520 wk 3

Well I found some great stuff this week. My blog was flagged for spam and I almost lost this account. I don't know how but that almost happened. The part of this week I enjoyed the most was the 280slides review. This tool is great! I used empressr before and it did not do what I wanted, but 280slides did. I could actually upload a ppt and make it available online. This means I can work with my familiar power point and then share it through 280slides. Also I enjoyed looking at google for educators. There is not much there for a person that teaches automechanics and collision repair but I still found it useful. I have enjoyed working with these different tools and I hope that I can keep track of them all. If I am able to incorporate these things into my teaching and my life I will be much more effective and efficient!

520 wk 2

Well summer is coming and I am excited! I always seem happier when the weather gets nice. So far I have enjoyed this class and I have appreciated the assignments. I enjoyed the internet based learning assignment because I found a lot of great articles in support of it. I think that what we are doing in this program is very useful for our profession. I want to be a leader in my school and a good example of a technology literate teacher. These articles would be good ammo for a budget, faculty, or school board meeting in order to support educational technology. I have always been in support of using the internet for teaching and I go as far as using youtube in many of my classes to show videos and google images for pictures. I could not be as effective or interesting without the support of technology. Not to mention all of the good ideas I get from the web. I was not all that suprised to also find articles about people and teachers that do not support educational technology and do not use any either. I hope to change the minds of those people in my school and keep growing in my "techKnowledgeY"

520 wk 1

This course has started off pretty well. I missed most of the first class because I was attending an awards dinner with my students. I did catch the end and was able to get a pretty good picture of the assignments for this week. The focus on evaluating internet resources is a great activity. Using the forms provided in the wiki and creating my own really allowed me some time to think about how I evaluate web information. These tools will be very useful when assigning course work that students can use the internet as a resource. Many people may not be aware when they are doing internet research that some sites have a bias or an agenda that skews the information they provide. These types of influences can prevent students from doing effective internet research. It is the same as when we used books and magazines as our only sources. If I was writing a paper on gun control, the NRA would definitely have something to say, and their information may be valid, but you can bet that it will have a pro-gun slant. Being able to determine the validity of the source is important no matter what type of media you are using.