"Doing" Part of Internet Safety

I talked to my mom about internet safety. When I asked her about what she knew about internet safety, she talked about how important is to not give out personal information and to have computers in a room that is used often. I shared with my mom the importance of talking about internet safety openly so that in the future it does not feel like a taboo subject. I also talked about how important it is to focus on the positive uses of technology and to give children opportunities to use technology, but in a positive, productive way. Overall, I would say that the conversation went well. I shared Elder Ballard's talk with her and I hope she reads it in its full form because it is such a strong statement about technology and media and how it relates to the family.

301 Personal Learning Theory

My personal learning theory takes into consideration all the theories that were discussed in this class. I like some aspects of certain theories better than others, and so I have taken pieces of different theories and tried to work them together in my mind. My experiences I have had during practicum have also influenced my own learning theory.

To begin explaining my personal learning theory, I would like to start with Vygotsky. I have seen how real the zone of proximal development is as I was teaching and how when teachers teach in this zone, student understanding is greatly increased. This idea is supported by the phrase: “what I can do with help today I can do by myself tomorrow.” How do the students reach a position where they can work independently? Through scaffolding that the teacher sets up so that the student is more supported in the learning in the beginning and as the learning continues, the responsibility is transferred more and more to the student. This set up of responsibility is known as assisted learning. These ideas of Vygotsky are part of my learning theory.

As I was reviewing social cognitive theories, I wanted to include some of those ideas into my own theory. For example, I believe that self-efficacy plays an important role in student learning; if students believe they are capable of learning, then they are more likely to do better. Similarly, the teacher’s sense of self-efficacy is a critical part of student learning. This is one of the few characteristics that teachers have control over that is correlated with how students perform in the classroom. I noticed that as I was more confident as a teacher during practicum, the students became more responsive. Also, modeling is an important concept from the observational learning theory that I strongly support. It is extremely helpful for students to have someone model the behavior that is expected of them. When I used this principle when I was teaching, it definitely helped solidify the expectations for whatever activity we were doing. Another aspect of this model that I include in my theory is self-regulation. This is when students learn to control their own behavior. It is an important skill for students to learn. As I taught, I would have the students check their voice levels and check themselves to see if they were on task. This helped prompt the students to evaluate their own behavior.

Looking at the cognitive approach and how the memory works helped shape my theory also. In particular, it is important to use priming when beginning a lesson. Activating background knowledge helps when teaching a new concept or even when continuing an ongoing unit. It adds flow to the lesson and the students are able to focus better. Another important principle is elaboration. Connecting new information to existing knowledge is a way for students to make sense of new information and allows them to figure out how it fits in with what they already know. It is a good way for them to contextualize what they are learning. Organization also helps students’ learning. When material is organized, students will understand it better and will be more likely to remember it in the future.

The ideas from the course on social processes also influence my personal theory. For example, collaboration is important in any learning environment; it is necessary to respect others’ differences and build on the knowledge that other people have. Similarly, cooperation in the classroom is also essential. Learning how to work together for a common goal will help students throughout their lives. By engaging in cooperative learning, students can work in small groups which help each other learn. This is the kind of learning I want to have in my classroom.

Another important part of my learning theory depends on the student’s locus of causality. When a student is intrinsically motivated, I have found that they focus better on learning activities and strive to think and learn about the subject. However, when students are extrinsically motivated, they are easily distracted and become off task. If teachers can try to harness the intrinsic motivation, it will encourage lifelong learning because learning is its own reward.

These ideas from this course have helped shape my own personal learning theory. I believe that these ideas coexist and that the various theories help explain each other. Learning is a complex process and I do not believe that one theory explains all aspects of learning, which is why I chose to work from a combination of the theories.

301 Learning Log and Reflection

For this assignment, I chose to learn how to cook and bake better. I chose this because it is a skill that is important and one that I have wanted to improve in my life but haven’t had the time. I had my roommate teach me how to make some meals and some desserts as well. She is an excellent cook, so I was excited to learn her secrets. While I didn’t learn so much about cooking that I can instantly tell what a dish needs to make it better, I did learn basic skills that are used in general cooking and baking situations.

