CHIP: Chapter 1
This chapter makes me excited to be a teacher in this day and age. From the discussion in class today and the reading from today's chapter, one of the things that I wonder about is Web 4.0. Dr. Krug described it as something of a predictive nature based on analysis of data for students. I know that it is not yet completely out there, but how beneficial it would to be put out there for the students and teachers. I wonder if it was specifically designed for students and educational uses or if it is something that was designed with something else in mind and has just evolved with the educational community in mind. As more concerning the chapter, several things came to mind. I think about the different blogs that I have read over the past couple of years. One of the points is made that "Bloggers often have an effect on their readers". I first think about a movie that was made around a food blog that was created. The readers responded to what the lady had to say. In a growing technology educational community, what a great opportunity for our students to be able to have an effect on the world that they live in at the time. The big push now is to teach the test, but I hope that we don't loose the fact that our students have the potential to impact the world around them. This would extend outside the four walls of our classroom. Blogs would afford them the opportunity to have that impact while still meeting educational objectives. Of course the issue of digital citizenship would have to be observed, and so perhaps a blog could be set up as a classroom. What a great opportunity to have the students share their ideas and have other people respond to their ideas.
Another topic that was brought to my attention in the reading. The issue of Digital-age literacy. When we are working in the schools, we may be confronted with parents or grandparents that do not know how to effectively use the the technology that we might use in our classrooms. Our students will probably know a lot more than we might think by the time that we become their teachers, however we must not overlook the issue of educating their caregivers as well. This would foster a learning community with the parents, students and school, which is an invaluable resource for the educational process. This could be accomplished through workshops or parent/student internet scavenger hunts throughout the school year. Hopefully through this class I will be able to gain more tools that can be used to increase educational experiences through the use of technology.
The final component that caught my attention in the reading was the idea of problem-based learning. I am not very educated on this concept, however I look forward to using it in my classroom. In my opinion this very concept is the bridge that needs to be used from the classroom into real world application. I want my future students to be able to think for themselves and not simply "plug and chug" information that is given to them. I believe that PBL reaches these objectives. I think that these objectives can be met through science instruction but also in math instruction and in other content areas.
The blog that I reviewed was Practical Theory. I like this blog because it offers many different links to other sites that this education technology guru has found helpful. I like how he uses Delicious for his bookmarks and offers current news stories on the right panel. These features will be helpful to learn how to do when I am setting up my classroom blog in order to maximize the students' exposure to helpful, relevant and safe resources. I also appreciate that this blogger is someone who is in the field, with his involvement with his school. That gives me as a future educator that opportunity to connect with relevant and helpful information that will benefit my students.
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