Teacher Web Reflections

Having a teacher web site would support my future teaching by forcing me to be organized and up-to-date. It is much easier to keep a neat desk space if a lot of my work is done on the computer, and would save a lot of spaces to have students take review quizzes or submit assignments online. I believe that being more organized would help me be a more effective teacher. Also, it would be helpful with communicating the most up-to-date information to parents. Instead of sending home newsletter every time I have an announcement, I could simply change whatever needed to be changed on the website. This would also minimize the problem of students forgetting to give their parents things or having things getting lost between home and school.
I think having a class website would aid student learning in many ways. First of all, it would be very easy to integrate technology into any assignment by using a WebQuest for your lesson plan. Having computer skills is important for many aspects of a student's future, and I think it is wise to integrate them wherever it makes sense. Also, I think having a classroom website will help students to always know what is going on in the classroom and become more organized themselves. By having the homework assignments up online, they can check it every night instead of having to keep track of a piece of paper.
I feel that the two strongest pages on the TeacherWeb system are the Web Resources and Grades page. It is a good idea to have Web Resources page for your students because it will encourage them to use the Internet in a fun, safe, and educational way. I think it is also extremely beneficial to have grades online, even at the elementary school level due to efficiency, and reliability. With an online system for grade viewing, parents can track their student’s progress as the year goes on instead of waiting for progress reports. Also, you can be more sure this way that parents actually get to see their students’ grades and that progress reports won’t get lost between home and school.

Engaging Students with Concept Mapping

Concept maps are a great tool to use in an elementary school classroom for several purposes. They can be used for many subjects to get students to think in different ways. If I were to use concept-mapping software in my classroom, I would likely use it for social studies, math, or writing skills.
For social studies lessons, I would use concept mapping in the form of Venn Diagrams. I feel that Venn Diagrams would be very useful for comparing different groups of people or civilizations. I saw one example on the Kidspiration website that demonstrated the similarities and differences between Native Americans and Colonists. Based on this example, making Venn Diagrams for social studies lesson plans would be beneficial because it would force students to see similarities and make connections between things that they normally wouldn’t have seen.
In a math class, a concept map could be used for teaching fractions. I feel that teaching fractions to students is most effective when visuals are used. There was a terrific example on Kidspiration with an adding fractions problem. The problem showed 2/8 + 3/8= 5/8. Along with the typed problem, there was a picture of a bar divided into 8 pieces. Of those 8 pieces, 2 were colored yellow and three were colored red, which is helpful for visual learners. Concept mapping software could also be used with math to make visual aids for a story problem. This could transform math in a classroom by getting skeptical students to see it as a fun and artistic subject.
With older students, the primary way I would use concept-mapping software is to help them with organization when writing essays. Concept maps are good for helping students organize and distinguish the topics and details of their body paragraphs, as well as to help them see where they are missing information or could make connections between ideas.
Although I’m pretty sure that it would take me awhile to learn how use Concept mapping software to its full potential, I think it would be worthwhile if I was teaching an upper-elementary level class. Not only could I use concept mapping software for visual presentation aids, I would be able to teach the kids how to use the software to benefit their skills in many academic areas. However, I feel that younger students (K-1st graders) would probably become quickly frustrated with this software and it would take more instruction to teach it than is worthwhile.

Blogs and Wikis in Education

As schools progress toward the 21st century, teachers will begin to rely more on technology than ever before. Technology can make learning fun and interesting for the students, as well as create less paperwork for the teacher. There are many ways that teachers can integrate technology into their classroom, including educational blogs and Wikis, or RSS readers.
Educators have found many innovative ways to use blogs and Wikis. For example, Lewis Elementary school in Oregon has all of their school’s information on a Wiki. This means that students will never have to carry home a newsletter from the PTA or their teacher. Every teacher and specialist has a link to their individual blog on the main page, so parents and community members can assess any information related to the school. Another way to use a wiki is as a class guide or syllabus for older students. “Mr. Welker’s Wikinomics Guide” is a wiki that a high school economics teacher, Mr. Welker, made for his students as an online course guide. Blogs and Wikis are also a terrific resource for teachers. There are many blogs written by teachers to share ideas and experiences.
RSS readers would be a very interesting thing to integrate into classroom curriculum, particularly with older students. In a Current Events unit, a teacher could have each of their students subscribe to different online newspapers that may offer articles that relate to the current events the students are studying. RSS readers could also be used to help students with online research they may do for a project or a paper.
Many parents and educators are concerned about their young students using the internet because of privacy issues. Also, technology use in classroom can be frustrating to some students who do not have access to computers at home. However, with proper instruction and patience from their teacher, even these students can use to use technology proficiently. It will be very useful to students to have computer skills when they reach older grades and in real life.