I also learned from my mistakes as I went along. For example, when baking pie crust, you should poke holes in the bottom of it or it will expand and a weird bubble will form. Also, poking the bubble will just make the filling fall through the poked hole and not make the bubble go to the bottom of the pan if it has already cooled. However, if when you make pizza and the cheese forms a weird bubble, poking it when it is in the oven will deflate the cheese bubble and it will no longer look like fluffy pizza. These little nuances of baking are best dealt with when experienced. I’m not sure I ever would have come across those situations if I hadn’t taken the time to make both of those dishes. The mistakes I made while cooking helped me realize that mistakes are a helpful way to increase learning. Because I have had these experiences, I am more likely to remember how to fix these mistakes than if I had done it correctly the first time. Although learning from mistakes is one way to have knowledge become part of your long term memory, it is certainly not the only way; doing things correctly the first time does help reinforce the correct behavior so that you remember what to do next time.

Learning Log

1/16/09 cooked chicken 7-8pm 1 hour

1/23/09 pizza crust 6-7pm 1 hour

1/30/09 enchiladas 7-8pm 1 hour

2/28/09 chocolate lollipops 9-9:30pm ½ hour

3/13/09 pizza 7-8:30pm 1 ½ hours

3/14/09 chocolate pie 2-3pm 1 hour

4/4/09 peanut butter cookies 5-6pm 1 hour

4/4/09 cinnamon rolls 8-11 pm 3 hours

New Ideas from Presentations

I learned new ideas of how to incorporate technology from the presentations today. One thing was about how recording the students' work (whether auditory recording or visual recording) allows the students to see their work presented through technology helps to motivate the students to learn. It also helps them be proud of their work and have a good sense of ownership. Another thing I learned was that allowing students to have more involvement with the technology helps the lesson and the engagement of the students.

Reading about Internet Safety

For the reading assignment, I chose to read "An Ensign to the Nations, a Light to the World" by President Gordon B. Hinckley. After reading this article and the other articles assigned, I decided that one of the most important things I learned was the need to be open and address the dangers of internet. If children are aware, then they will be better prepared with how to deal with it if it crosses their path. Also, by talking about it openly, it dissipates curiosity about what it actually is and it lessens the shame if they accidentally come across it. Another thing I thought was important was to address the positive, uplifting factors of technology. By replacing bad things with good things, children will be able to be tech savvy without having to feel the negative consequences of degrading media.

One thing that I will do as a teacher and/or parent is talk about internet safety with my children so that they are aware of the dangers. Also, I will have them talk about what rules they think it is important to follow. If children come up with the rules themselves, then they are more likely to follow them. By having this discussion, they will see why it is important to make these decisions before a dangerous situation presents itself.

One way that I can have a positive influence on family and friends is to let them know about the things I've learned from my reading. I think the 7 things that Elder Ballard mentioned in his article were especially helpful, and I am going to share them with my mom. Also, when talking about the influence of technology, I can give positive alternatives about how to use technology in fun, productive ways that others may not have thought of before.

Learning from other presentations

As I looked at how my classmates used technology in the classroom, I realized that there are so many different ways that technology is easily incorporated into lessons. Some make life easier for both students, like projecting words on a screen. Other uses of technology help the students explore their knowledge farther Another presentation showed a useful way to find out what the students already know, like in the presentation that used kidsperation to have the students sort their background knowledge. I have received many new ideas for various ways that it can be helpful to use technology in the classroom

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Shared Reading With Technology!

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Shared Reading with Technology!

On Thursday I am doing my technology lesson. I will be incorporating technology into my shared reading lesson. The students are going to be doing a choral reading of a poem from You Read to Me, I'll Read to You: Very Short Fairy Tales to Read Together. I will have the words on a PowerPoint and project the words and some of the images from the book onto the screen. I am going to have a pointer so that the students read altogether and stay reading at the same rate. Although it is helpful for all the students to be able to see the words at the same time, I felt like this was not using technology to the greatest advantage. I have linked some of the words in the poems to outside articles or images. After we read the poems, we are going to discuss them and I will have students click on the links that interest them. I've started creating the PowerPoint, and I am pretty excited about this lesson. My mentor teacher also is excited for me to teach this, and I hope the students will be engaged in the lesson and learn from it as well!

