Blog Post 16

Now that I have spent an entire semester learning about important tools that every classroom should have, I think I have a better idea of how my classroom will be set up. My classroom will have at least three desktop computers for students to use, a total of 20 ipads, organized bookshelves, a SmartBoard, a white board, along with 22 desks. I plan to teach second or third grade students, therefore I will be teaching all subjects such as: reading, math, science, social studies, and English. There will be a wall in my classroom that will be called the wall of words. The wall will contain vocabulary words that my students and I have worked on in class.

In my future classroom I hope to engage my students by using projects and technology. Even though technology is good to use I hope to still be able to teach using the traditional way of teaching. I still think that students can be taught using the white board. However, through my journey in EDM 310 I have opened up to the idea of using the Smart Board, blogger, prezi, and ipads. The SmartBoard will be a great tool for me to use when explaining to students how to look up sources that they can use in projects. I can also pass out Ipads to my students when we are doing research and allow them follow along with what I am doing on the SmartBoard. Using the SmartBoard will allow me pull up websites I want my students to look at via the internet and I can also come provide students with the opportunity to come up and use the SmartBoard on their own. When I was in elementary school teachers used those old projectors that required a worksheet made for the projector, which is one of the reasons why I think SmartBoards are unique. In my classroom I hope to be able to show my students games, play videos, and use tools from my Symbaloo Account.

During writing sessions I will assign students the opportunity to use their blogs. We will have a classroom blog that parents, friends, and other teachers will have the opportunity to comment on. The blog is designed to guide students with their writing skills. Every parent will have a link to the blog and I will ask the parents to check the blog regularly as well as leave comments. I hope that having friends and family comment on my student’s blog will encourage them and provide them with useful feedback. During our parent-teacher open house meeting I will inform parents that they do not have to comment on just their child’s blog and I will also explain why their child is blogging and inform them of privacy rights set up with our classroom blog so that no one will be worried about safety issues. I will check my student’s blog twice a month; however they will not know when I plan to check their blogs. My reason for conducting random blog checks is to make sure that every student is writing to the best of their ability at all times and so I can have accurate information when I get ready to assess how well they are doing in English.

In addition, I stated that I plan to use ipads in my classroom. I hope that there will be enough ipads in my classroom for each student to use. EDM 310 has revealed some amazing applications that I plan to use on my own ipad in the next couple of months. I am excited to learn more about how to use these applications so that I can incorporate them into my classroom instruction. I really enjoyed learning how to make book trailers using imovie this semester. In my classroom I plan to group my students in groups of three and have them create an inspirational book trailer. By the time I actually start teaching in the classroom I hope that Apple will have more options and features available to use on the ipad for imovie. Did you know there is an Accelerated Reader on the ipad? Students no longer have to go to the computer anymore to take test I can have student’s checkout the classroom ipad and take their AR test right from their desk. This will be convenient for most students! There are so many resources on the ipad App store for students to use as well as myself as a future educator.

In blog post 1 I said that I would like to use candy such as M&M’s as a way to help students with their math skills. Candy is always nice, but sometimes it can be a mess to clean up. The SmartBoard has many clip arts and shapes that students can use to count with and I even found some math worksheets that I can pull up on the SmartBoard to substitute using candy. My students can take turns coming up to the SmartBoard working out the problems on the different worksheets that I found for them. Candy can help students get involved with what they are learning and it also causes them to get hyper, but I believe that the SmartBoard will spark more interest in elementary students.

I also said that I would teach my students using PowerPoints in blog post 1. After finding out about prezi, I realized that PowerPoints are dull and boring. Prezi allows you to add websites, pictures, videos, and music just like PowerPoints, but I feel like prezi is more appealing to the eye. Prezi has slides that are animated and there is no fee to use this website. How will my students use prezi in my classroom? My students can use this website to make presentations about a book we have read in class, create solar system and use the slides to tell about each planets, or I could assign them a biography project and have them include pictures a video that relates to them on their presentation.

Blog Post 15

Ipad Usage For the Blind By: Shakeya Andrews

Watch Ipad Usage For the Blind

Ipads are good tools to use in my classroom because they have what is called VoiceOver. VoiceOver is a resource that students with vision impairment and students who are deaf can use. This gives them the opportunity to navigate through email, ibooks, itunes u, and more with just the click of a finger. Using VoiceOver on the ipad will help the student become independent. According to VoiceOver Accessibility “VoiceOver is a revolutionary screen reader that lets you know what is happening on your Multi-Touch screen and it helps you navigate even if you cannot see what is on your screen.” Voiceover is built into the ipad therefore, I will not have to worry about buying and installing this application to use on ipads in my classroom. There is also an application on ibooks called ereader that will be helpful for my students with disabilities. You can buy and read books to students to through this application. Students will be able to hear a description of items that are on their screen and from there they can choose where they want to navigate to on their ipad. Students can also use braille and international voices through VoiceOver. VoiceOver is accessible for almost any student.

Teaching Math to the Blind By: Shakeya Andrews

Watch Teaching Math to the Blind

Instead of using the traditional method of teaching math by pencil and paper or using the whiteboard, I can use number blocks as an assistive technology tool. The blocks have braille on the back of them and the visually impaired student will be able use a barcode scanner to identify what the numbers are. All the student has to do is hold the button on the barcode scanner, then place the scanner over the block and the computer will identify what the number on the block is. Math is already a difficult subject to teach so I think it would be wise for me as the teacher to have a one on one session to teach the student math using this method.

Wikipedia defines Assistive Technology as an umbrella term that includes assistive, adaptive, and rehabilitative devices for people with disabilities and also includes the process used in selecting, locating, and using them. AT promotes greater independence by enabling people to perform tasks that they were formerly unable to accomplish, or had great difficulty accomplishing, by providing enhancements to, or changing methods of interacting with, the technology needed to accomplish such tasks.

A couple of assistive technology tools that I think will be available when we become teachers are the IPad and the EBook. Both of these tools can be used across all grade levels. Both will enhance learning for both the vision and hearing impaired student by involving them in the classroom assignments and making them feel apart of the classroom community. The IPad is equipped with apps for communication such as voice over as well as apps for screen reading and navigating.. These features will make learning personal by enabling the students’ independence. The EBook also contains apps that can be utilized for features such as voice-over, text to speech, magnification and large text for all subject areas.

 After watching The Mountbatten, we learned that the students who are identified as struggling learners rely on immediate feedback from their teachers as well as their peers.One of the best things about this type of technology is that the teacher does not need to know Braille in order to communicate with the student because the machine converts the braille text into print. The blind student is therefore able to research, explore and create on his own with the help of this assistive technology thus including him into classroom assignments.




