My 21st Century Classroom

Hello and welcome to my 21st century classroom. I am Mr. Cummings and today I will discuss with you my classrooms vision and the vision I lay out for my students learning using multimedia tools and software. I am an 9th through 12th grade history teacher and I love to incorporate video learning and hands on projects for my students to learn from. History is best learned through setting the scene and time for the students, not by power points and lectures. History is what students will realize by the end of my class that is not just something that George Washington did when he crossed the Delaware, but that history is in the present, not just the past; something that the students themselves are creating all the time.

Technology is becoming the new way of the world, and my job as an educator is to stay up to pace with the current technological breakthroughs and designs and apply them to my classes. Students will learn how to stay connected through social networks like Facebook and to create educational groups through these networks to stay connected with me and others. A great source for up and coming history teachers can be found here: http://thwt.org This is a great starting point for history teachers that are timid of technology use and is a great source of information that I apply in my learning objectives in my classroom. The website provides step by step analysis of the choices made in the classroom and how to better prepare my students for new learning objectives.

Now a good starting place for ideas for projects can be found in many places on the web itself. One that I enjoy reading on is http://www.historyteachersattic.com/ Found here are a large amount of topics about projects, ideas, and if they are applicable in a classroom. These projects have given me several ideas and starting points to my in class projects. Today I am going to introduce to you new project in my 11th grade art history class that we have been working on.

This image is a basic mockup of what my room would look like architecturally. The students would be able to visibly see the smartboard from any angle easily, with 2 students assigned to each desk with a computer for every student. I would be located at the top right close to the smartboard and students so I can easily see anyone who is having a problem or needs a question answered. The curvature of the desks allows for a more 'centered' feel on the smartboard and what I am going to show them for that days lesson. If the class size grew to large for this setup then I would simply have more rows of curved desks. Along the walls itself in the classroom would be inspirational posters, historical figures and quotes, and of course, student made work from the art history class itself. I believe this type of room allows for more focus on the objective at hand and allows for me the teacher and easy means to walk around the room to view the students current tasks.

Now, on to the lesson! I got my lesson plan objectives from here. This lesson is coming shortly after some photoshop tutorials that I demonstrated in class in the past weeks. It is going to be finding your favorite painting in history and incorporating yourself in the painting. This project will tell me several things about my students.

1.What are their art interests? Art style preferred?
2.What history period are they interested in? (When the painting was created)
3.How far along are their photoshop talents? What more can I improve on teaching them?

The answer to these questions are made much clearer after this projects completion. It allows me to know their art interests, their historical interests, and their technological prowess; all of the things that are important to me in this art history class.

The evidence of understanding the students show will be within the work itself. I will be able to easily see if they possess an understanding of the art form they are attempting to put themselves in to.

The lesson will be constructed as follows:

1.I will give a brief demonstration and show examples of previous work done in the class and give the students a week to complete the project start to finish.

2.They must use a painting from any time period and describe the paintings style, who painted it, when, and why they believe the artist incorporated what in the painting.
3.The end result will consist of a before picture and an after picture and a one page summary of the questions posed in #2.

To see the project in its fullest please click here to see my thought process. Also, here are some very great links to photoshop tutorial sites that I would relay to my students in class.

http://photoshoptutorials.ws/

http://psd.tutsplus.com/

http://www.photoshopstar.com/

http://www.good-tutorials.com/tutorials/photoshop

I would encourage the students to look online for their own tutorials to advance their learning through their own means as well. Thank you for taking the time to review my 21st century classroom. I would like you to take a few moments of your time to complete this small survey below.




References:

Works Cited

"43 CHAPTER 4 LESSON PLAN & UNIT PLAN FORMS." Http://www.edinboro.edu. Web. 15 Dec. 2011. .

Cartoon Computer. Digital image. Http://mrsldixon.wikispaces.com. Web. 15 Dec. 2011. .

Cartoon Table. Digital image. Http://www.how-to-draw-funny-cartoons.com. Web. 15 Dec. 2011. .

Fischer, Adam S. Prezi. Prezi - The Zooming Presentation Editor. Web. 15 Dec. 2011. .

Hat. Digital image. Http://rlv.zcache.com. Web. 15 Dec. 2011. .

Smartboard. Digital image. Http://www.clker.com. Web. 15 Dec. 2011. .

Teacher. Digital image. Http://pphouse.org. Web. 15 Dec. 2011.

