Final Comments

I commented on Tori's video here

McKenzie's video here

and Jeff's video here


Merry Christmas!

Final Reflection

I found all of the technologies we have learned or discussed in class to be useful. I know for my class, I will be more likely to use logger pro since it is a more inquiry based technology. It allows students to be more interactive with their research and data collection. I was also grateful that we learned about the smart board. For my future student teaching classroom, there is a smart board that my cooperating teacher uses. Instead of feeling overwhelmed and not knowing how to use it, I am comfortable using it and having my students be interactive with the lectures and assignments since they can participate as well. These technologies allow for the students to be interactive with the lessons rather than sitting and listening. They can participate and be involved as well as responsible for their learning because they are being included.

I have really appreciated this class this semester. It has truly opened my eyes to new ways of teaching boring concepts to make them more interactive and fun. And I actually feel more technology literate than I have before. This class has also helped me be a better student as well!

Thanks!

Internet Safety Discussion

For this part of the assignment, I talked with my manager at work. She is a parent of 4 kids (17, 15, 13, and 5 year old). I felt like it was important to talk to her about protecting her kids from the internet because they are at the age where internet is rather prominent in their lives. I talked about the Frontline video that I had seen and discussed things I had learned from the video as well as in class. She had previously heard about cyber bullying but hadn't researched it much since she is always at work. Since my manager is always at work it is hard for her to monitor what her children do or see online. I think the discussion we had was a sobering yet possibly scary discussion. She had mentioned that she was going to change the computer and put it in a more public place so that when she is home, she can see what her children are doing. She said she also planned on putting up more strict parental controls on the computer so her kids were only allowed a specific time limit and can only access certain websites. After our discussion, she planned on trying to open the lines of communication with her children and discuss cyberbullying and how to prevent it. I think the discussion went well. Again, I think I might have scared her a little, but she told me she planned on making changes at home to protect her children.

Internet Safety

For this assignment I watched the Frontline video "Growing Up Online." Here is a link to the video Frontline Video

There were many things I learned from this video. I learned that adolescents spend SO much time online and adults are not as involved as they should be. As a parent, I am going to be more involved in my child's life and what my child sees and does online. As a teacher, I will include necessary technologies as they are pertinent to assignments and lessons, but I will not provide the students access to sites that are potentially dangerous and inappropriate. I will help my brothers and sisters-in-law make the internet a safe place for my nieces and nephews; I will also discuss with my friends ways in which we can protect ourselves and our future children from the harmful affects of the internet. I think that when it comes to cyberbullying, it is a little difficult to try and regulate what happens especially if the youth does not want to talk about their lives. I still believe if you begin with open lines of communication from the start then the youth will be more likely to discuss things with adults; we also must keep an open mind and try not to be judgmental when students and adolescents come to talk to us. I think the most helpful way of preventing cyberbullying is educating the youth on how to protect themselves. They are ultimately the ones that can completely have control over the situation. I know there are some resources online to help prevent cyberbullying; the church has articles and helpful tools in addressing them. There are also seminars and classes that parents and teachers can attend to be better informed on how to help; some of these classes can be for students as well since they are the ones that come in contact with bullying online more often. As a teacher, if I want to show a youtube video, sometimes there can be advertisements or inappropriate related videos that show up on the sides; I can use the quiettube website to help protect my students. I can also have a strict control set up on the computers so they can only access specific educational websites. I can monitor their computer access to make sure that the usage of the computers are strictly for assignments. I think I can make the internet a safer place for my students by showing them websites that are interesting and entertaining yet educational and useful. They will be broadening their website library and may be less likely to get bored and search or access websites that are unsafe.

Multimedia Project

Mitosis Video:
If you want to watch from Youtube please go to this link:
IPT Project

I had a lot of fun filming and editing videos. I learned that I can use videos to enhance my classroom. I would use videos like these as assignments for my students, where they have to create a video to demonstrate an objective. I can also use videos to do demonstrations that would take too long or that I would not be able to do in the classroom. I can use them to engage my students because it can break up mundane lectures. Everyone loves videos! :)

Beginning Multimedia Project

Here is my storyboard for my video. The reason why it is posted late is because I was sick and missed class the days we were discussing the video.

Here it is!

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1BHNa3sg4mfkBDjnSFR_XDQ4uYcinsSRSB7WdP-tN048/edit

Personal Technology Project 2

For the second half of my project I chose to learn:   Polls Everywhere!!!

here is a link to my webpage:
https://sites.google.com/site/mrsjonesbiologyi/

1. I can use this technology to have students let me know what they feel like they are lacking in or what they need more help in. It's totally anonymous so the student does not have to feel like they are singled out. I can also use this technology as a sort of formative assessment, just to see where the kids are at in our instruction.

2. I can use the polls as formative assessments, like quizzes to see where the students need help and what they are strong in. I can also use them to see students' interests or opinions on topics or classroom practices.

