Comments for Kids #4,#5, and #6

For my fourth "Comments for Kids" I was assigned to Miss. Garden's class in Pt England School in Auckland, NZ. I was assigned to Maru, a sixth year student in room seventeen. In his post, he writes about his class receiving netbooks. Each student was given a netbook and was able to take it home also. Maru is super excited about receiving his netbook and said it was like receiving a Christmas present.

My Comment: Hey Maru, I attend the University of South Alabama in Mobile, Alabama. I am a student in Dr. Stranges EDM 310 class. I think that it is awesome that your class received netbooks. You will see what a great benefit that they are for your education. Technology has many great benefits and it is great that you have it at your finger tips at all times. I wish you all the best of luck with continuing your education and make the most out of the great uses of technology.

For my fifth "Comments for Kids" I was assigned to Mrs. Lagitupu class in Pt England School in Auckland, NZ. I was assigned to Mauina, a year eight student in room twenty-one. In her blog, she writes about the 6.3 magnitude earthquake that hit Christchurch, NZ. She describes the event as people having lost their lives and many have no place to live.

My Comment: Mauina, I am student at the University of South Alabama. I am in Dr. Stranges EDM 310 class. I really have enjoyed reading your post. I feel for the people affected by the earthquake. The magnitude of the earthquake shows how powerful an earthquake can be. It is really sad to think of all the people who were injured and lost their lives on that tragic day. That is why we need to be thankful for our lives each and every day and not take it for granted. Living on the coast, I have seen my share of what nature can do. In 2005, Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast. Many people lost their homes and had no place to go. Though we were affected by a natural disaster the community as a whole pulled together to rebuild.

For my sixth "Comments for Kids" I was assigned to Mrs. Phares' class. I was assigned to Shawnee blog a student in Mrs. Phares fourth period class. In her blog she writes that cyber bullying is wrong and it is sad when people bully each other.

My Comment: Hey Shawnee, I am student in Dr. Stranges EDM 310 class at the University of South Alabama. I have enjoyed reading your post about cyber bullying. I agree with you that it is wrong and I don’t understand why people do it. Maybe it makes them feel in control of that person. Bullying is a major problem in our society today and that is sad. My motto is treat others how you would like to be treated. No one likes to miss treated, so we should all try to get along.

Blog Assignment #9

What I've Learned This Year

I really enjoyed reading this post by Mr. McClung. In his post, he writes about his first year of being an elementary teacher. Here are some of the points that he learned. Be flexible because there will be obstacles that come along and as a teacher you have to change your plans. I liked what he said, "No lesson is ever perfect. The lesson you teach and the one you plan are always different." When things may go wrong, we have to work with it and turn it into a positive situation. He also writes about communicating and that it is the best medicine. I agree with him 100%. We need to have positive communication with our students, parents, co-workers, and also our bosses. If we have issues you need to talk it over to solve any problems. I will take Mr. McClung advice on communication. He suggests that you practice good communication skills because it is the hardest skill to develop. I do not have the best communication skills with others because I am very quiet and shy. I know that communication is something that I personally need to work on. Another point that he made was listen to your students. I think that is very important. I personally think that teachers should take time to learn each and every individual student. I want my student's to trust me and come to class ready to learn. I want to make a difference in my student's life and be the teacher that they look up to. His last point was never stop learning. As a future educator we have to be open and willing to learn. We might be an educator, but we are still not going to know everything. I have learned so much reading Mr. McClung post. He pointed out some great points and I know we will all probably feel a little over whelmed our first year of teaching. So, we could all take the advice that he wrote and use it.

Project #12 Skype Interview

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.

Project #13 Smartboard Instruction

Driving Lessons

A Smartboard Lesson by:

Jennifer Hackney, Kenneth Nelson, Ashleigh Skelton, and Miranda Tidikis

I personally think that our group did a great job on the smartboard presentation. We did a short presentation on driving lessons and after the lesson we then had a quiz. We used a device called a clicker and they were able to answer the questions using the clicker and after the quiz they were able to get immediate feedback on how they did. The clickers are great to use because it was fun and it was a great way to get students to interact with the smartboard.

