Strengths and Weaknesses

I felt and feel like this UNI survey is a little premature in our careers especially for how extensive it is, it was hard to take it seriously with out feeling overwhelmed with how much we should know.  It did give me an idea of what is out there for us to take advantage of in our teaching careers, but to learn all of that technology and become an expert at all of it is more likely to happen for a technology expert.
With that said I feel like being a teacher is a career that asks for a jack of all trades kind of person.  That is part of what I like about teaching is that I get to learn about so much and then pass that learning on to others.  In my short life I feel like I have been able to become quite adept at some of the things listed on the survey.  So my strengths from that survey would be using multimedia software, and print lay out design, doing a Bachelors degree in design and illustration defiantly taught me a thing or two in those areas.  I still really enjoy doing those kinds of things.

For my weaknesses I feel like the area I need the most improvement is in using, spread sheets, data bases, and graphic organizers.  I have been helping my wife out as she is interning as a Fifth grade teacher in the Provo School district, in helping her I have found out just how much Teachers use these tools.  It almost seems like those programs have become second nature for my wife because she uses them so much.  I feel like those programs will be learned along the way but it would be good to learn how to integrate them into lessons for students to learn them.

The one thing that came up in a conversation that I know nothing about and would love to learn more about is Smart Boards/ Interactive White boards.  Those would also require me to learn how create and use graphic organizers.  I found these online tutorials that seem very interesting http://www.fsdb.k12.fl.us/rmc/tutorials/whiteboards.html#resources and http://downloads01.smarttech.com:80/media/services/handsonpractices/pdf/english/sb_basics.pdf .  I have a neighbor who is the Principal of Sharon Elementary who has been able to supply a Smart board for every class room in her school.  She and her teachers love them for how versatile they are.

Week 13 Field 3

Following up from last week, there is also a shortage of gadgets for the kids to use at this school.  We did our technology interview this week and I was really impressed with the Computers Teacher.  She is very excited about the subject of technology and she has a lot of great ideas on how to get the kids excited about using computers.  For example she had them make personalized Don't Disturb door handle hangers the kids really enjoyed doing it and it got them familiar with the text and picture boxes, changing the font text type and size/ color.  One thing that also saw and was really impressed by was how she the Teacher had the kids help each other once they were doing the task.  I had been talking to some friends earlier that week about Peer Tutoring and partnered learning.
All of the projects that we have done so for in Technology have used this principle of team work and I love it.  One thing I have noticed a lot of in this field experience is the lack of motivation that  many of the students have.  Especially in the traditional class room setting.  Once the kids started doing things together where they were teaching each other or just working together that motivation would almost magically appear.  With the Door handle assignment many of the kids that struggle to get one problem done in math did the whole project twice.  The other reason that I love this concept or aspect of teaching is how applicable it is to real life.  So many jobs require us to work in team or groups even as teachers we will be asked to do so.  It is great that we can start them with good group habits.
I want to research this area of cooperative teaching more and figure out how to best use it.  I read a few articles about how it is being used in England and other countries.  I  know that there are times when it does not help to have the students teamed up and as I talked to my cooperating teacher I found out that many parents don't want their kids working with other kids that might bring them down. There is so much to learn.

week 12 field 2

I noiticed this week that there is a shortage of computers for the kids to do a lot of tech stuff with at least computers.  The issue at hand would most likely be funding.  I know that the kids could bennefit from more technology use.  I aslo feel like it is safe to assume that their parents would want them to do more that way. As we have been shown in many of the weekly videos it is becoming more and more essential for the children to know how to use all kinds of technology.
Where do we get the money for all the supplies?  How do we get everything integrated into technology?  Is the goverment willing to pay for it?

I imagine that there are grants to help.  I just don't know what grants.  So as a teacher this is what I need to learn.  I need to figure out what things will be most important, or rather what are my priotrites.  This a little overwhelming to think about.

week 11 field 1

In the class room I found one piece of technology that I had not thought of using before a wireless microphone to enable the teacher to walk around while reading.  I thought that was brilliant and than I went to Social Studies Conference and the instructor suggested using audio books when you are trying to save your voice.  I have also been learning what the true attention span of a 10 year old is.  It is small for most of them and I also found out that most lessons only last 30 to 40 minutes if that. 
We will be teaching about the Explorers that discovered the different continents and such.  I found a lot of fun activites for them to do and learn about as they research an explorer.  I have also noticed that most of the kids are pretty good with computers. After they had finished with an online assessment they had free time and most of them went to image manipulation program.  I hope we can help them do a little more with the computers and maybe start them on photoshop and other adobe programs early to facilitate their fluency in sophisticated programs.
It is so important for them to be engaged in their learning.  I can see the potential that webquests would have and I can also see the potential in having them make posd casts and vid casts.  Until now I was thinking I would be making them to show to students, but I can see that getting boring for them and frustrating for me.  If  I can get the supplies to allow them to make them they will be much more engaged and excited about learning.  I am liking the idea of teaching 5th or 6th grade more and more especially if I could have it be integrated with all these subjects, like technology, art, and social studies.  There are so many things that can make school fun but they are all involving subjects not on their tests. 
The thing I have found the most frustrating is that when I am out talking to teachers they say that all that stuff you learn in school is too hard to use.  They have so much stress on preparing for the tests that anything unrelated is left behind.  I see the potential of integration within the other subjects but how do we learn how to do it practically.  Pracitice in field? Well yeah that helps a little. My wife is an intern right now and she is beside herself in knowing how to fit everything in and with the attention demands of such varried students it seems impossible to switch things around from the established regiment.  For alot of this stuf to happen it seems that you have to a school start anew with everyone ready able and willing to do all the integration.  It would be amazing to have the art teacher and technology teach plan lessons together with the core teachers and cooperated on how thing will be taught.  But as of right now they are too busy keeping up with their own schedules and core subjects that don't always match up.    Change is hard but we will do it.

