What Matters final presentation

PLN 13-2 (26)

While skimming through the Denver Post, I noticed an article called Dog on death row unleashes a protest by Cassie Hewlings, which talks about how a dog that is one lady's best friend is sentenced to death after he bit another women.

"Rolo had no history of violence, but he got out of Hagan's house unleashed and
bit a neighbor who was walking with her child, Hagan said."

I believe that this is outrageous and Rolo (the dog) should be left alone. All he did was bit a neighbor and it was the first and only time he ever did something like that. He is normally a really well trained dog. Most dogs bit at least one person. They are just playing. My friend has a dog who is the sweetest dog ever, but will bit when she is excited because that's what dogs do. Rolo was probably just excited to be outside and wanted to play. In my school, tons of people have dogs and they all will bit once in a while because they are playing. I feel like this dog should not be killed for some minor incident that only happened once.

PLN 13-1 (25)

While skimming through some interesting posts, one shocking post caught my eye titled Why are kids failing? by Mrs. Davis which talks about how out of 49 9th graders, 21 have low D's and F's. This is extremely shocking to me!! Mrs. Davis talks about how she tries to provide opportunities for her students to achieve higher grades, but students just don't care. By talking to the gifted/talented at risk teacher, she figured out that out of 500 9th graders, 110 of them are failing at least one of their classes, if not 3 or 4. This is astonishing! I don't understand how students can not care about their grades and not even try. Students today are just lazy. We are exposed to many new technologies that can be a huge distraction. Students don't have to debate for long which they would rather do, homework or watching tv. They would choose watching tv, which will never get them anywhere in life. Even though homework can sometimes seem like a pain, you would never be able to understand any concept without practicing it, and homework is just practice on the concepts you had just recently learned. You learn not for school, but for life. If you choose not to learn, then you will not be successful in life. The only way to obtain a successful life is through knowledge which students would obtain from school, if they actually cared. Students are capable of doing the work but are just lazy. In one of my classes, about half the class is failing and I don't understand why. The only way you could fail that class is to not do any work. Around the world, students are failing in their classes because they don't feel like doing their work. I'm sure that some teachers feel like they are waisting their time because they are not able to help those students who don't care. They have to be willing to learn first, before the teacher is able to help, which many are not willing. This saddens me to think of how little people think of education. The United States is way behind many other countries on education which is not good. We are the future generation that will be making the important decisions regarding our country and if we are not able to pass a class because of laziness, what will happen to our country?

PLN 12-2 (24)

While skimming through the posts on the Denver Post blogs, one caught my eye called Bomb scare debunked at Conifer school by Kirk Mitchell that talks about how a 14 year old boy was talking to a middle school student about how he was carrying a bomb in a case he was carrying, but none was found.

"he student allegedly told a middle school student on a bus this morning that
the case he was carrying had a bomb inside, Shires said."

This is an important issue that schools all over have to deal with, especially lately. There have been many attacks at schools with weapons over the past couple of years. An example that happened in Colorado was the Columbine attack, where two students came into Columbine High School with guns and shot several students and teachers. There have been several suspected bomb threats in high schools around my district. In my school, we are, like many others, trying to have the safest environment possible for students and making sure every necessary action is taken into place when threats like these are made. Around the world, people have to be careful where ever they are, school, work, or even the airport. These people that normally start the crisis need help and action should be taken to prevent them from getting out of control. Luckily in this case, there was no bomb in the case, only a camera, but if there had been, the whole school would be in danger.

PLN 12-1 (23)

I have recently read an article called Fight Hunger While Learning Vocab by Karl Fisch that talks about how there is a website on the Internet that asks you vocabulary questions that are your level and for every question you get right, 20 grains of rice is donated to the United Nations World Food Program. "

FreeRice automatically adjusts to your level of vocabulary. It starts by giving
you words at different levels of difficulty and then, based on how you do,
assigns you an approximate starting level. You then determine a more exact level
for yourself as you play. When you get a word wrong, you go to an easier level.
When you get three words in a row right, you go to a harder level. This
one-to-three ratio is best for keeping you at the “outer fringe” of your
vocabulary, where learning can take place.There are 50 levels in all, but it is
rare for people to get above level 48."