I learned so much from this project. All though no one in my group knew much about a smartboard we were all able to come together to create a unique lesson. I am so glad that we used the clickers for our lesson. I have used the clickers before at my junior college because that is how one of my teachers did her test. So, it was cool learning how to construct smartboard questions using the clicker device.

Here is the results of the google form. The two young ladies that took the quiz did a great job. They seemed very interested in the clickers because it was something new to them and they also did excellent on the form. I know our lesson was basic and they knew the information anyways it was still great to have them interact with us.

2responses

Summary

What should be worn by the driver and all passengers at all times?

seatbelt seat belts

What is a cushion in motor vehicles that inflates upon impact. It cushions people from being thrown into the wheel, dashboard, and windshields.

airbag air bag

When someone is tailgating you, this is what you should do
	speed up 0 0% slam on breaks 0 0% if you feel uncomfortable pull off the road and let them pass 2 100% fix your mirrors 0 0% People may select more than one checkbox, so percentages may add up to more than 100%.

A pedestrian is walking across the street in your path of driving you should
	A pedestrian is walking across the street in your path of driving you should 0 0% slow down and come to a complete stop and allow them to clear your vehicle 2 100% bump them with your car 0 0% all the above 0 0% People may select more than one checkbox, so percentages may add up to more than 100%.

When there is no traffic at all, it is okay for me to text message.
	True 0 0% False 2 100% People may select more than one checkbox, so percentages may add up to more than 100%.

A yield sign is red because it means I should stop.
	True 2 100% False 0 0% People may select more than one checkbox, so percentages may add up to more than 100%.

_____________________ is dangerous driving that can result in accidents.

High-risk behaviorHigh-Risk behaviors

_____________________ is any violation of the current traffic code.

Traffic ViolationTraffic Violation

_____________________ is any display of aggression by any angry or impatient or passenger of a motor vehicle.

Road rageRoad Rage

Untitled Question
	True 0 0% False 2 100%

Progress Report on PLN Project #10

For my PLN, I used Symbaloo. It was very easy to use and to understand. I tried to color coordinate my PLN. For fashion, I used pink and had the websites of my favorite purses, clothing, and shopping places. Orange was for news broadcast, such as weather, local news channels, and global news. The black is for sports. I am not a huge sports fan, but I wanted to be somewhat up to date with the news. I have Nascar, ESPN, and Dukes basketball home website on my PLN.  The brown represents everything that I use for school. For example, our classblog, timetoast, USA home website, and Sparknotes. I used blue to represent for social networking. I have Facebook, Twitter, class blog, Skype, and my email accounts on it. Red is for all other websites that do not fit into a category, that I use on a weekly basic.

Blog Post 7

Randy Pausch Last Lecture: Achieving Your Childhootd Dreams

This lecture is awesome and is worth the time to watch it. Randy Pausch is a great role model. He did not let the hardships of life bring him down. Randy Pausch was diagnosed with cancer and he passed away in 2008. I watched more videos posted about him and he truly was a great person. He has made a great impact on people and has made a tremendous difference in education. His story has made a great difference in my life. The doctors only gave him a few months to live, but he still keep on living for the time he had left. Dr. Randy Pausch was a husband and a father to three small children. He was such a great person and he will always be remember. I would defentitally check out more videos on him because they are great.

In his presentation, he pointed out many of his childhood dreams. I like how he said, "That you need to have specific dreams." I agree with him. Everyone should have childhood dreams. Although, you may not acomplish some of your dreams it can still have an affect on you. For example, Mr. Pausch did not accomplish the dream of playing for the NFL, but football still was apart of his life. He was ok with not accomplishing his dream of playing with the NFL, but he probably got more stuff more valuable. One of the points he made was that experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted. I think that is well put because we can all learn from our experiences.

In his lecture he gave many great techniques that you can use for teaching. I noticed throughout his speech he used a lot of props for his lectures. I thought that was very interesting because it actaully keeps your attention. He used technology, videos, and group work. He used technology beyond searching the internet for information. Here is an example of what I mean. Alice is a program that teaches computer programs and this is his professional legacy. The children were able to make movies and games. They also are learning how to program and yet they don't realize it. One thing that he said, "Millions of kids having fun while learning something hard." That is a great concept because we should want our students to learn, but also have fun while doing it.