 Having a Great Time Teaching Mom By: Emma Boren

Watch Having A Great Time Teaching Mom

 The iPad has a lot of great tools that can assist blind children in using it. Blind children can use the iPad due to it’s talking feedback. You can use a finger to scroll over all the icons, and it will tell you exactly what you are on and how to open it. It also talks to you while typing. There are two modes for this, standard typing mode and touch typing mode. This way, the children know what letters they are typing, and it helps them know that they are typing the right thing. It also talks to you when you have apps open. If you scan your finger across the screen it will tell you what you are clicking on. This is a useful way for these children to get the same benefits of technology as the children who are not blind. The students would still be able to interact in the classroom with the iPads and not feel left out. They would be receiving the same education. I think this an excellent tool to have in a classroom where there are special education students that are visually impaired. I would use it in my classroom!

Blog Post 14

Congratulations! It's almost time for you to apply for candidacy in the Education Department. In section B you are required to explain what motivated you to become a teacher and your journey to candidacy. You must use a Google Document or Imovie for section B. When you explain your journey to candidacy be as detailed as possible. Give the names of classes you've taken, how long you have been in college, include the name of the college you start off at,and any trials you may have experienced along the way if applicable.

Include at least two pictures

Include at least one video that pertains to what motivated you to become a teacher or a video that describes your journey to candidacy. (Videos are optional)

This will go in your portfolio

C4T #4

My Comment: My name is Shakeya Andrews and I am a student in EDM 310 at the University of South Alabama. My blog can be found at Shakeya Andrews

I think this is a great project that you are getting your students involved in. I love the fact that you are allowing your students to put their input in this project. You said that board members will meet and decide on which loaning opportunities to choose on Kiva.com. I am curious to know what kind of loaning opportunities your students chose. I also like the idea of having your students learn about the countries where you all will be donating your money. How do you plan to make a presentation with this project and will your class use some type of technology to present information about Kiva.com for this project?

My Summary: William Chamberlain is planning a project called service based learning. For his project he will ask his students to donate money to Kiva.com. He will have his students vote for a corporate board and each class will have a corporate board, who will be responsible for deciding which type of loan they will use for Kiva.com. William is asking each of his students to bring $1 so that his class can donate $150 to Kiva. The students will learn more about the countries where they loan their money, they will learn about payment schedules, and they will also learn how to be a good steward of money. After this learning experience they will present the information they learned in class.

read more about Attempt at Service Based Learning

My Comment: My name is Shakeya Andrews and I am a student in EDM 310 at the University of South Alabama. My blog can be found at Shakeya Andrews

Hi Mr. Chamberlain! I found this blog to be very interesting. I also found the article you read to be interesting. It never crossed my mind that when we put our focus on achievement we can easily turn learning from something natural and enjoyable to something stressful and forced. I believe that it is very important to have assessment conversations with our students. When parents sit down and talk with their students about what they are doing in the classroom they can use the information they receive to help guide their child as a student. Also, research has proven that having daily conversations with students can enhance their vocabulary as well as reading skills.

My Summary: Mr.Chamberlain talked about assessments and how important it is not to rely fully on them. In Mr. Chamberlain's blog, he stated "Students only allow us to know what they want us to know, even when it comes to what they have learned." Mr.Chamberlain believes that parents should have conversations with their children about with what they learned in the classroom. Chamberlain is convinced that students can choose the wrong answer on test even when they know the correct one. His school held a conference to promote having conversations with students and using that as an assessment. In the conferences teachers demonstrated to parents the type of conversations they should be having with their children.

Read more at Teaching Our Families to Have Conferences With Our Children

Final PLN Summary Project #2

Since my previous PLN post I have found new things to add in my symbaloo tabs. I have added Facebook, Pinterest, Gmail, Yahoo, Flickr, Classroom games, Sight words, Cool math, and the link to the EDM 310 class blog. I love the fact that symbaloo has classroom games and sight words and I will definetly be using these websites in my classroom. I think using sight words via symbaloo is interesting because it is a different way to get students engaged in the classroom. Instead of using plain flash cards and holding them up for the students to see I could use symbaloo on the smart board. Using the smart board also gives me more tools to work with. For example, if I pulled up a sight word that most of my students were unable to say, I could take a pen from the pen tray circle, underline, and break the word we are using apart so that students will be able to understand to say the words correctly.

Also, I was able to organize where I wanted my tabs to be using Symbaloo. Symbaloo has so many of my favorite apps to use and what I find interesting is I can have all of my favorite apps on one site! If you are a future educator I highly recommend checking this app out.

Smart Board Project Part B

C4K for November

For my first C4k assignment I read Isiah's blog. Isiah is a 7th grader in that attends England School in New Zealand

My comment: Hi Isiah! My name is Shakeya Andrews and I am a student in EDM 310 at the University of South Alabama.

I loved reading your blog because there was a lot of suspicion going on throughout your story. I could picture you in the woods being frightened by the noise you heard. I thought maybe a bear was after you, but it turned out to be an owl. Overall, good job! However, I have one suggestion for you. Make sure every "I" in your paragraphs are capitalized and for the sentence "I’m in the wood’s” you don't need to put an apostrophe after the d. You kept me as the reader on edge!

Summary: Isiah's blog is entitled What's that Noise. In his blog he starts off telling us that he got out of bed because he heard a whistle. After hearing the noise Isiah went looking around to see where the noise was coming from. He was startled after hearing the words "I'm in the woods" so he searched and searched until he could figure out where the noise was coming from. The noise lead him to a camp close to his two friends who were laughing at Isaih because the noises he heard were just owls.

I was assigned to read Mrs.Yollis Blog my Comment: Hi Mrs. Yollis!

My name is Shakeya Andrews and I am a student in EDM 310 at the University of South Alabama. Your video was fun and interesting to watch.I love the way you get parents involved with what the students are doing. It is important that parents are monitoring what their children are doing especially if they are able to blog outside of the classroom. Dr. Strange teaches our EDM 310 class to leave a comment on our peers blog that contains quality, which is why I found it interesting that you inform your students to proofread their comments, ask questions, and leave specific comments when they are commenting on other students blogs. I believe once they master this skill they will be able to leave comments with quality and write blogs that are detailed and grammatically correct as well. Also, I love your 1-2 point system! I may have to use it in my future classroom. What a great way to get students involved!

Shakeya

Summary: Mrs.Yollis talks about how her students uses blogging in the classroom in her video. She informs us that she has two blogs. One of the blogs is a class blog and the other blog Mrs. Yollis has is a 365 blog, which allows parents, people from other countries, and her students the opportunity to leave comments and pictures of different photo and text. Mrs. Yollis uses blogging as a way to enhance literacy in the classroom and she also teaches her students how to leave comments of quality on their peers blogs. Students are able to improve their comments by getting feedback from other students. Mrs. Yollis allows her students to use what is called the 1-2 point system to determine how well someone did with their comment. The 1-2 point system ranks how well each comment is.

