Teacher Productivity Using Technology in The Classroom

Technology helps both teachers and students be more productive in teaching and learning respectively. Digital classroom management reduce any disorder or chaos among students while they are learning. Using technology, teachers have better grasp of the learning environment. They can save time doing many teaching activities. As a prospective teacher, I will use the teaching technology tools I experimented with in this class and the ones I learned from my peers to create an engaging learning environment.

Technology is a valuable tool for teaching differentiation. Students stay engaged with learning when they are not overwhelmed with knowledge that they can't keep absorb or they don't have a pre-requisite knowledge to learn learning target. Computers allow students to learn at their pace, therefore an engaging learning environment. Having a variety of hardware such as Desktop stations, Labtops, Tablets and students phones with some type of monitoring will enhance students learning as seen in the video 210 Seconds: 2nd graders Set Up 25 Nexus Tablets in 3 minutes. Students can rotate every 25 from one station to another can keep them focused on learning. 

Technology . 

Teachers can monitor their students progress using detailed data driven technology. Instead of walking  up to the student station to see wether he or she is doing her work, teachers can observe his students using classroom management system. It is one piece of software that control all the hardware made available to students for learning.

As a prospective teacher, I plan to use the mentioned hardware and technology tools to get students ready for a challenging  workplace. My students will migrate from pen and pencil to using technology tools such as Gmail. It will be my communication means with students. They can ask me questions about their homework or provide guidance to their learning any time of the day. Through Gmail, I can keep the parents informed about my students learning. Google Forms will help me avoid the cluster of paper on my desk. I  will use google templates form that will be distributed digitally to students for their assignment. My future students will have access to a shared google drive where they can have access to previous lesson presentations, project based learning assignment and homework assignments. As Jake Miller Jake Miller mentioned to encourage students use voice typing in google docs, is another presented by technology to engage students with their learning.

In addition to the above tools, in my future classroom, I will use Rescuetime that I have just discovered in the presented article 5 Tools for Increasing Teacher Productivity. Rescuetime provide a solution for my time management inside the classroom. It will allow me to avoid any distraction and it will track the time I spend on each task in the classroom.

Summary of Learning

                     

I used Utellstory for my summary of learning to relate my experiences in this class. Utell story allowed me to use text, audio and video to present my summary of learning. I chose it because all the mentioned features are integrated in on technology tool. All my biggest take away from this class are presented in the presentation using Utellstory.

http://www.utellstory.com/viewstory/view/3a7e668d97157083a1bdff306a687dab#

My digital Classroom : Blended Teaching

                                              My digital Classroom : Blended Teaching

Blending traditional and digital teaching requires careful planning. Lesson plans should include a variety of methods of teaching to engage students in learning. Then, As a prospective teacher, a series of questions should be asked while planning for blended teaching. When a math teacher should choose the right pedagogy of teaching a combination of traditional and online teaching ? How will I use blended teaching? What tool will I use to enforce my blended teaching?

In my digital classroom, blended teaching will allow me to better my relationship with my students. It is an opportunity to give my students ownership of their learning by changing the space, the time and the tools of their learning. At times, my students will learn partly online, afterward, they will discuss what they have learned in class. The teacher will have a chance to interact with his students as well as learners will collaborate with their peers in their group discussion sessions. In her video, Stacy Hawthorn mentioned the four models of blended learning: Rotating students model; we applied this model in this class when we formed with seats and tables a circular shape to encourage an engaged conversation in the classroom. The author of the video talked about flex models, self blended model and enriched virtual model. The models variety shows that blended learning could be implemented in various ways that will keep students engaged in their learning. 

In this class, the no face to face classes at various stages of my learning in this class of instructional technology applications is a testimony of blended room. I had the opportunity to read independently various articles and watch the videos that the teacher had selected for the corresponding learning target. Following the no face to face class, student met with the teacher to shed the light on what had been learned on learning management system Springboard. We had a lively discussions and reflections on the subject and more projection on the future reading. I believe blended learning in this class allowed me to ponder on my learning as well as advance learning at an acceptable pace.  

Our blended learning approach has been slightly ineffective in this class being not able to apply various models of blended learning due to the constraint of time. One semester is not enough to apply various ways of blended learning while in middle and high school schools teachers have ample of times to apply other models that were mentioned in the video. In addition, Students support to the blended learning model was limited with respect to a lively discussion on line by writing constructive comments on peers blogs. Therefore, students role in building the learning environment is important. However. I found some sporadic comments on certain blogs interesting to read. During blended learning in this class, small network communication channels were created that could be noticed in comments posted online. It was interesting to see how students choose to respond to some blogs but not to others and whether the decision making was based on the personal interests, cultural background or gender. 