Shared Reading Idea

One idea for a technology-enhanced lesson that I might be able to do involves technology and a shared reading. I would like to create a powerpoint with slides for each page of a book. In order to incorporate the students using the technology, I would like to create a link from some of the words to either an activity or some kind of image that would help reinforce the text. This would make technology essential for the lesson and would add value to the lesson by extending the understanding of the students. I will first need my mentor teacher to give me text that she would like me to use for a shared reading, but I think that this activity would benefit the students.

Classroom Technology Inventory

The classroom technology inventory was quite informative. I found that the school has two computer labs that we can schedule and that my mentor teacher has used it before for special lessons so she could help me figure out what kind of technology would be good to use for lessons. Also, the grade has a laptop and projector that is shared between the classrooms, so I could easily use that for in my lessons. I also thought that it was interesting that the school has software that helps the students publish their writing. That will help them feel more like authors, which is really important. After seeing the technology available, I am excited about the possibilities for my lessons.

Virtual Tour Link

Here is a link to my Lincoln virtual tour!

301 Applied Lesson Plan: Social Constructivism

My lesson plan is based on three different types of faults that cause earthquakes and how they affect the Earth's surface. This lesson plan can also be taught from the Social Constructivism perspective. I have decided to teach this lesson using an instructional conversation. In an instructional conversation, the teacher is the more knowledgeable other. The teacher is the one who leads the conversation, providing instruction on the topic when necessary. This instructional conversation would start by asking the students if they have ever been in an earthquake, and if they have, what it felt like. It is important to activate and use background knowledge in any good teaching, but it is also a key component of a good instructional conversation. The conversation would then turn to what causes an earthquake and asking how the Earth moves during an earthquake. This helps establish the thematic focus for the lesson. Then the instructional part of the instructional conversation comes into play. This is when I would share the first type of fault that causes earthquakes, or the lateral fault and model the fault with my hands. Then I would have the students participate and do the same thing with their hands. I would then ask the students where they felt pressure when they did this demonstration and how their hands reacted. I would ask them why they think the demonstration worked the way it did. I would ask them what they think the connection between the model we made with our hands and how the Earth responds to this kind of fault. Because I am doing an instructional conversation, I would ask these questions to encourage general participation and allow them to express their thoughts instead of just telling the students about the lateral faults without the students' involvement. I would have this kind of conversation for the next two faults as well.

At the end of this activity, I would have students work in pairs and discuss diagrams of the different types of faults. They would label the faults and discuss how they know which kind of fault to classify the diagrams. This is a good way for the students to apply their knowledge to a new situation.

In my lesson, I used cultural tools by having the students look at diagrams. These kinds of tools help them to break down the knowledge they learned in the instructional conversation and apply to a different setting. I also tried to make sure that this lesson would be able to take into account the students' zone of proximal development, which is what a student can do with help that they cannot do on their own. Although all the students will not be at the same level, it is important to try and reach as many of the students that I can. I tried to do this by realizing that most students would have a difficult time just reading about faults and trying to figure out what they actually look like. By having the students model these faults themselves, they are hopefully able to understand the concepts better than if they had tried on their own to understand them. This lesson also has opportunities for teachers to scaffold student learning. This can be done by reminding the students of the characteristics of each fault before students work in pairs to identify the faults in diagrams. By doing this the teacher supports their learning and helps them be ready to work by themselves. The relationship between the learner and the more knowledgeable learner, the teacher in this case, is important to consider also. It is important that this relationship is built on trust and understanding. When teachers and students have this kind of relationship, there is a safe learning environment and students are more willing to take risks in order to understand the concepts. While part of the goal is for the learner to gain knowledge from the more knowledgeable other, it is also important for the teacher to take advantage of opportunities to learn from the students. There is always more to learn and different perspectives and explanations that are good to consider. This is why it is important to have a solid relationship of respect and an attitude of learner between the learner and the more knowledgeable other.

TPACK for Virtual Tour

The content that I am using for this virtual tour is found under the 5th grade social studies core. It is standard 4, objective 3 indicator a which states that students will identify the key ideas, events, and leaders of the Civil War using primary sources (e.g. Gettysburg Address, Emancipation Proclamation, news accounts, photographic records, diaries). This activity focuses on a key leader of the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln. Students will use primary sources when they read or listen to the text of Lincoln's first inaugural address and the Gettysburg address. In addition, they will learn more about Lincoln's life and how much the American people mourned his death. This content will help the students understand the background of the Civil War.