Blog 13

A Girl Who Demanded School By: Shakeya Andrews

In A Girl Who Demanded School Kaneya spoke about her life growing up. When she was 5 years old she found out that she was engaged and after that she spent most of her time learning how to become a good wife for her soon to be husband. Kaneya’s mother raised her while her father spent most of his time away working. When her father came around he would abuse her mother and take the money that the family had earned but he never helped his family out. Her mother did not have the opportunity to get an education, which is why she pushed her children to go after their dreams and get an education. Kaneya’s dream was to become a teacher so she worked hard while she was in school to fulfill her dreams, but she didn’t have a chance at continuing her education because she knew that she would be getting married soon. Kaneya teaches us that no matter what obstacle we face, continue to go after what we want because we can do whatever we put our mind to. Even though she did not get the chance to continue school and become a teacher when she wanted to, she still chased her dream . Kaneya asked people to help support her so that she could take a trip to America to finish her education and surprisingly people were willing to help. She persevered because she knew that she had the right to get her education. In spite of challenges kaneya was granted the opportunity to finish her education. I learned that there are four things that we must carry with us when we are trying to reach our goals. In order to reach our goals we must be the best we can be, be confident, be bold, and be fearless. Kaneya says, “If you can change your world, you can change your community” such powerful words and very encouraging.

Shane Koyczan by Emma Boren

Number 8 on Ken Robinson’s top 10 ted talks is Shane Koyczan’s To this day... for the bullied and beautiful. In this video, To this day... for the bullied and beautiful Koyczan talks about his life growing up. He says that he was bullied, and then he became who he did not want to be; a bully himself. Through this whole video, Koyczan tells his story. He tells about his dreams growing up, what he wanted to be. He says that not only was he called names but his dreams were called names too. Stupid, silly, unrealistic, and more. He wanted to be a writer, and when he was told that was unrealistic, he said he wanted to become a wrestler. That was silly they told him. This was his whole life. He lived with his grandmother who would make him porkchops when he felt sad. To Shane, porkchops were the same thing as a karate chop. His grandmother thought it was cute, but it ended up getting them into some trouble. When he fell out of a tree and bruised his whole right side, he and his family life got investigated. When asked Shane told them “my grandmother gives me karate chops when I’m sad.” When the story got out and everyone figured out what really happened, he began to get called porkchop. After telling his story, he goes into his poem. His poem is a story about three different kids who lived their lives being bullied. They are depressed, they get put on pills for their depressed and everyone around them thinks they are pill poppers. They consider suicide. They try to figure out how to be invisible, how to make it stop. This video was so eye opening to me about the issues with bullying. I knew it went on, but I never knew the extremity it went to. Shane Koyczan’s talk can teach people a lot about the way kids feel when they get bullied.

By: Tracy Armstrong #6 on Ken Robinson's top ten ted talks

One of Sir Ken Robinson’s favorite ted talks is of Mae Jemison addressing the need to teach both the arts and science together. It amazes me that eleven years after Ms. Jemison gave that talk that we are still discussing the fact of whether we should teach art along with the sciences or not. Ms. Jemison says and science that art are manifestations of the same thing. They are avatars of human creativity. They spring from the same source. In other words, we must learn that they cannot and should not be separated. The most profound statement that Ms. Jemison said was that,” science provides understanding of a universal experience and the arts provides universal understanding of a personal experience. Both requires visions that must be put into action. They are both equally important because the actions will be builded upon by future generations. We have a responsibility to contribute to the legacy of our country. We cannot afford to fail to act for the future. We can learn from this ted talk by Ms. Mae Jemison that our understanding of the arts and sciences must be expressed and shared in order to further the growth of our nation.

Project 15

Blog Post 12

How Schools Kill Creativity: By: Shakeya Andrews

In Mr. Robinson’s video he explains how students are not being allowed to be creative anymore. Students should have the opportunity to express themselves in the classroom without being ridiculed for failing at what they tried. He also says that creatively in education is as important as it is in literacy. Education is what will lead our children into this uncertain future that we sometimes are unable to grasp. In the video Ken says that “No one has a clue where education will take us in the next 5 years,” which is very true. However, being able to use our creativity can enhance the places we are trying to go. Mr. Robinson believes that kids will take a chance in whatever they do without being afraid of the outcome. Society is causing our students to lose their ability to be creative by placing so much emphasis on how well they succeed at attempting to be creative or do things correctly. One of Ken’s famous quotes is “I believe this passionately that we don’t grow into creativity; we grow out of it.” He firmly believes that students are born with creativity. Ken wants our society to live by Picaso’s quote which states that “All children are born as artist; the problem is to remain an artist when you grow up.” Ken also said something that I found very interesting. He said, if you’re not prepared to be wrong you’ll never come up with anything original. Students lose their excitement for being adventurous and when they reach the adult stage because they are scared to be wrong.
Watch Ken Robinson explain  How Schools Kill Creativity

Changing Education Paradigms by Emma Boren

Ken Robinson starts off this video Changing Education Paradigms by describing education and the process of how it has changed throughout the centuries. He states that everyone, everywhere is trying to reform the public education system. Education is either economic, trying to teach kids in a way that they will find their way in the economy of the 21st century, or education is cultural; education that gives children a sense of cultural identity while encouraging the process of globalization. The problem is that we are trying to meet our future goals while doing exactly what was done in the past. This process alienates children who don’t see the purpose in school. This is becoming more common since it isn’t really necessary to have a college degree to get a good job anymore. Robinson says that the problem with the public education systems is that they are still designed for a different age of time. We need to raise the standards. Children are classified as “smart” or “not smart” based on their academic ability and this causes many brilliant people to believe they are not smart. Mr. Robinson then goes on to explain the chaos of the fictitious epidemic of ADHD. It is the modern plague he states. However, it is not really an epidemic. He states that children are too routinely medicated for ADHD. These children live in the most stimulating century, and they are being punished for their interest in the modern technology such as cell phones, computers, tv, etc, because it is distracting them for the boring aspect of school. The ADHD “epidemic” has been growing parallel with the importance on standardized testing. Robinson also states that it is shown that the further east you go through the country, the more the children are medicated to stay focused. The main victims of this epidemic are the students of the arts. Art requires aesthetic thinking, when the senses peak, but education is becoming more anaesthetic. This shuts off the sense and deadens the self to what is happening. Education is still modeled on the interests of industrialization. The schools are organized factory lines; ringing bells, separate facilities, and divided subjects. They are also dividing the kids into batches based on age. Robinson makes a great point, who is to say that age is the best way to divide these children? What about how the perform based on time of day, small groups or large groups, individually. Education is conformed to standardization, and we need to be going the opposite direction. This is what Robinson means by changing paradigm. The last thing he talks about is divergent thinking. Divergent thinking is essential to creativity. Children learn to see many different answers to the questions, and a lot of different ways to interpret the question. Divergent thinking teaches children to not think laterally. When kindergarteners were tested on their divergent thinking ability, 98% of them tested in the genus level. This number drops as children get older, thanks to the standardized way of teaching and testing. Children are taught their whole school lives that there is one answer to a question, it’s in the back of the book, but it is not okay to look at it, copy it, or talk about it. This is cheating in school. Outside of school, this would be known as collaboration. This is the direction we need to be taking our classrooms. As Robinson lastly states… “Most great learning happens in groups.”