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Tool reflection part 2 - Musuembox and Go!Animate

Today I will discuss two unique classroom tools and their uses.

First up we have Museumbox presented by Cody - http://museumbox.e2bn.org/

This is a very cool tool for an aspiring history teacher for sure. What would a Greek soldier have on hand during a battle or an American World War 2 have on hand storming up the beaches of Normandy? Museumbox allows you to look in to the life of that person and what was essential to them. You can place items in to boxes that is something that specific person would have on them at that time. You could do a project where students ask their parents what they found essential when they were teenagers growing up and to make a Museumbox about them. I see a lot of possibilities with this free program.

Next we have GoAnimate from Dashaya - http://goanimate.com/

For simply signing up you can make short animated clips of anything that youd like. GoAnimate also has a large amount of possibilities at its disposal, allowing recreations of events in history through the creativity of the student. Check this program out for sure and have fun with it - there is alot of potential for the teacher themselves to make a project for their lectures - it's not just for the students with GoAnimate.

This concludes my second analysis of classroom tools - please feel free to comment and share your ideas on these two tools.

Wordle, Popplet, and StoryJumper - The first round of classroom tools

So in class all of the students are presenting cool free classroom tools they have found on the internet and my assignment is to reflect on their possible usage in the classroom and if they were share a place in my future classroom or not and why.

First up is Wordle - http://www.wordle.net/

Wordle is a free online program that allows you to type a paragraph in to a text box and on the next page the words that show up the most in the text will be the largest, the second most be the second largest, and so on and so forth. I can see something like this being a good use of poster space in my future history classroom, to get across the broad message of important words used in famous speeches or documents. My students could write a report and then pop it in to Wordle to see what words they use the most and why - and they could write a response for that as well! I see Wordle being a very useful tool in a history classroom setting because words hold weight in history.

The downsides are that there is no real printable method of these creations and you have to result to print-screen capturing the design and then printing it out after some editing.

Next up is Popplet - http://popplet.com/

Popplet is a never ending brainstorming bubble that can be made to organize thoughts or simply just to hold thoughts for later use. For a history project, students could pick to write about say, Abraham Lincoln. They could use Popplet to brainstorm endlessly about him and have a database of everything accumulated over the course of the project and then write about their discoveries. This can be useful to more creative thinkers - brainstorming is not for everyone, however and while the project may open a door for an unsuspecting brainstormer, not all students will enjoy organizing their thoughts this way. This would take classroom 'testing' to see if this program would truly be effective in my classroom - but I believe it is very cool nonetheless.

Last but not least is StoryJumper - http://www.storyjumper.com/

Unfortunately, I don't think StoryJumper will have a huge use for my classroom. This is a tool designed for younger children and I am focusing on becoming a high school teacher - but for younger children I can definetly see this as being a great tool for creativity. There is a maximum page amount which can be confining to a child but also keep the child from making hundreds of pages of material. StoryJumper is certainly interesting but I think I would rather have my children draw their own books at that age because I personally believe in a more hands on approach to artistic projects.

All three of these tools are very cool in their own way. I urge you to mess with them a bit and see what you can come up with! Let me know what you think of these tools. Thank you Tasha, Nicole, and Colton for demonstrating their uses!

The history of the universe in 18 minutes!

This video is an unbelievable compilation of everything from the Big Bang theory to what technologies us as humans have developed in our present day, all summarized and spoken in 18 minutes by Mr. David Christian. I believe this video can bring perspective on to anyone on to how big, or small, of an impact humanity is on the universe. 18 minutes to learn the stepping stones of modern physics and the historical context of how the universe came to be to me was breathtaking. To have all of this information summarized so quickly I mean, that's not even half of a class period!

I am truly inspired by watching this video to be as informative and interesting as Mr. Christian.

Digital Domain - Out of Teachers Reach?

We've all had our eyes opened at least a little bit in the last few weeks of this course with Mr. Smith. We all see the raw potential of a computer...of the internet and what it has to offer. Social media, open source items, unbelievable amounts of data, sharing of ideas and concepts. The simple yet unbelievable power of an e-mail - just think about what an e-mail would have done to the world 300 years ago. The long journey across the Atlantic Ocean conquered within SECONDS! Truly people take what we have today for granted - whether through great understanding or little.