In the closing of his lecture he gave some great tips. Here is few of his tips: Get feedback and use it, show gratuitde, don't complain just work harder, be prepared, and find the best in everybody. No one is all evil because everyone has a good side. He pointed out, "That it is not how to achieve you dreams but how to lead your life." If you live your life the right way, the dreams will come to you. Again, this lecture was awesome and was worth every minute of watching it.

Comment for Teachers #2

Post #1-Manaiakalani Research
I was assigned to Manaiakalani blog. Manaiakalanin Project is research that has been collected from 2008-2010 based on e-Learning. The focus question of this project was "What is the impact of the Manaiakalani Project on literacy teaching and learning? There are seven schools in New Zealand given the oppurtunity to particpate in this project. The research focused on the achievement of students in Literacy, including speaking, reading, and writing. It also focused on the use of technnology for students. Here are a few things that were found from the Manaiakalani Research: Students achievement levels had risen by 2010, it took two to three years for teachers to implement the project, and took about two to three years for teachers to full integrate e-Learning. Here is a link to the blog for more of the data collected through this project:

My Comment:
My name is Jennifer Hackney and I am a student in Dr. Strange's EDM 310 class at the University of South Alabama. I really have enjoyed everything in your blog and it has some great information. The Manaiakalani project is awesome. Sounds like you and your team are making a tremendous difference in students lives. As a future educator, I want to be the teacher who makes a difference and I want my students to be eager and ready to learn.

Post#2- T.E.A.M

This post is from Manaiakalani on the New Zealand earthquake. TEAM stands for together everyone achieves more. This is so true, because if everyone works together it will come out better in the end. Team work is the best for anything. In this post, she writes that on television they showed streets coming together for cookouts and encouraging each others in this devasting time. This was a great example of team work.

My Comment:
I am a student at the University of South Alabama in Dr. Strange's EDM 310 class. The recent disaster in New Zealand is devastating. At times like this is when team work is effective. Like you said, "Together everyone achieves more." I have never been in an earthquake, but I have experienced a hurricane being on the coast. When Hurricane Katrina came through my hometown in Mississippi, it was destroyed by the storm. Everyone in our community came together and supported each other and helped with the clean up efforts. This is just an example of how teams are great. In natural disasters it is best when everyone in the community works together to rebuild. I send all my prayers to New Zealand because they have lost so much and are in need of help. My personal blog is http://hackneyjenniferedm310.blogspot.com if you would like to check it out.

Project #11 Short Movie

Comments for Kids #1, #2, and #3

For my first "Comments for Kids" I was assigned to Mrs. White's fourth grade class in Crozet, Virginia. Mrs. White is a passionate teacher and you can tell that she has a heart for her children. I commented to Eli's blog. In his blog, he writes about water war games and the winner would receive ten dollars. Eli describes his games using water noodles, water guns, and water soccer. I enjoyed reading his post and as I read his other post, it was apparent that he has a great passion for writing.

My Comment to Eli: I am a student at the University of South Alabama in Dr. Strange's class. I really enjoyed reading your post. I love water games and you gave me some great ideas on new games that I could play. I look forward to hearing more from you and thanks for the post.

My second "Comments for Kids" I was assigned to Mr. St. Pierre's class. He is a 5th grade teacher at Terryville Elementary School in New York State. I was assigned to comment to Michael's blog. Michael's blog was about how he liked to play with Lego's and how he loved to build cool stuff with the Lego's

My Comment to Michael: I am a student at the Univesity of South Alabama in Mobile, Alabama in Dr. Strange's class. I agree with you that Lego's are cool. I have a nephew that is always playing with Lego's and making the biggest mess throughout the house. I also enjoy building things with him because you don't realize all of the cool things you can build. I really enjoyed reading your post and keep on writing.

For my last "Comments for Kids" I was assigned to Hope a fifth year student from Pt. England School in Auckland, New Zealand in Mr. Chris Mark's class. For her post she had a picture of herself titled, "This is Me." It is so great what these students are doing at such a young age.