How to Escape Education’s Death Valley: By Tracy Armstrong

After watching Ted Talk by Sir Ken Robinson, I learned that as a future educator that I should be concerned with educating the whole being of the students. The only way for this to be done is to control the climate of our classrooms by engaging the student’s curiosity, individuality and creativity. We should not just sit back and work off of the commands of conformity and predicated academic ability. According to Sir Ken Robinson, Death Valley was a hot and dry place where nothing grew until the climate was controlled. He also said that Death Valley was dormant until someone took the time to cultivate it. I think that Sir Ken was trying to tell us that in order for our students to flourish in all areas of their lives that we as educators need to give them the necessary tools to stimulate their whole being. Sir Ken also demanded us to stop leading students to believe that it is wrong to make a mistake and to instead help them to become original and prepared to make mistakes. The thought intended here is that learning takes place once the mistake is corrected.

C4T #3

For My first C4T I was assigned to read Doug Pete's blog Doug Pete

My Comment: My name is Shakeya Andrews and I am a student in edm 310 at the University of South Alabama. My blog can be found at Shakeya Andrews

I agree the video is very powerful because it lets the younger girls know they have a voice. As a future educator, I found the information in "Why are we looking at data?" to be interesting because it relates to everything that I am learning in my education classes. In fact, students in the class that I observe in the students took a test similar to the EQAO. Also, in EDM 310 we recently created a book trailer on a book of our choice and I see that Lorraine used Hooray for Diffendoofer Day as her book trailer. I used the book Oh,the Places You'll Go by Dr. Seuss. Book trailers are interesting to watch and fun to create I would definitely use it in my classroom. "We need to know the kids we are teaching." Yes, this is true. Every teacher should assess their students interest and needs so that we will know how to create lessons and projects for them and so that the students will stay interested in what they are learning. Interesting Post!

Read This Week in Ontario

Summary:

In International Day of the Girl there is a video with younger girls explaining why it is important for them to get an education. The girls give statistics and quotes on why education is important to them. Doug included this video in his blog because he said it was powerful and inspiring.Doug Pete also wrote about the EQAO data that Lorraine Boulos talks about in Why Are We Looking at This. Doug enjoyed reading about how Lorraine describes, in the first person, life with the testing and the realities of Ontario teachers dealing with test and trying to do their best with teaching,the link to Lorraine's blog leads to all types of data gathered from students who took the EQAO.

My Comment: My name is Shakeya Andrews and I am a student in edm 310 at the University of South Alabama. My blog can be found at Shakeya Andrews

Hi Doug! loved the fact that you included the united guitar video in your blog it was very moving. The video added to your post about one or two people making a difference. Also, your post had me curious to know what was said in the breakout group sessions. What were some of the things the presenter said to make their speech powerful?

Summary: Doug talked about his experience at a conference he went to. At the conference he learned that one or two presenters can make a difference in others lives. In the messages that Doug recorded from the conference he stated that there were 1300 people present at the conference with two or three people leading the breakout group. In the groups the leaders talked about their passions, expertise, knowledge, and their skills. After attending the conference Doug found the quote by Martha Mead “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has” because it related to what he had seen at his past conference. Read more about Doug's conference Power of One or Two or Three

 My Comment: My name is Shakeya Andrews and I am a student in edm 310 at the University of South Alabama. My blog can be found at Shakeya Andrews

"I believe that it is essential if you are to grow and mature as an educator. I also believe that it’s never over." This is a powerful statement because if we are growing as educators that means we are learning as well. Many classrooms are starting to become technology based and I could tell by reading your blog that you are a technology based teacher. Do you use technology like Ipads, Smartboard, or blogs in your classroom? Also I found it interesting that you do not use presentation slides during presentations because many are use to having this as their back up.

Summary: I read ECOO13 Session Doug talked about how he presented his at the conference. He also shared some of the the websites he used during his presentation to show the difference between his presentation and others presentation. In his blog he stated that he is a firm believer of levering technology whenever possible. Doug created a graphic to highlight his main points in his presentation, with things such as facebook, feedly, zite, twitter, diigo, etc. During his presentation he makes contact with his audience and he does not use notes or slides to go guide him through his presentation.

Blog Post 11

The students in Mrs.Cassidy's classroom use blogs just like many other classrooms around the world. The students are instructed not to say bad things when they leave comments because it could hurt someone's feelings and they must write a blog on a week by week basis. What I found interesting about the way Mrs. Cassidy use blogging in her classroom is who gets to comment on the students blog. The students in Mrs.Cassidy's class can receive comments from their family members on their blog, which I believe is a great learning opportunity for students. Allowing parents and friends the opportunity to comment on the student's blog will motivate each student to do better because they know important people are always looking at their work. After watching Mrs. Cassidy's video on the way she uses blogging in her classroom I think my perspective on blogging has changed. In my future classroom, I could incorporate blogging into our writing time and give parents the link to review what their child wrote for the week. This will not only help the student but, it will help the parent know how to guide their child's writing skills. The students in Mrs. Cassidy's class says their writing gets better every time they write on their blog.

Not only does each student in Mrs. Cassidy's classroom use a blog, but they also use their classroom webpage, which helps them find things on the internet. The classroom webpage is available for students to access from home. Mrs. Cassidy also allows her students to use Wiki as a resource in her classroom. Students wanted to know more about traditions of other so they created a wiki page to ask people help them learn more about traditions. Wiki seems to be a good resource to use in the classroom because you can receive feedback from people all over the world. Students can also post videos and watch them on their wiki page. Also, I like Mrs.Cassidy's approach to teaching in the classroom. She gears what she teaches around things that will keep her students interested. The students use skype to talk with people from all over the world and people in familiar classrooms but live in different states. Students are also allowed to use their Nintendo DS games in the classroom. A Nintendo DS is a hand held game that comes in many different colors. Students can access the internet on their DS and they can also play games with other classmates. It is said that playing the DS helps students to become better problem solvers and learn how to share.