As a prospective math teacher, I will use blended teaching when I see students need to work at their own pace. Math teacher who has to teach his kids how to solve one variable equation, need to investigate the students' previous knowledge. Some students still struggle with adding, subtracting, multiplying and dividing  like and opposite signed numbers. At this instance, the math teacher will personalize the teaching according to the students' learning need. Blended teaching will allow the teacher to differentiate his teaching until all students acquired the prerequisite knowledge to learn the concept of solving an equation with one variable.

Blended Learning Energizes High School Math Students (Tech2Learn Series

The above differentiated learning using blended learning will leads me to the most striking thing I took away from Stacy's Presentation. The teacher role in the defining dimensions of learning model and where I stand as a teacher, my role to lead and support the instruction and when I should let my students direct their own learning. The questions she raised are important while planning for blended teaching. The blended learning that is considered an instructional model will be designed at the unit or at curriculum level. Finally, the ability to tune in the parameters in the blended learning will allow the teacher to use blended teaching effectively.

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Digital Classroom: Gamification of Probability with Dice

                                                  Gamification of Statistics

Learning statistics through games help students engage with the content and solve math problems. Students who struggles with a bunch of axioms thrown at them to learn statistics need motivation through e-learning. Conditional probability is better introduced to students through games rather than applying a given formula. We will explore briefly the meaning of conditional probability, then we’ll investigate how Bayes rule is implemented in games.

Conditional probability states that during an experiment, there are specific condition in order for event A given that event B has occurred. A simple example is rolling a balanced dice twice where event A is the sum of the numbers is 7. Event B is both numbers are odd. The probability of A given B denoted P(A / B) = P(A n B) / P(B)

It is easier to understand this concept by illustrating a Venn Diagram.

Let’s see how the concept of conditional probability is used in a games such as Zombie Die. The player has 13 dice in a cylindrical container. He got to select and roll only 3 balanced dice. Note that the faces of each die contains either a Brain, Shot Gun blast or Runners. The colors of dice are distributed as follows:

6 green dice : { 3B, 1SG, 2R}

4yellow dice: { 2B, 2SG, 2R}

3red: {1B, 3SG, 2R}

The students will be asked the following question: What is the probability of getting a brain face given a red die?

P(R/B) = P(R n B) / P(B)

P(B/R) = [P(R/B) x P(R)] / P(B)

Students need to find the probability of having Brain face, the probability of having Red color, the probability of having Red color given a Brain face . Finally, they will be able  to solve the  probability of having a brain face given a red die. 

The teacher’s question is only one form to understand the conditional probability. Students can create their own questions to expand their knowledge of the learning target. The advantage of using this game is that students can work as a group of three or four students that will stimulate instructive communication. Dice games allow students to come up with variety of responses while playing a game while learning.

Assessment

Assessment is a teacher tool to measure the students mastery of learning target at various stages of learning. Assessment is part of the teacher's instructional design. Teacher rectifies any misalignment of learning when he gets feedback from his students learning through assessment types. However, assessment is not restricted only on how well a student acquire knowledge, the teacher obtains information for  making decisions about curricula, programs, schools and educational policy. Systematic procedures of assessment such as tests help gather observations and characteristics of students using numerical scales or classification scheme.After assessment, the teacher provides feedback to his students on their strengths and weaknesses, and how can they improve, for parents, the teacher provides the students guardians strength and weaknesses of their kids as well as what can they do to improve their kids learning. Finally assessment's feedback for the teacher on how well have students learned the contents? Have students achieved their short term goals? What misconceptions do students have and can the teacher adjust his instructional plan accordingly?

  

Formative assessment judge the quality of student's learning while still in the preocess of learning While summative assessment judge the quality of achievement after instructional process is completed. Rick Wormeli indicated the gray area that exists between the formative and summative assessment; A summative assessment can become a formative assessment when students have not reached the mastery level of the concept. On the other hand, fomative assessment can becom a summative assessment as well. His instructive critical feedback leans toward the bidirection between formative and summative assessment. In addition, I find his remarque interesting toward the teacher's design of assessment. It should be based on the classroom differentiated learning. In other words, the teacher should be able to tell from the descriptive feedback what each student need in his learning.

 Pear Deck is a tool that allow each student to connect to the teacher presentation. As the teacher asks questions, students answer the questions instantly. PearDeck technology display an instant colored tabular or diagram data that the teacher can use to base his next instruction. EduCanon technology allows students to view the material that the teacher presented to his learners. Students can view the video and answer the questions on the content of the video. EduCanon technology marks the lesson is complete when students finish viewing the video. Students can view all the lesson they have completed as shown in the following figure.  I think both viewed technologies facilitate the learning in terms of conversation between teacher and his students, engage students in learning and extend learning beyond the wall of the classroom. Students can learn at their convenient time.