Week 10 Digital Story 2

I am learning just how different how programs can be and how true the fidelity comments are that are made in class.  The program we used in class  photostory was so easy to use and figure out, but then it was also very limited.  I did a presentation for another class along with Johnathan and we used Windows Movie Maker I think it was also pretty easy to use, and had quite a few options of beefing up the presentation.  I have been fooling around with iMovie on my mac and good grief mac lost the user friendly trait on that one.  It is not nearly as hard as flash I took a class on that and still only know a little.  But that said both of those programs iMovie and Flash can do a lot of amazing stuff.

I have a lot to learn if I will be expected to know flash for art classes.  Hopefully I can learn iMovie well enough to put some dreams to reality I would also like to learn flash but well we'll see.  It seems as though we as teachers need to know about most any technology that comes out which is good and exciting but also a little overwhelming.  I guess back in the day they had to learn how to thread the super8 movie projectors and learn tricks about keeping a chalk board clean.  I almost wish that I had that easy, almost.

I feel that we are learning very important and relative information to our careers.   However, I also hope that we are going to be prepared for all the technical difficulties when things don't work as planned.   I also feel that some students will not always benefit from all the technology we as teachers need to be prepared for those students that struggle with technology and may benefit more from the dewey decimal system of research rather than a quick google search.

I was impressed with the statistics provided in the video and I see many of those stats becoming even more exaggerated  in my nephews as they get email accounts at the age of nine and less.  My nephews are interesting to me the youngest one is doing great in school and often does research of his own online and can whip through a lot of games and programs with no problem, but has some real social problems. The other nephew is pretty good socially but struggles with school.  He is good with technology not quite as good as his brother but still good.  Why I bring this up is because it illustrates my point that we need to know about all of the resources available for us to help our students and while technology will help us with many, many things it will not answer all the problems it still just to aide in teaching.

Week 9 Digital Story 1

I am very excited about the digital stories. This seems like a very powerful format.  It makes me think of movie previews which I guess these digital stories are basically lesson/unit previews.
I hate to think of all the hours that these could take, was one of my first thoughts once I understood what it was.  Now that I am planning it I am excited to do it and if I am excited about something it doesn't really matter how much time it will take.  As far as how this might effect me in the future it could mean that allot of lessons will start with a preview/ Digital Story and the kids will be like so what is this one rated my mom won't let me do PG lessons.
I do wonder if this could get out of hand.  Are the text book publishers going to be hiring movie production companies to make them for each unit and have those voice over actors make the caterpillar to butterfly process seem more like world coming to an end process.  Do we want to make everything super dramatic the kids might get bored when they see the real stuff happening.
I really enjoyed the Nasa Digital Story I had not heard of a lot of the astro-naughts and cosmo-naughts that they had mentioned but it was true all of those lives of very smart passionate people were sacrificed so we could have better flying golf balls and more efficient toothe-paste dispensers among many other things.

i feel a little lost

I am very pleased with everything I have learned so far in the education program.  I am excited to teach and very excited to make a difference in the lives of the youth that would be in my class rooms.  However, every time I look at an illustrated children's book or go to an art exhibit I get so excited about art and what it means to me.  I have always felt that I should be teaching art.  I got into the program wanting to build a secure foundation for my education career. Thus far it has deffinately done that I feel like I am learning exactly how to teach and I love it.
 I love learning the theories and methods of how to manage and understand a class room.  I love thinking about how I can take all kinds of subjects and integrate them together to make them more interesting for the students.  I especially like learning about how different children learn best.  I know for me I learn best visually and everything about the visual art is what makes me passionate about life. So thus I come to my conclusion question am I waisting energy that would be better spent on what I am truly passionate about.    

There are times that I feel like I have a unique veiw on life and compassion for those kids like me that would be valuable to the elementary core education world.  I feel that I have a good and wide knowledge of  all the subjects and am competent to teach them.  I also feel that I could teach in a way that would be reach alott of kids that normally get left in the cracks.  So how will I know where I will be the most effective and influential?