The pedagogy for this activity is to teach the students about Lincoln and his life in a way that makes him real, not just some old President. By going to places that he lived, students will learn more about the things that he did and how he impacted history. A tour of a person's life gives insight into that person and establishes a connection between the learner and the person being studied. This is why teaching about Abraham Lincoln through a tour of main events of his life fits well with the content. The boring facts on a textbook page come to life when using this method to teach about Abraham Lincoln and his role in the Civil War.

For this activity I am using Google Earth to create a virtual tour. This technology fits well with the content and pedagogy. By creating a virtual tour, students can personalize the content more than if they were reading the text by themselves. Google Earth has Wikipedia articles that are helpful for students to do their own research. This helps them become owners of the information, because they discovered it for themselves. Also, by creating a path, students will see the connection of events through Abraham Lincoln's life. The content of the Civil War comes to life when it is learned through the technology medium of Google Earth.

Virtual Tour Plan

Location	Activity	Google Earth Content
1. Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historic Site	Read Wikipedia article- What was the Lincoln's farm called?	Wikipedia research
2. Washington, D.C.	Look at pictures of Lincoln's first inaugrual address- What is one thing he said in his speech?	Outside link to pictures and address
3. Gettysburg National Military Park	Listen to Gettysburg address	Link to Gettysburg address
4. Ford's Theatre National Historic Site 5. Lincoln's Tomb State Historic Site	View pictures of interior and read wikipedia article- What play was Lincoln watching when he was assassinated? Read article and measure distance that the funeral train traveled to bring Lincoln to his grave	Wikipedia research Measure pathway
Details of image overlay / path / polygon:	Pathway between Ford's Theatre and Lincoln's tomb, overlay of pictures of Lincoln's tomb

301 Applied Lesson Plan: Developmental Cognitivism

My lesson plan is based on the three different types of faults that cause earthquakes and how they affect the Earth's surface. This lesson plan can be adapted to support the Piagetian constructivist learning principles. For example, taking into account Piaget's stages of cognitive development allows us to consider what the 5th graders will be able to understand about this particular concept. Fifth grade falls under the concrete operational stage, and while not all children develop at an exact rate, it is still most likely that the majority of students will be at this stage. Thinking about the characteristics of this stage will help us understand how the students will respond to the lesson. For example, in the concrete operational stage, children understand reversibility, so if I wanted to first show the students a picture of the aftermath of an earthquake, the students would be able to think backward from the end result to the beginning (the earthquake). Also, in the concrete operational stage students are able to classify, which is important because the lesson asks the students to be able to distinguish the characteristics of each type of fault and classify them as either a lateral fault, a reverse fault, or a normal fault. By looking at Piaget's stages of cognitive development, we understand more about the students we want to teach.

Although this helps us better understand our students, it is not enough. Every student learns in ways that are specific to them. In other words, there is a uniqueness of individual learning that always exists for each student that is in a classroom. This is why it is important to learn about each individual student and what helps them most to learn and understand content. In order to facilitate learning about the content of the types of earthquakes, I would make sure that the students have an experience that involves action. This lesson already has an activity like this in it; it uses hand movements to help the students understand what the types of faults look like. This activity helps the students be involved in the discovering of new information. Another important factor to learning when using the developmental cognitivism approach is the necessity of social interaction. Interacting with others is important because it helps us construct our knowledge in a social context. This particular lesson plan does not take into account this need, so I would modify it by having the students quiz each other on the types of faults. They could model with their hands and their partner could tell them which fault they were modeling. They could also work together as pairs to come up with lists of characteristics that each fault has. This would be a way to incorporate social interaction into the lesson.

There are other concepts of developmental cognitivism that are beneficial to consider when thinking about this approach. For example, it may be necessary that students adapt their previous thoughts about earthquakes when they learn new information. This could happen if students thought that earthquakes only happen suddenly without any warning. The conflict of previous knowledge and new knowledge that the student is experiencing is called disequilibrium. By realizing that the types of faults determine how an earthquake will happen, they will adapt their thinking to fit the new information. When the student realizes that their previous knowledge does not help them understand the new information, that is when they use assimilation to fit their their thinking with the new information. They students adapt their earthquake schema, or organized systems of thinking, to fit into what they have just learned. Also, this lesson can incorporate guided discovery learning to help students learn and adapt to the new information. This could be done by having the teacher not do so much direct instruction, but instead allow the students to notice the characteristics of each fault type and to come up with conclusions on their own. These are some of the ways this lesson can be descirbed from a cognitive development point of view.