Watch some of Mrs.Cassidy's videos Mrs.Cassidy, Mrs.Cassidy, Mrs.Cassidy, Little Kids Big Potential

Project 12

Project 10

C4K for October

For my first C4K I was assigned to read and comment on this blog Interactive Understanding of the Government

My Comment:

My name is Shakeya Andrews and I am a student in EDM 310 at the University of South Alabama located in Mobile, AL.You said that your class started with a interactive discussion dealing with a current issue in our democratic society. Engaging students in discussions gives them the opportunity to get outside of their comfort zone and actually think and understand what they are learning. It is good that your class is allowed to express their opinions even if they may sometimes cause heated discussions not many classes that I have been enrolled in do that. This is the type of environment I want for my students. I want each and every one of them to be eager to learn more about the things we learn in the classroom and for them to use their imaginations if or when we have a discussion. Would you introduce government and politics in a 3rd or 4th grade class? Good Luck in the future. Shakeya Andrews

Summary:

The student informed us that in her class the talk about politics and how the government system works. She explained that she is in an online school for girls. Her teacher Mike Gwaltney assigns reading assignments that challenges the class to understand and breakdown the Declaration of Independence. He allows allows them to have open discussions between classmates about the way the government is going. The way the class argues about a topic is through and online discussion panel.It is said that the assignments that Mike Gwaltney assigns allows his students to look at pivotal issues that our society faces. Students also seem more interested into politics and how it works after taking this class.

I read Jessica's blog. Jessica is a student in Mrs. Hartooni's class.

Summary: Jessica's blog is entitled Science. The student explains what she would like to do in her science class, what she is currently learning about, and how she felt the first day of school in her blog. Jessica is currently learning about cells in her science class and she hopes that her teacher has some group work planned for them in the near future. She would also like to start using the garden in class. On Jessica's first day of class, she felt scared and she also had butterflies in her stomach.

My Comment: My name is Shakeya Andrews and I am a student in EDM 310 at the University of South Alabama located in Mobile, AL. I can relate to your post. On my first day of school I felt scared and butterflies were in my stomach as well. I think it is natural to be nervous about the first day of school especially if you are starting your first day at a new school. The night before I began my first day of high school I tossed and turned because I could not go to sleep. I couldn't sleep because I did not know what to expect. You covered all of your points that you wanted your readers to know like what you are learning, how you felt your first day of school, and what you would like to do in your science class well!I would like to know what made you want to start gardening in your class?

I read Jen's Blog. Jen is a student in Mr. So's 2nd grade class.  Read Jen's Blog

My Comment: My name is Shakeya Andrews and I am a student in EDM 310 at the University of South Alabama located in Mobile, AL. I thought it was really sweet of you to name your mom as your hero! I also enjoyed reading about why you chose your mom to be your hero. In the second sentence of your blog you defined what a hero is, which is good because it helps readers have a better understanding of what a hero is if they are unsure. I have one suggestion for you and that is consider changing your first sentence to "I am writing this blog to inform you who my hero is." Overall good job!

Shakeya Andrews

My Summary: Jen starts her blog off by informing the reader she is writing about her hero in her blog she also defines what a hero is in her blog. Jen states "A hero to me is someone who is right beside you to save you." Jen says that her mom is her hero because she takes care of her when she is sick and because her mom listens to her when she needs someone to talk to. For my last C4K I read Alex K's blog.

For my last C4T of October, I was assigned to Alex K. Read Soybeans

My Comment: My name is Shakeya Andrews and I am a student in EDM 310 at the University of South Alabama located in Mobile, AL. Hi Alex! Your blog about soybeans was really interesting and informative! It never crossed my mind that I was eating soybeans when I ate a chocolate candy bar. Chocolate is my favorite type of candy to eat. At least i'm getting my proteins in right? Have I ever grown soybeans? No, the only seeds I've ever planted were watermelon seeds and seeds for flowers. I like how you included where soybeans grow in your blog and you also included an interesting statement about how many soybeans it would take to fill up Lincoln Nebraska. Interesting! Continue including details in your writing and you will go far!

Shakeya Andrews

Summary: Alex talked about a girl who gave a speech on soybeans and where soybeans grow, which lead Alex to write a blog about soybeans. Alex stated that proteins from soybeans give you energy and they are also healthy for you to eat. In Alex's blog was information about where soybeans are grown and the types of food you can find soybeans in such as: meat and chocolate. Alex asked where do soybeans grow then Alex went on to explain that soybeans are grown in Nebraska and that they are natural resources. One interesting thing I found from Alex's blog is it takes more than 25 times soybeans to fill up Lincoln Memorial Stadium in Nebraska.

Blog Post 10

If you are ever feeling discouraged and down I recommend watching this video. Randy Pausch is an example of what it looks like to be encouraged.Randy included some really good points that everyone could learn from not just teachers. Watch Randy Pausch

After watching the video I learned that inspiration and permission to dream is huge when it comes to acheiving our goals. Randy stated that it is important to always have something to bring to the table because that will make you more welcomed to others. As future educators, it is important to make our students feel welcomed so they will be comfortable asking questions or talking about a situation that may be going on with them. Randy pursued his dreams no matter what obstacle stood in his way. He learned from his trials and used that as motivation to push him forward. I found this statement to be powerful "Experience is what you get when you didn’t get what you wanted." Experience is a great teacher because every time you learn something new about yourself you should evaluate what happened and try a different approach to be better than the last time. Randy wasn’t afraid to try something different.

Randy teaches us all how to stay motivated and happy even when life is trying to knock us down. He could have easily talked about his experience with cancer in the video and how down he felt when he heard the news, instead Randy talked about his experiences with teachers and the ways they motivated him. Randy also used his humor to catch the attention of his audience. In the beginning of his video, he said "We can’t change the cards we are dealt, but we have to choose how we will respond to it." This statement is so true we can't change the things the unexpected pain, trials, nor hardships that we face but we do have the opportunity to choose how we will respond to these events. Later on in the video Randy talks about ways that will help students reach their dreams. Parents and role models are number one on the list to help students reach their goals As future educators it is important that we learn how to include parents in what we plan to teach our students because parents are the foundation of our students. “The brick walls are there for a reason. "The brick walls are not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something. Because the brick walls are there to stop the people who don’t want it badly enough. They’re there to stop the other people.” I hope to put this quote in my classroom because there is so much power behind these words. The quote would be to remind my students not matter what bump, lump, twist, or turn they face in and outside of my classroom keep going.

Project 14

Blog Post 9

Blog Post #9 - By: Shakeya Andrews, Tracy Armstrong, and Emma Boren What can we learn from these teachers?

Back to the future We learned that there are many teaching styles that we can use to help students. In ”Back to the future,” the students in the video were in the 4th, 5th, and 6th, grade and they lived in poverty. The teacher realized that the students were not very knowledgeable of where they lived and their phone number after giving them a survey. Brian revealed in his survey that the students lacked knowledge by no fault of their own but because of the narrow curriculum. Even though the students lived in poverty, there were still opportunities for the students to receive a valuable education, which was proved in Brian’s video. As future educators we should know that not all of our students will have knowledge of the things that they should know that’s why It is important to allow our students to be creative in the classroom and to be interactive with each other. When we allow students to interact with other students they will be able to think on their own and share common thoughts. In the class the students learned to create by hands on experiment which is what we plan to do in our classroom. We also learned that students can be empowered and motivated when collaborating on their own.