It is interesting to observe a teacher communicating with his students about their learning. In this video,  The teacher's background is impressive. The progressive evolution in one's career can only enhance the student's learning. The teacher who always strive to be a better teacher is a sign of one's career success. This video doesn't only tackle concept of assessment but it shows how technology impact the learning in a positive way. The most impressive ideas I gathered from this presentation is how the technology used helped the teacher gather information about previous knowledge of his students about assessment types. It allowed him to find his teaching starting point. This stage is called the input in The learning cycle. The process of learning stage started when he presented the learning targets to his students. The consistent digital conversation that Mr scott have with his students gives him an instructive feedback to adjust his teaching. It is clear The role of technology and how it is important in the learning. The real time gathering of data and display of information on the screen helps somehow the teacher. 

This presentation will impact my learning in a positive way. I added to my arsenal of teaching tools Peack and Deck as well as educanon. They will enhance the instructive communication with my students. Eventhough, Peack and Deck feedback display will help me adjust my teaching during the presentation of learning targets, I questions the reliability and validity of the displayed feedback. Are there any error in the shown result? Is there a bias displaying information that will mislead the teacher before making any decision about his teaching? The technology tools feedback can not be the only resource of feedback gathering information, but it could be integrated to other sources to avoid any future errors in decision making about the learning.

Learning Space

   Learning spaces have an impact on students learning. Flexible learning spaces invite students mind to be receptive to new information. When Students feel comfortable in the their classrooom, they interact with their teacher better and they pay attention to the learning instructions. Students like to rearrange their tables and chairs to take advantage of their learning spaces. Their learning spaces change periodically according to their gist.  Some students prefer to sit by the window  to read silently  while others form a circle with their chairs to discuss a story they have just read as a class. Flexible learning spaces give students the desire to learn either as a group, inddpendently or one -on-one learning with the teacher. According to the article titled " Designing the 21st Century  K-12 Classroom" desks and furniture support collaboration among students and teacher-students. In sum, students enjoy learning when allowed to rearrage their own learning spaces.

Learning is not  limited in the vicinity of the walls of the classroom. It has extended everywhere due to virtual learning. Google Apps for Education allow students to accesss school material any time, anyday of the week and from anywhere as long as there is a connection to the internet. Through the redesign of the education, the students use the virtual learning spaces to connect with their peer and collaborate by sharing google documents, working on the same document using google doc or communicating with the teacher through Gmail.  The article " How Learning Environment are Changing" mentioned that learning is not restricted only in schools, but learning happens at homes and the community as well.  The virtual learning GAFE is a 21st century learning space, cloud based collaborative application platform. It gives students a wealth of information related to their academic in a virtual controlled environment. 

As we design learning spaces for the future, The teacher should plan the virtual learning space as well as the physical learning space in the classroom. Designing the virtual learning space consists of the use of GAFE and other technologies that fit the students needs in their learning. The teacher should decide what learning devices that could be integrated in the learning process. Another challenge is the time dedicated to virtual learning compared to group learning  in the classroom. The latter requires rearranging classroom in groups for students to tackle problem based learning activities. In the article Trends in Learning Spaces Design, the author mentioned three main  trends for learning space design. The first one, the prospective teacher should design space based on learning principles that should be based on social learning. Second trend is the human  centered design which is based not only on finding information but knowing how to apply the acquired knowledge . The third trend is devices that enrich learning as mentioned above.

The University  of Akron's learning space design evolves as technology changes rapidly. The technology department added more computer stations in the first floor of Bierce library.  To accomodate students needs, they made available laptops to AU students other devices such as video cameras. Tech help desk assist AU students who have either computer software or hardware problems. Study rooms in the library are equipped with technologies that allow students to work collaboratively. Most classrooms have computerized projectors and are connected with AU wi-fi. In summary, The new building such as zook hall, art and science building are state of the art buildings because they are equipped with modern techonology that advance students learning. On the other hand, The old buildings wait their turn to be renovated, therefore installing new technology that will help students progress in their learning.

My academics needs are partially fullfilled. I still think that the main library needs more space, especially more study rooms because between 11 am and 5 pm, many students can't find a study room available unless they reserve it ahead of time. On the positive side, The tech help desk helped me several times with most of issues that I frequented dealing with new technology apps.

Cool Tool Video Collage : Video Editor

                     
               
Video Collage App(Android) is an application that combine videos and pictures to create a memorable experience.  Video Collage Editor Video frames could be mixed with audio such as music files to revive images and videos to tell a story.

                        

The Video Collage Editor application occupy 28.74 MB memory in your Android. The reviews for this app were not promising. Few reviews complain about the length of the video is cut short to 15 seconds while others don't appreciate the adds tor adjusting the videos in the frame.

In spite off the mentioned reviews, I downloaded the Video Editor 3.2 for Android 4.1.  It is the latest version of this app. Video Collage Editor allows the user to choose from 50 available frames to make own videos. The user have complete control of his or her video by changing its size. In addition, one can add colors and patterns to the frames as well as adding effects to the photos. The latest version made modifications in picking images and made corrections in ads policy.