"Tryin' On Clothes" Digital Storybook

This is our digital storybook. We did a poem interpretation of the Shel Silverstein poem Tryin' on Clothes.

301 Applied Lesson Plan: Behaviorism

My lesson plan is about the types of earthquakes and how they affect the Earth's surface. My goal for this lesson in the form of a behavioral objective is that students will understand the three kinds of faults: lateral fault, reverse fault, and normal fault by using their hands to model these faults. The students will demonstrate this understanding at the end of the lesson by writing a paragraph about the types of earthquakes and how they change the landforms around them.

When teaching this lesson, I will encourage class participation by using reinforcement. If I gave the student praise about how their response showed a good thought process, that would be considered positive reinforcement because I am trying to strengthen behavior (participation) by presenting a desired stimulus (praise) after the behavior. If I told my students that if they participated and showed me they understood the concepts through their written paragraphs, then I would excuse them from doing clean up crew before recess, that would be negative reinforcement. It would be negative reinforcement because I would be trying to strengthen the behavior (participation and understanding concepts) by removing an aversive stimulus (picking up scraps before going to recess).

If I decided to use positive reinforcement in the form of verbal praise, I would need to decide when to use this reinforcement. In other words, I would set up (either consciously or subconsciously) a reinforcement schedule. The type of schedule that provides the most response for the longest amount of time is the variable ratio schedule. If I decided to use this schedule, then I would vary the amount of responses before I gave praise. This shows that I value the students thinking processes, but they don't need to be praised every single time for them to keep up the desired behavior.

Another Behaviorist principle that can be employed in this lesson is using a cueing and prompting system. For example, at the end of this lesson it is suggested that students write a paragraph about their understanding of earthquakes and faults. The cue for this could be getting out a paper and pencil so that they are ready to write. The prompt could be a checklist provided by the teacher that helps the students remember what is expected when writing a paragraph like this. Points on the checklist could include writing in complete sentences, summarize principles, and connect to past knowledge. These things would prompt the students to write a paragraph about what they learned without the teacher guiding them the whole way through the process.

Using the Premack principle when teaching this lesson could motivate the students to become more involved. The Premack principle uses a more-preferred activity to serve as a reinforcer for a less-preferred activity. For example, if my students enjoy drawing pictures and coloring, I could say that if they first write their paragraph about what they learned, then they could draw pictures of the types of faults with their colored pencils under their paragraph. The more-preferred activity, or coloring, would reinforce the less-preferred activity, or writing a paragraph.

This lesson plan supports the Behaviorist principle of shaping. Shaping is reinforcing each small step of progress toward a desired goal or behavior. In this lesson, there are 3 steps that could be used in a shaping approach- making models of faults using their hands, discussing the models, and writing a paragraph about what was learned. Each of these steps can be reinforced when they are reached. This is easily seen in the task analysis that is below.

Digital Storytelling with TPACK

The content we are addressing in this activity is from the Utah State Core. Specifically, we want students to develop language through viewing media and presenting and to help students write daily to communicate effectively for a variety of purposes and audiences. The students will use their language skills to write for the purpose of creating a digital storybook for their peers. This process of writing and creating is the content that we are focusing on through this activity.

This activity has a hands-on approach for the content. By having the students arrange or create the language for their storybooks, it allows them to understand how the language works together to form the whole. By having students also create images to go along with their text, it helps reinforce comprehension. This is why this activity is a good way to teach the content.

To complete the TPACK formula, we need to look at how we use technology in our activity. The technology we use in this activity is a digital camera and a program to put the images together in a storybook form. The technology helps support both the content because they are the medium through which the students are expressing their ideas. The technology also supports our pedagogy for teaching because it allows the students to take control of their learning. Students can record the images they create with the digital camera and then arrange the images to correspond with the text to create the digital storybook. This project allows the students to make decisions on what will be best for their text and to implement those decisions. This is how all the components come together for TPACK in this activity.

Storyboard!