It seems that a good teacher is one who empowers, motivates and includes every student in the learning process. We learned that as future educators it is important to use various tools and resources that will spark imagination and creativity to build passion among our students. Brian used tools such as skype, class blogs, and videos to connect his students globally, to gain an audience, and even to include the students sick classmates in the learning environment. The requirements of the ACCRS were met when students tied into a learning network with a school in New Zealand and shared what they learned through reading and writing. Also, students invited their community and inspired other students around the world by blogging about their “high hopes.” By watching the video our group learned that students can benefit from real world experiences like the students in Brian’s video did when Brian brought in an engineering graduate student to talk and work with them. The students were engaged by actively building a boxcar of their own. One of the most important lessons we learned from this video was once students were given the opportunity to build schema for the world, they were empowered and motivated to teach other students. as we so eloquently witnessed through the teaching of the can crushing method to other students by Brian’s students via skype. Watch Back to the Future

Blended Learning Cycle There are 5 E’s to learning science, which are engage, explore, explain, expand, and evaluate. The five E’s can be blended with online resources and classroom instruction. The video instructs us that it’s okay to stop and make sure we have an understanding of what is going on. In fact, the teacher says he doesn’t allow his students to go on to the next level until he is sure that they can summarize and understand what they have learned. He doesn’t encourage burp back education and neither should we. We want our students to be able to take what they have learned and apply it to daily experiences.

Mobile, online, and classroom learning blended together is Paul Andersen’s definition of The Blended Learning Cycle. Two things were presented in this video. One was the power of the question and the other was the power of learning. Andersen explained that learning begins with a question that really gets the students attention. He went on the explain the acronym, “QUIVERS.” “QU” is for the question or the the hook to begin the learning process. “I” is for the investigation or experiment that the class will conduct. It also stands for inquiry. “V” is for the use of videos in place of lectures. “E” is for elaboration through reading the textbook in order to gain more depth and to practice problems. “R” is for review of the lesson by meeting with each student individually to ask them question to test their understanding. Last but not least is “S,” which stands for summary quiz. We also learned that another tool that can be used to teach students it live data. Watch Blended Learning Cycle

Making Thinking Visible After completing assignments students worked in small groups to talk about what they learned in a previous lesson. We learned that we should ask questions that will challenge our students after they have done a project. The students seemed to be more interested and involved when they were asked to think about what they did in the previous lesson and it also helped the teacher know who was really involved in what they were learning. In Mark Church’s video, Making Thinking Visible,” we learned about the power of collaboration. It seems like this works best when students work together in small groups. The students were able to come up with their headline by bouncing ideas off one another through brainstorming. Watch Making Thinking Visible

Blog Post 8

21st Learning and Communicating Tools by: Shakeya Andrews

In my classroom I would like to use tools like Funbrain and Classroom Quizmo. I chose an online resource and a board game to give my students variety in the classroom. I’m afraid that if I allow my students to use one type of learning tool they will become extremely bored and shut down. I chose Funbrain as one of my learning tools because it has many different subjects that the students can choose to work on. Funbrain is also an online website that includes some of the subjects included in the Alabama Common Core Standard like reading and math. On the Funbrain website there are a list of different math, reading, and fun arcade games for students to explore. There are also word puzzles, comic books, and fill in the blank stories for students to access on Funbrain. The website is not hard to access and the students do not have to create a username nor password to login in they simply go to the website, click on what they want to work on, and get started. I hope to spend at least an hour a week on Funbrain in my classroom or allow students the opportunity to use it during their free time. The activities on Funbrain includes work for children in grades kindergarten through 8th grade. Hopefully my second graders will find interest in the website and use it as a tool to use throughout elementary and middle school. I found funbrain resourceful because on the webpage there are grade levels listed and activities listed below each grade level so that students can work on a lesson that suits what they know. To me the page is organized well enough for a 2nd grader to be able to use without someone supervising them. I would also like to use Quizmo in my classroom. Quizmo is a board game that deals with math, phonics, spelling, writing, and much more. Find out what Quizmo has to offer for your classroom.

21st Century Learning and Communicating Tools by: Tracy Armstrong

The learning tool that I will use when I begin my career as second or third grade teacher is Spree Learning. This is website that has multiple educational games that promote learning, exploring, thinking, and questioning while bringing high levels of engagement. On spree learning games.com, you can search for games by subject, age or grade level. The site even contained games that were appropriate for children with autism. One of these games in particular Autism Emotions Game allowed the autistic students to adjust separate parts of the face to represent common emotions. Although, I am not planning to enter the special education phase, I know how important is is to be prepared and ready for whatever may come my way.I also think that one of the challenges of educating students with special needs is to be able to keep them engaged in the learning environment. I will use this tool to to help students acquire and practice skills that are needed to enhance their understanding of science, math, art and history. I will also use this tool as a review of subjects that the students are learning at the time.I chose this tool because I think it will allow me to have all of the students completely and totally engaged 100% of the time. This tool will also allow for the students to have fun while learning.

21st Century Teaching Tools by Emma Boren

This 21st Century teaching tool that I chose was blabberize. This website makes pictures talk. This way, I, as the teacher, could put up pictures that show what we are learning, and incorporate what they should say to help the students learn. I think this would catch the students attention in a way that I couldn’t. They could get online and browse through the pictures and take in the information. I know when I was growing up, I would have enjoyed something like this. It was so hard for me to pay attention all day in the classroom. I believe that I could make this website fun and informational for my students. Visit Blabberize for more information. Another tool I would use in my classroom would be instructional video games. Such examples are World of Warcraft, Civilization IV, and Diplomacy. These video games are educational, and they would definitely interest the children. In today’s society, all kids do it seems like is play video games. I believe that these games would be useful tool to put in centers and let the children play in their free time. I don’t think there is a better way to keep a child’s attention. I want my classroom to be fun, but I also want the kids to be learning. I think that these would be ways to make my classroom different and make learning fun! I also think it would be a good way to get the kids adapted to technology.

C4T #2

For my second C4T, I was assigned to read Joe Bower's blog. Joe Bower teaches in Alberta, Canada and his plan is to challenge traditional schooling while exploring progressive forms of education.

