Digital Footprints

"We're failing to empower kids to use one of the most important technologies for learning that we've ever had." As a student, I feel that many of my teachers are truly neglecting to teach me and my fellow classmates about the true dangers and hazards of using technology. Many teachers are just sitting back and letting us explore while we may be getting ourselves associated with things that we shouldn't get associated with.
"Challenges educators face right now is figuring out how to help students create, navigate, and grow." This quote appeals to me as an educator becuase I feel that it is bacically giving me the complete understanding of what needs to be done for the children. This quote truly deciphers what we need to be doing for the students and how they need to be walked through the dangers and hazards.

2 Million Minutes Video

The main difference between the schools in India and China and the schools here in the U.S. is the students. Most of the students here in the U.S. do not completely assert themselves in everything they do. The only way that a child in India or China can get out of the country or move up the ladder is to achieve a higher education. The parents also have a large position in the influence of the children and their work because the parents in other countries tend to push the children more than that of the parents here in the U.S. The culture influences the students decision because if the students do not do well in school, they do not go anywhere in the culture.
I believe that the United States school system is the best system in my opinion. While the other countries school systems are exceptional, the U.S. school system provides more opportunities to vary your interests. With the number of electives and numerous top undergraduate schools for specific majors allow many different students the opportunity to achieve the same degree. The schools in China are strict to the basics and are advanced in all of the basics. China does not provide many different schools for one profession, however, the students tend to specialize in specific areas.

Boolify

Ben Rimes posted a blog called "Give the people what they want" on November 10th, 2008, about a tool that aids in using search engines. This tool helps teachers of the younger ages to teach kids how to safely search the web. This tool is very beneficial because it teaches students how to search safely and effectively to get what you want out of your results.

clipped from www.google.com I’ve had trouble over the past few years putting together a really good lesson about using search engines would be an understatement. credit has to go to closure_hashCode_="223">Boolify, an amazing visual search engine that uses the concept of interlocking puzzle pieces as a metaphor for creating Boolean web searches.

Nuclear weapons and Clauses

Ben Rimes posted a blog on November 6th, 2008, about companies placing a clause about creating nuclear weapons at the end of the user agreements to protect themselves. Recently Apple has added the clause to the end of their user agreement to protect themselves from any person using ITunes to create nuclear weapons. As Rimes states, it would be interesting to see how a teenager reacts when you tell them that they can launch a weapon from their IPod.

clipped from www.google.com tell a teenager that Apple is concerned they may use their iPod to launch World War 3 Apparently, many companies include what the Freakoonmics post calls the “nuclear clauses” in their End User License Agreements; you know, those long, boring documents you have to scroll down through before installing a new piece of software.

Sound factory

This game sounds like a lot of fun and is very educational by providing students with the ability to make music by having fun. Like many internet education games, it is very addicting, however, makes learning fun.

clipped from www.google.com The beauty of target=_blank closure_hashCode_="1110">Sound Factory is that it’s a relatively simple music game for beginners, and then ramps its difficulty up considerably so that it doesn’t feel like a walk in the park . I’ve found that many gamers students will often blow through games and activities that don’t provide a challenge.

Wordle- Animoto for words.

clipped from www.google.com closure_hashCode_="1087">Wordle, the website that does for text what Animoto does for images; makes them pretty. Wordle works by analyzing the text you give it, and then creates a cloud of words based on the frequency of the individual words.

Animoto Video

This is a video about Hunting. I chose to put pictures about the animals I hunt and eat. Enjoy and some are actual animals that I have killed and gotten stuffed.

http://animoto.com/play/KCmvyz0WTxutToBnD4jtiA

Learning Democracy

In the blog "Civics Lessons Beyond the Election" by Ben Rimes, he discusses how he used the election to inform his fourth graders on the democratic form. By using the free civics website, American Epic, he taught the students how to go beyond voting. Mr. Rimes allows the kids to visit the site and watches them as they make democratic decisions for running a small school in history and other civics lessons. This site also allows the kids to make movies about the Core Democratic Values and also has many offline options in forms of notebooks and comics.