My Comment to Hope: I am a student from the University of South Alabama in the United States. I am an Elementary Education major in Dr. Strange's EDM 310 class. I think it is great that you have your own blog. Technology is great and it is so cool that we can communicate with each other from opposite sides of the world. I wish you all the best of luck in continuing your education.

Blog Post 6

The Networked Student by Wendy Drexler

I really enjoyed this video and thought its creation was interesting. I like the idea of connectivisim. According to this video, connectivism is a theory that learning occurs as part of social networking of many diverse connections and ties. It allows you to use all tools of technology , such as internet, blogging, search engines and many more. I also liked how you can connect with other s which strengthens the learning progress. I personally learn more when I work with others and have different people’s opinions. An example of this is our blogs. I always learn from what people comment on my post because people can interpret things differently than what I took it as. So, it is great to have other people’s opinions because it can make you think out of the box and open your mind up to different outlooks.

Another point that I liked about connectivism is the students take charge of their education. The students don’t have books and the teacher hardly lectures. I am going to be completely honest, when a teacher is lecturing, unless it is a topic I am interested in, I tune them out. I tend to learn more when I am on the internet navigating to find information. For example, I have learned more information in EDM 310 than any other class this semester because you have to do the work on your own. Of course, there is help when you need it. Reason I say this is because you don’t have a teacher standing in front of you telling you a bunch of facts. Instead, we have to use technology and learn the most from it. I know what I learn from this class will always follow me through my education

So, you ask why the Networked Students need a teacher? Well, for one, we don’t know everything. So, we are going to need some guidance from the teacher. The instructor teaches the students how to properly communicate with each other and I think that is very important, especially this day in time. I am sure that most of us text on our cells phones. How many of you shorten your words for example, letter “u” meaning you? I know that I do and when we properly communicate with others we need to make sure that we don’t use that type of communication. The teacher can also teach you how to maintain your personal network and skills that will be needed for the 21st century.

A 7th Grader's Personal Learning Environment (or PLN)

I thought this 7th grader did a great job on her PLN. She had it well organized and you can tell that she had spent a lot of time on it. She gave me some great ideas for my own PLN. I liked how she had a note taking program on her PLN. I think that would be great to add to mine because there are many times that I just write down notes and a lot of it is unorganized. And sometimes I don’t remember what the note was for. So, the note taking program could be helpful and a great tool to have.

Critiques on Smartboards

In both, Why Smartboards are a Dumb Initiative and Why I Hate Interactive Whiteboards; I can see their point of view. Yes, they are expensive, but I think they are great tools to have in a classroom. When doing observation hours for a class last semester, I saw firsthand that students like working with smartboards. I noticed the students were eager to come to the board and participate in class. I think participation is a main key to effective teaching because we want our students to be engage and eager to learn.

A blog that I found was, Smartboard Survey-teachers like’m. I thought this was interesting because the results came from 237 teachers who did a survey on the use of smartboards. A question that was asked “was how many teachers find that their students are more engaging with the use of the smartboard?” 214 teachers agreed and 23 disagreed with the question. This just shows that smartboards are great tools to have in a classroom and are beneficial to our students. So, as future educators if we have a smartboard, we need to make sure we use it!

Here is the link:

 http://doug-johnson.squarespace.com/blue-skunk-blog/2010/5/5/smartboard-survey-teachers-likem.html

Project 9b

Nicholas Sparks is one of my favorite authors. I am not a big reader, but I love his books. I fell in love with the movies, but the movies do differ from the books. So, it is a good idea to read the book and watch the movie. I found all the information on Nicholas Sparks' personal website. The images for his books came from his website, and the movie photos were found on google. For the books, they did not list the day that the book was released, so I made up a day, but the year and month is correct. Here is a link to his website: http://www.nicholassparks.com/

Blog Post 5

Judy Scharf Podcast Collection

Judy Scharf's post had many helpful tips for a podcast. I liked how she pointed out that students love to do podcast and I agree with her. I personally believe that students love working with technology and podcast are a great tool to use. One of the benefits she listed was  that students can enhance their communication skills. That is so true because the students get to work together and talk among people and classmates. I believe that if we start our children out at a young age working with other people, it will have a positive effect on them in the end.

