The Haka
14 years ago
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Monday, April 13, 2009
Teaching about Internet Safety
For the 'doing' part of the internet safety assignment, I taught my mom and younger sister (age 15) about internet safety. After talking about what they already knew about internet safety and any questions they had about it, I talked to them about all the dangers that are out there on the internet that we should be aware of. Although they already knew about most of the dangers, I think it was good to remind them about being careful with the internet. We also talked about lots of the ways you can protect yourself when you are using the internet. Specifically, we talked about being careful with Facebook (not putting personal information on your profile, not talking to people you don't know, etc.) and not opening emails that you don't know who they are from or what might be in them. Also, I showed them how they could get to articles on internet safety through lds.org so they could go there if they have more questions. Overall, it was a good experience, and I think it served as a good reminder for all of us to be aware when we are using the internet. Lots of times, I think we feel like the problems that happen with the internet always happen to other people and we are somehow protected from everything that could happen, but it is important to remember that you need to be actively working to protect yourself and your family from problems that may arise on the internet.
Wednesday, April 8, 2009
IP&T 301: Personal Learning Theory
I believe that in order for learning to take place, one of the most important things that must be present is a desire to learn. When there is a genuine desire to learn a new skill, the learner is then much more likely to put effort into the learning process and will take more meaning away from the experiences he or she has during learning. This desire may come from necessity of possessing a certain skill, or it may also come from simply wanting to know certain skills, knowledge, or other information. One scenario which often induces the development of new knowledge or skills is problem-based learning. In this type of learning, the learner encounters or is presented with a problem. The learner then learns through the process of figuring out a solution to the given problem.
In my experience, one of the most effective ways of learning something new is through interaction with a more knowledgeable other. This person knows more about the topic or skill to be learned, so he or she is able to use modeling to demonstrate to the learner what it is that the learner is learning. Throughout the learning process, the more knowledgeable other can scaffold the learner by guiding the student’s thinking, giving encouragement, and helping the learner to be able to do more with help than he or she would have been able to do without this assistance. I believe that this scaffolding is extremely effective because it helps learners to develop a deeper understanding and gain confidence in their abilities to learn the new task.
I have found that in the earlier years of a person’s life, there is more of a focus on learning through stimuli and responses to these stimuli. As children first begin moving body parts and manipulating objects around them, such as toys, blankets, etc., these children learn that when they move their fingers (stimulus), they can cause objects to move in certain ways (response). Also, children learn through experience that when they cry (stimulus), this will generally cause a parent to come to their assistance and meet their needs or give them the attention they desire (response). Another example of this includes the methods used by many teachers and parents to help children learn what behaviors are acceptable and desired, and which are not. Adults often use positive and negative reinforcement to encourage children to continue doing certain behaviors. Alternately, they utilize positive and negative punishment to discourage children from continuing certain behaviors. Children can also learn which behaviors are desired through vicarious reinforcement, in which the learner sees another person praised for doing a certain behavior and, therefore, tries to do the same behavior in hopes of receiving praise as well. In these examples, the behaviors that are exhibited by the students are the stimuli. These behaviors then cause the teachers to give certain responses, which can be either reinforcement or punishment, depending on whether the behavior was desired or not. By seeing which behaviors the teachers praise and which ones are discouraged by punishment, children then are able to learn which behaviors are acceptable, and they exhibit these behaviors more often because they desire the praise and rewards from their parents and teachers. As people get older, they often start to use more self-reinforcement as they teach and train themselves to continue certain desired behaviors and accomplishments. They also use more self-regulation to encourage themselves to continue working toward desired goals.
As we learn, it is important for the information we bring in to be meaningful so we can have strong connections with the information and use retrieval to easily bring it from the long-term memory into the working memory. In order for this to occur in learning, I believe that it is very important to provide learners with authentic tasks, or tasks that are easily relatable to real-world situations or problems that could arise in the learners’ future experiences. By teaching through these kinds of tasks, the learners are able to feel that the things they are learning are truly meaningful and will help them in their future endeavors.