This program helps with two important issues. It helps give food to the starving people of the world and it helps improve our vocabulary. There are starving people all over the world and they need food. We have to help them because there are two different worlds on earth. There is our world that is full of opportunity and we are very lucky to live such a clean and successful environment and one that lacks the advances our world has made and is home to the poor. They have hardly any money and are starving to death. We need to help this other world and this is a step closer to helping. Because of the rice given, people will be able to eat and not spend all their money on just food for their family, but other necessities like a place to live. Also, many people around the world need to improve their vocabulary and this will help. In my school, many people including me need to expand our vocabulary. This website is beneficial in so many ways and is one step closer to ending world hunger.

PLN 11-2 (22)

An interesting post that caught my eye is called Pocket Texting and Open Phone Tests by Will Richardson which reveals a story of a 14-year old boy who uses his available technology to help him get answers for school like his cell phone and his computer. The 14 year old boys name is Insoo and he is able to send texts without taking his phone out of his pocket. “

Insoo doesn’t even have to take the phone out of his pocket to send an SMS. He
knows how to slide it open, which buttons to push how many times to reach the
“Send SMS” menu option, compose the entire text message, and hit the send button
— all without even looking at the phone. This is especially handy when he needs
to send an SMS during class.”

Also, there is a website on the internet called Naver Knowledge iN which is a popular online Q&A service with some 70 million entries. All you have to do is post a question you have on the website and in a couple minutes, someone will post a legitimate answer. In this article, Will Richardson asks a highly debated question that asks, is it cheating when students use the technology around them to help answer a test question? Will Richardson makes a good point when he says we should teach them how to make good use of those resources instead of pretending they don’t exist, but I feel like it is cheating. Using these resources is very helpful while studying for a test, but actually using them during the test is considered to me cheating. I believe we should be taught how to use these resources and acknowledge there existence, but I believe we should do that while studying, not during the actual test because if the technology is being used during the test, the only knowledge being demonstrated by that student is their knowledge of the technology, not the actual test material. In my school, the majority of the students own a cell phone and/or computer which they are able to access easily. Useful information can be passed or searched through these devices. During tests, some students do send text messages to find the answer to a certain question which I believe is horribly wrong. Many students know this and I’ve never witnessed it before, but I’ve heard of instances like this occurring. Students around the world have access to this technology as well and hopefully are using it wisely. I believe these technologies should be used for the purpose of learning the material, not just copying the answer because you will never fully understand those concepts by just copying them down.

PLN 11-1 (21)

While skimming through some interesting posts, I came across a post titled Maine's 1:1 laptop raises writing performance by Dan Maas which talks about how studies are showing that students that have access to laptops in everyday classes, perform better in writing by writing more and better. I believe that using laptops is very beneficial for writing skills. In my English class, I have access to a laptop everyday. Because of this, my vocabulary and grammar skills have improved drastically because while I am writing, I am able to look up synonyms to common words and enhance my vocabulary and also on word, you are able to spell check what you have written and learn from your mistake. I believe that many of my classmates fell the same way and have also improved. Having access to a laptop everyday also increases our knowledge of facts that even out teacher might not know. There is an infinite amount of information available to us with a click of a button on the Internet. We are able to expand our knowledge even beyond our teachers. People around the world are able to communicate with each other and learn from each others ideas by using programs like blogger and leaving comments on posts about how they feel about the blogger's ideas. Since our world is becoming more dependent on technology everyday, I feel that it is important for my generation to have access to as much information as they can by using this technology.

PLN 10-2 (20)

While skimming through some interesting posts, one caught my eye that was posted by Dave Warlick titled How Much does this Really Matter? which talks about how many people in the United States don't understand science but how many people believe in pseudoscience (pseudoscience is a theory, methodology, or practice that is considered to be without scientific foundation).

According to the National Science Foundation (NSF, www.nsf.gov/statistics), the average U.S. citizen
understands very little science. For example:
66% do not understand
DNA, “margin of error,” the scientific process, and do not believe in
evolution.
50% do not know how long it takes the earth to go
around the sun, and a quarter does not even know that the earth goes around the
sun.
50% think humans coexisted with dinosaurs and believe antibiotics kill
viruses.

