The bad news first - always. Who wants to leave the semester on a sour note? There just isn't enough time in one semester to sufficiently cover all the technology we could face in our careers as educators. It is also a sad fact that today, we don't find technology in every school and even when we do, it seems underutilized. I know that this is an evolving issue and that with time will come greater inclusion of existing and new technologies into the field of education at all levels.
The best part about the class was all the technology we were able to study. I hope that I'll have the opportunity to use a variety of the Web 2.0 tools and other cool tools we covered in class and those soon to be. I hope I'll be on the forefront of educators using technology in innovative ways as teaching and learning tools. I can't wait to use some of what I already know next fall during my student teaching semester!
Have a great summer!
Thursday, May 5, 2011
Thursday, April 28, 2011
Teaching Style Comparison
Movie Teacher Style Comparison
I chose to watch Stand and Deliver and To Sir, With Love in my comparison of the teaching styles of two movie teachers. Both movies portray teachers that work with underprivileged student populations. Stand and Deliver is based on the true story of East Los Angeles teacher, Jaime Escalante. To Sir, With Love stars Sidney Poitier as Mr. Thackeray, an engineer-turned-teacher working in a lower class London high school.
Although both Escalante and Thackeray both deal with underprivileged students who socially sit outside the mainstream of society’s concerns, I feel the similarities end there. Escalante comes to his student population as a part of their own culture. Thackeray is from British Guiana and comes to his class in London via the United States. Thackeray’s teaching style is very authoritarian. He tells his students in one class, “I teach you truths, my truths.” He throws his textbooks in the garbage can and decides that what will serve his students best is to learn about life, about how to be an adult. He teaches them about cooking, takes them to the museum, and talks to them about what it is to be a real man. I wondered what he’d say to the girls about being a real woman. In his classroom, his voice is the only one that is correct.
Escalante’s teaching style is much more egalitarian. Although he does hold himself up as an authority figure, his attitude toward his students is as a guide and mentor. He does just the opposite of Thackeray; he gets out the heavy-duty math books! He feels that for students to succeed in life they must know more than just how to live. Most of his students are already more mature and carry more responsibility that they should. What he feels they need from him is a chance to get an education and more than a dead-end job. Escalante does not hold himself up as the highest authority; he puts his subject matter and his teaching before his own authority. He’s a strong enough figure that in one scene, he chastises his students for getting the wrong answer when he, himself is the one who is wrong.
Of the two teachers, I think that Escalante’s teaching style is the better one. Of course, I say this because Thackeray’s experience is purely fictional and it would be unheard of in today’s society for a teacher of seniors in high school to throw out the books in order to teach students how to make a salad. Escalante’s style and dedication are an inspiration and show how a teacher’s attitude toward the importance of learning and education can positively affect his or her students.
I chose to watch Stand and Deliver and To Sir, With Love in my comparison of the teaching styles of two movie teachers. Both movies portray teachers that work with underprivileged student populations. Stand and Deliver is based on the true story of East Los Angeles teacher, Jaime Escalante. To Sir, With Love stars Sidney Poitier as Mr. Thackeray, an engineer-turned-teacher working in a lower class London high school.
Although both Escalante and Thackeray both deal with underprivileged students who socially sit outside the mainstream of society’s concerns, I feel the similarities end there. Escalante comes to his student population as a part of their own culture. Thackeray is from British Guiana and comes to his class in London via the United States. Thackeray’s teaching style is very authoritarian. He tells his students in one class, “I teach you truths, my truths.” He throws his textbooks in the garbage can and decides that what will serve his students best is to learn about life, about how to be an adult. He teaches them about cooking, takes them to the museum, and talks to them about what it is to be a real man. I wondered what he’d say to the girls about being a real woman. In his classroom, his voice is the only one that is correct.
Escalante’s teaching style is much more egalitarian. Although he does hold himself up as an authority figure, his attitude toward his students is as a guide and mentor. He does just the opposite of Thackeray; he gets out the heavy-duty math books! He feels that for students to succeed in life they must know more than just how to live. Most of his students are already more mature and carry more responsibility that they should. What he feels they need from him is a chance to get an education and more than a dead-end job. Escalante does not hold himself up as the highest authority; he puts his subject matter and his teaching before his own authority. He’s a strong enough figure that in one scene, he chastises his students for getting the wrong answer when he, himself is the one who is wrong.
Of the two teachers, I think that Escalante’s teaching style is the better one. Of course, I say this because Thackeray’s experience is purely fictional and it would be unheard of in today’s society for a teacher of seniors in high school to throw out the books in order to teach students how to make a salad. Escalante’s style and dedication are an inspiration and show how a teacher’s attitude toward the importance of learning and education can positively affect his or her students.
