other people post. They are dated posts so anyone who reads it can see when the blog was written. They can be anywhere from one to two sentences to be really long. People express the thoughts and feelings on something they think or in response to someone else. A good use for this that I like from the book was the book study option. I think that it would be good to provide a prompt from a book being read and challenge students to think about what they read. I think communicating with other classes reading the same book would help to expand the learning of the students because they get even more views on the questions they are blogging about. If the students could blog and communicate with the author that would be very exciting for them and educational. Wiki's are content that has been placed on the Internet but anyone can go in and add, remove, or change something that someone has written in it. There a host sites that provide templates that allow people to create their own wiki but it is open to others to change, add to, and remove things. Some of the host sites anyone can contribute to what someone else as created but there are some available that allow the creator to limit the ability of others to view and contribute to the pages. A classroom use is to give instructions for a class projects. The wiki can be used to provide all students with the necessary information to complete the project as well as the links need to other resources that will help them with the project. Work-based word processors allow people to create word processing documents on line and save them there so that they always have access to their work where ever they are. The documents can be edited, created, and stored on line and if it is appropriate and the person choses to they can publish it on line. The documents can be private but if the person who creates its wishes to share it with others. When they share it with others they can choses to either have the person they share it with read it only or they can chose to have the person collaborate and make changes. A use in the classroom I really liked was the round-robin writing. I think that this would be a fun activity for the students to create a story that they were all able to contribute to. The story would be creative and every student would add their own ideas to the story which could create a very interesting story because all the students would think differently and the story could go in any direction.
Blogs are an on line writing tools that allow people to express their feelings or raise a question. The last blog written is the first one in the list. With blogs people can respond and make comments on what other people post. They are dated posts so anyone who reads it can see when the blog was written. They can be anywhere from one to two sentences to be really long. People express the thoughts and feelings on something they think or in response to someone else. A good use for this that I like from the book was the book study option. I think that it would be good to provide a prompt from a book being read and challenge students to think about what they read. I think communicating with other classes reading the same book would help to expand the learning of the students because they get even more views on the questions they are blogging about. If the students could blog and communicate with the author that would be very exciting for them and educational. Wiki's are content that has been placed on the Internet but anyone can go in and add, remove, or change something that someone has written in it. There a host sites that provide templates that allow people to create their own wiki but it is open to others to change, add to, and remove things. Some of the host sites anyone can contribute to what someone else as created but there are some available that allow the creator to limit the ability of others to view and contribute to the pages. A classroom use is to give instructions for a class projects. The wiki can be used to provide all students with the necessary information to complete the project as well as the links need to other resources that will help them with the project. Work-based word processors allow people to create word processing documents on line and save them there so that they always have access to their work where ever they are. The documents can be edited, created, and stored on line and if it is appropriate and the person choses to they can publish it on line. The documents can be private but if the person who creates its wishes to share it with others. When they share it with others they can choses to either have the person they share it with read it only or they can chose to have the person collaborate and make changes. A use in the classroom I really liked was the round-robin writing. I think that this would be a fun activity for the students to create a story that they were all able to contribute to. The story would be creative and every student would add their own ideas to the story which could create a very interesting story because all the students would think differently and the story could go in any direction.
Do you have personal experience with any of these tools? If so, please describe that experience. If not, please explain why you have not used these tools.
The only tool that I have had experience with is the blogging, and that was just the blogging that we are doing here in class. Up to the point I have never really had a need to use any of these tools so I really have not looked into them. As I have expressed before, I really do not like expressing my feeling or thoughts on the Internet and for the word processing I have just always used Microsoft Word. The web-based word processing would have been very useful when I was an undergraduate though. It would have saved me from e-mailing work I did at home to myself and saving it on a computer lab computer in order to work on it in the computer lab or where ever I was at. I can see how these might be useful in the classroom to help students interact through technology. Once I get into a classroom I will have a reason to use it so I may get more familiar with these programs.
Sunday, July 3, 2011
Chapter 9- Gaming
What are your personal beliefs about the educational value of gaming? Please provide evidence that supports your opinion.