The challenge I found during the make of the video Collage is working with audio files on several platforms. The process of transferring audio files from windows to Android was a challenging one. Audio files worked on my Android phone but MP4 didn't work on  tablet.

The limitation of this video is the short time allowed to display the video collage. Students or their teacher will have hard time to convey their ideas in a fifteen seconds video. However, one can use more than one video in sequential order to get their point across.

As a prospective teacher, I will integrate the video collage presentations in my pedagogy of teaching along with the authentic teaching. Video Collage allows me to implement differentiated teaching instructions. Based on the interest of my students, I can select frames that will engage my students to learn math concepts. Students will be able to crate video measuring their favorite items. Boys who like football, can create videos measuring football field. Girls who collect dolls, can measure the height of their favorite doll. Learners can use videos about measurement to show other creative ways to measure an object or an area. Students will be able to share their presentation with other students. In this cas, The measurement concepts is accessible to students through video editor

This technology targets high levels of thinking. In  various activity type, Learners will " Consider", "Produce" and "create"  work that demonstrate math concept skill, learners will use either their comera to record their math activities, then display their work  using Video Collage. Students can also create their own tailored lesson and demonstrate various strategies regarding a specific learning target.

To access the following 15 seconds videos, Android platform is required.

                         

                                          


video shows how to make video collage on windows

A simple vision of a digital classroom

                                     1 A -  My Physical Classroom: Digital Mindset

My digital physical classroom is a physical space dedicated to both E-learning and traditional learning. Even though there is a contradiction between a virtual classroom and a physical classroom, I visualize an actual physical learning space that will include a digital space for students to connect to the outside world. One can argue that a student, from his assigned seat, with iPad, tablet, smart phone or a laptop can connect to anywhere in the world. It is true, however, my digital physical space will have desktops programmed with creative software that other devices don’t have. Therefore, I name my virtual classroom Spacecraft 2999.

A digital physical space dedicated to students in the classroom will give students the digital mindset to learn the 21stcentury skills, working on several, different platforms as well as learning the ethics of digital citizenship. My digital physical space will consists of several desktop equipped with VR tools. Students will work as groups in my space craft.  Students travel virtually to the outer space to search for concept that they learned in the classroom. Student will travel as groups and create an instructional communication around the learning topic. By changing the classroom environment, the mind is receptible to learning.

   

Secondly, my digital physical environment will include several station game types. It is a physical space for students to exercise their free time wisely. Students who finish their work little early can use their favorite play station. Whether it is an Xbox, DS or NES, the teacher can use it as a positive reinforcement tool or as a motivator for students to do their math work. In addition, play station often encourage teamwork. PlayStation -Edu teach students how to work with play station platforms, hardware and programming. My students will learn how to find solutions when stranded in their space ship. Accessing the development kit for PS2 and PSP will help students find solutions to Play station Hardware and Console for the game they love to play. The Space station corner classroom is an escape from math anxiety learning while learning problem solving skill, social skills.

The arrangement of desktops will take a circular shape. There will be a central desktop or the command center where a student who assume the leadership of his team will lead his team in various adventure manipulations. Students will have be assigned tasks related to the content studied in the designated grade level but tasks will take the shape of games to engage students with learning. Here, students mind set is transported to an adventurous learning area in a physical classroom.

In summary, It is important to dedicate a physical space for a digital classroom, it changes students mindset about learning. A student who moves from his assigned seat to another area of the classroom associated with games and play, attenuate the anxiety and stress of the many little obstacles that he confronts while learning new concepts. Finally, the teacher should take advantage of the classroom space to enhance his students learning in any way possible. 

Cool Tool Mind Map

I have chosen the Map mind tool. It is a diagram that serves as a mind organizer of concepts and ideas. It is a traditional, hierarchical method to map complex things in the mind. It shows how sub-ideas are connected to the main concept. Students can use the digital mind map as means for note taking either in the classroom or at home to organize the learning targets of a lesson as well as the structure of the lessons taught in the targeted curriculum.

Students can use mindmap in the classroom as teacher present the lesson to the students. Students will note only the main points of the lesson. Mindmap will allow the students to see the connection between cincepts presented in the classroom in a real time. In other words, digital mindmap enhance the students comprehension in the classroom. Students write down the main topic idea in the central image. Concepts of lower hierarchy branch out in various twigs. Looking at the whole picture, students can have a mind pictorial view of how ideas are connected to each other.

Digital mindmap cool tool MindMeister provides the option of making several new  maps that are independent from each others. Students have the option to share the selected mindmap with their peers to compare their notes or share the mind map with the teacher who can rectify any misrepresentation in understanding the relation among concepts. Mindmap menu is versatil, coloring text, associate pictures and video to concepts. Students can create slides from the mind map to be organized according to their concepts priorities to understand the lesson.