On the other hand, according to the NSF, the general public
believes in a lot of pseudoscience.
88% believe in alternative
medicine.
50% believe in extrasensory perception and faith healing.
40% believe in haunted houses and demonic possession.
33% believes
in lucky numbers, ghosts, telepathy, clairvoyance, astrology, and that UFOs are
aliens from space.
25% believes in witches and that we can communicate with
the dead. *

He asks a question at the end that states "Should we be concerned?" I believe we should be concerned because maybe being able to obtain this knowledge isn't a necessity in someones work, but this shows how little education was given to them or how little knowledge matters to them. The only way we will be able to understand our world is by having the knowledge to understand what we already know or think we know. Many things we believe in like ghosts and witches comes from our religion. We might never know if this is true, but to be able to back up your thought, you need to be able to support it with some kind of evidence and knowledge that we already know. In schools like mine, we are taught many subjects not only to figure out what we want to do in our life but also to be able to use some of this knowledge that we accumulated sometimes in our lives. Around the world, people are using the knowledge we know to help improve our lives. You never know when this useful knowledge is going to be needed. Knowledge is power! You can't improve our world without knowing the many important facts science provides for us.

PLN 10-1 (19)

I recently read a post by Katy Human and Jeremy P. Meyer titled Do schools have birth-control role? which discusses the reasons for high schools and middle schools giving their students birth-control pills.

"Of every 1,000 girls ages 15-17 in the city, 54.5 will become pregnant,
compared with 24.3 throughout Colorado, according to the campaign. The
recommendation comes from a task force created to help define the future of 12
school-based health clinics, six in high schools and six in middle schools."

In my school, I know that many students are sexually active which I personally believe is not right, but there is no way of really stopping them if they want to do it. I believe that they should had out birth control because, in Colorado, teen pregnancy is one of the largest reasons for girls dropping out of high school, but I believe middle school is way to early for kids to even be thinking about that! Around the world, many teens are sexually active which shouldn't be the case. Maybe giving the birth control pills at high schools will cause more people to start becoming sexually active, but that could possibly be better then teens getting pregnant and not only they are in trouble, but their kid is also in trouble. Since we are so young, the men usually run away and the girl is left to raise a baby by herself which almost forces her to drop out of high school. But teens should also understand that just because you use birth control, it's not 100% effective. You are still able to become pregnant while using birth control pills. The best solution would be for teens not to be sexually active, but since this is a huge goal that is almost impossible to achieve, handing out birth control pills might help prevent many high school girls from dropping out and will help keep less unwanted kids from being born because they have to suffer their whole life because of it.

PLN 9-2 (18)

While skimming through some interesting posts, one caught my eye called Brazil: 5 years old boy dressed as Spiderman saves baby posted by Paula Goes which talks about how a 5 year old boy saved a little one year old girl from a fire dressed as spiderman in Santa Catarina, Brazil.

“5-year old boy named Riquelme (named after an Argentine soccer player), rescued
a one-year old girl from a terrible fire in a neighboring home, while clothed in
a Spiderman outfit. When he saw the fire growing, he yelled, “I'M SPIDERMAN!”
and ran into the house and saved the girl."

This is an amazing story! A little boy was influenced by spiderman how he saves the world and saw that someone was in trouble and saved their live. It was a miracle that he didn't get hurt though but this shows how much superheros can affect children. Around the world, their are famous superheros that fascinate children who want to become a hero themselves. Personally, I've always admired cat women because she was one of the only superhero women and I adored cats. I thought it would be amazing to be her and save peoples lives and get rid of all the bad guys. The truth is, everyone can be a hero if they want to. You don't have to have a mask and cape or have a cool name and capture all the bad guys, you simply just can help around and be a great example to everyone by doing the right thing and who knows, maybe someone will be inspired by you and save someones live or become a better person.

PLN 9-1 (17)

While perusing through many interesting posts, one caught my eye which was titled Why Wireless? posted by Karl Fisch that discusses why specifically at Arapahoe High School they are allowing students to bring personally owned devises that will be able to connect to the internet like a laptop. I believe that this is a good idea because technology is becoming a big part of most peoples life's and it is important that we know how to use it. The school can not afford laptops for everyone so you need to bring your personal one. There are many uses for having access to the internet for students. Personally, I'm a student at Arapahoe High School and I use the internet constantly. My teachers assign assignments that you need to access from their website and also our grades are online. People worry that this could be a big distraction for students, but this is prepairing us for the real world. There will be tons of distractions is the real world that no one will try to stop us from being distracted by them. The internet is used daily in most jobs and it is necessary that we learn how to use it and be able to work with it. So much can be accessed from the internet and so much information can be saved.

