Today in class we were introduced to the website called Teaching Channel. This website is a coming together of teaching related videos not wholly unlike Ted ed. This website is split in two main parts. There is the core section and then the specialty topics. The common core section focuses on teaching as a whole.
This is the main screen of navigation.
The first video I watched was called Discovering the Properties of Quadrilaterals. It focused on a class of high school students discovering what quadrilaterals were for the first time. Not only did it reveal a very well put together lesson plan it also revealed a way to make math hands on! The second video I watched in the common core section is called Grant Writing: Blending Literature and Community. This video shows how to blend a practical life experience(grant writing) into a bland old English class. My personal favorite video that I watched in the common core was the video called Do Now. The idea presented in this video is for a small beginning of the class assignment that reviews homework or previous class work as well as introduce the current days topics. This idea excites me because I can use this to review my flipped classroom assignment from the night before. I also explored two topics in my own major. The first series of movies that I watched were Called Reading Like a Historian. These were a series(or uncut like the link I posted) of films that taught you how to teach children the way to learn about history in the same way that historians learn about history. The second series that I watched is called Inquiry Based Teaching. This series focuses on teaching to the students needs as in teaching about questions they have.
Congrats you earned it.
Overall I found this website exciting! It really emphasizes being the best teacher that I can be. It gathers resources and ideas that I could spend a lifetime researching. Two thumbs up from this guy!
Flipped learning is defined on Grauer Shcool as the teacher’s lecture is delivered outside of the traditional class time, via a video students view on their own. The main idea of flipped learning is to be able to reach the students outside the classroom. This can be done by previously recording a lecture and posting it on the web. This idea focuses on the idea of spreading knowledge. I love this idea. I believe that knowledge should be spread to as many people as possible. No one can own knowledge, it is not private property, so why shouldn't we share it with everyone. This way more people in the world will be "enlightened." This TED video gives a more in depth look at the technical process of what it takes to develop a "flipped" lesson. This idea can also be applied directly to a classroom. In high school I participated in many sports or activities, and often times missed class due to travel for these. In a classroom if the teacher were to record their lecture and post it online those student, who like me, missed class could then go in and watch and learn. The only problem that I have encountered in my experiences with learning like this is dependence. I currently have a college class where attendance is not mandatory, and the teacher posts all of his lectures online. Now in an 8am poli si class this can and is taken advantage of. Students do not come to class and rely on the lectures to be online. Now this is all well in good if everything worked perfectly, unfortunately it never does. The professor could get sick or the his internet could go down or he/she could just get lazy.
As I did more research I have found Three more websites that really help to prepare teachers for flipping their classroom. On the website tech smith.com I learned that by being able to move lectures to outside the classroom and "homework" to inside the classroom I would be able to spend more one on one time with my students. ON eschool news I learned that the teacher still lectures but the lectures are supplemented by videos on the web. This allows the student access to more information. My favorite though is the video below. It shows the simplest way to start flipped learning. It also goes on to describe how class time can be better used if the traditional lecture is assigned as the homework.
In conclusion I believe that this idea of learning outside the classroom is brilliant. Not only does it allow for students who miss class to make up work it also allows anyone from worlds away to learn exactly what I am teaching in my classroom.
Where to begin. Well how about the end? Seems logical enough. In the end our group was able to come together and create a great presentation that I am sure will earn us fine marks. We presented our information in a well put together and informative manner.
A clever screen shot of google drive
Now...back to the beginning I hate group projects. Don't get me wrong I enjoyed everyone in my group and enjoyed the opportunity to socialize with my classmates, but group projects scare the Sh*@ out of me. You have to rely on, in my case, three other students who you ave never met to complete their work and do a good job on it. SCARY!!!!!! Now no one in my group slacked off and as I mentioned before and I am fairly confident we did alright on the project, but I am morally against group projects. The only redeeming quality of this group project was Google Drive. Not only is it a clever program it was also very useful. Drive was the one link in our group that never faltered.
In short I did enjoy the work we did on this project and especially enjoyed Google drive, but I would rather jump into quicksand cover in stinging bees than do group projects.
Me in front of a crowd
The presentation that we did at the end of this project I will admit was intimidating. I am told that I am usually a very good public speaker. The dirty truth is, I am the biggest scaredy cat when it comes to public speaking. So this was indeed a challenge, but I pulled through and feel as though I did very well. Here are some things I learned from the feedback of my classmates.
1) Stand up straight
2) Speak clearly
3) DO NOT fidget
4) Come prepared
5) Have fun!
Along with those I also used lifehack.org as a great reference for public speaking.
