Thing 10

Picture taken by Felix Idan.

I like Flickr, but for a math teacher I really don't see that many uses. I checked out the Fascinating Flickr Assignment to Teach Math blog, but I really didn't see much of a use for it in math unless it is being used for geometry. We haven't done many projects this year in my class, because we have been so testing-oriented. Once testing is over, I think I might use Flickr for a project on Geometry and to introduce Creative Commons and posting attributions. I could probably have students create a slide show or a presentation showing difference 2D and 3D shapes. Then the could lable the parts of each shape on the picture.

On a personal note, I love the idea of saving all of our family photos on Flickr. This could be used to educate my children about their family history. Plus, there are things in photos, other than people, that can help students learn how to use the context clues in the photos to help date them.

When it comes to math, I can't think of many uses, but for other subjects I can. When studying other countries, students can find pictures of other countries. Language Arts teachers could post a picture and that could be their students writing prompt. Each student could have a blog, be required to post the picture (with its atribute) and then thier journal entry. In Life Science, students could have pictures of bones and use those to create a slide show to describe a part of the body or a system from a body. The ideas could go on...I just wish I had more math ideas.

Thing 9

Probably the only reason why I have noticed the creative commons symbol on websites this year is because I took a class that Caroline taught at the beginning of this year, where she briefly explained what it was. If it were not for that class, I would have never noticed it. I don't think students would notice it, nor do I think they would care once they found out what it meant. I think the new CC rules would definitely effect students more if they were following the old rules. Plagiarism is a big deal, but it is not treated as such. Language Arts teachers teach a lesson on plagiarism every year. When we write papers in my math class, we discuss plagiarism and references. Still, every year we have students that plagiarize in some form or fashion. I have had students "borrow" paragraphs from five different papers and combine them to be their own paper. I have had students print out pictures and paragraphs from the internet and glue them to a poster board and turn it in for a project. I've even had a parent tell a student to glue those pictures and paragraphs to the poster. Students just don't seem to care and I feel it is because there are no consequences and they just don't understand the point.

Though all this complaining, I have come up with an assignment that I think might help students "get it" when it comes to plagiarism. Have students walk around the school with a purpose of taking pictures for a specific "fake" project. The fake project is to help them understand why we have copy write. Have all students take a specific number of pictures, but tell a trusted few students to only take one or two. For this to work, your "trusted students" can't be your high-achievers who always put forth 110%. The trusted students need to be students who you can tell to only take one or two pictures and won't tell the other students that you told them to do it. Download all of the pictures to the same folder and then tell the students to find the pictures to do their assignments. Most students will use their own, but then tell the students who only took one or two to use any pictures and as many as they want. When the projects are turned in, let the students display them, and lead a discussion about what is the same what's different. Ask "How many pictures did you take?" and "Is it fair to use the other students pictures?" To me this would open the door.

I do use digital images, videos, etc. from the web in my classroom. Eventually, I want to lean how to tap my lessons, or a short overview of the lesson, and post that on my wiki for students to view. That's about as far as I would feel comfortable sharing on the web. I'm fine with sharing academic material on the web, but not personal pictures and such. The materials I create I own and I won't care if other teachers edited what I had created. When it comes to personal pictures, I wouldn't want to share those and give people license to edit those. If I can't have the final say over what gets published, then I can't control how those pictures are changed. In fact, even with a copyright, I can't control what happens to that pictures. There will always be rules and laws and there will always be rule breakers and law breakers. Once something is out on the web, I don't think you can ever really delete it. You can't un-ring a bell.

A Sharing Habbit

I have definitely created a reading habit, but I have also created a sharing habit. Whenever my reader helps me find a gem of an idea to use or that one of my colleagues can use, I share it. I probably email at least one person a day from my reader to share with them a blog or a website or an idea that the reader has found for me. I get a lot of thank yous for doing this, but what I would really like is for someone to actually use one of the things I send them and then let me see the results. A lot of the items I email are the types of sites and programs that as a math teacher I will never get a chance to use. For instance, I sent a student teacher at our school who is teaching about mythology a web version of a Myth and Legend Story Maker. It sounded like she liked the idea, but I haven't heard anything since. I sent our Scope teacher, who I knew was doing some project which involved picture taking and collages a link to Photovisi. Again, found by the reader. I haven't received any negative feedback, but a little more positive feedback would be nice.

Thing 5

I have really enjoyed finding this new way to get so much information. I never new there was such a thing as an RSS. I have even found stuff and shared them with other teachers around our school. For instance, next week is Read Across America for Dr. Seuss's birthday and one of the blogs entered into my reader sent me essentially a version of Read Across the Planet. So, I sent that to our librarian because she does a lot with Read Across America. Then, my reader found a Young Scientist Challenge and I emailed that to two science teachers who I thought would use it.

My favorite blog that I have found using my reader is Kim's Ventures in Educational Technology. I don't think it is so much how she writes, but what her topic choices are. Her topics that I have read include:

• What is your six word inagural address? - I thought this would be a great assignment to see what stuents would write. I would have them write their 6 word address and then write an essay about why they chose those words.
• Teacher Uses Webcam to Deliver Lessons - This is something I would love to be able to do. Plus, our county has been planning in case of an flu epidemic. Using a Webcam would be a great way to deliver the lessons.
  

Thing 3

2009 Student Blogging Challenge

I don't know much about it yet or how I'm even going to use it in my classroom, but I signed up for it anyway. Apparently, there was a 2008 Blogging Challenge created (I think) by a teacher in Tasmania, Australia and the 2009 Blogging Challenge is an extension of that. The 2009 Blogging Challenge connects students and teachers from all over the world. Each teacher has their own blog and then each student can have their own blog or they can use a "class blog," which is basically a blog that multiple students in the class uses.

The Student Blogging Challenge strives to:

• Connect students from around the world,
• Give students a network of internet pen pals,
• Integrate technology into the curriculum
• Share customs from around the world
• Discuss curriculum topics and tips,
• and much, much more.

Each week an "Activity" will be posted. A pre-challenge activity has already been added.