301 Applied Lesson Plan: Cognition

The lesson plan that I have chosen to use is based on the different types of earthquakes and how they affect the Earth's surface. The lesson describes three kinds of faults: lateral fault, reverse fault, and normal fault. In order for the students to remember these types of faults, I would use the chain method. The mnemonic sentence that I made up to help remember this is Lazy Rita Naps. The beginning letter of each of words stands for one of the types of faults (lateral, reverse, and normal). Hopefully this strategy would help students remember these specific terms about faults. Another strategy this lesson employs is that of elaboration. I would use this by relating these faults to existing knowledge they already have. For example, I could relate a reverse fault to an arm wrestle- one hand is pushing up and the other is pushing down. A third strategy for remembering these terms is to create a concept map. The main idea would be "faults" with links to the types of faults. Then arrows would connect to the attributes of each type of fault, such as side-to-side movement for a lateral fault.

This lesson supports cognitive learning. For the beginning of the lesson, I would show before and after pictures of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. This would catch the attention of the students because they would be focused on the stimulus of the strong visual images. The processing of this stimulus into information is done initially in the sensory memory. Students process the stimulus and give it meaning and interpretation, such as the meaning that earthquakes change the Earth's surface in dramatic ways. This is known as perception. As we discuss and demonstrate the different types of faults, this knowledge will be in the students' working memories, which is where the information is that you are focusing on at a specific time. As we work on the mnemonics and connecting new knowledge to previous knowledge, hopefully the short-term knowledge about faults will be transferred to long-term memory where the students will be able to access it in the future. Through this lesson, the students will be able to know that earthquakes change the surface of the Earth, which is an example of declarative knowledge. This is how the lesson can be applied from a cognitive learning viewpoint.

TPACK and Science Activity

For our science activity, we concentrated on the Utah State Standard 2 for 5th grade science, which is that students will understand that volcanoes, earthquakes, uplift, weathering, and erosion reshape Earth's surface. For our activity, we focused on exploring a volcano and also the Grand Canyon, which was shaped through the process of erosion. This is the content section of TPACK.

We chose to teach our activity the way we did because it gives the students an opportunity to visualize how the surface of the Earth is changed. Instead of trying to picture this image in their heads, they can actually see what it looks like. They also can explore the terrain for themselves and come up with their own conclusions. This is a type of discovery learning, which is a good way to teach science. Using this method to teach our content demonstrates the PK part of TPACK.

The technology we used for activity was Google Earth. This fit well with both the content and our pedagogy for teaching it. Google Earth shows the content in a real-life way, showing the topography as well as actual photographs. This enables students to visualize how volcanoes and erosion actually affect the Earth's surface. This technology also allows the students to explore the locations themselves, which helps support our view on effective teaching. Incorporating all these components into our activity demonstrates how TPACK can be used to teach science.

Tech Savvy Teachers

Written by Jennifer Ray and RaeLene Hamblin

As Tech Savvy teachers, we want to give our students the opportunity to use content-specific technology tools. We know that these technologies allow our students to explore science in ways that are engaging and enjoyable.

We used technology to teach about the reshaping of the Earth's surface, which is standard 2 in Utah's core curriculum for the 5th grade. Specifically, we wanted students to explore volcanoes, canyons, and mountain ranges after we had discussed the forces that create these landforms. Students were also given the task of describing the terrain of a new location, such as Nevada in our example. Google Earth is the technology tool students used to accomplish these tasks. The image to the right is an example of how students are able to see the topography of various landforms, in this case a volcano.

Google Earth enables students to view geographic locations throughout the world. We began by looking at the Mauna Loa volcano in Hawaii. Google Earth allows the students view the terrain of the actual volcano by using the 3D feature and by zooming in to the volcano. Students can move the focus around the terrain so they can explore the volcano in depth. As seen in the picture below, Google Earth also offers informational articles when this specific box is clicked. In this example, a Wikipedia article shows information about Mauna Loa.

Next, students explored the geological features of the Grand Canyon. Students were able to see real photographs of the Grand Canyon alongside the topographical view. As the students explored the Google Earth images, we discussed the forces that created these landforms. Finally, students were instructed to explore a nonresidential area of Nevada and describe the terrain they see. Students also explained what forces shaped that terrain. An example of a student's view of Nevada is provided below.
This technology of Google Earth allowed students to observe and analyze data in the form images. Because the images were three-dimensional, students were able to gain a deeper understanding of the content than they would have through a lecture with pictures. The following image of the Grand Canyon exemplifies the kind of images that students are able to manipulate to explore geological landforms. Investigating these landforms engages students in meaningful learning. This is one example of how tech savvy teachers use technology to enhance learning.