This group project presented some great challenges for me but I feel as though I came out the other side with a good grade and a more experienced young man. My only hope is that my teacher dose not assign any more group projects because I have bees and I know a guy who can hook me up with some quick sand at a good price.
In this project we were told to create a lesson that envolved the use of Power Point. So i set out to make a Geography lesson as fun as possible. This turned into an awfully difficult task, and half way through I saw horrible visions of my class full of student falling asleep while I lectured. Somehow I made to the other side though and have created what I think is a rather interesting and fun Power Point. Although this Power Point was much to time consuming to be practical for every day lessons I believe that if I were to supplement my lessons with little "games" like the one I created my students would be willing to participate in the class more. My initial thoughts as I began this project took me back to long hours sitting in my A.P. U.S. History class in high school. My teacher, who shall remain nameless for his or her own protection, stood infront of my class with powerpoint and lectured about the information on the slides. Yawn! It is impossible to count the number of students that fell asleep in that class due to how boring our teachers style of teaching was. So as I approached this project I was not excited, BUT the more I worked on my project the more I began to enjoy working on it. I believe that I have created a slide show that the students will find to be fun as well as one that they will be able to learn from. So in conclusion I still have a grave fear of Power Points putting my students to sleep but I also believe that with the right slide show the students will not only learn from the lesson but also have fun with it. So my general thoughts towards POwer Point are as follows: "eh."
I have found two more blogs to add to my blog roll. I felt the need to add blogs that included all my my interests in one. I didn't find any that could do that but, I did find some that included several of my interest. One Example is Politics K-12. This blog takes modern politics and focuses on how they affect kids in the classroom, hence k-12. In the article Obama Warns of Ed. Cuts, Touts Vision on K-12the blog describes President Obama's plan for the educational future of our country. As a Secondary Social studies major(with a minor in political science) I find this blog to combine a fair amount of politics and how they affect the educational setting. I will be continuing to follow this blog as I graduate and become a professional as it will show insite as to how policy makers affect my job. The second blog also combines two of my great passions, being a huge closet nerd, and being a huge closet nerd. This blog is called GeekAlerts. This blog informs the reader about up coming technological advancements. I feel that it is important to keep up with technology because it will help me each in the future.
The video below is of a well respected English literature professor. He explains the positives of using technology in the classroom. Be warned he is British.
The real question I have right now is if the name for my blog is appropriate. I named it after The giant statue of a high-land warrior on my college campus affectionatly name Angus. Let me know if it works for you!
As I approached this class I assumed I would be working more with computers and smartboards. I had this false sense of knowing for two reasons. One my high school had those laptops and smartboards so I assumed that is where technology in the class stopped. Two, I didn't read the class description which I am sure shed more light into this class. Now that I am in this class I find that we are to use blogs and twitter to enhance my education. I personally have one blog already but, I use that as a way to anonimouisly berate politicians and until this point have refused to even consider using Twitter. So I approach these ideas with optimistic caution. I had one teacher who tried to use a blog in my high school English class, he failed miserably. To his credit he tried and for the first month he did very well but, we as a class could not grasp the idea of it. So with a mask of confidence I will leap into the ocean of ideas that this class offers. Though I truthfully would rather wade in wearing water wings.
Today in class we were introduced to the website called Teaching Channel. This website is a coming together of teaching related videos not wholly unlike Ted ed. This website is split in two main parts. There is the core section and then the specialty topics. The common core section focuses on teaching as a whole. 
Flipped learning is defined on Grauer Shcool as the teacher’s lecture is delivered outside of the traditional class time, via a video students view on their own. The main idea of flipped learning is to be able to reach the students outside the classroom. This can be done by previously recording a lecture and posting it on the web. This idea focuses on the idea of spreading knowledge. I love this idea. I believe that knowledge should be spread to as many people as possible. No one can own knowledge, it is not private property, so why shouldn't we share it with everyone. This way more people in the world will be "enlightened." This TED video gives a more in depth look at the technical process of what it takes to develop a "flipped" lesson. This idea can also be applied directly to a classroom. In high school I participated in many sports or activities, and often times missed class due to travel for these. In a classroom if the teacher were to record their lecture and post it online those student, who like me, missed class could then go in and watch and learn. The only problem that I have encountered in my experiences with learning like this is dependence. I currently have a college class where attendance is not mandatory, and the teacher posts all of his lectures online. Now in an 8am poli si class this can and is taken advantage of. Students do not come to class and rely on the lectures to be online. Now this is all well in good if everything worked perfectly, unfortunately it never does. The professor could get sick or the his internet could go down or he/she could just get lazy. 