Eagles Nest Radio and Class Blog

The podcast I listened to was All Roads Lead to Rome. It was hard to believe that these kids are only in elementary school. The children did a great job and you can tell that the kids had there act together and they sounded professional.  I also learned some information about Rome that I didn't know. One thing that I liked was the music throughout the podcast. I think that is a great tool to add to a podcast. Overall, these kids did  awesome. I think it is fantastic what these young students are doing. They are opening themseleves up to the great uses of technology.

The Education Podcast Network
The Education Podcast Network is a great tool for teachers. It shares information about podcast programs among teachers. The teachers are able to share ideas and knowledge amongst each other. I believe this network is great for current teachers and future educators. This network shares many podcast that are very helpful. I think all teachers and future educators should use this network. The network will grow as people share information and ideas.

Project 9a

Project #8

Podcast Project by Jennifer Hackney and Kenneth Nelson

We interviewed Raymond Hunt and Mr. Fry from Denton Middle School about the pros and cons of technology in the classroom.

Click the image below to listen to our podcast.

Blog post 4

Don't Teach Your Kids This Stuff. Please?
Scott McLeod is an Associate Professor at Iowa State University. He is the Director of the UCEA Center for the Advanced Study of Technology Leadership in Education, also known as CASTLE. This is the only organization that educates schools and teachers about technology. Mr. McLeod is one of the leading academic experts for school technology issues.

I enjoyed this post made by Mr. McLeod and he made some great points. First, when I was reading I thought he was serious, but as I got to the end, I saw his sarcasm. Technology is becoming more advanced, which is a great thing. I believe that technology can have a bad influence on children, but the wordly things can to. We should not let the negative issues of technology hold us back from all the great things that technology can provide. I believe the good outweighs the bad.

The iSchool Initiative
This was a really great video. I personally like the idea of having an iSchool. It would allow chiildren to have access to great tools in the palm of their hand. It would also cut down on the use of paper, which is great for our enviornment. I also like how you can have access to textbooks on the itouch. This would be a great benefit to our students because they would not have to carry around heavy bookbags that can actually cause shoulder strain!

The only problem that I have with the ischool is sending emails to the parents about homework and assignment due dates. Sending emails to the elementary school aged parents is ok, but not to the older ones. The only reason I say that is because when they graduate from high school and they go to college, the Professor's are not going to send parents emails about assignments. So, I think it needs to be the student's responsibilty in remembering and doing assignments. Other than that, I think the ischool would be ideal. It would have such a positive impact on our students.

The Lost Generation
I thought this was a great video. It is sad, but a lot of what she was saying is true. Their are many parents who put there job, before their children. I personally believe that family should come before anything else. It was cool though how she made something negative into a postive. I think she had a great approach to it. It surley caught my attention.

Eric Whitacre's Virtual Choir

This was really amazing. You would not have thought that everyone would sound beautiful together, considering they had never met before. This just shows what a great benefit techology is. Technology can be used for so much, but I have to say, I have never seen anything like this. It is crazy to me that these people used the internet and formed something so beautiful.

Teaching in the 21st Century

This video was inspiring to me. One thing that pointed out to me was that students do not need to be entertained, they need to be engaged. I thought that was very well put. Entertainment is short-lived and engagement has long term results. Isn't that what we want for our students? We want them not to just memorize information, but learn from it also. Our goal as teachers should be to provide our students with meaningful and powerful engagement.

Project 6

Project #5

Comments for Teachers #1

Post #1- Fluency Timer

My teacher was Mathew Needleman. The post that I commented to was Fluency Timer. Mr. Needleman created a software application that timed and recorded students as they read. The students were then able to listen to themseleves. After the students listened, they were able to hear their mistakes. The students were very eager to keep reading and improve their reading skills.

My Comment:
Hi! My name is Jennifer Hackney and I am a student at the University of South Alabama. I am majoring in Elementary Education and I am in micro-computing system (EDM 310). I think it is awesome that you have created a software that will help students become more fluent in reading. When I was younger, I had a hard time with reading, and it would of been great to have had this software . I love that your students are eager to read more and improve their reading skills. It is always great to see students ready to learn. Your blog is great and has awesome ideas to incorporate in your classroom. Our class blog is http://edm310.blogspot.com and my personal blog is http://hackneyjenniferedm310.blogspot.com if you would like to check it out. I look forward to your future post and talking with you.