"Our students must know what to do when they don’t know what to do. They will
need to know how to learn how to learn."

The internet also allows us to communicate our thoughts and ideas with not only the students in the classroom, but from all around the world. We are one world and we have to break away from our isolation and share our ideas with the world not just our teachers and classmates. Also, we are able to see others views on matters, not just our classmates or our teachers because there are different sides to everything.

We are moving from:“do your own work” to “work with others”“just in case” to
“just in time” learning“hand it in” to “publish it.”- Will Richardson

PLN 8-2 (16)

While skimming through the blog 2 Cents Worth, I came upon a post titled Parents & Internet-Using Teens which was by David Warlick which talks about how parents are more concerned about what their teens are doing on the computer.

"Parents today are less likely to say that the Internet has been a good thing
for their children than they were in 2004. However, this does not mean there was
a corresponding increase in the amount of parents who think the Internet has
been harmful to their children. Instead, the biggest increase has been in the
amount of parents who do not think the Internet has had an effect on their
children one way or the other. Fully, 87% of parents of teenagers are online —
at least 17% more than average adults."

I believe that the Internet offers helpful information and useless information to everyone and it just depends on what you are doing. Parents have become very aware of what their teens are doing online because of all the bad things they hear about in the news that relates to teens interactions with others online. This can be a very bad thing because you never know who you are really talking to and if they are telling you the truth, but if you know who the people are and you know they are safe to talk to, it is fine to talk to them online. This blogger account is an example of interactions between people. This is a very good idea to share your views with other people and have them comment on them. You are able to let people who are interested in your views hear what you have to say. I have people posting on my blog that I know are safe and it is really interesting to hear what they have to say about my beliefs. Their are people all around the world sharing their ideas with others which helps make our world feel more connected to each other.

Presentation Evalutaion 2

Over all my presentation was ok. I was nervious so my voice stumbled a lot so I need to work on being more calm while presenting. Also, I touched my face a lot so I need to remember not to do that anymore while presenting. Finally, I didn't keep as much eye contact as I did in my first presentation so I have to remember to try and memorize what I am going to say better. Over all though, it was not horrible, but I could have done better.

PLN 8-1 (15)

I have recently read a post by Dave Warlick titled A Conversation about Failure which talks about the hardships of people (especially students) with disabilities and centers around a guy named Henry Winkler who suffers from dyslexia. Dyslexia is a learning disability where people's brains process written or verbal language differently. Through out this post, Henry Winkler was quoted on talking about his life as a student with dyslexia which was a while ago. He talked about how people who might be extremely gifted with knowledge, would be classified as "slow" in the classroom because they are not able to read as well as others.

"Yet, when a person has difficulty reading, regardless of other exceptional
skills, they seem to be labeled, automatically, in traditional classrooms, as
slow."

I believe that no one should be classified as slow or anything related to it. People are all different so we all learn differently. If you are classified as "slow" then some people start to question if they are good enough and start feeling like they are doing something wrong. This has resulted in many high school drop-outs which is horrendous! It is the worst feeling in the world to feel like you aren't good enough. Many drop outs feel this way and to help prevent this from happening, schools have to stop classifying people in terms of their learning abilities. Kids who learn at a faster rate should be in a more rigorous class so they don't get bored but no one should be classified as better. One program that only certain people are able to attend is called GT or gifted and talented. If you are not in this program, you start to question if you are gifted or talented which everyone is. Every one around the world is gifted and talented in their own way and classifying people with names like "slow" or "gifted and talented" give the wrong message to people who are either in a certain classification (like "slow") or are not in one (like gifted and talented).

PLN 7-2 (14)

I recently read a post by Mr. Craig titled Allowing Re-Takes To Improve Student Learning that talks about how if a student gets below an 80% on a critical thinking responses on a test in biology, then retakes are available to them to score as a high as an 80%. I believe that this is a good idea because he only allows people to retake the test if they attend a study session where they are not allowed to leave until they fully understand the concept. I am currently taking biology and to be able to do well on the critical thinking response, you need to fully understand the material. I am lucky that my parents are scientists and are able to help me, but not many kids have that so many go into the test not fully understanding the material. The purpose of going to school is learning and some students have a difficult time understanding concepts so they need some extra help. We don't go to school to get good grades, we go to school to learn. If you understand everything, your grade will reflect that, but if you don't understand everything, your grade will also reflect that and it is necessary to be able to understand the material because later on in life, it will be good to know. Knowledge is power!

