Primary Sources and NARA Blog # 9

Primary sources are materials from, or directly related to, the past. In History, primary sources are usually records, letters, or other documents created during the period that is being studied, such as legal notices, diaries, or first hand accounts. Primary sources; however, can include photographs, audio recordings, jewelry and other items. Finding primary sources can be exciting whether a student is searching electronically or actually examining the primary source.

The NARA website http://www.archives.gov/index.html is a valuable tool for finding primary source materials electronically. According to Dr. November’s book, this organization is an independent Federal agency that houses and manages all Federal records, and has developed a web site to provide public electronic access to thousands of documents. Some of the available links on this web site include military service records, World War II photos, genealogy databases, and historical documents such as the Declaration of Independence, Constitution of the United States, and the Bill of Rights. There are also links to the Federal Register, Presidential Libraries and Museums.

As a sixth grade Social Studies teacher, primary sources and the NARA website are exciting teaching tools. These teaching tools will help students to use their higher order thinking skill to critically analyze information. Using primary sources will help the students utilize research skills to learn more about their personal genealogy, their country, and the world. Primary sources can be used to teach main idea for Reading, writing exercises for grammar skills, statistics for math, and historical aspects for Social Studies. I will utilize primary sources and websites such as the NARA to provide my students with a higher order educational environment that promotes life long learning.

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Worst Fears and Best Hopes Blog # 8

Digital Natives

I was enlightened by several ideas as I read chapter three in Alan November’s book. I especially liked the idea of using an anonymous distant reviewer. This idea seemed to work well for the teacher from Britain when she collaborated with a teacher from Japan for insight about her student’s Haiku writing.

I have been striving to improve my technology skills so I will be able to meet the challenge of the “digital natives” that I teach. Chapter three made me realize that I have many challenges facing me because I am a true “digital immigrant” which causes me to have several fears.

Worst Fears

Shifting Control: I have always taught with a very structured classroom and maintained high expectations for my students. Shifting control to the students makes me afraid because many students may not stay motivated and expectations may be lowered.

Reverse Mentoring: Allowing students to take control and teach the “teacher” without the teacher losing credibility is very challenging.

Parent Collaboration: Many parents have the “what can I do?” attitude when a teacher discusses their child. Many parents also do not have technology access or knowledge which makes parent/teacher collaboration difficult.

Teacher Technology Skills: The lack of technology skills or technology knowledge of emerging technology can be very overwhelming.

Best Hopes

Shifting Control: I have begun to shift control with a small group of students in a gifted and talented class. These children are being allowed to have less structured lessons, encouraged to think critically, and allowed to design some of their own independent projects. My best hope is that this method will continue to encourage these students to take control of their future learning and set high expectations for their educational experiences.

Reverse Mentoring: Alan November had a wonderful example when he mentioned the reluctant student and how she had excelled with the handicapped project. Sometimes it is easy to be a reluctant learner even as a teacher. My best hope is that I will be able to learn from my students without feeling inadequate. Striving to be a lifelong learner will help with these feelings.

Parent Collaboration: Staying in touch with parents via e-mail or telephone calls will help. My best hope is that many parents will change their “what can I do?” attitude when they realize I only have their child’s best interest in mind. Hopefully this will help the students to take control of their own learning and achieve high expectation goals for themselves.

Teacher Technology Skills: Wishing you had the appropriate skills will not make them happen. A teacher has to initiate the educational learning for the skills to occur. My best hope is that I will be able to continually improve my skills whether it is from technology classes or utilizing reverse mentoring and learning from my students.

The skills I have learned from ETEC 524 are very valuable. I have always felt that my technology skills resembled a piece of Swiss cheese – full of holes. This class has helped close many of those holes with a solid filling of knowledge. These skills have lessened my fears for using technology for educational purposes. I hope and plan to use the technology skills I have learned from this class such as interactive Power Points, moviemaker, blogs, and wikis to enhance the learning of my current and future students in creative learning experiences.

I often strive to share my teaching expertise with my colleagues especially any seminar or workshop knowledge I may gain. I have been a mentor teacher of alternative certification interns for many years. As a good example of reverse mentoring, I probably learn more technology skills and new innovative learning activities from them than they learn from me in most cases.

I realize I have to do some “mental attitude” adjustments on myself in order to lay some of my technology fears to rest. I also need to use websites such as http://www.4teacher.com/ to enhance student learning. I will continue to use more critical thinking skills in my classrooms and encourage students to set high expectation goals for themselves. I will also attempt to use student reverse mentoring as empowerment over the wide gap between my “digital immigrant” skills and the “digital natives” in my classroom.

Digital Immigrant

Picture sources: http://cefnfforest.podomatic.com/2007-05-24T14_54_53-07_00.jpg

http://www.untangledlife.com/wibrary/wp-content/upload/nana%20technology_untangled%20life.jpg

Education Today and Tomorrow Blog 6 & 7

The video from Dr. Wickersham’s blog and chapter two of our textbook made me realize that I have a great deal of improving to do if I am going to reach the digital natives of today. I have always used a fax machine just to send information to another source so it never occurred to me to use the fax machine for communication or a teaching tool as discussed in Alan November’s book.

Distance education is allowing teachers and students to explore a new frontier. Video streaming, video-conferencing, and e-mails are a few of the forms I use for distance education. The advantages of these technologies include being able to enhance learning, give students a new perspective, experience a virtual field trip to places where they may never get to visit, and communicate with parents quickly. The disadvantages of distance education include the cost of video-conferencing and the fact that many parents may not have e-mail or access to computers or other technologies. Christy Turney told me about http://www.earthcam.com/. This is exciting to me. I found a world map which works well for my teaching assignment in sixth grade Social Studies. A person can click on a part of a world map, choose a country, and then focus on an area of the world and receive a “live” video. I am currently teaching about Australia. This website will allow me to take my students to Australia where they can view a live animal or some other aspect of Australian life. The fact that the feed is live may be a disadvantage because a teacher will not have control over what is viewed; therefore the site will have to be picked very carefully.

I have really enjoyed ETEC 524. I did not know how to blog, make a wiki, use moviemaker or Photo Story 3. I knew how to e-mail, use desktop publishing, and make Power Points - not interactive - so I really look forward to learning how which will allow me to make my teaching Power Points better.

I do have a disadvantage in my district. We only have one open lab and it has been closed to all non-TAKS teachers until TAKS is over because of Successmaker being used by the Reading and Math teachers. This is wonderful if it will make a difference in the success of children; however, it really makes it hard when a teacher wants to do a technology project with students and can not because the labs are not available. Since I also teach fifth and sixth grade gifted and talented students, I plan to have the students do a moviemaker project when the labs are available in May. I can only imagine how wonderful these will be since these students are truly digital natives.

In my vision of education I believe technology should be integrated in an educational setting that helps a student attain individual learning objectives and goals. I aspire to provide my students with a higher order educational environment that promotes life long learning so they will not become lost in the world of one way thinking.

Check out this video: Education Today and Tomorrow. I think it paints a great picture about why, as educators, we should be analyzing our teaching methods to meet the needs of student learning today and tomorrow.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fnh9q_cQcUE

Video Source: http://www.youtube.com/