Does Technology Change the Way We Teach?
People nowadays think of technology as electronic, computerized and web-based - but it hasn't always been defined in this way. Once upon a time, pencils and pens were new technology. Now those things seem to have always been around. But just as the electronic age is changing the way we do things, all new technology forces change in the areas of lives of the people it touches.
Considering that technology changes the way we live, it has and will continue to change the way we teach. The bigger questions should involve how it will change the way we teach. There are so many different aspects of technology that teachers and students use on a regular basis. There are also aspects of technology that have yet to be incorporated into our daily pedagogical practices. I hope to be a part of a new way of teaching that incorporates technology and utilizes it to its fullest potential to provide the highest level of academic success for our students.
Considering that technology changes the way we live, it has and will continue to change the way we teach. The bigger questions should involve how it will change the way we teach. There are so many different aspects of technology that teachers and students use on a regular basis. There are also aspects of technology that have yet to be incorporated into our daily pedagogical practices. I hope to be a part of a new way of teaching that incorporates technology and utilizes it to its fullest potential to provide the highest level of academic success for our students.
Thursday, April 14, 2011
Web 2.0 Tools
There are so many cool web 2.0 tools out there. It was hard to pick just one that I wanted to take a better look at, but in the end, I worried that the tool became more important than the lesson - or that it lacked the sufficient rigor needed for high school classes. Early on, when our class looked at web 2.0, we covered the big names, Twitter, YouTube, etc. It was then that I thought of a lesson using YouTube. I liked that the tool itself is only the vehicle and that its use is something that is hip and cool for today's students. My lesson focuses on using a text, more specifically one that is meant to be presented dramatically - a play or poem - Shakespeare immediately comes to mind. As a student, I found it difficult to get into just reading Shakespeare's works. It simply wasn't enough to get a strong hold of the material. My idea is to have students, alone or in groups, work to bring to life a scene, character or a plot summary of a Shakespearean work in video and post it to YouTube. I even tried it out myself and enlisted the help of my children and a few of their friends to create a very brief overview of Romeo and Juliet.
Originally I thought that I could use a lesson like this with the reading comprehension strategies GLI but as I went through the exercise myself, I found that issues of comprehension were in the background and I was more concerned with characterization and presentation. There was another GLI regarding those goals that made better sense, and this lesson gives the coverage of this material more life than simply reading it.
For those of you who think, "I'll never get permission to use YouTube with my students," there is a viable alternative - TeacherTube. It may be less popular and lesser known that YouTube, but it is very similar web 2.0 tool dedicated strictly to videos that have some kind of academic pursuit and it would easily calm the worst YouTube critics.
Here's a link to the video I made for this project. Enjoy!
Romeo & Juliet - Slightly Abridged
Originally I thought that I could use a lesson like this with the reading comprehension strategies GLI but as I went through the exercise myself, I found that issues of comprehension were in the background and I was more concerned with characterization and presentation. There was another GLI regarding those goals that made better sense, and this lesson gives the coverage of this material more life than simply reading it.
For those of you who think, "I'll never get permission to use YouTube with my students," there is a viable alternative - TeacherTube. It may be less popular and lesser known that YouTube, but it is very similar web 2.0 tool dedicated strictly to videos that have some kind of academic pursuit and it would easily calm the worst YouTube critics.
Here's a link to the video I made for this project. Enjoy!
Romeo & Juliet - Slightly Abridged
Thursday, April 7, 2011
The Value in Learning from Fiction
Of course there is value in learning from fiction! How else can one visit unreachable places, experience the events of the distant and not-too-distant past, get to know a variety of personalities, all while learning about the universal themes of humanity?
Fiction provides a window into a larger world - one that we might never experience without the aid of a good book. Dipping into this larger world allow us to walk in the shoes of a million different characters and gives us a larger perspective about ourselves, our lives, the people we know, and the world outside our own personal experience.
I can't imagine a world without fiction. Human beings used it since before anyone can remember so that we can convey to each other how to live our lives, respond to our environment and deal with the knowable and the unknown.
Fiction provides a window into a larger world - one that we might never experience without the aid of a good book. Dipping into this larger world allow us to walk in the shoes of a million different characters and gives us a larger perspective about ourselves, our lives, the people we know, and the world outside our own personal experience.
I can't imagine a world without fiction. Human beings used it since before anyone can remember so that we can convey to each other how to live our lives, respond to our environment and deal with the knowable and the unknown.
