Week 10: Organization and Conference

CFY is an organization I have volunteered for many times. I got involved when my wife was trying to look for a job in the educational field and a friend told her about it. I did not know what I was getting into when I signed up for their upcoming event. When we arrived we were greeted by one of the events organizers who was very cheerful and friendly. After the introduction I was in for the long run. I thought to myself, this is something I would enjoy spending my weekends on.
So what is CFY? This is an insert from their web site at http://cfy.org/
"CFY is a national nonprofit organization that helps students, teachers, and parents use digital learning to improve educational outcomes." Video http://vimeo.com/49477789
As a volunteered, I was able to be an assistant to one of the presenters and helped with the informational and computer set up process. I worked directly with the parents and student. This organization not only helps students and parents learn and interact with technology, but also provides every single student who attends the workshop with a computer, which they are able to take home. The presenters encourage student parent interactions throughout the workshop and it is a joy observing parents and students communicate and learn together.

 I have heard many teacher talk about CUE and it has piqued my interest enough to want to attend to one of their conferences. Many of the teachers who have attended the conferences raved about the many workshops, educational technology innovations, and the many freebees they acquire.
CUE's Mission and Vision from http://cue.org/

CUE inspires innovative learners by fostering community, personalizing learning, infusing technology, developing leadership, and advocating educational opportunities for all. 

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                                       A community inspiring innovative learners

Week 9: Independent Class

This week we are working on our Organization Review. I have so many things going on but I’m glad things are coming to an end for this quarter atleast.

Week 8: Theory Presentation

Our Information Processing presentation is finally here. I’m not a great public speaker but I have gotten better. My group members are really good and I lucky to be presenting with them. All though we practiced I don’t feel ready, I tend to forget things and tend to hide by using the presentation slides too much.

Our presentation went well. I need to stop reading of the powerpoint slides. Learning about the Information Processing Theory was very interesting. Finding methods in which my students and I can retrieve information to use in our learning will com in handy for our futures.

Week 7: Veteran's Day

Having a week off should be productive but all I can do is stare at my laptop and want to do something else. I’m going to spend some time with my daughter and will have lunch with friends and family. Maybe I’ll catch up with some HW later!

Week 6: Theory Research-- Work in progress...

This has been a busy week. I started my research on our group theory presentation. I am learning a lot of new things and many of these practices that I’m learning about will be useful in my class. I have two great group members and they are very cooperative and understanding. Our ways of communication through email, texting, and Google docs has been a positive experience.

Week 5: Adobe Connect

There are so many ways in which we are able to communicate face to face if I can put it that way. I find it fascinating that we could be at the beach or in the middle of your living room, and as long as you have a good wifi signal, we can have a meeting with family members, coworkers, friends, and class mates. Adobe Connect was a good experience for me. We were able to have discussions and things ran smoothly compared to Moodle Chat. I find that Adobe Connect has many options to communicate successful. I found that the little icons that facilitated discussion were funny and useful. I would definitely will use adobe connect for web meetings, eLearning, or webinars in the future.

Week Four--Presentations

Learning about the many tools that our class mates research was a great experience. There are so may tools that we have access to. Prezi was my favorite, it is just a different way of using power pint. I almost seems that it is non-linear. Moodle chat provided immediate feed back on our presentations and that made the whole event exciting. Commenting and reading people's comments was like being in the middle of the class at times I forgot that I was sitting in the dinning room.

Week three--Moodle Chat and Youtube Video

Moodle Chat and Youtube Video

Chatting with my class mates and professor on like was not something I pictured my self doing, so when I went through it I had mix feeling about it. I did not know what to expect but it ended being a great experience over all. It had it downs with the slow network and kicking us out but the conversations moved on.
Web 2.0 was something I've used without knowing what it was called. Learning about it was very interesting. There are many tools I use to collaborate with coworkers. One of my favorites is Dropbox. This tool allows us to collaborate and edit documents that are written for our classroom like lesson plans, assessments, and many other things. I love the way technology has made it easy for all of to communicate and collaborate. Google documents is another tool I use a lot with my colleges and students.
The video we so on Youtube about technology was very eyeopening. We don't really think about how technology affects the people around the world. Living in the US is a wonderful thing because we have so many resources that we take advantage of. We own smart phones and  computers that the cost can support a whole family in a third world country for a year, but we don't put much thought to it. The video also cautions us towards the ethical use of technology and how it can get out of hand if we don't use it properly.

Week Two--Educational Technology Theory

Educational Technology Theory

“Technology is just a tool. In terms of getting the kids working together and motivating them, the teacher is most important.” – Bill Gates

I would like to think that our fascination with technology started when modern men invented the wheel. Knowing that things could be done easily by using tools was such an event that has not stopped ever since. According to Wikipedia “The theory of educational technology can be grouped into three main theoretical schools or philosophical frameworks: behaviorism, cognitivism and constructivism.”

            The great pioneers of behaviorism pave the way in which we view human learning. These theories and views have benefitted educator around the world and have helped us to develop effective learning systems. As an educator I believe the in order to create effective technological learning models we how our behavior will be affected by the implementations of it.

            The cognitivism aspect of educational technology is an important par of learning and it is empirical to know how we react towards leaning psychologically. An important part or educational technology is media, and processing this media can be used to study our cognitive behaviors.

            As my role of a facilitator, constructivism will allow me to build learning models that will take advantage of learners’ previous knowledge. I believe that in order to have a meaningful learning experience learners should interact with the tools in hand and using these tools should not cause a struggle. A quote use by A Hypertext history of Instructional Design sites Vannever Bush “There should be a tool that would enhance human memory and thinking and that allows people to retrieve information from a computer in many of the same ways in which retrieval is accomplished within human memory.

 http://www.ps.unisb.de/~duchier/pub/vbush/vbush.shtml

References

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Educational_technology

http://faculty.coe.uh.edu/smcneil/cuin6373/idhistory/1940.html”

Week One--Introduction

If we teach today’s students as we taught yesterday’s, we rob them of tomorrow.

John Dewey

Hello World!

My name is Antonio and I’m a second grade teacher. As an educator I believe that learning and modifying your approach continuously towards teaching to find the best ways to relate material to your students is important.  Today’s world is constantly influenced by technology and I believe the proper use of technology will be the foundation towards creating a socially and morally conscious society.  I believe that this masters degree in educational technology will allow me prepare and improve my educational strategies which so that I can implement them in my classroom and share with my colleagues.