Lesson 8

Yeah, it's the final blog for class! Once I finish this blog I will start blogging solely for school purposes (classroom assignments, what's going on in math class, etc.). This week the purpose of this blog is to talk about the benefits of using different online communication tools within the classroom and any security benefits that the school system has in place. Personally, I am constantly using email to communicate with my parents. In this day and age almost all people are online at some point during the day. The biggest benefit that many have in using email is that they do not have to worry about talking with others over the phone. Due to the restraints on my time schedule while at school I find it easier to send a quick email to the parents regarding what is going on in class and how their child or children are doing in class. I have not had the opportunity to use different communication tools with my students in the classroom. I do feel that this school year I will definetely implement blogs into my classroom. I teach math to three different classes each day, however I do have one class that I have A.R. time with. I feel that it would be awesome for the students to set up their own blog to do book reviews on. This would allow students throughout the school to get an idea of what kind of books are available to them and what the book is like. Lastly, the school system that I teach in has a wonderful security system for our use of technology. The system is set up to reduce any malicious software that could infiltrate the system.

Lesson Seven

Lesson seven is regarding technology that I use inside of my classroom. I teach a 5th grade math class to around 75 students everyday. Every day I use the Smart Board to teach my classes. I feel that this is a very valuable piece of technology that I am very grateful to have at my fingertips to use daily. Due to the fact that I do have larger classes it is sometimes hard to use one form of technology (programs) with each one of my students. However, the school I teach at had the pleasure last year of purchasing the use of a program called Success Maker. Again this year we are starting the year out by testing all students in the school system on Success Maker. This program is used by our district to test all students for RTI in reading and math. Once all the students have been tested our school develops a schedule to allow all morning math classes to have the chance to continue to use the Success Maker program. The biggest benefit for using Success Maker is its reliability and dependability. The program is designed to give us, the teachers, an idea of how a student would perform on the CATS test at the end of the year. Also, the math form of the program allows students to practice all aspects of math that they will see during the school year. By doing this the students will have the chance to see different topics before they are actually taught in the classroom.

Lesson 6

The lesson for this week (lesson 6) was a very interesting, yet confusing lesson. I have never had anything to do with WebQuests, and honestly I was very confused through many parts of the lesson. I enjoyed viewing previously created WebQuest that would be beneficial to use in my classroom. After viewing the different WebQuests that other teachers/educators have created I felt more at ease with creating my own. Boy was I wrong! I used the website that Dr. Goldberg recommended for creating my WebQuest. Setting up the WebQuest was pretty easy. The website was great to give step by step instructions. The main issue that I had with the website was that I could never get it to allow me to insert any clip-art for making the WebQuest more appealing to my students. Also, I was not happy with the choices that I had to change the font (including the size), background colors, and font colors. I felt that I was very restricted with what I could and could not do.
On a positive point I will explain a little bit about my actual WebQuest. I created a WebQuest that would incorporate mathematics and vocational skills together. Many, if not all, students are unaware of the concept of budgets for a large or even small family. I used this concept to build on the idea of allowing the students to separate into groups that would create a menu and grocery list on a budget for a family of four. After the students created the menu and the grocery list they were required to go on a shopping spree to see if they could remain within the budget they are given. Using this basis for the central idea/concept the students will learn how to add, subtract, multiply, and divide using decimals and fractions.
Below is the URL for the WebQuest that I created.
http://questgarden.com/108/13/7/100810144345/

Lesson Five

Lesson five was an interesting lesson to go through. This is my first time using any sort of electronic communication besides email or the occasional chat. Just signing/creating this account I realized that this was going to be an interesting technique to communicate with not only my teacher for the course, but with the parents and guardians of all my students. Looking over the lessons that I did last year I realized that I have not only short changed myself but my students as well. There has been plenty of times that I could have easily used chats and/or blogs with my students in the lessons. The major reason that I never used any of these among others is because I have never been to familiar with anything other than email. As soon as we all hit our teenage years we feel that we MUST have an email account to communicate with our friends without our parents knowing. Needless to say this was me as a teenager. However, times have changed. At an earlier age students/children are getting email accounts through school and privately, they are using cell phones for chatting, and constantly chatting online. Before a student walks into my room they have more than likely already used some form of electronic communication. Toward the end of the first school semester the school district placed Smart Boards in the classroom. Using the Smart Board will allow me to open up new doors to my classes. I can also use the school new Mac Books or my personal laptop to allow my students to participate in different classes across the world. I have been doing research online about how other countries teach math in their classrooms. I think that it would be an amazing experience for my students to participate in a math class that is occurring in a country on the other side of the world. I would also like to create a lesson that allows my students to communicate through online chat sessions with other schools. As the school year approaches I am trying harder and harder to come up with ways to allow my students to communicate electronically with other students from different areas.