PLN 7-1 (13)

I have recently read and interesting article posted by Julie Poppen titled Dog who nearly starved to death scampers to recovery which discusses a tragic but also miraculous story about a dog (Neeko) who was abandoned by his owner and almost starved to death nine weeks ago. Neeko was found near an abandoned home with another dog who sadly had already passed away. Neeko weighed only 30 pounds and lived only because he ate parts of the dead dog that was with him. His owner, Kristy Knecht, will appear in court on Wednesday and is charged with cruelty towards animals. Fortunately for Neeko, he was found just in time and brought to the Alameda East Veterinary Hospital by an Aurora animal care officer. Once Neeko arrived, the journey back towards health was sluggish. In a period of nine weeks, he astonishingly gained sixteen pounds after being feed a carefully planned diet to prevent him from eating too much or gaining bad weight (like fatty weight). Nine weeks after Neeko was found on the brink of death due to starvation, the feisty Belgian Malinois jumped for a tennis ball and attempted to run through a parking lot Tuesday. "That's a dog who couldn't walk — or even sit," said Lauren Immel, spokeswoman for the VCA Alameda East Veterinary Hospital, as she helped show off the dog's remarkable progress. It shocks me to even imagine someone neglecting their animals. I have a cat who I dearly love and it saddens me to think what it would be like to see my cat starving to death. I don't know how Neekos owner could just abandon her dog like that. Many of my classmate own a pet and hopefully take into consideration that they are living creatures and need attention, love, food, shelter, and water. There are animals around the world being abused and abandoned by their owners which should end! It is cruel to purchase a pet that you know you are not able to take care of. The picture above is Neeko after nine weeks of attention and care.

PLN 6-2 (12)

While skimming through some interesting posts, I came across a post titled Are you ready to grow? What's holding you back? by Mrs Parson which talks about how because of technology, there is too much information available that our brains can not handle. Some important questions that she asks are, "It makes me question how I teach, am I preparing the students to have the skills to obtain knowledge rather than feeding them knowledge? Has technology changed the way we teach, in some ways, but are we as teachers really preparing the students for the 21st century? Is "know where" replacing 'know what" and "know how"?"
I believe that when tons of information is given, the student feels overwhelmed and even if they study, lots of the information will be forgotten after the test is taken. I had a teacher who gave out so much information that it took me 5 hours to study for one test. I studied extremely hard, but now, I forgot a lot of the material we learned. There was so much information, that I could only remember it for a couple of days. Technology is very useful, but maybe teachers could start not feeding us so much information all at one time. Maybe they could break it down and make sure we understand a couple facts and keep building on that. There are many facts about a certain subject available with just the click of a button. People around the world use search engines on their computers, like Google, to help obtain information. Sometimes as many as 1 million websites about that subject appear.

"we have always had access to more knowledge than we were able to handle. It has
intensified in our generation."

PLN 6-1 (11)

I have recently read an article posted in the Denver Post, written by Mike McPhee titled State pushes teens to buckle up more which talks about how in Colorado, teenagers are being pushed to wear their seat belts while driving which I believe is a good thing. Driving can be very dangerous and wearing a seat belt is essential for safety. In 2005, 71 teenagers died in car accidents, 50 were not wearing seat belts. This is a huge issue. Some teenagers believe that they are "cool" if they don't wear their seat belts, but I believe it is the opposite. Car accidents are not rare and can be fatal. If you are not wearing a seat belt, you will be ejected from your car and will be badly injured or die.

"75 percent of accident victims who are ejected from cars die of their
injuries."

Soon, I will be driving and I believe strongly in seat belts. Many students in my school are driving and hopefully are wearing their seat belts. Teenagers around the world are not wearing their seat belts and speeding because they believe that nothing bad will happen to them, but it will. As Sue Matzick, a surgical nurse at Denver Health Medical Center and a former emergency medical technician for 10 years told the Denver Post,

"Motor-vehicle crashes are the leading cause of teen deaths," she said.

