Post 4

Blogging in elementary schools is becoming more popular today. Some benefits i found were when kids have another audience besides their teacher checking their work, they write better. If kids can read their peers' blogs this would help them become better writers and see what level their peers are writing and where they stand just by reading other bloggers. I think this would be a great factor to incorporate maybe in a Science Unit and everyone records what they observed each day. You could incorporate blogging into any unit easily and would be very beneficial for students.

Here is a link i found on blogging in elementary schools.

(The picture was found on flickr and taken by Michael Surran)

Post 3

I found a video on the SMART table. It described some benefits of using it in a classroom and how the children can use it and what they learn from it. This is a really neat piece of technology that makes it very hands on for the children and can make a boring or non-favorite topic interesting. There are other SMART devices out but this is something that really caught my and seemed very beneficial for students.

Here is the video i found on youtube



Here is a website i found that talked about the smart table SMART devices.
and where i got the picture from.

Post 2

The past week while I was at home for break I was able to volunteer in my cousins Kindergarten classroom for a few days. I got to interact and help her students which made it very enjoyable for me but one thing I did notice was that she did not have much technology in her classroom. I know they are only in Kindergarten but I still think the curriculum should include technology early on so they can be prepared in their later years. I was only in her classroom for two days but there was not technology interaction while I was in their the classroom. Although they do have computer lab time but I did not get to see what they were actually doing while they were in the computer lab. I might add that my cousin is in her first year of teaching so she might not have access to technology since it is her first year. I know she had the potential to use it in her classroom but just not access to it because of budget cuts and money problems.
Here is link describing the effects of budget cuts on a California elementary school

I got the picture from flickr from Peter Kaminski

Post 1

Technology and Academic Achievement



This article focused on the small amount of research being done on how technology improves academic achievement. A few studies showed when teachers used simulations on a computer for problem solving the student's math scores improved by a lot. Although there were other studies suggested incorporating computers had negative effect on the students than if the teachers did not use computers. Obviously today there are more researches being done on technology and the benefits when incorporating it into a classroom. Like in the Digital Natives Web 2.0 lecture talked about how technology had influenced the way the world communicates. It is going to continue to change and if we do not prepare ourselves and our students for upcoming changes we will not have a successful society.