Reaction to Easily Organize Your Dropbox Files With This Awesome Ipad App

Boxie is an app for an iPad and also works on iPhones which has now become free.  It is essentially a dropbox app.  As a business education teacher students always want to bring their digital files home to work on them.  My old answer to students would be to either save it on a flash drive, if they have one or email it to yourself.  Also our school district limits the size of files students can save in their folder.  Since many students have a smart device Boxie could be a solution to aide many students in file storage.  Also, by saving items to the cloud, students can access files from any location with an Internet connection.  Overall, I think Boxie sounds interesting and I would like to try using this app in my class to determine if it is a good storage option for students.

Reference:

Kharbach, M. (2013, December 6th). Easily Organize Your Dropbox Files With This Awesome Ipad App. www. educatorstechnology.com.  Retrieved December 7th, 2013 from: http://www.educatorstechnology.com/2013/12/easily-organize-your-dropbox-files-with.html

Collaborative Editing Reading Response

Collaborative editing is when a group of people or students can all edit and view a document at the same time.  Teachers may also use collaboration software for demonstration purposes.  For instance, teachers can share a reading with students and allow for read only access.  Collaborative editing is a much more efficient method for revising files because all the group members can edit a document in real time.  This can be a big time saver rather than printing out a copy of a rough draft or having each group member work a different topic individually and putting it together at the end.  It also saves paper too since no printouts are necessary as long as each group member has a technology device and access to the account.

Collaboration software is a great technology for teachers to be able to use for group activities.  It allows for all students to be able to contribute to a digital document at the same time.  Collaborative editing is going to continue to grow in popularity for educators as teachers discover the power and effectiveness it can have for students.

Reference:

(2005, December).  7 Things You Should Know About Collaborative Editing.  www.educause.edu/eli. Retrieved December 7th, 2013 from:  https://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ELI7009.pdf.

Reaction to Chapter 8 - Collins and Halverson

Chapter 8 examines how the education world can deal with changes of incorporating technology in the classroom.  One of the most important ways to manage these issues is to establish a new curriculum.  The top example given was to use games to help get students engaged.  I know that my students really like to play review games using the clickers and I think developing other types of technology by using games could help.   Utilizing technology in the classroom can also help with collaboration such as using blog, wiki or even GoogleDocs.  Students can collaborate both in and outside of the classroom on core concepts.  Students will be more engaged if they are able to work in teams and use technology.  Since students are always using technology outside of the classroom if teachers incorporate technology inside their digital classrooms students will be more interested in any subject are.

Reference:

Collins, A., & Halverson, R. (2009). Rethinking Education in the Age of Technology: The Digital Revolution and Schooling in America. New York, NY: Teachers College Press.

Teaching Critical Thinking (with Dog Food)

Now more than ever students need to learn how to think critically.  So many times when I am teaching middle school students are so concerned with what is the answer?  But, more importantly they need to think about thinking. 

This article discusses an process which uses a box of Frosted Mini-Wheats cereal.  When the students are asked what it is they state “Mini-Wheats” because that’s what the box says.  When the boxes is dumped out, out comes dog food.  In this article Bach uses a 3 word (Huh? Really? So?) to help involve critical thinking to a question:

Huh?

• Do we understand what is being talked about?
• Is it confusing?
• Vague?

Really?

• Is it factually true?
• What hard evidence do we have for it?

So?

• Why does this matter?
• To whom does it matter?
• How much does it matter?

I thought this was an interesting approach rather than always teaching bloom's revised taxonomy in a lesson that involves critical thinking.  Huh? Really? So? are easy words middle schoolers may relate to better and it can easily help them to critically think when a question is ask during class.

Article Citation:

Bach, James (2013, November 30).  Teaching Critical Thinking (with Dog Food).  www.edutopia.org/. Retrieved November 30th, 2013 from:  http://www.edutopia.org/blog/teaching-critical-thinking-dog-food-james-bach

Response to Social Media in Plain English video

I found it interesting how the author related social networking to everyone being able to develop their own flavors of ice cream.  For years, people all had only the same methods of communication, either by writing a letter, talking on the telephone or talking face to face.

Now through the Internet, many more establish methods of communication exist.  When I was in high school instant messenger was becoming popular, now Facebook has incorporated instant messaging with social networking.  Many other websites have become available to choose from enabling different methods of communication such as wiki’s or blogs.  Similar to how the video stated, Internet users have many choices when it comes to communicating.  Users must experiment to see which methods work best for their needs, multiple methods or creating one’s own flavor of communication is the greatest solution in today’s world!

Reaction to Chapter 6

Twitter can be a great resource to share information, communicate with family or even be used as a resource for education.  Schools are currently using it to be able to communicate with parents and the community.  Edmodo.com is a free substitute source for teachers as well.  Richardson suggest before using a resource such as Twitter in the classroom “Think about Twitter for yourself first” (89, Richardson).  Use it as a resource to connect with others about interest first and see if you can incorporate it to use in the classroom.

Social bookmarking is a great way to keep track of information specifically list of URL’s.  Not only can you add or “tag” URL’s of websites you want to visit another time you can also add keywords describing the website.  This information then get shared with others as they view the same websites with a social bookmarking website like Delicious.com.  You can either keep bookmarks private or choose to share them with specific groups such as students.  Annotating is also a great way to leave notes or comments about a specific URL you have posted for a group to see.

The most important part about social bookmarking is that it is web based.  Before social bookmarking when you use your browser to social bookmark it would only impact that one computer.  Now by using social bookmarking, you can find pages that were previously visited on any computer as long as it’s connected to the internet. 

Educators can use social bookmarks as a tool to not only share websites but collaborate with students by feeding them information.  Social networking can also be used as a method of communication within education.  As technology and BYOD continue to grow in the classroom, these tools will become essential to digital learning. 

Reaction to “The Biggest Hurdle to Flipping Your Class”

As a teacher you hear the term “flipping your classroom” constantly.  Why should educators do this if school has been structured the same for centuries?  The article answers that flipping your classroom “Makes class time more enriching and more valuable.”  This certainly sounds like something teachers should implement.

The article states that students are not just given the content but are forced to “learn how to learn”.  I have tried flipping things in my classroom this semester such as a video recorded instruction as well as providing the entire course notes on Blackboard but still think I have many enhancements to make. 

The issue for me has been so far at middle school; students don’t want to or expect to view elective class notes from home.  Some students may not have a computer from home so I still have to dedicate time in the classroom for students to view the instruction I have provided online.  One of the most important things to teaching in a flipped classroom is implement a routine with the class from day 1.  One major benefit I have seen is that some students will go home and view my instructional videos multiple times if they don’t understand something.  Students have mentioned to me that they wish their core classes especially math and social studies would record daily lessons they could go back later and view.

Overall, I think flipping your classroom is a neat idea and it works differently depending on each teacher’s situation but should be able to be performed to some extent in all subject areas.  Flipping your classroom is the imminent of education and we will see more of it in the future as technology improves.

Article Citation:

Bergmann, Jon (2013, November 18). The Biggest Hurdle to Flipping Your Class. http://www.edutopia.org/.  Retrieved November 23rd, 2013 from http://www.edutopia.org/blog/biggest-hurdle-flipping-your-class-jon-bergmann