Post #2- Close the Computer Lab
This post was by Mathew Needleman. In his post he talks about schools that have computer labs, but are not using them. The reasons why computer labs are not being used are:  the computers are barely working; the lab is not staffed; and locked labs with broken computers. Mr. Needleman suggest that schools have both, school libraries and classroom libraries. If computers are in the classroom the teachers will have constant access. Also the computers will become a great benefit for teaching and learning.

My Comment:
Mr. Needleman,
My name is Jennifer Hackney and I am a student in Dr. Stranges EDM 310 class at the University of South Alabama. I think you brought up some good points. I like the idea of having school libraries and classroom libraries. I believe it would be great if all teachers could have computers in their classroom. When I was in high school, I can not even remember how many times I went to lab and the computers didn’t work. That was very frustrating, especially when you are trying to get work done. I look forward to your future post. My personal blog again is http://hackneyjenniferedm310.blogspot.com and my twitter is @jenniferhckny if you would like to check it out.

Blog Post 3

Michael Wesch: A Vision of Students Today

I really enjoyed this video. It was the true life of a college student, from over priced books to costly tuition. There has been plenty of times that I have bought a textbook and never taken the plastic off of it. One thing, that I don't understand, is why do students pay for school and don't even show up. College is tough and we have to pay for it, so we might as well do the work and come to class. One reason why I chose to attend South is because of the small class sizes. I really enjoy the smaller classes and many of my teachers know me by name.

I liked how the video picked out the hours that students spend on their cell phones, internet, watching television, and listening to music. I know I am guilty of those things, especially the use of cellphones. I probably spend a combined two hours texting and talking on the phone through out the day. Sometimes, I spend more time on facebook and wathcing television, than I do on my school work. Now, I get my work done, but still procrastinate. One thing that I did not notice in the video was procrastination. I think it plays a big role in college students today. I am sure there are alot of students who stay up late the night before to write a paper that is due the next day. I know I am guilty of it.

"It's Not About the Technology" by Kelly Hines
I really enjoyed reading the post from Mrs. Kelly Hines. It was filled with some great information. I liked how she pointed out, that its not all about the technology that helps the students learn. I agree that teachers must be learners. As future educators, I believe, when doors open for us to learn new things, we should jump on it. We should always be ready and willing to learn. I also agree that we should be up to date on research and tools that can be incorporated into our classroom. As this will help us to see how students learn individually.

Technology is useless without good teaching, that is so true. I have seen first hand how technology is wasted by a teacher that is not trained or does not feel comfortable enough to use it. I think all teachers should be properly trained in specific technology such as, the Smart Boards. That way, we know the teacher understands how to use it for their lessons. I also, have seen first hand how students interact with the Smart Board. The students loved working with it and were more involved during class. I think it would be great if all teachers could have a Smart Board, but I know they are pricey. There are some teachers who don't like to use technology and that is when technology is being wasted. Many teachers don't want to change their way of teaching, but I think all educators should be willing to try something new.

Karl Fisch: Is It Okay to Be A Technologically Illiterate Teacher?
I thought this post was blunt and straight to the point. This made me think, is it ok to be techologically illerate? I know teachers take on a tremendous responsibility all ready. Many teachers may feel as though they don't have time to learn. Others teachers are set in their ways and don't want to change their style of teaching.

Staying up to date with the newest technology can be very hard. I know that technology is changing constanlty. I think as future educators, we should make the best of it. We should incorporate it in our lessons because students like using technology. I think if teachers use technology in their classroom they will find that there students are more involoved and keep their attention longer. For me personally, I will strive to learn the latest technology and apply it to my classroom.

Gary Hayes Social Media Count
The Social Media Count is really cool. It is crazy how much social networking and the internet is constantly rising. This shows us that technology will play a tremendous role in teaching. That's why I am glad to have this class because it is taking us out of our norm and opening us up to all kinds of new skills we will need to be successful with the use of technology. Technology is constantly changing, so we will obviously have to be up to date on the new trends of technology.