Evolving Classroom Education: Where is K-12 Technology Headed?

This article discusses the use of higher technology in schools and how important it is for teachers to realize the good in this change. BYOD is shorter term for Bring Your Own Device, and this is being implemented in schools everyday. Whereas teachers used to tell students to hide their phones or tablets, they are now being told to bring them to class. Schools are also using the NUI program (Natural User Interfaces) and this is a program that is targeting the physical/social aspect of children. For instance, devices like the Wii. PLE's will also be a key component to this technology change going on in schools. PLE is another term for personal learning environment and basically is a way for the student to go at their own pace and learning ability. I somewhat disagree with the article in the sense that they say that new teachers don't understand this technology movement. They claim it is working but really I think that students are just getting to "play" in class with a terrible excuse. They are doing TOO much technology. Now I could understand how the BYOD could be affective maybe once every few weeks or something but I don't think it should be an everyday thing. I think that schools are trying to be more lazy and make everything so robotic instead of pulling out their own creativity and making it work.

Voki project

Cyber Bullying

Cyber Bullying is a problem that goes unheard of most of the time. It is swept under the rug. It's just "kids being kids" on the computer. But what we don't know is that it can cause depression, serious social anxiety and even suicide. I personally have never been cyber bullied but I have been bullied in person so I cannot imagine what hurtful things could be done over the internet, after all, people are more confident behind a computer screen. With all of the new technology I can imagine that cyber bullying could be getting more common. This is a serious matter that needs to be brought to the table more often. I once watched a Lifetime movie called Cyberbully and it was literally life changing. This girl was super popular until one day her little website that was popular at the time got hacked and the person was posting things that were completely false about her. Long story short, she finds out it was her "best friend". Most of the time it is a close friend. I think a good way to stop it would be to inform students, mainly girls, that girls are mean and they don't always have your back. Its not always the case but I think friendship should be preached to these students and I think they should also stay away from bad websites. I think that the web is the most dangerous place a young student could be. Parents should keep track of it more, especially with technology growing the way it is. I think cyberbullying should be just as important as some of the other things they teach in school these days. And I think it is time that we recognize it.

21st Century Skills: Why They Matter, What They Are,and How We Get There

Ken Kay writes an article about how modern skills (21st century skills) would benefit students today and why it is important to have this kind of stuff taught in schools. He says that in the past skills like finances, business aspects and global awareness have not been very necessary because the society has not been moving that fast. Now that it is, writer Malcolm Gladwell says that it is important to teach students these type of skills. He says that their has been research and lots of thought into what will be taught and hopes that people will catch on and start implementing this in classrooms. Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) was a test that showed most Americans score lower on skills like these because they involve world knowledge and critical thinking to be successful. He says there are 3 reasons that these skills should be necessary for 21st century knowledge. Number one, the skills are rarely taught in schools and since they aren't made a big deal, they don't "matter" to people. Second, it is critical for all students in today's world to achieve this knowledge. And last, employers are specifically looking for these skills in order to succeed in the workforce. He says we need to be more organized with our teaching and more competitive. 

I think that this article is important for many reasons. One of those reasons if when I was in school, I always wanted to know how to survive in the real world but instead I was being taught geometry when I wasn't even going into a field that dealt with high math skills. I was being taught literature (which was important) but not necessarily. I needed to know how to be writing papers for college and other stuff. This article seemed to be nothing like the common core. This is something that is very well researched and thought out. The students are not the bait in this process. These educators will see how students react and work with this kind of change and work around that. Whereas the common core, I feel like, is using the students as bait to figure out if it will work or not. I think implementing 21st century skills into education could only help students in the long run. 

Why Tough Teachers Get Good Results

For class we had to read the article "Why Tough Teachers Get Good Results". This article talks about a teacher, Jerry Kupchynsky, who would be fired today for teaching the way he used to. But it says the students loved him. It says that being strict and mean are two different things. Statistics show that a little constructive criticism only helps children. It also says this is why other country's test scores are higher than us, because we are too easy on the kids. Another thing it mentions is that failure is good sometimes. Sometimes it can help the students realize that failure is supposed to occur in order to succeed and it will make them want to succeed the next go round. 

 This has been by far my favorite article. I have been wanting to know statistics on this type of research for sometime but I never got around to looking them up.  I loved this because I had a coach in high school that I was terrified of but I loved going to practice for some reason. He yelled at us, drilled us until we couldn't do anymore conditioning, and made us practice until perfection. But that was just it. Perfection. It was there. Everytime we competed for 2 years straight we won first or second place in our competitions and I was one of the best cheerleaders on the team because of that strict coach. I agree with this teaching style. Now I just need to find a way to approach it without being considered mean and disliked.