My Favourite Excerpt from Reign of Error

Summary:

In My Favourite Excerpt from Reign of Error Joe Bower demonstrates why the reform era won’t work in education. He also offers solutions to help with the problems, which are based off his experience and evidence. In Joe's blog, he explains that students who come from a background full of resources have an advantage in school. The resources that Joe is referring to is having a helpful family and being able to live a healthy lifestyle. He says that we must do whatever is necessary to extend the same advantages to every child who does not have the proper resources to help them through school. Joe believes that no matter what type of household a child comes from everyone should receive the same chances for a good life. In "My Favourite Excerpt from Reign of Error Joe suggest ways to improve the lives of the younger people and ways to create a stronger society. In order to create a better society, Joe Bower suggests that pregnant mothers should make sure they receive proper nutrition and see a doctor often because a healthy baby is a happy baby. It is important to take care of a baby even though they are in the womb because the child could be affected later on in their life. Secondly, he suggests enrolling children in pre-kindergarten classes to help build their social skills. In the blog Joe includes different types of stresses and the importance of establishing programs and goals to close the poverty and segregation gap in education. According to Joe society is what creates strategies and goals to help close the gap and create equal opportunity for our students.

My comment:
My name is Shakeya Andrews and I am a student in edm 310 at the University of South Alabama. My blog can be found Shakeya Andrews

I have really been informed by reading your blog. You’re right there is an educational gap in the school system and it all starts with the type of resources that are available to students. You stated that "mothers should receive good nutritution and go to the doctor often while pregnant." This statement was interesting to me because parents create the foundations for our students. When parents fail to create a healthy environment for our students it makes it harder for educators and future educators to close that educational gap. As I prepare to embark on this educational journey I look forward to seeing the educational gap close and more parent involvement.

Education Excellence Requires Equity

Summary: Education excellence requires equity explains how the rich and poor class are contributing to students success. The first video is called "Actual Distribution of Wealth in the U.S" and it shows how wealth is distributed and it classified the poor, middle class, and the wealthier people.It is said that the top 1% of the country has all of the wealth. The video shows that there is not much of a difference between the poor and the middle class. Also, the richer students seem to do well compared to the other classes. The second video which is called "For Richer for Poorer" is a tale of two Schools that explains how Canadians and Albertans schools are different from each other. Some schools in these areas receive more funding than others creating a better environment and closing the opportunity gap for each student in Canada. Patrick Airlie School is a public school that is much more different than Webber Academy which is the number one school in Calgary. Webber Academy is a private school with more resources for students to use. Even though Webber is a private school it is funded by the government and it provides students with a solid food program and nice labs for students to use. Joe wrote this blog to show the poverty gap and his goal is to lift people out of poverty and creating more opportunities for students.Read Education Excellence Requires Equity

My comment:
My name is Shakeya Andrews and I am a student in edm 310 at the University of South Alabama. My blog can be found atShakeya Andrews Watching the first video is sad because it is not fair that the economic equity isn’t divided into equal portions. Like the old saying says “the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer.” Why is it that we have students living in the same country living in towns less than 15 miles away, but their schools are different and the opportunities that they are provided with are different? I agree we need to get our students out of the poverty gap. Find me on Twitter @educating_1

Gary Stager on Progressive Education

My Comment: My namne is Shakeya Andrews and I am a student in edm 310 at the University of South Alabama. My blog can be found at Shakeya Andrews I found your point “Parents and teachers should do everything possible to help kids get through high school without hating it” to be interesting. Parents and teachers have the biggest job when it comes to keeping students motivated. I’ve seen some parents that have had to help their kids get through elementary school without hating it. The workload that students are expected to handle is a lot now. It breaks my heart to see kids struggling in school because they know that they are not meeting the standards in the classroom and they begin to shut down. How would help get your students through high school without hating it? Find me on Twitter @educating_1

 Summary: In Joe Bower’s blog Progressive Education he lists some of the principles of progressive education, which was originally written by Gary Stager. There are three principles that Joe mentioned that I thought were interesting. 1. Strong progressive public schools are the bedrock of our democracy 2. Parents and teachers should do everything possible to help kids get through high school without hating it. It is important that educators and future educators know what our students need to help them be successful and how we can make that happen. Parents play a vital role in our children’s lives. Where the teacher is lacking in knowledge the parent should be a dependable resource for students to turn to. However, that is not always the case for children in our society not. Joe also stated that “The best thing schools can do is prepare kids to solve problems that school has not even anticipated.

Project #9 Podcast Video

First Progress Report On My PLN

I chose Symbaloo for my PLN because it has easy access to all the tools that I need to use for this class. It includes Twitter, Gmail, Pintrest, and a link to the class blog. It also allows me to use google search to find whatever I am looking for. I can consult students in my EDM 310 class as well as people on twitter for help using symbaloo. Symbaloo is filled with ideas from other people and at it also allows me to share some of my ideas.

Project 13

Blog Post 7

 Project Based Learning by the Derrain Group: Tracy Armstrong, Emma Boren and Shakeya Andrews.

PBL Part 1 
Project Based Learning allows students to create a project using all the contents that the state requires. Because the students have to know the state contents, PBL is content driven.PBL has an audience, gains student interest and involves the community in order to show real life scenarios. In PBL part one, Icurio was used to write Congressman Bonner thus covering the reading writing and social studies standards of ACCRS. The students really liked this project and they were very engaged. We also learned that reflection and revision are the most crucial parts of PBL. Watch ProjectBasedLearning

PBL Part 2 
In this summary with Anthony, he shared with us that not everything is going to go well so always be prepared to improvise. Anthony gave an example of how one parent did not approve of the assignment and because Anthony respected the parents concern, he allowed the student to create an alternate project. Anthony gave another example of how things can go wrong when he shared with us what happened when the state representative came for a classroom visit and the comic strip website was not responding. Anthony decided to incorporate some art tips that he received from Dr. Vitulli. Needless to say, when all the representative arrived, ALL of the students were engaged and Anthony and his class won their approval. We also learned to never limit our students and create the opportunity for them to go beyond what we are asking. Also, give the students a choice in regards to PBL because it gives them ownership of their work.By using PBL students know what they are doing and why they are doing it.Watch ProjectBasedLearningPt2

ICurio 
Icurio per Anthony’s definition, is an on-line tool that students can safely use to search websites that have been polled and filtered for educational purposes. Students can search for images, video, audio and texts. Icurio is good for all grade levels. One of the features of icurio is its storage capacity. This feature allows the students to store content that they find valuable. It also gives the students practice at organizing themselves on line via the folders.Icurio also saves automatically. This is good because students may have to leave in a hurry or they will be able to collect all of their material so that they can go back and finish it later if needed. Some more features are the time line and the historical figures feature. The latter is good for history projects or current event assignments. It allows the student to search by criteria. Icurio is learning disabled friendly. It contains a read aloud feature for students that struggle in that area.Watch ICurio

Discovery Ed In his Discovery Ed video, Anthony explained to us some of the advantages of Discovery Ed. One advantage is that it is good for visual as well as audio learners. Because the text article is coupled with visual materials, the students retain a lot more. This tool also enhances research material by bringing experts into the classroom via videos. Discovery Ed is a great tool for social studies and science. Anthony said that his students associate Discovery Ed with reading but on a higher level because of all the different kinds of illustrations. Watch DiscoveryEd

Additional Thoughts About Lessons by: Tracy Armstrong Anthony says that lessons should be four layers thick. The first layer being how the lesson fits in with your year. The second is dividing the layers into units. The unit projects are done in stair steps so that by the end of the 6-8 week unit, subject should be mastered. The third layer is the week. The week should be devised so that you can get everything done. In other words, set goals for the week. The fourth layer is the daily lesson. This layer is just as important as the weekly, unit and yearly plan. This layer should contain a hook that will keep the students attention while learning. During this part of the lesson, the teacher must measure what the students learn in one day so that he can know what do do on the next day. During the course of the year, all content standards should be covered and the curriculum must be written.