Thursday, March 31, 2011
Video Critique
Watching oneself on video can be excruciating. For me, personally, I don’t feel as if the image on the screen is the real me. The person I go through the day with sounds much different and, of course, I don’t have to watch myself move around, walk, talk, and interact. Seeing myself on screen was an interesting exercise.
Overall, in watching my video clip, I liked that my voice was modulated and not too fast. It had a good pacing and was easy to follow, allowing for time in between important concepts for emphasis. I did not, to my relief, use a lot of ‘ums’ or ‘ahs’ or likewise pausing-for-the-next-thought phrasing. I was to the point and precise most of the time. I also felt that I was adequately able to convey the point of the subject matter I was discussing and able to use the accompanying video to illustrate my points properly and with good timing.
Those positive impressions aside, there were some things I did not like about watching myself in front of a classroom of people. The camera’s distance to me was considerable enough so that I could not see my facial expressions, but my overall body language was a bit dull. I did not move around a whole lot except to start and stop the video or use the appropriate technology. While I gave my lesson, I stood very close to the podium and didn’t move around because I was afraid to get in the way of the projection of the video I was playing behind me. I did use my hands a bit but my movements were small and did not attract much attention. I’m not sure if this is a good thing or not considering that my purpose was that my audience would watch the video while I spoke and not watch me wave my hands around to jump about the room. Nonetheless, I felt I could have been more animated; I seemed stiff and uncomfortable due to my lack of movement.
Among the footage I edited out of my video, I found myself looking at my notes too often and seeming to read directly from them. I much more enjoy presentations in which the presenter speaks off the cuff. In most cases, it conveys that they know the material well enough not to have to have their notes directly in front of them. So I felt that it was necessary to edit out the portions of the video in which I spoke while I looked at my printed notes.
From a technological standpoint, I love the way the video turned out. I was able to cut out the portions of the video that I found to be less than desirable. And, I was able to add a portion of the “Amazing Optical Illusions” video I found on YouTube.com directly over my video so that it was clearly displayed while I continued to speak in the background. As a finishing touch I added a title to the beginning of the video to introduce the subject matter of my presentation. The end result seems very professional to me and I’m happy with the way it looks.
Overall, in watching my video clip, I liked that my voice was modulated and not too fast. It had a good pacing and was easy to follow, allowing for time in between important concepts for emphasis. I did not, to my relief, use a lot of ‘ums’ or ‘ahs’ or likewise pausing-for-the-next-thought phrasing. I was to the point and precise most of the time. I also felt that I was adequately able to convey the point of the subject matter I was discussing and able to use the accompanying video to illustrate my points properly and with good timing.
Those positive impressions aside, there were some things I did not like about watching myself in front of a classroom of people. The camera’s distance to me was considerable enough so that I could not see my facial expressions, but my overall body language was a bit dull. I did not move around a whole lot except to start and stop the video or use the appropriate technology. While I gave my lesson, I stood very close to the podium and didn’t move around because I was afraid to get in the way of the projection of the video I was playing behind me. I did use my hands a bit but my movements were small and did not attract much attention. I’m not sure if this is a good thing or not considering that my purpose was that my audience would watch the video while I spoke and not watch me wave my hands around to jump about the room. Nonetheless, I felt I could have been more animated; I seemed stiff and uncomfortable due to my lack of movement.
Among the footage I edited out of my video, I found myself looking at my notes too often and seeming to read directly from them. I much more enjoy presentations in which the presenter speaks off the cuff. In most cases, it conveys that they know the material well enough not to have to have their notes directly in front of them. So I felt that it was necessary to edit out the portions of the video in which I spoke while I looked at my printed notes.
From a technological standpoint, I love the way the video turned out. I was able to cut out the portions of the video that I found to be less than desirable. And, I was able to add a portion of the “Amazing Optical Illusions” video I found on YouTube.com directly over my video so that it was clearly displayed while I continued to speak in the background. As a finishing touch I added a title to the beginning of the video to introduce the subject matter of my presentation. The end result seems very professional to me and I’m happy with the way it looks.
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Critiquing Yourself
It's such a meta type of activity - critiquing oneself. Initially, I approached this with hesitation, hating the sound of my voice and seeing myself move around on video. In my mind's eye, I don't look or sound like that at all. To edit my video, I had to separate my feelings about seeing and hearing myself from my editing goals. In the end, I pared it down pretty effectively and found myself feeling alright about the final product. I hope it never becomes a common practice to have teachers watch video of themselves teaching for means of critiquing their skills.
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