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. 

Do Not Track Me Plus

When I went to the website at first I did not understand how it worked but once I figured it out I started to surf the web. The first site I went to was Facebook and only one person was tracking me. The website that was tracking me was named "doubleclick". Well that was a very smart name for a website and I did exactly that, I double clicked it and it allowed the website to follow me. I noticed and blocked them again. Next, I went to Pinterest and I looked up Tri Delta, and I immediately had 2 followers. These were weird names that weren't any interest to me, so I just ignored them. I went to blogger.com next and I am all clear of trackers on this website! This is a very cool thing to have on your computer. I think I might keep it on here, although it is kind of creepy that people "track" me. I researched more on it and it is very weird, yet strategic, how they pull you in. They will use the ads that interest you or target your exact interests for you to click on them. After that they will blow you up with information about their website and try to get you to buy from it. These website owners are very creative and strategic about how they do things. This program is very interesting and I hope to look more into it.

Inspiration Comments

Erika- Erikas use of pictures were really good and her blog was well designed.
Some of the activities were not as good as some others that she has.

Jacqueline- I think that her ideas were really good along with her standard. The way she incorporated a dress up day was really unique.
I think that her actual concept map could have been more mature looking, although purple is just a childish color.

Jennifer- I really like the theme, biomes were my favorite part of elementary science.
Powerpoint might be too difficult for this age, but not if it was done in class.

Amanda- I thought the Who Wants to be a Millionare activity was very creative and i think students would enjoy it alot.
I don't think that the song was the best choice for this activity, it sort of threw me off.

Jordan- I like how Jordan incorporated different types of a presentation. I like how she used posters, powerpoints, and other types of activities they could do.
I dont think having the students bring materials for the assignment would work. But it is a very fun idea.

Jonathon-Jonathon was very creative for being a boy. His concept map didnt even look like a school project, it looked really fun.
I dont think a quiz is a very fun first activity though.

CONCEPT MAP- Corduroy

Corduroy

Students will write an opinion on a story they read/listen to and they will include a beginning middle and end. They will also have to have a concluding statement to sum up everything that they wrote.

STANDARD: Write opinion pieces in which they introduce the topic or book they are writing about, state an opinion, supply reasons that support the opinion, use linking words (e.g., because, and, also) to connect opinion and reasons, and provide a concluding statement or section.

              STORY TIME!

I will introduce the story to the students by showing them a teddy bear with buttons,talk about their special "friends" they have at home and then show them the book. I will read it aloud to them and have them raise their hands and answer questions about the beginning, middle and end.

A. Have students come to carpet time and talk about the characters and introduce the story.

B. They will participate in active listening as I ask them questions throughout the story and at the end.

   MOVIE TIME!

The students will open the link on their screen and watch the story corduroy with headphones on in groups of three or four.

A. Students will get in groups of three or four and they will watch the story on the computer.

B. After finishing the movie, students will answer 5 short questions and write a summary on their favorite part.

  Super Why Comic Book Adventure

Students will help Super Why stop the evil eraser from erasing words out of the book and they can make the story go in order from beginning to end.

A.    The students will play this game on the computer to work on their comprehension skills.

B.    They will actively work with the character Super Why to help find missing pieces of the story and add them back in.

  Find that button!

Children will take home the bear that they cut out and put together in class and find him some buttons just like the bear did in the story.

A.    Students will have mixed pieces of a bear, cut them out and pin them together.

1.    They will have help making sure the arms and legs are pinned in the right spot so the bears arms and legs can move.

B.    They will take the bear that they glued home and find him buttons for homework..

1.    The students will find objects at home, for example, fruit loops, pennies, ect.

    Eyesight Challenge

When finished with all of their activities, they will play this game and look for the items in the picture, just like Corduroy went through the department store looking for his button.

A.    Students will go to the website and play the game to find the hidden objects.

B.    Each time the level will bump up and they will have less time to find the items.

The pedagogy wheel would be extremely helpful as a teacher because it gives examples of websites or programs on the computer that you can use for different activities for your classroom. I would use this wheel often when trying to figure out how I could use technology with some of my lessons. It makes it easy by just looking at what activity your trying to accomplish and then looking at the links or websites it gives to go by.

Bloom's Digital Taxonomy is a list of key terms that can be transformed into verbs that have technology to do with them. For instance, creating is the first key term and I could look at that word and know I want my students to create something but how could I have them do that just by thinking of that word? I could look at this outline and see that blogging is one of the ways my students could create something for a project. Many people have trouble thinking of different ways you can incorporate technology in your teaching skills and this Taxonomy would help people incorporate it with their lesson plans.