As a prospective teacher, I will use the Mind map during lesson presentation to give students an overview idea of the lesson structure. Using Mind map, Students can point out to the concept that need to be mastered. I will note the mastery level for the classroom next to each concept of the content. Since Mind map could be accessed from several platform devices, it is a convenient tool to engage students and motivate them to connect to their learning. The teacher should integrate the way how to use Mind Map in the instruction, so the students will know how to benefit from its features. It will be integrated in the learning. The teachers have to chose methods to teach the use of mind map that is relevant to the objective of the lesson.  For example, the math teacher will present to his students that real numbers are presented as the main topic rational topic is the second lower level topic, followed by integers and natural numbers. The teacher will point out the menu tools to be used in Mind Maps to represent this hierarchy of number sets. I believe that the successful methods teachers use to integrate technology in instruction will have a positive impact on students learning.

E-book in a Digital Classroom

                       Giving students a voice -Global Publishing through E-books.

Students who use e-books in the classroom will see a change in their writing process. Learning through e-books make education more personalized. Students are more subjective when writing about their learning subject. They tend to replace paragraphs with pictures or videos. This generation is influenced by the social media language. Nowadays, students try to break away from the academic writing style to a writing language that is free from any rules or guidelines. Students find E-books a good environment tool because they can express their imagination in different ways compared to a notebook and a pencil. E-books technology get students engaged in the writing process because learners have the opportunity to share their knowledge not only with their teachers and their classroom peer, but with the outside world; the community, society and they can reach out to students globally. As jon Smith mentioned in his audio “ The world is My Audience” E-books capture the students attention in learning. Jon Smith focuses on the multitude of listeners make writing interesting to the students. It gives value to the student effort in the classroom. E-books offer this opportunity to student to show their work to the world. Students can  also sell their book online as demonstrated in the article Using Book Creator to  support students with autism. Publishing their own books, students with learning disabilities find writing interesting. They created written material  published their e-book in a matter of three months. I will use this technology in my future digital classroom that will have a positive learning effects on my students.

As students write and create their own e-books and publish their work to the world, the teacher role is to guide his students to create a quality writing. Teachers see many benefits why e-books are a positive asset in classroom learning. E-books make the content more dynamic with animation and links to the concepts associated with the story telling. Students become rapidly immersed in the content. 

Teaching with Technology applications that are portable on mobile engage students for learning because the latters don't seem to separate themeselves from their smart phone even during classroom session. The article and video about Presentain provides the ins and outs of the software application used by ESL teacher in this case. Students will be able to see the teacher presentation on their mobile device and ask questions about the topic presented. The feature of this technology is the environment that create a discussion among peers. The digital classroom becomes student centered instead of teacher centered. The chart presented motivate students to enrich the discussion among them. 

Teachers-student relationship strengthen toward learning. Students ask their teachers guidance to create an e-book that they claim as their own. Teachers steer student away from the freestyle writing to academic writing by respecting the grammar rules and following the structure of telling the story to the world. Teachers integrate the e-book in the framework of TPACK to make instruction more meaningful to Students. The authors article E-books and TPACK depict e-books as an extension of traditional instruction. Classrooms equipped with e-books can only enhance the students reading and comprehension. Consequently, teachers should broaden their knowledge about this technology.

The topic video talked about  Jon Smith’s experience selecting the e-book technology, introducing it to his IEP students and integrating it in the instruction. The most remarkable thing is the legacy that the students left behind after they created their own E-books that can be viewed by the digital world. Most importantly, the teacher’s will to transform learning using a e-book technology.       

Cool Tool Mathematica

Not all math learning software are free for learning purposes. I checked the copyright for math lab, The owner put many limitations for learners who seek to know about the material before purchasing it. However, Mathematica is a reliable software for learning math according to a cool tool testimony for a guide to math software. It allows users a free trial for 15 days. The teacher can purchase products according to his or her math teaching tools needed. Wolfram provides a webpage that displays the registered product either for teaching or personal use. Mathematica 11 focus on many areas in mathematics. Mathematica for education is suitable for use from elementary to graduate school. AYA Integrated Math teachers could select materials from Algebra, probability, statistics or geometry. 

Mathematica online provide first users a tutorial about the product features.Students can create notebook. The free form input is done through sections, subsections. I ca relate that to the programming structures such as procedures, routines and subroutines. It gives students an idea about hierarchy of programming. Calculation environment with Mathematica represent features such as approximation of decimal numbers, variable assignments, Students can create various functions according to the concept they are learning. A student can assign a function in the following format f[x_]:=  x + 5. The syntax of mathematica language is close to other languages such as C++. This software allow students not only to learn mathematics but a way to think logically as a programmer. A student can give the variable x= 1, the returned function will be f[1] = 6. More importantly, in mathematica, the function can return strings as well which is a good practical understanding of a function. f[*coin*] := coin + 5. 

