OTEN Conference

Last weekend I attended the OTEN coference. It focued on integrating technology into my teaching. Different seminars where held to assist us in putting together the total package of technology and teaching into our classrooms. I attended 2 workshops: Stellarium, and Personal Learning Environments; exploring possibilities for teaching and learning. I tell more about them in my yodio presentation. To hear more, please follow the link:
The YODIO did not publish correctly, now I can not log in to YODIO as I forgot my password and the ones the keep emailing to me do not work. I will keep working on this and get the link working.

My Favorite Web2.0 Tools

Web 2.0 are internet based applications and services. You can have full access to all your software and files anywhere, and anytime as long as you have access to the internet. Nothing is dependent on the local computer. This technology can impact my effectiveness as a teacher because this is a social outlet. You can create, edit and share this information. With this technology I can teach through the world of my students. As an effective teacher, I will be able to have constant access to my word documents, spread sheets or presentations. If I forget to print something off my computer at home, no big deal! Because I can access my lesson plans from any computer with internet.

Here are 2 web-based tools that are currently my favorite:
Google Docs- This is an application of google. Here you are able to write all your documents and keep them saved to this application. You can also upload all your important documents that you don't want to get lost. I can ask my students to submit their writings on google docs. Then I can just sign in on any computer and see what my students have posted from their homes or at school.

Wikispace: Wikis are simple web pages that groups, friends, and families can edit together. Wikis are great tools for engaging children in learning, involving parents in their child's education, and sharing resources with other teachers and schools.

Education and Blogs

Applying blog activities to classroom instruction:
I would like to implement blog journals as a weekly assignment in my classroom. At the end of each day I could have students spend a few minutes reflecting on their day. They could write about what they learned that day, something exciting that happened to them, or something that was challenging for them. I would then ask them to login with a family member once a week and have their family member make a comment on their posts. Then, as a teacher will login and comment on the student’s blog and on the family member's comment. This would be a great way to implement communication between the student, the parent and the teacher. Of course I must take into consideration the fact of having a diverse class and using technology is sometimes difficult in diverse classrooms since some homes do not have internet access, or would not feel comfortable with their literacy level to write. The use of technology may have to be used only for in school activities. However, if all students have access to internet outside of school this would be a great way to enable parent-student-teacher communication.
I also like the idea of having students post blogs that focus on who they are. They can post photos, list special things about them, and post their favorite pieces of work they did in class. I would then have students read each others and comment. This would be a good way for the class to get to know each other on a deeper level and support each others’ work and successes.

Planning Curriculum That Is Multicultural

Reflection 6.3 Textbook Tally
The book I used to research multicultural representation in children's textbooks is titled Reading- New Beginnings by Scott Foresman. This text was recently used for a 2nd grade classroom. After looking through all the pictures I found that the representation of males and females was about equal. The final count according to race/ehnicity was: White Americans-22, African Americans-10, Latino Americans-7, Asian Americans-5, Arab Americans-3, Disabled Americans-2, and American Indian-1. Based on this representation, it is clear to me that this reading curriculum is based on the points of view of White Americans. The knowledge that we share with our students is based on a limited point of view that may be biased due to the narrow viewpoints of the group of people who are putting the curriculum together. This is unfair that some groups have to feel left out and that they feel they aren't important enough to be included. I can include the students in my class who do not have much representation in the textbooks by providing supplemental books that include people that they can associate themselves with. I can also supplement the under representation by hanging posters that display other groups, sharing stories about great achievements made by others that they can relate to, and playing music that is popular in different groups around the world.