I believe that educational value can be in gaming if the appropriate educational games are played. I liked several of the games we have found on websites when doing WEAVE and feel that the ones where the students are practicing educational skills would be very beneficial. Children react positively to interactive activities on the computer. I feel that is due to the technological age they are growing up in and computers are all around them. I think that games on websites have to be monitored though because some of the games I found were just fighting games or animals doing like an Olympics but I feel that these had no educational value. Most of these games were minigames. The more complex games can have educational value as well as long as the teacher carefully selects them. Games such as as Oregon Trail could be fun for students and I think that they could learn a lot. I remember playing Oregon Trail when I was in elementary but we did not have computers then so there was lots of paper work. It was fun but a little more confusing. Having this game on line I think would be more fun because the game could be saved in a more organized way and the game also gives extra information for the students to learn by giving better description that I did not receive when I played. My biggest problem, even with the minigames, is that time that they consume. Even an hour is a long time for the minigames. If you were to do a complex game I think it should be in connection with a unit such as Oregon Trail would be. The minigames I feel would be best used in extra time the students had after completing work or during free time they may have to reinforce skills they have already learned. Once again, in the school setting I feel that they should be games that reinforces skills and not just fighting games or games that do not have any educational value. If possible, I also feel that using games on CD Rom would be beneficial because it protects the students from the dangers of gaming on line and the safety issues when communicating with strangers on line as well as cyber-bullying that may occur.
What might be the value in having children develop their own minigames as an assignment? Explain
A value I could see in children developing their own minigames is that it could help develop their creativity as well as help develop and reinforce their knowledge on a topic. This type of assignment would challenge the students to come up with ideas on what their game will be about as well as having to use the knowledge they have learned to develop their storyline, characters, and levels of the game. They will have to incorporate the knowledge they learned about the topic into the game which will help reinforce what they learned. They may also have to look up more information on the topic to develop certain parts of the game which would extend their knowledge. An issue I have with this is the same issue I have with any topic involving games. The book says it may take 2-3 hours to develop a minigame which I feel to have educational value it may take the students longer. The complex games it says could be incorporated as a semester or year long assignment because of the length of time it takes to create. I still feel that classroom time is precious and slim and with all the other distractions beyond your control, such as assemblies, or other valuable educational activities, such as field trips, it may take up to much time. I do not think there would be a high educational value to creating the games and to give up the limited time available to teachers for this acitvity would not be worth the sacrifice of this time.
I believe that educational value can be in gaming if the appropriate educational games are played. I liked several of the games we have found on websites when doing WEAVE and feel that the ones where the students are practicing educational skills would be very beneficial. Children react positively to interactive activities on the computer. I feel that is due to the technological age they are growing up in and computers are all around them. I think that games on websites have to be monitored though because some of the games I found were just fighting games or animals doing like an Olympics but I feel that these had no educational value. Most of these games were minigames. The more complex games can have educational value as well as long as the teacher carefully selects them. Games such as as Oregon Trail could be fun for students and I think that they could learn a lot. I remember playing Oregon Trail when I was in elementary but we did not have computers then so there was lots of paper work. It was fun but a little more confusing. Having this game on line I think would be more fun because the game could be saved in a more organized way and the game also gives extra information for the students to learn by giving better description that I did not receive when I played. My biggest problem, even with the minigames, is that time that they consume. Even an hour is a long time for the minigames. If you were to do a complex game I think it should be in connection with a unit such as Oregon Trail would be. The minigames I feel would be best used in extra time the students had after completing work or during free time they may have to reinforce skills they have already learned. Once again, in the school setting I feel that they should be games that reinforces skills and not just fighting games or games that do not have any educational value. If possible, I also feel that using games on CD Rom would be beneficial because it protects the students from the dangers of gaming on line and the safety issues when communicating with strangers on line as well as cyber-bullying that may occur.
A value I could see in children developing their own minigames is that it could help develop their creativity as well as help develop and reinforce their knowledge on a topic. This type of assignment would challenge the students to come up with ideas on what their game will be about as well as having to use the knowledge they have learned to develop their storyline, characters, and levels of the game. They will have to incorporate the knowledge they learned about the topic into the game which will help reinforce what they learned. They may also have to look up more information on the topic to develop certain parts of the game which would extend their knowledge. An issue I have with this is the same issue I have with any topic involving games. The book says it may take 2-3 hours to develop a minigame which I feel to have educational value it may take the students longer. The complex games it says could be incorporated as a semester or year long assignment because of the length of time it takes to create. I still feel that classroom time is precious and slim and with all the other distractions beyond your control, such as assemblies, or other valuable educational activities, such as field trips, it may take up to much time. I do not think there would be a high educational value to creating the games and to give up the limited time available to teachers for this acitvity would not be worth the sacrifice of this time.
Chapter 6- Virtual Worlds
Have you ever visited an online virtual world? If so, which one, and what were your experiences there? If not, explain why.