Wolfram for educators provides many tools for math teachers. The image below represent various lesson plan that the math teacher could integrate to his or her teaching. Mathematica lesson plans are rich with dynamic concepts. For example geometry lesson plans bring geometry 3-d concepts to life. Teacher could communicate the ideas to his students using mathematica technology.

Wolfram for students offers course assistant applications targeting various common core standards concepts. Students can download Wolfram in their smart phones, tablets or use mathematica online using schools desktops. Therefore accessibility and usability are one of the advantages using mathematica tool. Students can describe

Students can also create animation using the cool tool mathematica. In this example a student create music scale and rythm program in mathematica.

So, where Mathematica fits in the TPACK framework. Wolfram educational portal is aligned with the the state standards. Mathematica for students present contents from elementary to high school in algebra, The article Seven Free Sources for Common Core Aligned content states that Wolfram  portal answers the content questions in real time. Students can learn content at either a self paced environment on the web. Student can also participate in group discussion in the classroom or using the Wolfram community groups . Teacher centered  learning where instructor shows dynamics math models to illustrate designated math concepts. The appropriate technology here is Mathematica 1. The technology used to explain math content to student in the form of  text; notebook features demonstrated in the tryout image above, Wolfram technology uses the multimedia documents as animation,sound and hyperlinks.

It important that the teacher know about the Wolfram alpha cool tool. The math teacher should be aware of various application using the software. As the video about wolfram alpha below states, the teacher should test the tool himself before start using it in the classroom. . Both teacher unique experience with the product as well as students shared experience will enhance the learning in the classroom.

Copyright and Fair Use

         

A math teacher often has to illustrate concepts using images. There are many math educational resources that have math images related concepts posted online. However, the access and the eligibility to use the material varies from one source to another. The digital math teacher is responsible for the way he or she uses the educational images to be integrated in the lesson plan.

Under fair use doctrine, the math teacher can use images with copyright following outlined guidelines In the classroom, part of the art work and graphic images  are allowed  to print only a limited number of copies for classroom use with restrictions on adding text to images. The copyright holder doesn't allow alterations to the selected image used in the classroom. Fair use guidelines remove some

restrictions that the copyright rules exercise on the designated images that the math teacher wants to use in the classroom. In the bottom image, the copyright holder has restriction on the use of the geometric images. The math teacher has to ask permission for the use of such material. the owner of the copyright who doesn't give permission for the use of such material tend to seek financial gain. Copy right and Fair Use for teachers shows to the prospective math  teacher how the doctrine can be used and the printed copies that can be made to avoid any violations of the rules.

On the other hand, before the math teacher downloads the selected math images from the web, he should inspect the Creative Commons that the owner had applied to the material of interest. If the creator had already given permission to his or her work, the math teacher is allowed to used the material. The video lists the different licenses that a creative comment image could have: Non commercial, Attribution, no derivative or share alike licences. It could be any combination of the previously mentioned licences.

Our responsibilities to be aware and to teach students that the material posted online are to be used according to the laws established for the digital world. Students and teachers are to read and understand the Creative Commons, Copyright and Fair Use doctrines. The math teacher should ask himself on what guidelines did I base my decision to use the material online in the classroom. According to Maureen T. Lerch, in his Copyright handout, The user should know the framework for analyzing the the copyright use. The article display a list of questions that students should ask themselves before attempting to use the material online.

The creator of images, text, video and audio should register his or her own work at the US. copyright office or use one of the search engines to find and register at creative common website according to the type of material created; images, text or video as shown in the video below. 

Teachers like to vary their ways of teaching, A math teacher who introduce a song about a math concept will get his or her students attention. However, there are Ethical issues around downloading music.The common infringement of  music downloads is practical nowadays. It is immoral to use the

music illegally. It is a violation of being an ethical digital citizen. Students or teachers who would like to use music for education purposes need to check the permission granted on the song or the video.

I would suggest that users should either go the the public domain where text, images video and musi download are free because their copy right are expired and the protection rules are not in effect anymore. Otherwise, digital citizens including teachers and students should respect the fair use, copyright and common core doctrine guidelines.

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Cool Tool for My Future Classroom

                                            Cool Tool Socrative   

   

 I would like to present a cool tool that I will use in my future classroom. I have chosen the Socrative technology learning tool. It is an application used in the classroom to facilitate learning, makes interaction between the teacher and his students much easier. Socrative is a learning environment that encourages instructive communication among peers. Socrative teacher allows the instructor to engage his students in learning concepts and makes it to assess student during the learning process by collecting data about the students understanding. Socrative Student makes learning enjoyable for students by using their smart phones in the classroom for education purposes.

Socrative application is compatible with other platforms in various various phones such as Androids, iphones, personal computers, ipads, tablets..etc. It works on chrome, internet explorer. It latest version is Socrative teacher or socrative student apk 4.4.1. Teachers can add images to the question which makes learning more visual and fun. 