In Colorado, 11 Colorado counties will be trying to get teenagers to buckle their seat belts. Their campaign is the "Click It or Ticket" campaign. If people started wearing their seat belts, there would be less fatal car accidents.

PLN 5-2

I have recently read a post by Kieran Nicholson titled ACLU decries school cellphone searches that talks about how some schools are searching through students text messages when they suspect drug abuse or cheating on tests. I think that going through every ones personal text messages is wrong. Many people text personal information to each other that shouldn't be read by anyone else. The only way that I think reading other students text messages is legal is when a student is showing signs of dangerous actions.

Administrators there said they've searched student text messages when they
suspected drug abuse or cheating on tests.

It would be similar to the canine locker search where you only search someones personal information or space if there is a good reason for thinking something is wrong with that particular student. In school, people text all the time and many of the texts are personal and should not be read by anyone who it is not intended for. Around the world, people text constantly and if their texts are searched for no apparent reason, that is violating their rights to privacy.

"Students have legally protected rights of privacy, and the actions of
Monarch administrators are violating those rights."

"Prior to confiscating the students' cellular phones and transcribing text messages found on them," school officials contacted the district's legal counsel and were told "it was indeed legal for them to take the actions," the district said in a news release.

PLN 5-1

I have just recently finished an article written by Will Richardson titled “Give 1 Get 1″ One Laptop Per Child Promotion which talks about how when you buy a laptop for $399, a laptop will be donated to child living in a developing nation. I believe that this is a wonderful idea! With labtops, you are able to access so much and these kids barley have anything! Laptops will help provide them a better education. In my english class, we use laptops daily. They help us comprehend information better because so much is online. Around the world, people are able to obtain tons of information on a certain subject in a matter of seconds! The world is advancing with technology every year. Nations that aren't priviledged enough to obtain this technology are falling behind and if many children are able to obtain a labtop, developing nations will have a better future and the children who are yet to come will be privlidged enough to have this important technology.

PLN 4-2

I have recently finished reading an article posted by the Denver Post titled DPS plans to shutter 8 schools. In this article, it talks about how the Denver Public School Officials are planning to close down 8 denver public schools. They are doing this for two reasons. One is to save money and the other is to give more money to other schools. The proposal would also change 5 denver public schools programs and will give the saved money to them to create a better learning environment. They will also provide money to the schools to expand and enroll children from kindergarden to eighth grade or preschool to eighth grade. I think that this is a good idea because enrollment is low in many denver public schools (it is only using 70% of its space), and giving more money to improve the schools will hopefully attract more people and will allow more students a better education. Education is very important for people and having a good education is a top priority. My public school has many opportunities for me to succeed and not giving that chance to as many people as possible, wouldn't be fair.

PLN 4-1

I have recently read an article posted by The Nata Village called Natavillage.org gets invited to Geneva, Switzerland!! The Nata Village is a small village in Africa with a very devastating problem with HIV/AIDS which is very high in Africa but in this area especially. The rate of infection in Nata is higher then 37% and nearly 50% of all pregnant women there are HIV positive. Because of this pandemic, over 400 kids in Nata are orphans. This is a very serious problem and serious action needs to taken. This blog was set up to help bring awareness to people around the world and share the stories of people's lives in the Nata Village. In this particular post, it talks about how the Nata village bloggers got invited to Geneva, Switzerland to inform people about the Nata Village even more in depth. Many people donate money to huge organizations in Africa, but sadly, many times, the money doesn't go to the people who really need it like the Nata Village. Because of this conference, hopefully people will become aware of the tragedy there and hopefully more help will be available for them. We are very privileged in the US and many of us have never experienced anything remotely as tragic as people there do on a daily basis. We take so much for granted like school for example. Probably, most of the kids in the Nata Village don't have the privilege of obtaining an education while kids who are priviledged enough complain about attending school every day. I believe we all have to do the best we can to help the world become a better place for everyone and that we should not take things for granted because some people would gladly take what you have! People around the world should be informed on what is going on in the world today.

