Polarization of America and Web 2.0

Polarization of America and Web 2.0


I tend to socialize with people that think like I do and online I connect to people that have the same interests. My son tends to connect with gamers that like Halo and they will lead him to other similar gamers. When connecting to RSS feeds, Blogs, and social networks I keep the connections that agree with my ideas and eliminate the connections that don’t agree therefore I am only reading what I agree with. This reinforces what I already know and creates a situation that could cause me to become even more extreme in my thinking without ever looking at the opposite point of view. When I read a news paper I tend to read both points of view. I need to think critically and make a conscious effort to look at both sides of the story, but how many other people will not realize this. I am concerned about America and I suspect that Web. 2.0 contributes to the polarization of America.

Learning then and now

Thing 3 is about how thinking and learning has changed. As a young child in school I was to stay in my seat and only answer questions when called on. I was given paper tests and the grades were posted. Later I worked a job that had a specific set of directions that I followed daily.


Today, my students will be entering a world where they will have to work collaboratively with each other. My students will work in a competitive world with limited resources. They will be expected to have a good work ethic. Despite having great skills they will change occupations several times during their lifetime. My student’s will be employed in jobs that do not exist yet.


I need to teach my students good work ethics, communications skills and to be flexible. They need to be self motivated learners and the working environment is changing exponentially now. The students I am looking at in the classroom are self absorbed, focused on texting their friends and they do the minimum amount of work possible to pass class. How do I engage them?

Thing 2 November 2009, I am reading more blogs these days because they are on my I-google page in my google reader. This has made my favorite Blogs very accessible. I am starting to sort through the blog feeds that I have created to find the most informative and only keeping those that I read. I am still uncomfortable with making my writing public because I don't think of my self as a good writer.

Thing 21

Thing 21
Earlier today, I decided my hair was too long and I was noticing how nice a layered hair cut looked on other woman. I typed into Google "layered hair cut how to" it pulled up a utube video that was wonderful. I checked out a few other videos and grabbed the comb and scissors. I look fabulous and saved money and I am wondering what else I can find on utube.

I am already using utube to find explanations for tough math concepts. Then I teach the concepts using the info that I gleaned from the videos. Utube is blocked in Bedford, but we have been given instructions on how to download at home and play it.

These are the instructions...maybe they will work for you.
http://teacherweb.com/MI/Bedford/earl/downloadingvideos.pdf

The teacher across the hall uses this and it works. So I will try it this week and report back.

Thing 11

Thing 11 and yes the "things" are out of order, but I could not get the sound to work on the slide share site. Truth be told--it still isn't working but I felt the need to move on. So here is the first problem, and it is technical--The sound may not work! What if they remove the slide show and you have it in your Blog. What if you were planning on using the slide show in a presentation to your class and it disappeared. What if you had students creating slide shares and the students included something inappropriate or stole copyrighted information and now they are on a public site. Lots to think about.

Exponents

Powers and Exponents

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Thing 17

I like having a Wiki because it is the cool thing to have right not, but I don't have a way to use it in my classes...yet. I am fascinated when my daughter logs into her English teacher's Wiki to get assignments and information. I would love to do something like that, but it is easier if you are an English teacher and I am a math teacher......

Perhaps I could do a problem of the day and have the students reply with possible answers--then I would do the problem in class and give extra credit to the students that logged answers. That would give the students an opportunity to learn about Wiki's and spend some extra time working on math. But the first student that answered the problem would record the answer on the page and inform the other students of the answer. Maybe they could email the answer, but that would defeat the purpose of the Wiki ---the ability to edit/add information. I could just use a blog for informing the students of the problem of the day. Perhaps I could create a problem that the students would need to ask for more information to solve. Let me think about this......

thing 13

Thing 13- I would love to share my photos with you but they are still not showing up. I took a picture of my pure white cat and inverted the colors. My daughter was looking at the resulting photo and asked when I took the picture of Raven (a black cat we used to have)? I was able to use Dumpr to create a pencil drawing of my cat and it is beautiful. I thought It would look goofy-but is looks real. I hope you are able to see the pictures soon. 

I still am not sure how I can use the photos in my math class, except to personalize the class. 

Thing 12 - I am still brainstorming about how to use photos in a math class at the secondary level. But I can tell you how invaluable photos were in teaching writing to disabled students. I had my daughter climb a tree and took photos every minute-showing her problem solving while she was climbing. I took the 8 or 10 photos and posted them in my classroom. The students that previously stuggled with writing sentences were able to create stories using the photos. The students told me what was happening in each picture and then they wrote what was happening in each picture . Last, we connected the paragraphs and each student had formed their own stories. Instant success for students that had experienced failure in the area of writing.  

Thing 8 - I have the perfect example of why delicious is important. My computer aquired a virus and became unusable -I had been saving my passwords in a file on the desktop and bookmarking sites-I lost all of my passwords and that delayed me until I could figure them out, but what stopped me from progress in this class was the loss of the website addresses. 

I was able to locate info from emails and connections but it took time. I am looking forward to having all important site addresses easily accessable and when I am describing a great website; I can also show them instead of having to search for it or tell them I will email it to them. 

Thing 5 - I am part of Web 2.0 and I didn't realize it! I search the product reviews and I read reviews on books and music before I buy them. I even review products. I check on the reviews of hotels. I read travel reviews on locations I might visit. I read all the reviews and form an opinion using the info that ordinary people write-not the corporate info. 

I am part of the information age-Web 2.0- I need my students to do the same thing. I need to expand it to all areas of my life and use these same skills in educationing my students. I did use teacher reviews to help choose a text book but I need to go further. I need to locate the best teaching methods and best teaching lessons. Then I need to become part of the process of evaluating lessons and sharing information. 

Thing 4---I am a lifelong learner--but have I inspired my students to become lifelong learners?  I know that most of my students can't wait to get out of school. Most of my students have experienced failure in school and would rather eat worms than read a book. The students do love the computers and are fairly adept at locating information on them. 

I had a bit of success when I required the students to visit websites that contained the math concepts that I was teaching, but they wandered and often ended up on myspace. Then the parents would ban the students from using the computers. I never worked out a perfect solution but I made gains. 

People who smile -the warm kind of smile that includes the eyes- "have less anxiety, fear sadness, pain and despair in their lives... They reported feeling more connected to those around them. The smile helps trigger greater trust and intimacy." according to Dacher Keltner in his recent book Born to Be Good. This is so true in the classroom. My first hour never smiles and it is such an effort to get through the class period. The rest of my classes do smile and they are a joy to teach. I try to smile even when I don't feel like it and it makes a difference in the attitude of the room.