Yes, I have visited an on line virtual world. The on line virtual world I visited was Webkinz. For Christmas last year my husband bought me two of the puppies needed to get the coded to become a member of Webkinz. I went on line and registered both dogs. It was a little frustrating getting registered because everything I tried to type in for user names and passwords would come back with not available to use. I also had to download Adobe to be able to play. My husband did this for me but it only stayed on the computer for a few months and then I would have to download it again. I never did down load it again but because of this, it would not work on iPads if that was what I had because it had to have Adobe to run. After I finally got in and got them registered it was kind of interesting. I had to construct and decorate a room for each dog and then as time went on build a kitchen and a bathroom. I had to have a bathroom to give the dogs a bath to help keep them happy. There was three things that I had to keep track of: of their health, happiness, and hunger. There was a chart in the bottom corner to help you keep track of this. I had to make sure that I played with them, feed them, gave them baths, took them to the vet and just whatever needed to be done to keep them happy and healthy. When I stopped playing I was in the process of making them a backyard. In order to do all of this you had to have "money." That why it took a while to build the house for them. There were a couple ways to earn money. There were arcade games you could play where you earned money according to how well you did. The other way that was kind of neat was that there were quizzes to take. They were divided down into grade level and subject so a student would be getting quizzed over things they had learned. This was the quickest way to earn money. Then there was a store where you went to and had to buy the things for the dogs. It was a whole community but there were several things that I did not have a chance to explore because I did not have a lot of time to sit and play. It was possible to communicate with others, the spot was labeled mail, but I never did do this. The few things I did were kind of fun but I often had trouble logging in. There is another website where if you accidentally type WebKinx instead of Webkinz it would take you to a website that you would not want your students to accidentally stumble upon. But it was fun creating the house for the dog and playing the games. It was even fun doing the quizzes.
Yes, I have visited an on line virtual world. The on line virtual world I visited was Webkinz. For Christmas last year my husband bought me two of the puppies needed to get the coded to become a member of Webkinz. I went on line and registered both dogs. It was a little frustrating getting registered because everything I tried to type in for user names and passwords would come back with not available to use. I also had to download Adobe to be able to play. My husband did this for me but it only stayed on the computer for a few months and then I would have to download it again. I never did down load it again but because of this, it would not work on iPads if that was what I had because it had to have Adobe to run. After I finally got in and got them registered it was kind of interesting. I had to construct and decorate a room for each dog and then as time went on build a kitchen and a bathroom. I had to have a bathroom to give the dogs a bath to help keep them happy. There was three things that I had to keep track of: of their health, happiness, and hunger. There was a chart in the bottom corner to help you keep track of this. I had to make sure that I played with them, feed them, gave them baths, took them to the vet and just whatever needed to be done to keep them happy and healthy. When I stopped playing I was in the process of making them a backyard. In order to do all of this you had to have "money." That why it took a while to build the house for them. There were a couple ways to earn money. There were arcade games you could play where you earned money according to how well you did. The other way that was kind of neat was that there were quizzes to take. They were divided down into grade level and subject so a student would be getting quizzed over things they had learned. This was the quickest way to earn money. Then there was a store where you went to and had to buy the things for the dogs. It was a whole community but there were several things that I did not have a chance to explore because I did not have a lot of time to sit and play. It was possible to communicate with others, the spot was labeled mail, but I never did do this. The few things I did were kind of fun but I often had trouble logging in. There is another website where if you accidentally type WebKinx instead of Webkinz it would take you to a website that you would not want your students to accidentally stumble upon. But it was fun creating the house for the dog and playing the games. It was even fun doing the quizzes.
Do you think virtual worlds have a place in the classroom? Why or why not,
I do not think they have a place in the classroom. While it was kind of fun, to build up the house and do all the other things you were suppose to do with your pet it would be very time consuming. So time spent on line would definitely be an issue. Time in class is limited and I do not feel that this would be a worthwhile activity to use my time with. I tend to side with the objections listed in the book. The safety factor and privacy of issue of who they are talking to is a concern for me. Also, the cyber-bullying is something that would be hard to monitor. The chance of inappropriate content popping up as well as all the advertisement is another distraction the is a negative for virtual worlds. I know when I was on WebKinz, I would click on a tab to do something and a some advertisement would pop up. It was very annoying for one thing but sometimes I would try to click out of it and something else would pop up and I would have to try and find my way to where I would want to go. I would not want my students exposed to this or have to deal with the frustration of it. Also, having to have Adobe on the computers or iPads would be another issue to deal with. While I think they may be fun outside of school with parent supervision, I do not feel that they would be very beneficial for use in the classroom.
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