PLN 3-2

I have just recently finished a post written by Vicki A. Davis titled Is text-only enough for today's students? Throughout this article, she gives you two choices on which tells the story more clearly. You are give a text about it and a picture, video, wedpage, or slide show about it. The purpose is to show that text isn't always the best way to tell a story and I agree. Sometimes, a visual of what happened is the best way for someone to comprehend something. On the news for example, they read the story to you from the text they have written down and then show you a visual (a video of someone standing at the exact spot where this story developed or a picture of the event) which helps people to understand more about what happened. Today, technology is a huge factor in many peoples lives and is very convenient and informative. In school, teachers try to use visuals also to help kids understand the meaning of the story. We watch movies and are showen pictures which really helps us to comprehend what is happening. Around the world, people are using technology to help understand the effents that are happening and the visuals they use are helping them to understand the effents more clearly.

PLN 3-1

I have recently read an article posted by The Think Lab called Is Payment for Good Grades Legitimate Motivation in This Day and Age. I believe that payment is a good motivator but a bad tactic to use. A student should try to strive for good grades in hopes of a good future, not for money. If the only reason that you are motivated to get good grades is for money, then you will never truly be successful. Many students today will want to do better grade wise for money, but if that is their only motivator, they probably still won't work as hard as they really could if they were striving for good grades in hopes of a good future. Grades have become a low priority to many teens today which is horrible. They tend to not care so much about important grades that will help them achieve a good future. Maybe if you tempt them with money, then they will at least try a little harder, but if they truly don't care about their grades, they probably won't try their hardest. Personally, my parents give me money for good grades at the end of 2nd semester, but I don't strive for good grades for that reason. I care tremendously about my grades and even if my parents didn't award me with money, I would still strive to do my best.

"Overall, the gap of relevance seems to grow wider and wider between school
and life for most kids in most schools. While money (or even the promise
of acceptance into a 'good college') may offer a short-term incentive and even
be fair game in some settings, I wonder if we would be better served to invest
our energies and finances in re-imagining the original value proposition that
engendered school to society in the first place."

PLN 2-2

I have recently finished an article posted in the Fischbowl titled Is It Okay To Be A Technologically Illiterate Teacher? In this article, Mr Fisch said that 1. All educators must achieve a basic level of technological capability.2. People who do not meet the criterion of #1 should be embarrassed, not proud, to say so in public.3. We should finally drop the myth of digital natives and digital immigrants. Back in July 2006 I said in my blog, in the context of issuing guidance to parents about e-safety:"I'm sorry, but I don't go for all this digital natives and immigrants stuff when it comes to this: I don't know anything about the internal combustion engine, but I know it's pretty dangerous to wander about on the road, so I've learnt to handle myself safely when I need to get from one side of the road to the other."The phrase may have been useful to start with, but it's been over-used for a long time now. In any case, after immigrants have been in a country for a while, they become natives. We've had personal computers for 30 years, and I was using computers in my teaching back in 1975. How long does it take for someone to wake up to the fact that technology is part of life, not an add-on?4. Headteachers and Principals who have staff who are technologically-illiterate should be held to account.5. School inspectors who are technologically illiterate should be encouraged to find alternative employment.6. Schools, Universities and Teacher training courses who turn out students who are technologically illiterate should have their right to a licence and/or funding questioned.7. We should stop being so nice. After all, we've got our qualifications and jobs, and we don't have the moral right to sit placidly on the sidelines whilst some educators are potentially jeopardising the chances of our youngsters.
I believe that teacher do have to be technologically literate because technology is becoming a major part of many peoples lives. Teachers who don't know how to work a computer will fall behind because so much is done on the computer. In my science class for example, my text book is on the internet which is very convenient. The internet is also becoming a major research area. Many interesting facts are online. Thousands of websites will pop up in seconds on one search. The problem with this is knowing which websites are good and which aren't. Teachers who aren't technologically literate will fall behind and his/her students will suffer. People all around the world are using technology more and more, and this drastic increase in technology use will just keep building itself, until in every classroom, children will be using their own personal laptops and education will be linked with the new technology that has yet to come.

Presentation Evaluation

Overall, Friday's presentation was pretty good, but I still need to work on not sounding so nervous and fidgeting so much. I think I did a good job at keeping eye contact with everyone and not talking to fast which I normally do.

