I checked out a blog recommeded by Farrah, and ended up following a link to a blog that this teacher and his class put together. It's about a guy who lived like a Civil War soldier for two weeks to raise awareness and support for a civil war museum; the blog has his journal copied on it. It is really cool. The website is: http://civilwarsoldier247.wordpress.com/2010/02/24/bretts-final-days-on-picket-duty/#comment-17 It's a really cool and unusual way to get kids interested in history and it shows them that people care about history - it isn't just dead and boring.

Last Class

The whole discussion about tech etiquette made me feel more optimistic about teaching tech savvy students. I know when I go into my placement, that I'll have to follow my mentor's rules, but I can observe what she does and how well her rules work. I'll be able to start planning a list of my own rules/etiquette guidelines for my future classes. I do think that one of my rules is going to be no earbuds visible. I know a lot of students here at the U of M who leave them tucked around their neck during class or leave one in during class. I just think that that's too much temptation, so I'd actually want my students to tuck them away in a pocket or something. A similar rule would be no phones/ipods out unless I say that they can use them for looking something up online. I know many students keep their phones in their hand and text under their desk. If I see a phone/ipod, then I'm going to confiscate it until the end of class.
I really liked some of the stuff the guest speakers said. I'd love to find a way to cut down on papers by using clickers, but I'd need someone to help me set it up. Also, I liked the idea about that sticky-note wall cite. That's great because you can get input from everyone, but they can't go on and on (thus saving me a headache and teaching them to be concise.) It's also great that I, as the teacher, can edit anything before it's visible to all. That is the one downside to a blog or something like that - one kid with a bad mouth can tarnish the whole thing and get me in a lot of trouble.

Gen M reading

Well, that officially made me feel like a fish out of water. According to their reckoning, I'm supposed to be on the upper end of generation M, but I am not as 'plugged in' as the people they describe and I apparently have the previous generation's definitions of private and public. Besides a sense of social ostracism that I thought I'd left in middle school, I'm not sure what I'm supposed to get out of this article. I know the world keeps shrinking as people become increasingly connected, and I know that my future students will be in the habit of doing six techy things at once. I also know that, at the end of the day, that habit is just going to make my job of getting them to focus on me that much harder. (sigh) I wonder if it would be hypocritical of me to go watch Youtube now?

Edubloggs

OK, since I'm not sure how many people saw my tweet (or if the tweet counted toward the assignment requirements), I'm going to take a few moments to wax eloquent about the two edubloggs I've been reading.
The first is the Medieval Material Culture Blog, and it's all about different aspects of Medieval life. Most of the posts are about different museum exhibits, usually in California. However, I figure that even if I can't go to the exhibit, the museum's website aught to have some good material. Also, it reminds me to keep in mind our own local resources such as Ann Arbor's many museums. (Did anybody else check out the kimono exhibit at the Art Museum? - it was soooo cool!) The most recent post is all about scissors and has tons of pictures of different scissors from the Middle Ages/Renaissance; it's cool to see how some are the same as today's and some are oddly different. (http://larsdatter.com/wordpress/)
The second blog is The History Channel This is Not..., and the blogger tends to talk about the impact of different technologies on teaching - such as whether or not textbooks are still worthwhile. His most recent post is about the possible merits of giving students examples of what not to do. (http://nkogan.wordpress.com/)
Hopefully, some of you - especially the history dorks - will find these interesting.

After the podcast class

I'm so proud of myself! I actually did the podcast thingy without needing Kristin to stand over my shoulder every second. Of course, whether or not I can recreate this miracle when Kristin isn't there is another story entirely. I'm not sure how much help I actually was when Kristin asked me to go around and help others try to upload their podcasts to the wiki, but I gave it my best shot. I guess that's the thing that worries me most about using technology in my classroom - I'll be the one responsible for teaching students how to use it! Well, I'll let tomorrow take care of itself. Have a great time at the art fair and try to stay dry.

Games and Teaching reading

Thank you Mr. Gee for supporting teachers!
OK, that said, I do think that he oversimplified the similarities and differences between computer games and formal education. Good teachers, who explain why their students need to know seemingly random facts, can make learning fun.
Also, I disagree with some of his criticisms of classroom instruction. The one that I have the biggest problem with is his argument for 'just in time' information. In the real world, no one is going to hand you exactly the right info. at just the right moment; you have to know how to go out and hunt it down and how to separate the important stuff from the worthless stuff. (And actually, some 'worthless' trivia can be great conversation starters.)

However, I'm not going to dispute that some games are great learning experiences. Here are my favorites from when I was younger, which you might want to see if they've been updated:
1. Wishbone's Odyssey Adventure (you as the dog Wishbone/Odysseus must go through the episodes of the Odyssey by solving puzzles - it's actually very close to the story and very challenging)
2. Oregon Trail (you are a pioneer on the Oregon trail, and you must make decisions when confronted by obstacles the pioneers faced)
3. Zeus (you build your own Greek city-state, while being introduced to concepts such as money management, trade, issues of unemployment, lack of employees, the importance of material supplies, hygene, resource management, etc. On top of all that, you also get a breif introduction to characters in Greek mythology)
4. Spelling Jungle (you have to use trial and error, work out sequence of events/problem solving, and you learn how to spell words)
5. The Time warp of Dr. Brain (different puzzles, some more educational than others)
Granted, the last two are for elementary students, but I had fun with all of them. However, even the war games can be valuable; my cousin learned a lot of the sci-fi vocab he needed for the GRE through computer games.

Sorry for the long post, but I wanted to add one more thing - the answers to the Lion and the Unicorn questions!
The lion represents England and the Unicorn represents Scotland, and the two were brought together to form the British coat of arms in the 1600's when James the VI of Scotland became also James I of England, thus uniting the two countries. Previously, the two had been at war off and on for hundreds of years. The old nursery rhyme about their strife was referred to by Lewis Carroll in his book Through the Looking Glass, a sequel to Alice in Wonderland. Personally, I like the sequel better than the original.

After the Twitter class

I thought today went pretty well; (for once) my computer was not one of the ones having trouble, and I was able to create my Twitter account with no problems. I don't know if/how many people saw my Tweet, but I'll give you ficticious bonus points if anyone knows the relationship between the Lion and the Unicorn or their relationship with Lewis Carroll (and no, this is not an open book/computer question) :)
As for the webinar, part of me wonders if a conference call coupled with instant message wouldn't have been easier/have had fewer problems. But I must admit that I'm frustrated with visual tech stuff at the moment anyway - I have yet to figure out how to get my camera, the xacti model recommended, to talk to my pc computer! If anyone has solved this conundrum, PLEASE let me know.