Socrative Teacher will allow me to start a quiz for my students, interact with students via the the new technology, turn math project into team games that promote collaboration via a game called space race.and students can give the teacher a feedback about their learning through exit ticket. Socrative teacher will give me an instant and more comprehensive  results about students quizzes and tests in the real-time. As a teacher, I can see the questions that my students didn't get right. It will allow me to reteach the learning targets where students didn't perform well.

While testing this fun learning tools, I found out that I can use differentiated learning in my future classroom. Socrative Pro allows me to create rooms where I can form several teams in the classroom according to their diverse abilities and assign various learning tasks according to their mastery of learning targets. In addition,  Socrative will make my classroom management organized. I will be able to use this technology to create an environment suitable for learning. 

• Socrative is a student responsive system in the classroom that fits well in the TPACK framework.
• Content Knowledge: Bell work, quizzes reflect the student's previous knowledge of Math concepts. Conversation in rooms about the concept of percentages. My students will be able to give real world situations about percentages. 
• Pedagogy: My teaching style will adapt on how student learn from one classroom to another, Formative and summative assessment are ways of learning as well. Creating rooms for conversation between teacher and students or a guided peer to peer conversation about learning targets
• Technology: Socrative  is a good resource that provide  good environment for interaction with learners and it's a good classroom management system.

This is a fun game provided in Socrative tool. The color represent students teams that compete among each other while learning. Teamwork and team spirit engage student in learning the math concepts.As students are engaged in solving math problems, the space Race is a measure on how well they are doing dealing with math concepts.  Learners associate the math learning targets to the space race. Math become a game to theme. Therefore, it is a fun subject to learn. 

                                                       Socrative in the classroom

www.socrative.com

Digital Citizenship

                                                                                  

My Digital citizenship is about my responsibility as a citizen in a virtual world using various information technology tools. The norm of behaviors that I exhibit toward my fellows E-citizens in a digital society define my framework of digital citizenship. My digital participatory in a numerical society is based on a personal conviction of good behavior founded on mutual respect, and promoting safer digital environment for learning to everyone.

My digital access has become much easier and cheaper. I use internet constantly to stay abreast with my academics and my family overseas. Public libraries offer free limited hours for its patriots to use internet. One can find free Wi-Fi hot spots around town. Even though competition is tense among communication companies to attract more clients, I find my 5 GB for a reasonable price is not enough for me to stay connected to the digital world. I find myself obliged not to use high stream data applications such as you tube. As I travel overseas, the environment and location become a factor to stay a digital citizen. I had to purchase a new cell phone that conform to the regulation of the host country, visit cyber cafes more often and get use to the French system keyboards to stay connected to the digital world. In spite of the mentioned obstacles, In spite of the mentioned obstacles, I still consider myself having digital access to be a digital citizen      

A part from my experience on internet access, the article Teaching Digital Citizenship in the elementary classroom talked about digital access as the first of the nine elements of digital citizenship. The author stated that the opportunity should be granted to everyone to have access to internet. The article mentioned on digital access that Digital Citizenship is fundamental in development of society.    

My perspective of digital citizenship is based on respecting other digital citizens. My comments online are usually brief and to the point. I treat online users with mutual respect that promote progress in digital communication. As I further my education and widen my professional learning network, I become more participant in the digital world. Being aware of the visited online sites and their heir audience does affect the digital citizen. My feeling do not get hurt when reading aggressive comments by taking several precautions. Firstly, as a responsible digital citizen, I never respond to a harsh comment by the same. Avoiding digital communication conflict help the parties to not engrave the situation. As Dale Carnegie says in his book on how to influence people in one of his principals: “Show respect for other person's opinion. Never say you're wrong”. I believe it is a golden advice from one of the expert on how to deal with people. Even though his principals were meant to be used for communication in the real world, I think as a digital citizen, we should treat our digital audience as we meet them face to face. In addition,      

I like to read people’s reactions on issues that contribute to personal and professional growth. People react to issues in various ways in a digital society. As an adult who uses the information technology, I respect others opinions in the digital world. Even though

Sometimes, the expressed views are not in line with my opinion, I view it as an opportunity to exercise rational. As a responsible adult digital citizen, in the same article mentioned above Teaching Digital Citizenship in the elementary classroom, the author framed three of the nine elements of digital technology under Respect, Educate and Protect or REPs. These elements are digital access, digital etiquette and digital laws. Even though we have full access to internet and we laid out ground rules or laws for numerical world, we still have to treat others with respect to protect ourselves.

