Blog Post 6 The Lady or the Tiger? Why we should ask the right question.

      Once upon a time, in a kingdom far away, there was a young tavern boy named Aaron. Aaron was not the strongest man, but he was known throughout the kingdom as the kindest, wisest, and most loving gentleman. The princess of the kingdom heard his name mentioned by one of her servants, and she became curious about this fine gentleman. So, she began to visit his tavern disguised as a servant. The two quickly fell in love with one another, but Aaron did not know that his love was the princess.

      One day the king found out what his daughter had been doing and was outraged that she was in love with such a poor man. He had Aaron arrested and placed in prison. The princess was angered and argued with the king for Aaron's release for three nights.

      Finally the king said, “Well, if he is as wise as they say he is, then he must be as kind and loving as they say he is. I will test his wisdom, and if he passes you may marry him. But if he fails, he will die.”

      So, the king set up a dastardly riddle that only a truly wise man could solve. There were two doors. Behind one door was the princess, and behind the other door was a tiger. In front of each door there was a guard. One guard only told the truth and one guard always lied. Aaron was allowed to ask only one question to only one guard. Based on that question he would choose a door. If he was right, he would have picked the princess. But if he is wrong, the tiger would surely eat him. The king laughed at his plan, and awaited Aaron to be pounced by the tiger.

      Since Aaron was wise, he picked the right door. The king was disgruntled, but he allowed his daughter to marry Aaron. The new king and queen lived happily the rest of their days, and their kingdom lived in prosperity thanks to their wise king.

      I’m certain that many people have heard this tale. And although the story has aged over time, I believe this renowned riddle holds true in many ways. Wisdom and valor are more important than strength. Love is more powerful than an evil king. And most importantly, know how to ask the right questions, especially if you don’t want to be tiger chow.

      As teachers we often forget how important questions are. We want our students to know the answers, and sometimes we forget that for them to truly learn the answer, they have to answer the question themselves. Therefore, it is our duty as educators to ask questions. But asking questions can be more difficult than it seems. Aaron could have asked a question and quickly fallen prey to the tiger. So, we must ask the right questions.



      But what are the “right questions” for teachers? There is no one set of right questions. However, all right questions must get our students thinking. And, there are many techniques that can be utilized to do this.

      According to Ben Johnson’s The Right Way to Ask Questions, we should ask a question, pause for a few seconds, and then call on a random student to answer it. Utilizing this method pushes for all of the students to answer the question, and not have students that sit idly by while others answer the questions.

      Joanne Chelsea’s discusses in her video Asking Better Questions in the Classroom, that we need to ask open ended questions. It is very easy for us to want to ask yes or no questions, or questions that have simple finite answers. However, it is important for us to have our students actually thinking about the problem. And it is sometimes easy to change our closed finite questions into open questions. For example, if we asked, “Did the theory of evolution change the perspective of the world?” we would receive a simple yes or no. Not much thought is put into that answer. However, if we phrased it as, “How did the theory of evolution change the perspective of the world?” our students would actually have to think.

      There are many other methods that can be utilized, but the overall goal is that our questions get our students thinking. As long as this goal is being achieved, we are succeeding in asking the right questions. After all, it is up to us to know what these questions are for our students.

      So, which door will you pick with your questions? The students or the tiger?

Project 8 Book Trailer

My Sentence Project 7

My Passion Project 7

Blog Post 5 ICURIO

Podcasting: Voice recordings just aren't helpful for math teachers. Blog Post 4

I was very disappointed with this blog post assignment. Although I will summarize what I read and heard, my post will mainly be describing why I disliked this assignment and how to improve it in the future.

This particular assignment was on Podcasting. Podcasting was originally designed by Apple as an innovative way to broadcast for the Ipod. It now refers to multimedia digital files made available on the Internet for downloading to a portable media player, computer, etc.

Langwitches and Joe Dale are essentially promoting the use of podcasting in the classroom.

Langwitches gives direct examples showing what their students were able to accomplish using podcasts. The students were able to record their voices, write their own stories, present them, promote voice inflection and awareness, and utilize media and technology. They had several different projects that helped them attain these skills.

Joe Dale promotes podcasting through a list of benefits. On top of student involvement, he lists that: it can help students outside the classroom, it is familiar to students today and therefore makes it relevant, and parents can see what their students are doing. So, why am I disappointed in this blog assignment? Clearly, this method is proving to be effective and has so many benefits. And it really is… in the context presented by these teachers.

