Blog Post #2

As a student Microsoft Office but especially Word has been an important tool in my life and has made writing and learning easier. This tool as a student has allowed for me to write papers with broken fingers and has allowed me to share my thoughts with partners if there is a group project requiring Word and we may not be able to meet to share the ideas in person. Word has also allowed for me to make mistakes and correct them easily without having to rewrite the entire paper like I would have had to without Word at my disposal. Teachers that I have had have also used Word to best benefit students with most of them using it to post assignments on their blackboards for all the students to find that way if you may not have understood it in class this may explain the point more clearly. Teachers have also use Word to make test and study guides but usually you can tell the more experienced teachers because of all my past teachers and professors the more experienced ones tended to use this tool more creatively and makes games and puzzles rather than just standard Word documents.

As a student in the 21st century copyright and fair use have always been a hot topic in all my righting and history classes, this is due to the nature of the world we live in and the relative ease it would be to copy and paste from a random website to make papers and research easier. From my experience I have never had a problem once it was explained why copyright is a big issue but in Elementary and Middle School when it was less clear it was easy for me to copy and paste because I didn't understand the belief that it was stealing even if it was on a public website. As a teacher I think I would explain the concept a little differently than my teachers explained it to me. My teachers tried to explain this issue as solely an online copyright issue how ever I think I would explain it using books rather with the internet, I think I would ask how they would feel if they wrote a book, got it published but it was never popular then another person came along and copied their book, even if they changed a few words, and published it and then that book was widely acclaimed and then ask how different this would be to pulling ideas straight out of a source and trying to pass it off as their own ideas. As a student I have witnessed issues with copyright from classmates being caught copyrighting to first being told to always put sources for pictures to now being told this falls under fair use educational purposes and these issues have also put some of my teachers in tight spots especially when it comes to knowing if to cite pictures or not in the classroom.

Some issues that come up are almost impossible to avoid in a world of technology but most of these issues can be solved with education of the issue and monitoring activity. One issue that comes up is copyright, I would attempt to deal with this issue by educating the kids on why this is important and how if caught using somebodies copyrighted works without citing the source it can ruin your education in higher schooling. Another issue would be Cyber-bullying, this a relatively new issue but a vital one to educate on and for this one I could give some real life examples of the consequences of Cyber-bullying and how those convinced of this crime were punished in real life to try and make the students understand that although it is online the consequences of this can be very real. Finally another issue that you might run into when trying to integrate technology into classrooms could be the Hacking and Malware that has always been an issue on the internet, with these issues rising however I would most likely spend a decent amount of time talking about this issue because not knowing how hacking and malware occur and can impact your life can leave you vulnerable to these people to pray on ignorance. Also because this can lead to identity theft and ruin your life I would spend time explaining how to spot malware bugs and how to put yourself in the best situation to avoid sites that are likely to give you malware to give them the best chance to avoid it.

Blog Post #1

Teachers and students are both influenced to use technology in the classroom on  a daily basis but for both their influences come from different places. For example a teacher is influenced by the new standards set by states and county schools and how the students they teach should be technologically literate by the 8th grade. These standards influences teachers to learn the technology themselves so they can better teach their students and prep them for their lives outside of school and in the real world. Teachers are also influenced to use technology because usually the technology makes their jobs easier and more efficient, for example when a teacher needs to make a lesson plan or take attendance a computer will be able to help the teacher do this quicker and more efficiently and this gives them more time to spend with students helping them with anything they may need or even giving them a little more to themselves.

Students influences for using technology are based on the influences of the teachers, for example while a teacher may need to have a student learn the basics of PowerPoint the students just knows that he needs to use a visual aid for his presentation so this may influence him to use PowerPoint and learn the basics of it without the teacher setting him down and forcing him to use it. Another influence of students may be other students, while teachers have a large influence on students other students have just as big of a role. This may appear in group projects or competitions, when paired up with one another students can show each other their tricks for technology and teach each other what they may not have known apart, this alone can influence students to get better antiquated with the technology they are using.

The ISTE standards are in my option pretty well written and go pretty far in preparing students for the real world and help make sure they understand how technology can help you be a more productive member of the world but also how it can hurt you if not properly understood. Of all the standards the one that stuck out to me and made me happy to see was standard 2a of the student standards about learning how permanent the internet because as of now I don't believe that many people realize this and this could impact their future when searching for a job or applying for college. The standard that I don't think I personally currently meet is the student standard 5a, I can't really use algorithms with information as I lack the skill to make algorithms.

I do agree with the term digital native for today's youths, I think this term and the people it describes fit together very well because when people say digital native its not an insult its just an easy term to describe those who grew up with computers and learned how to use them from a very young age like a second language. I have seen differences between myself and those who are considered digital immigrants, when I see older people get new technology many of them can't just learn out of them box, many of them must be shown how to work it and all the features unlike with me and other people my age and younger, many of us can pull things right out of the box and have it figured out within minutes and learn as we go without much help from the instructions or others. I do think this lack of self learning when it comes to digital immigrants has impacted me and the way I learn with technology, sometimes when my teachers couldn't figure out new tech without help it would delay our classes because they would be to scared to try and figure it out on their own. I do see some differences between myself and future generations of students, I see future generations programming their own computers and integrating even more with technology and less separation between life on and offline when learning and I also see online classes becoming more popular with homeschooling and college students which I can't speak to as a good or bad thing.

Blog Post #0

My prior experiences with technology have been pretty extensive. I first really started using technology in 4th grade because of my teacher and his view that technology was the way of the future and that we should learn it early so we didn't fall behind in life. This continued throughout middle and high school and was very lucky to go to schools with access to good computers and help learning the systems so early on I felt as though I had a good grasp on these systems. I have had a couple computer classes in high school but have not had any in a couple years.

I hope to learn in this class more modern techniques for using technology and how to do this well enough to be confident in everyday life. I also hope to learn how to use Excel properly and how to use this system to organize data in case I need to use it later in life.

I learned from the questionnaire that I tend to learn by doing rather than by hearing and that I would prefer to do it rather than have it shown to me. I also learned that larger concepts for me come first then the smaller things fall into place later in the class once I understand the overall concept.