Book Summary

In today’s society, all students have never known a world without technology.  Due to this, many teachers assume that their students have skills for using technology and already know everything there is to know about technology.  Many teachers also feel that they are not as competent as their students when it comes to technology.  This makes teachers afraid to make mistakes in front of or learn from their students, but not all students are as tech savvy as their teachers.  Even if students are comfortable using technology, they may not be using it in the right way.  This means that teachers need to instruct their students on how to be members of a digital citizenship (Ribble, 2015). 

Digital citizenship is more than just a skill; it is a way of living.  Everyone needs to know what it means to be a member of a digital society and what their role in it is.  Technology should enhance learning, but not get in the way of it.  Teachers need to instruct students about the good and bad about using technology.  The book Digital Citizenship in Schools: Nine Elements All Students Should Know provides teachers with a framework for asking what should be taught and discussed in relation to technology.  This will help all educators and educational professionals provide a consistent message to students about digital citizenship and the use of technology (Ribble, 2015).

References

Ribble, M.  (2015).  Digital citizenship in schools: Nine elements all students should know.  International Society for Technology in Education: Eugene, OR.

A Blog about Blogs

This week, we looked at some of the best education blogs.  One of the blogs I looked at was “Busy Teacher” by Andrei Zakhareuski.  Andrei founded and runs the Busy Teacher blog, which is a blog for free resources and lesson plans.  His blog not only has worksheets, posters, and practice pages but articles and book recommendations related to educational topics.  This blog was a great place for easy to find resources.  It has over 16,880 worksheets and lesson plans for free with no registration required.  The thing I was most excited to see was Halloween curriculum connections.  These worksheets were fun, interactive, and festive.  One question to consider when looking at this blog is how can you use these materials in your own classroom and setting.

The other blog that I looked at was the “Hack Learning Blog” created by Mark Barnes.  This blog contained posts about increasing student engagement, rethinking assessments, and improving school leadership.  This website had a lot of great articles on a variety of topics, including How to Discuss Politics and Other Sensitive Issues in School, Reimaging Traditional Homework, and 3 Ways to Turn Failure into Success.  This website would be very helpful in finding applicable articles to my Master’s classes.  After looking at this blog, I wondered how often these articles are updated and how many people are contributing to this site?

References:

Barnes, M.  (2016).  Hack Learning Blog.  Retrieved from http://hacklearning.org

Zakhareuski, A.  (2016).  Busy Teacher Blog.  Retrieved from http://busyteacher.org/

Ed Podcasts

In choosing podcasts, it was difficult to pick because there were so many different options!  The first podcast I listened to was from the channel Truth for Teachers.  This podcast was about rewarding students for what they are supposed to do.  The speaker talked about how students should ideally be “actively engaged and intrinsically motivated” however this is not the reality (Watson, February 21, 2016).  She spoke about how rewards have become taboo in classrooms because they are not realistic and make students extrinsically motivated.  She put forth many important points about how students need their work to be recognized in order to maintain their motivation.  As adults, we are extrinsically motivated by a paycheck, feedback, thank you notes, catered lunches, etc.  and students need to be motivated as well to make them happier to complete the hard parts of being a student.  This podcast helped me to feel better about the small rewards I have in place in my classroom.  Students are given rewards for doing homework all week, maintaining good behavior throughout the month, and working well as a team.  These are all important characteristics and skills that help our class run smoothly, therefore it is important that students do these things.  Watson (February 21, 2016) said that rewarding students for imperative characteristics and behaviors is a way to help your classroom run smoothly.  The second podcast I chose was also from the Truth for Teachers channel, I ended up subscribing to this podcast.  This podcast was about classroom management topics.  I chose this podcast due to my interest in classroom management in relation to my thesis topic.  This was a very informative podcast because Watson (September 25, 2016) had many different suggestions for keeping a smooth running classroom.  This podcast gave me many different activities and procedures that I can try out and helped to strengthen my belief in the things that I am already doing.

I listened to my podcasts in the classroom on Monday evening.  This made listening a little more difficult because staying focused when other people were talking and working around me is hard for me.  I thought about listening to podcasts in the mornings instead of watching Netflix while I am getting ready for work.  This would give me quiet time to focus on what the speaker was saying and give me relevant, entertaining, and informative knowledge.

References

Watson, A.  (Producer).  (2016, February 21).  Should teacher reward students for doing what they’re “supposed” to do? [Audio podcast].  Retrieved from iTunes.

Watson, A.  (Producer).  (2016, September 25).  15 classroom management questions in 15 minutes (Ask Angela Anything) [Audio podcast].  Retrieved from iTunes.