Use Tech Don’t Teach it by: Shakeya Andrews Anthony says that you should not teach technology. He believes that as a teacher you should not include a list of things that students need to get done using technology. I find this statement to be interesting because it is rewarding when you learn how to work a product or solve something on your own without any help. In the video, Anthony says that it is best to use Project based learning to help students learn how to use technology. Meaning allow students to use different learning tools such as Imovie and Podcast. Anthony allowed his students to use imovie, which is a tool that we have used multiple times in EDM 310 this semester. Just like our EDM 310 class Anthony did not teach his students how to use Imovie he allowed them to explore imovie and create a project by themselves. Trial and error is always a good learning technique to use because it allows students to be creative and find new techniques to use when learning. In UseTechDon'tTeachIt Anthony says that his students have learned to express themselves and be creative while using Imovie. Being creative creates excitement because when students are bored and frustrated from trying to follow instructions step by step they are unable to experiment and see what works for them. Also, Anthony informs us that is important to be aware that students will make mistakes when using technology, but hopefully with trial and error they will get better. Once our students master how to use technology, then they will be able to demonstrate what they have learned and how they learned how to complete the project or work the technology.

The Anthony-Strange list of tips by Emma Boren
The video that I watched summarized Dr. Strange and Anthony’s list of what we should do as teachers (The Anthony-Strange list of tips for teachers part 1). As teachers, what can we do to better our classroom and the learning environment for our students. In this video, Dr. Strange and Anthony listed their top 6 things that we can do. The first is, “be a learner”. It is important for teachers to also be learners. We cannot teach withouday. Sometimes, changing your plan is necessary. It is important to be flexible and not worry that you aren’t on your set schedule. The next thing is “hard work”. Being a teacher is really hard work. A lot goes into the planning, the teaching, and the hands on of teaching. However, it is also very rewarding when everything goes right and your students get it. As stated in the video “it is hard work, but it is exciting!” Next is reflect; students need a purpose to reflect. This is why presentations can be helpful. Presentations make students go back and look at their work because they know they will be standing up and showing their powerpoint or talking about their topic in front of a bunch of people. I know that is true for me because if I have to get up in front of people to talk, I will look at the information over and over again until I think it is as good as it can get. Last was to start with a goal. I do agree that this is important. As teachers, we should definitely have a goal of what we want to accomplish in this school year. What do we want our students to learn? What do we want them to accomplish? What do we want them to walk away with this year? Being a teacher takes a lot of thinking and a lot of planning to give the students the best year they can have, but I think it will be completely worth it!

C4K for September

For my first C4K assignment I was assigned to read Buck's Blog.

This I Believe

My Comment for Buck: My name is Shakeya Andrews and I am a student in EDM 310 at the University of South Alabama located in Mobile, AL.

I enjoyed reading your blog. I usually express the way I feel through writing, but I found getting tattoos as a neat way of expressing your feelings. Usually people get tattoos just because but you described why you got your tattoos very well. While reading your blog, I knew that your tattoos make up a special part of your life. One grammar mistake I would consider fixing is “Your probably wondering.” It should be you’re or you are probably wondering.

Overall, good job explaining how your tattoos express your feelings. Summary:Buck gives us reasons why she has tattoos in her blog "This I Believe." In her blog she says that tattoos help express how she feels towards herself and others. Her first tattoo is dedicated to her dad, who died in September of 2010. Buck says that whenever she looks at her tattoos they bring back good memories. Buck has two tattoos but each tattoo has a different meaning behind them. Her second tattoo is dedicated to her brother who has been in prison for four years. To sum up Buck's blog she states that you can express your feelings in many different ways and getting tattoos is her way of expressing herself.

What is My Point of View

My comment for Austin:My name is Shakeya Andrews and I am a student in EDM 310 at the University of South Alabama located in Mobile, AL.

What is your point of view? Well in your blog you said you have a big red nose and big black boots. You also said you are funny looking. From reading your blog, I would say that you are describing yourself as a clown!

Shakeya Andrews

Summary: Austin P starts off by saying he looks like a nerd with big black boots and a red nose in his blog. He also said a guy came up to him and said that he is funny looking. I assumed that the student was referring to a clown because they have a red nose and they are funny looking. Lastly, he said that everyone gave him funny looks and laughed at him, which is what most people do to clowns. Austin's blog was written to see if the reader could find the point of view in the story.

Cinderella

My Comment: My name is Shakeya Andrews and I am a student in EDM 310 at the University of South Alabama located in Mobile, AL.

I liked how you used different colors in slide 2 and you were very detailed with your facts about Cinderella. I never knew she wore a size 4 1/2 in shoes. Good job in telling who the Grimm Brothers. Shakeya Andrews

Summary: Ashley, a student in Mr. Rhodus 6th grade Elsanor Elementary School gave facts about Cinderella in her google presentation. She listed Cinderella's shoe size, birthday, and she also informed us that Cinderella is a Disney character. On slide 3 of the presentation Ashley gave us information about Grim Brothers. On slide three she stated who the Grimm Brothers were and what stories they wrote.

How Much Does the Sky Weigh?

My Comment:Hi Angel! My name is Shakeya Andrews and I am a student in EDM 310 at the University of South Alabama located in Mobile, AL.

Wow! I never knew the sky was estimated to weigh close to 570,000,000,00 adult elephants. Good job explaining how much the sky weighs you used a lot of details to help me understand. "The air weighs more than you" really caught my attention because I never thought about how much the air weighed until reading your blog. Interesting post!

Summary: Angel explains how the sky is weighed in her blog. She stated that the sky is estimated to be 570,000,000,000 adult Indian elephants. She compare the weight of humans to the weight of air and informs us when we breathe in and out we are breathing in air. Angel explained how to tell the air pressure with a barometer and how low the pressure will be. I learned that if the air pressure is low then a storm could possibly be on the way.