Blog Post #5

Don't Teach Your Kids This Stuff. Please?

Dr. Scott McLeod is an associate professor and a blogger. He wrote the post called "Don't Teach Your Kids This Stuff. Please? In the post he was making an argument about technology replacing simple pencil and paper.Technology is evil and computers has a lot of bad things on them. Dr. McLeod mentioned that technology can be a distraction to children; they could ended of on porn sites and hook up with predators. He also say children do not need a computer 24/7, or cellphones. Lock all technology down and keep your kids away from it if you want them to be safe.

I found this post entertaining and he has some good points. I agree with Dr. McLeod to a certain point. There are a lot of bad things on the Internet; parents and teachers should monitor what their children or students look at. I would not say technology is evil and we should keep children away from it. Technology has a lot of benefits to it. Children are becoming more involved in learning and having fun with it. Back in the days, some children found learning boring and they did not want to go to school. Since technology has entered the schools, children are eager to go to school to find out what is next for them to learn. To keep children safe, the answer isn't to take away technology; if we monitor what they are doing on the computer and with technology I don't see a problem. Keeping kids safe goes beyond technology.

iSchool Initiative

This video was made by a man named Travis Allen. At the time that the video was made he was a 17 year old high school student on a journey to encourage schools to adopt his ischool initiative. The ischool initiative is having your classroom in your phone. The ischool has a lot of applications design for classrooms. Applications where students can take notes, use calculator, upload recordings from the teacher, and so much more. Not only would students be able to use the ischool but so would teachers and parents. Teachers can keep track with attendance, notes, lunch schedules, field trips, and more. Parents are able to see what their child has due on certain days and keep track of their grade. The ischool would only be used for school work, the internet access that will be use for the ischool will only let the students get on certain web sites. Travis Allen made a point in the video about school paying $600 per students using supplies but with the ischool, schools will only pay about $150 per student. That is a big difference. 

I think that all school should adopt this concept because we are in the era where technology plays a big part in our lives. Children are becoming dependent on technology and there are so many uses for it. Teachers would have a lot less papers to deal with and their classroom would be at their finger tips. Parents would know what is going on in their child's classroom. School would have to pay a lot less money with supplies needed for classrooms. 

Eric Whitacre's Virtual Choir

The video made by Eric Whiteacre. Watching the virtual choir was an unreal  and an eye opening experience. The virtual choir contains a series of 185 people from You Tube videos. Mr. Whiteacre zooms in on some of the people and it looks as if they are on the stage singing together. They are singing an opera song and it sounds really good. Eric compose all of these video into a choir and he was in the front as if he was the conductor. This video was made solely on the computer and it shows how much one person can do with technology. 

I am personally amazed because I think about how was Eric able to put together this video and make it sound and look so real. 

Teaching In the 21st Century 

This video was made by Kevin Roberts. His thought on teaching in the 21st century is teaching has changed a lot due to technology being introduced into the classrooms. He feels that now teachers are not teaching in classrooms, technology is doing most of the work. Teachers are becoming filters to technology. Children are learning the basic foundation of learning on the internet, because they are googling every thing instead of opening a book and trying to find the answers.  Teachers aren't teaching how to site book articles instead they are teaching how to site internet articles. Teachers and students have totally became dependent on technology. 

My opinion on this video is technology plays a major role in schools and classrooms but we have also benefited from it as well. In the 21st century, technology has grown and everything has became dependent on technology and it will continue to grow. We should not be scared of the change that has came with technology but only embrace it and encourage our students not only is there technology resources out there but also other resources that may be used.