I believe that learning is a life-long process, and everyone must go through this progression in order to mature and develop. As we are successful in our learning, we are then able to develop a sense of self-efficacy. I have seen in my experiences that this confidence in our own abilities to perform well at certain tasks and to be able to learn new information and skills effectively often determines the amount of effort we will put into learning new things. Our self-efficacy can increase our persistence when attempting to master new skills or concepts, and it can decrease our frustration as we have more patience with ourselves when we learn new things. As we strive to have confidence in our abilities and make our personal learning meaningful, I believe that we will be able to truly come to love learning.
In my experience, one of the most effective ways of learning something new is through interaction with a more knowledgeable other. This person knows more about the topic or skill to be learned, so he or she is able to use modeling to demonstrate to the learner what it is that the learner is learning. Throughout the learning process, the more knowledgeable other can scaffold the learner by guiding the student’s thinking, giving encouragement, and helping the learner to be able to do more with help than he or she would have been able to do without this assistance. I believe that this scaffolding is extremely effective because it helps learners to develop a deeper understanding and gain confidence in their abilities to learn the new task.
I have found that in the earlier years of a person’s life, there is more of a focus on learning through stimuli and responses to these stimuli. As children first begin moving body parts and manipulating objects around them, such as toys, blankets, etc., these children learn that when they move their fingers (stimulus), they can cause objects to move in certain ways (response). Also, children learn through experience that when they cry (stimulus), this will generally cause a parent to come to their assistance and meet their needs or give them the attention they desire (response). Another example of this includes the methods used by many teachers and parents to help children learn what behaviors are acceptable and desired, and which are not. Adults often use positive and negative reinforcement to encourage children to continue doing certain behaviors. Alternately, they utilize positive and negative punishment to discourage children from continuing certain behaviors. Children can also learn which behaviors are desired through vicarious reinforcement, in which the learner sees another person praised for doing a certain behavior and, therefore, tries to do the same behavior in hopes of receiving praise as well. In these examples, the behaviors that are exhibited by the students are the stimuli. These behaviors then cause the teachers to give certain responses, which can be either reinforcement or punishment, depending on whether the behavior was desired or not. By seeing which behaviors the teachers praise and which ones are discouraged by punishment, children then are able to learn which behaviors are acceptable, and they exhibit these behaviors more often because they desire the praise and rewards from their parents and teachers. As people get older, they often start to use more self-reinforcement as they teach and train themselves to continue certain desired behaviors and accomplishments. They also use more self-regulation to encourage themselves to continue working toward desired goals.
As we learn, it is important for the information we bring in to be meaningful so we can have strong connections with the information and use retrieval to easily bring it from the long-term memory into the working memory. In order for this to occur in learning, I believe that it is very important to provide learners with authentic tasks, or tasks that are easily relatable to real-world situations or problems that could arise in the learners’ future experiences. By teaching through these kinds of tasks, the learners are able to feel that the things they are learning are truly meaningful and will help them in their future endeavors.
I believe that learning is a life-long process, and everyone must go through this progression in order to mature and develop. As we are successful in our learning, we are then able to develop a sense of self-efficacy. I have seen in my experiences that this confidence in our own abilities to perform well at certain tasks and to be able to learn new information and skills effectively often determines the amount of effort we will put into learning new things. Our self-efficacy can increase our persistence when attempting to master new skills or concepts, and it can decrease our frustration as we have more patience with ourselves when we learn new things. As we strive to have confidence in our abilities and make our personal learning meaningful, I believe that we will be able to truly come to love learning.
IP&T 301: Personal Learning Report & Log
This semester, I chose to learn the skill of cooking for a large group by participating in a dinner group. In order to be part of the dinner group, I have had to cook a complete meal for 12 people once every three weeks. As I had never had to cook for this large of a group on my own before I joined this dinner group, I thought this would be a great new skill to focus on developing.
At first, it was very intimidating to have to cook such large amounts of food for my dinner group. In order to make sure I was successful with the meals I cooked, I always called my mom to get help planning appropriate meals and to get specific instructions for how to plan the meals, buy ingredients, put together the dishes, and cook/bake them. Because of her years of experience with cooking, my mom always seemed to have special directions for me to change something slightly in recipes to make them even better. My mom’s advice always helped me to make my dinners especially good, and she was usually able to give me pointers on how to get the meals done fairly quickly.