I’m going to begin by illustrating that podcasting is completely ineffective for high school math teachers. I have highly contemplated any possible way that it would therefore be beneficial to me. Podcasting is simply a recording. So how would it help my math students? I don’t think reciting complicated math equations is going to be helpful to my students. And if I wanted to record a lecture, I really would need to video tape and not simply record my voice. My students wouldn’t get much out of me saying, “The integral of x squared plus four x minus three is x cubed divided by three plus two x squared minus four x.” Did that make any since when you read it? Try reading it out loud… Yeah I don’t think that helped any. I think it is fair to say, as far as math is concerned, podcasting is a bust.

But Math isn’t the only subject that it would be difficult for podcasting to effectively be utilized. For it to be beneficial for science, history, art, music, athletics, or etc, it would need to be heavily extrapolated upon.

It is still incredibly beneficial for reading and literature right? Well, I can’t deny the benefits it can provide. However, podcasting isn’t some new aged technology that is sweeping the world. In fact, in technology terms, it is outdated. On top of which, the same things that were accomplished by Langwitches students could be accomplished using a normal voice recorder. The only thing podcasting gains in the list of benefits is the technology (specifically software) application. I don't think allowing everyone in the world see it makes it more beneficial to the students' learning.

Finally, if we want to learn about podcasting, it would be more effective for us to make one. We already have a blog post for that. So, why is this information not added to it? Why make me summarize what I learned, when I could just illustrate it through making a podcast… that I’m already going to be making?

So my solution is fairly simple. This post should probably encompass multimedia as a whole, podcasts being a subset. There is a possibility that I am unaware of all the potential multimedia out there. In fact, I assume that I am considering our ever changing world of technology. But, doesn’t that make changing this even more crucial? If a new and better way of accomplishing these goals comes out, we wouldn’t want to still be discussing podcasts.

Video media (especially information on YouTube) should definitely be added to this post. It is far more applicable and relevant than podcasting. Video media could very well be helpful to my high school math students at home. In fact, there are so many more things that video allows that a simple voice recording doesn’t.

Overall, this project needs to be changed for it to be beneficial to all future teachers. I sincerely hope that it is.

Project #3 Presentation

C4T #1 and #2

I commented on two different teachers blogs. The first was on Denise Krebs’ blog. Denise is a passionate educator, who is currently teaching middle school in Iowa. She has been teaching for 17 years. The second was on Ewan McIntosh’s blog. He is a former French and German teacher, and is now Scotland’s first National Advisor on Learning and Technology Futures.

Denise’s post was actually in response to Ewan’s, so I thought it would be interesting to include both of them, as it really was essential for Denise’s post. The topic of their disagreement is on “Genius Hour.”

Genius Hour is an idea that has been and is being implemented around the US that encourages students to learn on their own. Essentially, students are given an hour of free time to work on individual projects. The basis is similar to a process used by Google with their employees. The Google idea expresses that even though there may only be brief moments of genius, those moments could become the company’s next core product. For students, however, this becomes a little more complicated.

Our Expectations of Creative Genius -Denise Krebs
Denise argues for Genius Hour. She claims that it has been very helpful for her students. However, she doesn’t believe it is all about the ending genius project, but rather improving the imagination and creativity. She also argues many points that were specifically brought up by Ewan.

20% Time and Schools: not the best bedfellows -Ewan McIntosh
Ewan argues that Genius Hour isn’t suited for the school system. Essentially he believes that there isn’t enough structure for it to develop correctly, and it is difficult to measure the students’ actual learning and achievement. He also seems to believe that student’s miss the mark when there isn’t enough structure. He cautions about the implementation that he sees occurring.

My comments were specific to each individual. But, they did have a common theme. Overall, I agree with Denise that Genius Hour is a good idea for improving the imagination. It should begin in elementary school, so that students understand and develop its’ structure as they progress through school. I agree that there needs to be some structure, but not quite as much as Ewan believed. I also understand the fear that Ewan has, and would not want to see it instantly implemented on a high school without having a more formulaic structure. This, however, defeats the purpose of it for younger students. So, it is definitely not something to take lightly.

My comments were quite long, so I hope that you click the links and read them in full. Genius Hour will probably come up for us as educators in the near future, so it is worth looking into.

Whether, Weather, or Wuther: The Perks of Peer Editing. Blog Post 3

     “I have dreamt in my life, dreams that have stayed with me ever after, and changed my ideas; they have gone through and through me, like wine through water, and altered the color of my mind.”
-Emily Bronte, Wuthering Heights

     When Emily Bronte wrote these words, I wonder if she ever dreamed they would remain so immortalized in our society. As she puts it, dreams have the ability to change our ideas and alter our minds. But dreams are not the only ones to change our ideas. The pressure from our society, more specifically the pressure from our peers, can be even more idea changing. Our dreams can have so much meaning. And yet, they can be so easily beat, crushed, and demolished by a single strand of words.

