Blog Post 10

Today I will be giving my reaction to a few videos done by Kathy Cassidy. She covers a wide range of topics that we can definitely learn from.

In the first video Little Kids...Big Potential, we follow her class around and observe some of the tools they use on a daily basis. First up we see how much the students love to write on their class blog. They really seemed to enjoy when they got comments on their work from people they knew. Like what Anthony Capps said the other day, these kids really like to have the big brother and sister technology offers them. They think it is awesome that their mom, aunt, brother, and so on can see what they do on a daily basis during class. It makes them work harder knowing that this will be displayed on the web for all these people to see. It is also really cool that the parents and guardians have the privilege to stay up to date on their kid's school life. They also use Wiki to seek out information. The said they did not know what the word ritual meant so they went on this website and asked other people around the world to help them out. They got back a bunch of responses and some even gave them some of their rituals. Since they went through they did all this research, I feel confident they will very much retain the definitions. If you just wrote the definition of ritual on the board, they would have forgotten it by dinner that night.

Next we go to the first part of an interview with Ms. Cassidy conducted by Dr. Strange. They talk about some of the cool and interesting ways that technology has changed her classroom. She says that she has been using tech in her classroom for ten years. They started out with some brand of computer I have never heard of. I thought it was telling of her drive as a teacher when she sat out to make her class interesting by using these new devices. She did not just say "Yeah new stuff!" then let the things gather dust. She had the drive and the passion to learn some stuff she was unfamiliar with. She likes us ,when we first entered this class, had to work very hard to learn how to blog and make web pages. Another common thread I have noticed with all the kids in this video and others is that they really work hard when they know something is going on the blog. I very much look forward to doing a blog for my classroom. It seems to be to good of a tool to ignore.

Right of the bat in the second part of the interview, Cassidy said something that really hits home with me. She said she was unusual because she did not use social media much in her personal life but she knows that is not an option with her teaching job. I like her do not care for using social media in my personal life. I have never been interested in opening a Facebook or Instagram account. I like to talk and converse with people face to face. Having a personal connection is important to me. However, even I cannot not ignore the many perks using these tools could have on my classroom. I had a twitter account before entering EDM 310. I help run a website dedicated to keeping people up to date on the upcoming movie news and twitter really helps with that endeavor. So I guess I could take that same plan and apply it to a classroom. One of these days I will get off my high horse and open up some more social media accounts.

In part three she takes a few questions from some of Dr. Strange's students. The first student ask her how many times a week she has the kids blog. Her answer was that it really depends. Since her class at the time was smaller they just do it one or two times a week. So basically these kids blog as much as I do. What are they like eight years old? So give another point to students of today over me. Another student ask a question about concerns with cheating. I thought her answer was really awesome. She says that the classroom of today is going to more collaborative than it has been. We as teachers must be more creative in our assignments and how we go about giving grades.

I really enjoyed watching these videos and interviews. It shed some lights on things I have had questions on or never thought of.