Science Technology Explored

During class, we explored temperature probes. I was excited to experiment with this science technology. We could change the measurements from degrees Fahrenheit to degrees Celsius and we could even have two probes plugged into the same computer and have the two temperatures be graphed on the same graph. I liked the challenges that we were given because they gave us a chance to problem solve with the knowledge we had about how this technology worked. I think that this technology would be great to use in a classroom, especially when we are talking about graphs and how to read them.

TPACK

TPACK combines technological knowledge, pedagogical knowledge, and content knowledge together to be an effective way to incorporate technology in classroom learning. A teacher who teaches the material from the state core uses content knowledge. Knowing how to use technology, such as a thermometer, is called technological knowledge. Understanding the best way to teach people is known as pedagogical knowledge. The best kinds of teaching include all of these knowledges together, also known as TPACK. Using technology in the classroom to teach the content can enhance the student's learning. As a teacher, it may be hard to include TPACK in every lesson, but taking the time to explore techonolgy tools gives teachers more options when they plan their lessons. The students will benefit from the teacher's use of TPACK.

301 Observational Learning Report

For my observation learning report, I decided to observe my institute teacher. He is quite different from the institute teacher we had last semester. At the beginning of class he told us that we needed to find someone we didn’t know and sit next to them. Then he had “get to know you” questions ready on his slides to ask each other. We had one minute to find out about each other. We repeated this until we had met five new people. When he had us sit down, he asked us to all sit in the middle of the classroom and fill up the empty seats. By this simple activity, Brother Gibbs showed that his teaching method involved the class being friends and knowing one another. These activities seemed to bring the class together. I noticed a difference from the way institute was last semester, and I think that these strategies were beneficial. I know that as a learner in the classroom I felt like I could be friends with the people in my class because I now knew who they were and I became excited to come to institute for the rest of the semester. There is a definite difference in the atmosphere when you feel comfortable in a learning environment.

Brother Gibbs also introduced himself and he told us that he wanted us to know him and not think of him as just another teacher we listened to for an hour. We found out that he is legally blind and he told us a little about some of the experiences that he has had. This strategy was similar to the first activity because it was fostering an environment where students feel safe and welcome. While this was a good strategy, Brother Gibbs went off on a few tangents telling personal stories instead of covering lesson material. His stories were interesting, but the reason we came to institute was to learn more about the gospel. He spent about 15 minutes telling us stories, which is one thing that I would change if I were to teach the lesson he did; it took time out of the content.

For the lesson, we discussed one of President Hinckley’s talks about faith, which we all read before we came. Brother Gibbs had a few points listed that we discussed. I noticed, however, that he let the students do more talking than he as the teacher was doing. He was adding comments, but overall the student talk was greater than the teacher talk. This was a good strategy because it allowed the students to gain from each other’s knowledge and insights. It was a good balance and I felt like I learned a lot from what others said as well as what Brother Gibbs said. The lesson that we had on faith was uplifting and I feel like one of the only things I would have changed would have been to have more time for the actual lesson. I hadn’t analyzed a teacher’s style in a religious setting, but I found that Brother Gibbs definitely has good teaching strategies to help his students gain more knowledge.

RSS and Web 2.0 tools

This week I learned about what RSS is and how it could be helpful to use it as an educator. RSS takes information that you can get from various sources and puts them all in one place so you don't have to go look for them. This could be used in many different ways. As a teacher, I could use RSS to get updates from lots of educational resources. I could have an RSS feed for educational research so I could be updated about the best ways to teach. I also could have an RSS feed that has lesson plan ideas and different activities that can be used for teaching. Web 2.0 tools will also be helpful to use as a teacher. Resource sharing, like Goodreads and Delicious, will be helpful so I can get other teacher's ideas and resources. I can share mine with them and get theirs in return. When you collaborate with others, you can have a better range of information. I think that these resources will be very beneficial to me as an educator.

My technology background

My technology background is pretty typical. I had a computer in my house, which I used to play some computer games and more for homework as I got older. I have an email and facebook account and I use the internet to research all the time. I passed the technology tests required for admittance in the Elementary Education program pretty easily. I don't have much experience with anything more complicated than that.