Blog Post 8

This Is How We Dream, Part One and Part Two

This video by Richard Miller was interesting and it was done in a unique way. I liked how he showed the information in the background of the presentation because it keeps your attention and you are able to see what he is talking about. In the beginning of his presentation he pointed out some great points. With technology you are able to instantly communicate globally with others. Dr. Miller believes that we are at the greatest change in human communication and in human history.

I personally like the idea of multimedia and I think it can have a tremendous impact on our education. Multimedia can give a person a chance to show off his or her creativity. I think creativity is important because it gives you an opportunity to think outside the box and come up with something unique. Dr. Miller has done work with his team and they not only used text, but also images, films, Skype, etc. to make a more unique project. He also showed a document that he shared with his students that he had handouts and also a visual available.

 I thought the presentation on Dr. Martin Luther King was great. It was done in a creative way and I liked how he used text, video, and sound in the presentation. That shows that we can make presentations creative if we put our mind to it. Dr. Miller said,"Large restrictions are the ones we place on ourselves." I agree with him 100%. As a future educator, one thing that I do not want to hear in my classroom is "I can't do it." I want to stress to my students that they can do anything if they put their mind to it. Overall this video was great and I learned a lot of useful information from it.

Chipper Series and EDM310 for Dummies
I thought these student produced videos were great. EDM310 was a great example of how I felt the beginning of the semester. There was plenty of times I wanted to pull my hair out and pick up my computer and throw it because I felt overwhelmed. Once you start to get the hang of the class it is not that bad as long as you keep up with the work and don't get behind. I think I would like help create a video. It would be interesting to go around campuses not only at the university, but also in town and talk with teachers about technology. It would be interesting to know how many teachers use a smartboard in the classroom and if they actually know how to use it. I believe there are a lot of teachers who don't use a smartboard because they don't know how to use. I love smartboards and I want to learn how to use it more because when I graduate I want to be ready to use a smartboard in my classroom.

Learn to Change, Change to Learn
This video was awesome and had many great points. Technology plays a tremendous role on our students. Children are living now through twitter, facebook, email, and text messaging. Children learn not only in the classroom, but also through the community, at home, in libraries, in museums and on the web. We have classroom systems when we could have a community system. One point that stuck out to me was about the standard testing. Economically, it is a foolish idea because the jobs that our students get are not going to call for a right answer approach. Instead, they are going to look at how you work with teams, synthesis, how you use content, etc. This is why we need to learn to change and change to learn to better ourselves.

The Secret Powers of Time by Philip Zambardo
This video is awesome and was done in a creative way and I liked how he drew what he was talking about. He pointed out some great points in the presentation. He pointed out there are people who dwell on the future, past, and present. I liked how he said that in different cultures people have a different pace of life. People from the North are more future oriented than the people in the South. One statics that is scary to me is that he said,"That every nine seconds a child drops out of school." Children don't see how important education is for their future and to know that every nine seconds a child drops out of school is sad. Another point that I liked was about family values. Now, only 20% of Amercians have sit down dinners with their family. He said," You can't have family values if you don't have sit down dinners." I think family dinners are important because it gives everyone in the family an opportunity to come together and communicate with each other.

Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us by David Pink
This video was very interesting and had many great points. This video pointed out that people who are paid more money in the workforce did a poorer job than the people who were paid less. If people would pay their employees enough to get the issue of money off the table they will do better. Three factors that lead to a better performance is one autonomy which means is desire to be self directed. Second, is mastery which means to urge to get better at stuff. Purpose is the third factor that leads to a better performance. More and more organisations want to have a purpose because it makes coming to work better and also better talent.