     It is because of this that we as teachers often fear to tread the wuthering height of critiquing others’ works. We fear that our words may trample the very psyche of our students and colleagues, rather than expand their dreams and ideas. It is not necessarily a natural fear, but one that is essential when teaching. Understanding the power of our words is the first step in understanding how to teach. It is impossible for our students to learn and become stronger learners without being critiqued to some degree. Understanding the power we have with our words allows us to gauge the best way to critique.



     In this section we learned how peer editing allows for us to gain the skills to be a good reviewer, and how to accept criticism. For us to grow as learners, it is important for us to critique and be critiqued. Unfortunately, we don’t always know the right words to use. As the video Top 10 Peer Review Mistakes expresses, we are sometimes too extreme in our critiques and our handling of criticism. Overall, we should be positive, assertive, have an open mind, and be able to defend our writing.

      When peer editing, it is important to make suggestions that are helpful and aren’t simply mean. The video What is Peer Editing? explains that complementing the work and staying positive is incredibly important. This definitely holds true. People aren’t going to listen to angry rants. Rants don’t promote learning. Not everything can be a compliment, but staying positive when making edits is important to express your care and knowledge. After all, the person who wrote the work spent time on it and is also knowledgeable.

     In general, I personally believe the best way to edit and critique is publically. Though it wasn't as public as I would have liked, my group used the google drive to make our edits. This made the edits viewable to all of the members in my group. There are indeed circumstances where they should be done privately, but many critiques have some opinion bias. Your opinion may differ from another’s dramatically. When they are worded positively, this contrast in a public forum can promote thought and learning for both the person being reviewed and the reviewer. Also, I may miss a spelling error or misuse of grammar that somebody else notices. Having it in public gives the author more eyes to find simple mistakes.

     The pressure from our peers can dramatically change the way we view things. This can definitely be thought provoking and enlightening. But remember, Wuthering Heights received harsh reviews when it was first published. Yet, today the book is considered a gem of the Victorian Era. So, let the edits fix your punctuation but not quell your voice. After all, the opinions from reviews can change.

Blog Post 2

Professor Dancealot by Michael Johnson
overview and assessment written by Savannah Rhodes, Jamie Baxter, and Thomas Leytham

Professor Dancealot is a humorous video posted on youtube by Michael Johnson that shows how much can go wrong when a course's goals, assessments, and learning activities aren't aligned. Professor Dancealot, who is in charge of teaching a social dancing class, uses powerpoints to teach his students how to dance. The students are expected to sit there quietly and take notes without participating. As you can imagine, it'd be pretty hard to learn a dance without any hands on practice or experience! When it's time to take the final exam, everyone is confused and doesn't even know where to begin, even though they tried to prepare with the notes they were given.

I believe this video shows how important it is to teach students in a way that they feel involved. It’s important to use class time as an opportunity to really learn, and soak in material instead of just sitting there taking notes. That definitely has its place, but if it’s possible I feel like it’s important to come up with ways to make students feel involved. When you let students practice something in a hands on kind of way, they really pick up information and remember it.

Along with that, it’s also important to make sure that all of the class materials line up with what is expected from students in the end. You can't expect someone who has never touched a computer before to be able to write a blog post. They have to have practice and experience doing it. The same can be said about science experiments. It's likely that a student won't be able to learn from a science lab experiment just from having a teacher give them the steps through a PowerPoint. They need to try it themselves, make mistakes, and learn from them.

The video showing Professor Dancealot’s class shows what teachers are not suppose to be like. Students learn a lot better, especially in dance class, if they do the moves on their own and practice while the teacher is teaching.

The Networked Student by Wendy Drexler
overview and assessment written by Thomas Leytham

The Networked Student is true story based on a student utilizing connectivity to learn. The idea behind this learning comes from the theory of connectivism. The video defines this as, “a theory that presumes that learning occurs as part of a social network of many diverse connections and ties, which is made possible through various tools and technology. The tools are not as important as the connections made possible by them.”

The teacher’s role changes slightly in connectivism. In this class, there is no text book and the teacher rarely lectures. Instead of teaching a subject, the teacher teaches the student how to learn on their own. This is done by teaching how to assess data and insure its’ credibility. The teacher also helps when the student is stuck or needs to be pointed in a different direction.