Having considered respecting digital citizens can only enhance the digital environment, it is also reasonable to look at confronting the fear of lurking dangers that could prevent digital citizens from being part of digital participatory culture. Mr. Garth Holman, in his video Fostering Digital Citizenship and Student Legacy shows how a person can leave his or her digital footprint accessible to other parties. The web, twitter, student record,..etc. All have been archived. This wealth of information as digital archive that is shared with others about people's activities online could raise concern on the danger of lurkers. Parents and teachers should make kids aware of what is on the web, how to use internet and how to leave positive digital footprint. Mr. Holman gave several examples on how his students use what they learn in class about being a digital citizen and how they apply it in their real life. For example, students search information about their parent digital footprint. A student shares what is on class with the other digital citizens. The parents and teachers should contradict the fear and concerns on what might represent lurker dangers by educating students to build a good digital footprint or a legacy that is positive for other people to see.

 

    

Cool Tool Geogebra

                                                 Geogebra  as a Cool Tool

 This is a 6- petal flower inscribed in a circle. The objective of the investigation was to find the area of the six pedals in the circle. The figure was drawn using the tool .Geogebra.

 I have chosen Geogebra tool. It is a dynamic mathematics software. Geogebra is a multiple platform application that works on windows, mac, linux, android and ipad. Its latest version is 5.4.0. Geogebra is in both commercial and non profit use. Users can share their projects in the geogebra cloud as well as keep their work private. This software application is licensed under General Public License.

• This mathematical application allows students to represent math concepts in algebra, geometry, and calculus. Geogebra geometry application gives many options to draw geometric forms.It starts from points on the coordinate system, drawing various types of segments, rays, lines, angles, and various types of polygones. The student can also measure the length of segments, and angles. The author of Reflective Educator mentions that he likes the feature of exporting an existing file instead of create a new drawing as well as using the input text box that labels for example the equation of the line.As you can see from the figure below the input screen at the bottom allow the user to generate variables that measure either angles or lengths.For example, as the user moves the vertices of the triangle, one can see the values of the quantities measured in real-time. There are so many other functions that this software can do. I recommend to download the latest version for free to have a feel for it.

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I will use the Geoogebra tool as a supplementary tool to solidify the understanding of geometry concepts to students. First, As a prospective teacher, I should have a solid grasp of the content geometry as well as the know how to use the geogebra software application.The step by step instruction to student is an example to improve their understanding learning geometry concepts. 

This is an example of using Geogebra in the classroom setting where knowledge of Content, technology and pedagogical skills are combined to direct this activity in the classroom led by the teacher. All students have access to computers where Geogebra is already installed. Students follow the the teacher to construct the geometric form.

An illustration of a class notes using Geogebra tool ( Taken from concept of geometry class)

Electronic Constructions with GeoGebra

The GeoGebra software should be on your computer. If it is not, you can go to HYPERLINK "http://www.geogebra.org/" http://www.geogebra.org/, click on “Start Creating” in the center, select “Geometry”.

Note: Ctrl z is the “undo” command that you will probably use very often.

Activity 1: Discovering the sum of the measures of the angles of a triangle with GeoGebra.

Use the segment tool three times to make a triangle. The segment tool is 3rd from the left, 2nd down. The endpoints need to be on top of each other. Check that the endpoints are really attached by dragging on each endpoint (1st from left, 1st down).

Measure the three interior angles (8th over, 1 down) by selecting three consecutive vertices (say C, B, A to measure the angle at B). If you get an exterior angle, hit “Ctrl z” and measure again selecting the vertices in the opposite order. Make sure that nothing else is selected when you do this.

Now you will find the sum of the measures of the interior angles. At the bottom of the screen there is an input box. Type

SumInterAngles=

and hit Enter. To get the symbols , and , click on the symbol on the right side of the input box. It brings up a menu of symbols. You should see the result in the Algebra View window.

Now we will show the result in the Graphics View window with a text box. Click on the text tool, it looks like ABC, (10th over, 1 down) to create a text box. Then click on the screen and you will be given a text box. Type: “The sum of the interior angles is ” (see note below), and then click on the “SumInterAngles” in either the Algebra View window or locate in the dropdown menu under “Objects” in the text box, and then hit enter.

Note: In the text box there is a drop down menu called “Symbols”. The first row in this menu is called Basic and its submenu has the symbols and .

Drag each of the vertices using the move tool (1st over, 1 down). What conjecture would you make?

The sum of the measures of the interior angles in a triangle is .

On the other hand the author of the article explained how geogebra fit in TPACk education

A Conceptual Framework for Using Geogebra with Students and Teachers 

The author sees Geogebra in the TPACK framework as an organizer as well as an amplifier. The second one,geogebra eliminates that tedious drawing near perfection by hand or using ruler , protractor and compass. Meanwhile geogebra as organizer, its dynamicity gives the student another view of understanding the concept  vis-a-vis  to the static drawing in the paper. 

Geogebra software is oriented toward learning the subject of mathematics. Students could get creative by making various animations as illustrated in the following videos. Students would face several challenges using animated drawings. They have to know the features  and the tools of geogebra. They need help on how to integrate these features together to create the desired animation Therefore display it in Geogebra Tube.

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              https://www.geogebra.org/