I always tried to be creative with my meals, and I made sure the dinners were balanced and nutritious. In order to do this, I consulted my mom and thought about incorporating each of the food groups into my meals. As the semester progressed, I found that I was getting better at estimating how much food I would need to make in order to have plenty for everyone, but not have too much left over. Also, it became easier for me to think of side dishes I could make that would go well with the main dish I had planned. I began to really enjoy cooking because I was able to make some delicious meals, and I started to have fun planning what I could make next.
Personal Learning Log
January 12: 3 hrs. – Grocery shopping, preparing and cooking food
January 31: 45 min. – Planning meal, grocery shopping
February 2: 2 ½ hrs. – Preparing and cooking food
February 20: 1 hr. – Planning meal, grocery shopping
February 23: 2 hrs. – Preparing and cooking food
March 14: 45 min. – Planning meal, grocery shopping
March 16: 2 ½ hrs. – Preparing and cooking food
March 28: 45 min. – Planning meal, grocery shopping
March 30: 2 hrs. – Preparing and cooking food
Total: 15 hrs, 15 min.
At first, it was very intimidating to have to cook such large amounts of food for my dinner group. In order to make sure I was successful with the meals I cooked, I always called my mom to get help planning appropriate meals and to get specific instructions for how to plan the meals, buy ingredients, put together the dishes, and cook/bake them. Because of her years of experience with cooking, my mom always seemed to have special directions for me to change something slightly in recipes to make them even better. My mom’s advice always helped me to make my dinners especially good, and she was usually able to give me pointers on how to get the meals done fairly quickly.
I always tried to be creative with my meals, and I made sure the dinners were balanced and nutritious. In order to do this, I consulted my mom and thought about incorporating each of the food groups into my meals. As the semester progressed, I found that I was getting better at estimating how much food I would need to make in order to have plenty for everyone, but not have too much left over. Also, it became easier for me to think of side dishes I could make that would go well with the main dish I had planned. I began to really enjoy cooking because I was able to make some delicious meals, and I started to have fun planning what I could make next.
Personal Learning Log
January 12: 3 hrs. – Grocery shopping, preparing and cooking food
January 31: 45 min. – Planning meal, grocery shopping
February 2: 2 ½ hrs. – Preparing and cooking food
February 20: 1 hr. – Planning meal, grocery shopping
February 23: 2 hrs. – Preparing and cooking food
March 14: 45 min. – Planning meal, grocery shopping
March 16: 2 ½ hrs. – Preparing and cooking food
March 28: 45 min. – Planning meal, grocery shopping
March 30: 2 hrs. – Preparing and cooking food
Technology Integration Ideas
There were some really great ideas presented in my group for ways technology can be integrated into lessons:
1. One of my favorite ones was to use photostory to have the children record themselves reading parts of a story so that they could hear what they sound like when they read. This is a great way to encourage the children to read with expression because it helps them to hear what their reading sounds like and help them to want to make their reading more interesting.
2. Another idea I got from my peers that looked like a great way to use technology was to use a game show template either online or on Powerpoint to make a lesson more fun. One of my peers used a template for "Who Wants to be a Millionaire," and another used a template for "Jeopardy" that she found online. I think that these templates could be used to enhance many different lessons, and it would be a really fun way to get the children excited to participate.
1. One of my favorite ones was to use photostory to have the children record themselves reading parts of a story so that they could hear what they sound like when they read. This is a great way to encourage the children to read with expression because it helps them to hear what their reading sounds like and help them to want to make their reading more interesting.
2. Another idea I got from my peers that looked like a great way to use technology was to use a game show template either online or on Powerpoint to make a lesson more fun. One of my peers used a template for "Who Wants to be a Millionaire," and another used a template for "Jeopardy" that she found online. I think that these templates could be used to enhance many different lessons, and it would be a really fun way to get the children excited to participate.
Monday, April 6, 2009
What I Learned from Other Project Presentations
I enjoyed looking at other people's presentations of what they did in their classrooms to incorporate technology into a lesson. One thing I learned from watching these presentations is just how much you can do with technology to enhance lessons. There are so many great resources, programs, and equipment that can be used to help children enjoy lessons and have more hands-on learning. I think that, as teachers, it is important to be willing to take a little extra time to incorporate technology into lessons because it really does add to the quality and effectiveness of lessons. Also, the children really enjoy the use of technology in lessons, and it helps them to develop their understanding of programs and equipment for their own future use of such technology.
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