This particular student utilizes technologies to make a list of sources, subscribe to audio and video podcasts made by professors from elite colleges, use the internet to find other experts on the topic and asks them for information, and show what he has learned through blog posts. He then shares his organized research and threads with the world so that others may utilize his work.

There are quite a lot of good things provided by this video. However, I am not sure how I feel about them. The idea of connectivity can be wonderful. It is exciting to see students learning on their own, and having a surplus of knowledge to attain. But I am unsure if this learning should be used for all students. We all learn differently. Sometimes people need exact instruction and lectures. They shouldn’t always have to search for information. In my opinion, it can possibly lead to two negative outcomes. One, it makes the students lazy and they don’t actually learn. Instead, they learn to tag sources and go to them whenever the information is required. Or two, the process become monotonous and the students lose intrigue in learning through this method.

I’m also fairly concerned with the teacher’s credibility. It requires little training in order to promote students learning in this manner. How is the teacher to know whether the student is actually learning correct information if they themselves can’t verify it? And even still, how could it be assured that the student is actually learning the material and not just regurgitating internet posts? And what if the student needs something hands on? Could this kind of teacher provide this to every student? I’m unsure of these lazy qualifications. We cannot allow a teacher to simply monitor, and not necessarily have knowledge. The public school system is already seen as baby sitters. I don’t think this would help much with their image.

Perhaps the teacher qualifications are overlooked because the students now have professors from elite colleges to “teach” them. I understand that it is fantastic to have the best professors in the world at your fingertips and the most new aged information. But what defines the best professors in the world? Do they have the most knowledge? Or do they have the most effective results? Could they teach elementary students, middle school students, or high school students? Who is to say that my AP English teacher was lesser than an English professor at Berkeley? And is new aged information better than the basics for all subjects? I can see the benefits to history, psychology, and literature. But would math, the sciences, and the arts be benefitted in the same way? Is that even testable, and has it been tested?

I see Sugata Mitra’s ideas in connectivism, and though I find those to be exciting revelations, it could backfire if not handled properly. My fear is what would happen if we lost the internet for a week, a month, or a year? If we only teach in this method… we may find ourselves in trouble in the long run.

Overall the theory of connectivism has its’ benefits. The students are learning on their own, and can constantly be learning thanks to the internet. I’m excited to utilize these techniques. But I’m unsure whether this is the most effective for all students, all teachers, and all subjects.

Harness Your Students' Digital Smarts by Edutopia:
overview and assessment written by Savannah Rhodes

Harness Your Students’ Digital Smarts is a video post from Edutopia about all of the cool things that Vicki Davis is doing in her classroom. She brings up the point that she thinks every child is capable of learning, but when you only use paper and pencils in the classroom only certain types of learners are going to succeed. Mrs. Davis is able to teach the same curriculum in all of her classes, but customizes the specifics based on her students’ individual interests. Using this method, Mrs. Davis teaches her students how to use new software, how to blog, and how to collaborate with their own classmates as well as other students from around the world.

Mrs. Davis allows her students to share their projects and assignments through a website called DigiTeen, which encourages them to communicate and start discussions with other students about the material. One unique thing about Mrs. Davis is that when she introduces a term that her students are unfamiliar with, she expects them to google it and find out! It's important for students to be able to figure out some things for themselves in this day and age, especially when so much technology is available right at our fingertips. Not only does she expect this from her students, but they are also responsible for teaching some of the lessons! When a student really understands and grasps a concept, they are allowed to get up in front of the class and teach their fellow classmates what they know. Mrs. Davis believes that this gives them the empowerment that they need to be confident their skills, and to keep striving to be self learners.

Teaching in the 21st Century video by Kevin Roberts
overview and assessment written by Jamie Baxter

There are many things that I think about after watching this Roberts’ video. Where is teaching going to be in the 21st century? What does it mean to teach? The video got me thinking about what the schools are going to be like in just a few years.

When I was in elementary school, all teachers used to teach were chalkboards. Teachers in the 21st century will be able to use tablets and many different computer programs to aid in teaching their students. Students will be able to find any information at any time through the internet. There will be many different forms of technology in the classroom. Students will be able to communicate with one another through internet at any time of the day, which will make group projects more common. This will bring students together in the classroom, and not only will they learn from the teacher but from the other students as well.

Teachers teach their students skills and facts. In elementary school, teachers teach the students more facts then you would in high school. For example, students come to school in kindergarten and do not know what the alphabet is, so the teacher has to teach the students the letters of the alphabet and the sounds. Once they learn those then they use skills to put them together to form words.

The Robert’s video made me think about many different aspects of teaching, and also made me realize how different teaching is going to be in just a few years.