PLN 2-1

I have recently finished an article by David Warlick titled "Could it happen here?" that talked about how in Shanghai, teachers from all over attended a conference to discuss development of schools of the future and I agree with him when he stated that the US should also create a similar conference.
Technology plays a major role in education today and it will keep increasing as time goes by. Books are now on the Internet and in my English class, we are using laptops everyday. It is important for students and teachers to know how to use this technology and it is also important for teachers to discuss what is going to happen about technology in the future. Schools of the Future to me means that everything is located on the computer. Instead of books, students will acquire their own personal laptops with online books. If teachers attend a conference about the development of schools of the future, it will be easier for the students and the teachers to transition into this new method of teaching. In science, I was never given a text book. My text book is online and it is a lot easier for me. I don't have to remember to bring it home and I also don't have to strain my back by carrying it home everyday. Technology can be very helpful but it can also be hurtful if you don't know how to use it properly. This is why teachers need to learn and know what to expect. It is easy for the Internet to feed you the wrong information because anyone is able to put down what ever information they want onto a .com web address. The Internet can be a dangerous place if you don't know what you are doing. It is important for teachers to get together and discuss what they find helpful in terms of technology to try and make the best education possible for the students.

PLN 1-2

I have recently finished reading a post titled How Much Do You Value Test Scores written by Karl Fisch regarding test scores. This post was concerning test scores and there importance. I believe that too much emphasis is put on a single test score. I believe it is important for the teacher to administrate tests so they can decipher what his/her students don't quite understand, but if a student doesn’t do their best job on one test, it can lower their grade dramatically, even if they succeed at doing very well on their homework and other class assignments. Many factors besides just not knowing the answer can affect a student’s grade. They could be overly tired and not be able to concentrate, or not have eaten breakfast which also is proven to lower concentration levels. Also, the pressure for a student to do well on a test especially something like the SAT’s is so immense that sometimes students do worse then they could really do if they didn’t feel so pressured. I have recently taken a math test and did horrible on it. I was horrified to watch my grade drop so dramatically because of one test grade. I have recently read a book called “The Overachievers” and it talks a lot about how stressful tests are on students and how maybe they aren’t always the best way to prove a students intellectual ability. Take the SAT’s for example. You are allowed to take the SAT as many times as you would like, and usually you score differently. How can that prove anything if in just a month or so you can do extremely better or worse then when you first took it? Around the world, people are taking tests everyday and whether it is a huge test, small test, good grade, or bad grade, the tests are having a major impact on the grades of the kids and where they attend school. In the classroom, kids are very stressed out about tests and that can cause some down falls during test time. I still do feel that tests are necessary to make sure the students understand the material without having to look up the answers but sometimes students are studying so much and they just forget everything they learned after they are done with the test which isn’t the purpose of administrating tests.

PLN 1-1

I have just finished reading a recent post by Will Richardson called My Flickr Conundrum.This blog raises a question about taking photographs of landscape. His question was, “why take pictures of places that you visit that probably aren’t going to be as good as the photos that others have already taken that are already available for you to use in your own albums, slide shows, whatever? I mean, unless you want to organize the wife and kids in front of the spot just to prove you’ve been there, what’s the point?”

I believe the point is to be able to call the picture your own. You can always look up a picture on the internet, but if you do that, you are not able to say, “I was there and I took that picture.” It doesn’t matter if it’s the worst picture in the world, you can still be very proud of it.

On a personal note, my family travels quite a bit because of my dad’s conferences around the world. When I was little, I used to take pictures all the time of landscape that I thought was beautiful. They were never good pictures, but I kept them all, and it is entertaining for me to go back and recall the memories I had from that particular picture and be able to say, “I took that picture!”

I believe that the pictures that you take yourself are a way to make certain the memories stick with you. If you capture your own shots, you will remember how you felt at the moment and recall all the memories you had at that time. Even if you can find that same picture somewhere else, you can't say that it's your picture or remember your thoughts and feelings at the time.

The picture below is a picture of New Jersey. My class had our 8th grade trip and we visited D.C., Philadelphia, and New York. This isn't a particularly good picture, but I remember exactly what happened. We were in the bus driving from Philadelphia to New York and I remember looking out the window and thinking that we were in New York and I really wanted a picture of New York and I was so excited that when I was reaching for my camera, I smacked my friend right in the face! It was kinda funny cause she didn't get hurt, but I clearly remember that moment!
This can relate to the world because people usually try to take the easy way out and try to find everything that someone else did. They can never be proud of say a photograph because they always look it up on the internet.

In the classroom, this concept of taking the easy way out is common in many students. They just want to finish the work and then they forget about it. Because they copied off of someone else, they don't remember what they learned and won't get anything out of it.