Blog Post #11

Ms. Cassidy’s Classroom Technology

In the video I watched entitled First Graders in Ms. Cassidy's Class, the first graders talked about the different types of technology Ms. Cassidy used with them. They keep up blogs, much like we do in EDM310, though theirs are a lot simpler of course. They also have a class webpage in which they can find links to games and other educational things. In their "center time," they can get on a computer and go to reading pages or listening pages and work on their comprehension skills. The students make videos and also have a Wiki. They Skype other classrooms and experts to learn new things. Something that struck me as interesting was that they use Nintendo DS gaming systems to learn as well.

I am a secondary education major, so I will be teaching anywhere from 6th to 12th grade. In my classroom, I would love to keep up a webpage like that of Ms. Cassidy's. I think it is a great idea to do this, not only to provide links to your students for further learning, but to let absent students know what they missed. Blogging was new to me whenever I started EDM310, but I have come to really enjoy it. I think that providing students with ideas to start up blogs is a great idea; it can help them learn a lot more and also help them to reach out to other learners.

With the age I will be teaching, I realize that it will be very hard to keep them on track. The internet is huge, and students between the ages that I will be teaching can almost always find their way to trouble while using it. I hope to teach them about what is acceptable and expected while they use the internet. I will explain to them that it is something they should not take for granted because not all students have this type of access to knowledge.

I anticipate many benefits by using technology in my classroom. I think it will help me keep on track with my class. I can do this by using a webpage, like I said above, to keep students up to date on what we are doing. On this webpage, I could place a calendar to let students know what we will be doing in the days to come. Hopefully, I can teach my students that being ahead is way better than falling behind. I think technology will keep students attention much better than simple lectures and pencil/pen and paper!