3. Since the answers to the polls are sent by cell phones, the administration's rules of cell phones in the classrooms could hinder this idea. However, you could still use these polls while students are at home instead of always being in the classroom.  Also, if students don't own or have access to a cell phone or texting capability, they wouldn't be able to participate.

To view the polls on my webpage, it is under the new page "Classroom Polls."

Personal Technology Project

I learned how to use LoggerPro!

Experiment 1:
Objective: SWBAT understand different variables (conductivity, temperature, solubility, etc) that come into play with various solutions (hypotonic, hypertonic, and isotonic).

In this experiment students will use different solutions and test the changing conductivity in relation to their salinity. They will use the conductivity probe and temperature probe while they conduct the experiment in LoggerPro. They will also test other variables such as temperature with conductivity as well.

This experiment will help with the application to different physiological systems within the human body and see how conductivity and temperature of solutions help or hinder different systems.

Experiment 2:
Objective: SWBAT predict the changes of blood pressure and body temperature in regards to physical activity.

Within this experiment, students will gather data and test the changes within their blood pressure and their body temperature while they do various physical activities (i.e. sitting, standing, walking, jogging in place, jumping jacks). They will use the blood pressure sleeve sensor and the temperature probe while conducting this experiment. After gathering data, students will analyze their data and use this new knowledge to help "diagnose" various "patients" within their assignment.

I learned that there are many probes and sensors that you can use to conduct multiple experiments and that they can be used in various capacities rather than just using them for the "obvious" uses. The probes and sensors are very specific and sensitive; they are rather accurate when doing your different tests, which is helpful so that you can have accurate data when doing reports. 

LoggerPro is so useful especially in a science classroom. It is helpful when doing experiments that require gathering little bits of changing information. When practicing inquiry in the classroom, LoggerPro is probably the most useful tool when collecting data. It is also pretty easy to use, so my students will be able to use it with ease rather than spending time and energy trying to figure out how to use it. I can let them do their experiments without smothering them and showing them how to use the sensors and probes; this way, the students are in charge of their own experiments. 

The probes and sensors that I used for these experiments were the blood pressure probe, the temperature sensor, and the conductivity probe. These three probes/sensors were very helpful in the experiments we used them in, and we would be able to use these probes in other various ways as well. Other probes that I think would be useful within my classroom would be the oxygen probe and the light sensor. Most of the probes that were available can definitely be helpful within the biology classroom. They can help explore concepts and experiments that you may not be able to test if you did not have them. They all can be used to explore all the different topics within biology (photosynthesis, the human body, solutions, etc). 

Extra:

I also viewed the other tutorials on LoggerPro. These additional features will come in handy when students are presenting their findings of their experiment. They can use different features to customize their experiment and make it unique to themselves. Also, it is helpful for the students so they can use statistics along with their experimentations, they can present different statistical data and also use and manipulate various graphs and curves and it can drastically strengthen their presentations. Not only are they learning science during these assignments, but they are also extending their math content to help explain their projects.  

Copyright

This is a very unique mitosis video. What the creator did right in the video was he took a popular Green Day song and changed the lyrics to it to make it fit to his lesson. He did in fact mention the name of the song and the creator of the work. However, he did use the whole musical composition. Though it wasn't the lyrics of the original creators, the music that was used was from the original artists. What he should have done was made a shorter version of the song making it where only 10% of the music was used. Though he did mention who sang the song and what it was called, the creator of this video could have cited the song properly. 

In this video, students are showing all the various properties of water. For the most part, these guys followed copyright law pretty well; they made their own original video and included their own animations to portray their concepts. They also used music within their video and during the credits. Both music used they used just "snippets" of the songs that lasted less than 30 seconds. One thing they could have done better was, though they did mention the artist of the songs in the credits, they did not properly cite the song and artist. To make it credible, the creators of this video should properly cite the songs and artists so that individuals who view this video would be able to easily find these songs. 

Completed Class Website

Here is my completed class website.

https://sites.google.com/site/mrsjonesbiologyi/

I learned a great deal while creating this website, and I find that it will become useful in my teaching. I will be able to post the syllabus and class calendar so students will be able to access this information from any computer and have this info at "all times". I will make sure to keep my website updated regularly so that the information is useful to students all the time.
The most useful things for students is the page where they can access helpful presentations or videos that help guide their study. A useful thing for parents is probably the syllabus or calendar; parents will be able to access this information anywhere at any time, even if their child lost the hard copy versions, and know what their child is doing and learning in class.

Beginning My Very Own Website

here is the start of my classroom website.





Do not fear I am not finished!

https://sites.google.com/site/mrsjonesbiologyi/

First. Blog. EVER.

This is my first blog. Hopefully I can work it correctly; i'll try not to disappoint.

I guess this is where I will post all of my IP&T assignments.

:)

See you soon!