Blog Post #10

Adventures in Pencil Integration

In my opinion this cartoon is saying that even though pencil and paper are cheaper using technology is more green. This applies to teaching because the idea of using just books and pencil and paper to teach is obsolete. We need to use technology in the classroom and although the excuse that books and pencil and paper are cheaper may seem good but in fact in the long run it is greener to use computers because you can use them for so many different things.

Mr. John Spencer 
The post Why Were Your Kids Playing Games? is about a principal that is skeptic about new styles of teaching, sitting down and talking to a teacher that is using a game to teach his students. The principle doesn't want the teacher using games because apparently the principal had gotten complaints from a parent whose child's teacher was playing games instead of teaching and the student wasn't learning. The teacher was trying to get the principal to see that he wasn't just playing games to waste time but that the games actually teaching method that was getting the students to learn while making it fun. The whole point of the post is to say that while using worksheets and other old fashions tools to teach ok. but that there are different more exciting ways to get students to learn.
The other post I read, Remember Pencil Quests? , was about how Mr. Spencer reflecting back to when he was is in school and how one day his teacher told them they were doing a pencil quest. Looking back now the idea of a pencil quest seems like a pretty simplistic idea but as Mr. Spencer stated it was a pioneer of doing something different. By that he means doing something other then book reports and worksheets. He was reflecting while also wondering that while he is doing something innovative with blog post and pen pals, what will be the kids of this generations's "pencil quest". In other words what will be the things that these kids look back on and say "I can't believe we did those." 

Scott Leod 
In this I would have to agree that Mr. Leod. He gives reasons why some might would say that kids don't need technology in the classroom while at the same time making fun of the reasons given. Dr. Scott Leod is a professor at the University of Kentucky and has lead many leadership workshops while also winning numerous national awards for his innovations in technology workshops. 

Blog Post #9

Mr. McClung - Volume 4
Mr. McClung's post is a good way to evaluate yourself. It sounds like he has a very good idea of how he wants to his classroom to go and how he wants to teach. I think his comments about not focusing on what his peer think about him and his teaching ways is very good because as he said it should be about the students and not what someone's peers think. If you want to read his blog post click on Mr. McClung - Volume 4

Blog Post #8

Dr. Richard Miller
Dr. Miller was discussing how to make writing more creative and how technology will make story telling and finding information different from how our generation did it. I think this technology will help kids be more creative but I do also think it can be over used.

Carly Pugh
I can relate to Carly talking about being lazy because I am a lazy person myself. I also can relate to how she got excited about being able to write what she wanted because I feel the same way when I get freedom to write how I want to. I do think her thoughts were similar to Dr. Miller's.

Clipper Series & EDM for Dummies
The Clipper Series is about a girl in EDM that don't like how Dr. Strange teaches. Then she decided to leave school to create her own school which was horrible, and after that failed she got a job as a teacher and got fired from that because she was never there. Her jobs after that didn't work out either so finally she just went back to school and got her masters.

Learn to Change, Change to Learn
I don't think they were down grading the way school is now they where saying that we gone have to adapt to how things are changing.

C4T #2

Week 1
The first blog I read for C4T #2 was about free speech and the freedom of information and how the government was basically torturing people who were "whisleblowers" in the Army. A "whistleblower" is someone who is willing to expose the truth about improper practices or illegal actives that are being done by an organization or corporation (in this case the United States Army). Basically the blog talked about how when the soldier exposed the army that instead of the government doing something to better the process of the Army, they took actions against the soldier. My comment was that I agreed that this was unfair that something should definitely be done about it.

Week 2
The second blog I read was about how the education administration already in place at certain schools are putting children having better educations for the feelings of older teachers that do not want to change how they teach. In my comment I agreed with him because I do not think that compromising a better education is alright simply because an older teacher has taught a certain way for a certain amount of years.  

C4K

1st
My first post was about a kid doing a post on Tom Walker. He described him in great detail and made a very good blog post. In the comment I left him I told him he made a very good post and a little bit about who I was. I think it is cool that this kid is from Baldwin County and is blogging in high school. That is definitely an experience I didn't have.

2nd
My second post was to a kid who I believe is from Canada after looking at the rest of the kids' blogs in his class. After I look around his whole class's blog site and came to the conclusion that they were from Canada I now understand why his post was about Chris Neal being his favorite hockey player. Me being form the south, I don't not follow hockey much and am not a big fan of the sport but when i commented i asked him questions about Chris Neal and said he had a good post.

3rd
My thired post was from a 5 year old kid from New Zealand. He did a post about three different lights and he had a picture to go along with it. In the comment I left I complimented him on the picture and asked him which one was his favorite.

4th
My last post is from another Baldwin County student but this post was a different post. It didn't have any pictures or anything like that it was just simply talking about why people commit suicide(or at least I think that is what it was about). I didn't expect that type of topic from a 10th grader so it kinda caught me off guard and I was a little lost on how to comment. My comment was just saying that his topic was very sensitive and that he handled it well in his blog.

Podcast Project

Part 1


Part 2

PLN Progress Report

I am still trying to totally understand the whole PLN thing. I mean I get that it is group of people and tools that you can use to help you be a better teacher and share ideas with I just don't understand how to organize it all together. I think the whole concept is like having a little black book for teaching sort of but I will figure it all out.