What does this mean to a teacher? What does this mean to you? Can you grasp the amount of power at your fingertips - at mine as I type this sentence? I do not think I can, personally - not at least fully. Uncle Ben got it right when he told Peter Parker with great power comes great responsibility - because in your classroom you hold a great responsibility with what is at your disposal; to use technology efficiently and with compassion. If you can not truly appreciate the power that you hold with these tools one must ask themselves, how can students?

Power is poisoning, and can create laziness and desensitize from creativity. Social media tools can be used with slanderous agendas, taking the school drama to the child's home. Internet bullying is real and hurts just as much as in the hallways. You as a teacher controls your domain in the classroom and if you see a problem in the hall you can step in, of course! But...you can not police children on the internet. This problem has only increased with increased social media, but of course Facebooks main design idea was not to create a drama zone for teenagers - but that is just the nature of the beast; the internet. Look up the slew of reports you can find on Googles doorstep - young adults have died because of the onslaught brought upon them 24/7.

Bullying is not new - to any of us. Whether we were the victim, the cause, the voice, or the silent neutral party, we all know what bullying is. I offer no solutions to this problem on an internet scale. Prevention and talking to students is what works but we as educators never see the full picture usually until the damage has been done. I offer no solutions nor real suggestions because it honestly baffles me on how to do whats best for the students when I myself am still learning how to present technology in an efficient manner.

I will ask you this: If we are unsure and uneducated about the internet and computer applications what ability do we have to keep students aware of its possible danger? We can always learn more about a computer and about a student - but what can we do to prevent a misuse of power between their fellow peers? And this is just the beginning of this age of technology, what sort of Facebook will be out in twenty years? Harmony can exist between education and technology, but there will always be those who will abuse its gifts - this is the nature of humanity at any level whether in High School or not.

Blogging? Hmm...

So in my technology for teaching class we had to create this blog to share our ideas with each other and I must say I am impressed with what has come from it. We all had to look over 10 other blog posts by our classmates and then comment on their blog and post. I believe it was a great exercise to show the class the power and creativity outlet of blogging.

I can see a use in certain types of classrooms, but possibly not all classrooms. Blogging and commenting on certain assignments can be useful - of course. Unfortunately students who comment on other students work or read students ideas on their blog can become subject to plagiarism - in the sense of building their project or assignment off of another students blog.  I believe if the blog was used as only a tool to communicate with one another or simply an outlet for students daily lives that it would be beneficial for said student and those who are inspired by them.

There is much to be learned from this exercise, I take it in to deep consideration. Do you believe blogging can make the sun shine in your classroom or add a few to many storm clouds? Feel free to leave your thoughts and opinions in the comments fellow educators!

Post #1! Who is Mr. Cummings?

Hello everyone and welcome to my blog! Oh man I've needed to start one of these for a long time, but I am a huge procrastinator (something I'm working on!) Fortunately my professor, Mr. Smith, made it a homework assignment so I was forced to make one or get a big fat F...so thank you Mr. Smith!

Who am I? I am an anspiring student currently attending Edinboro University in my Sophmore year studying secondary education. I graduated from Pittsburgh Technical Institute (PTI) in 2010 with an associates in multimedia technologies (I can make websites and stuff.) What brought me from that to this? Well, I was living the ramen noodle life in Pittsburgh for six months when one of my professors noticed that I had straight A's in all of my classes since day one he offered me a job to tutor at PTI and at that time I was like ugh...I don't want to deal with teaching kids how to write code and design websites...but I really need the cash so I gladly accepted. Two years later I graduated from PTI and proudly accepted my assosciates degree from them holding my head high as I walked to my parents with paper in hand. My parents said to me "Alex, whats next?" I looked at both of them and replied "I'm gonna go back to school and teach!" It was a stunning experience to go from one passion to another, but this is one I plan to stick with.

Mr. Smith wants to know what my aspirations are in education. Aspirations definition is:  A hope or ambition of achieving something; what do I hope to achieve in education? I want to have a classroom of teenagers that want to learn history with a dash of technology training. Technology training? What do you mean Alex? Well, I want to teach not only historical events and the importance of history, but also how to present these historical interests using a multitude of different computer programs and applications. I will create a website for my kids to submit their homework assignments online to save paper and of course make editing and keeping track of said assignments easier for me (of course!) Teenagers will learn that the internet is not just for wikipedia and for youtube - but huge untapped pool of information resides on the internet as well - and at the same time how the internet and its sources can be a history projects downfall due to misinformation. My aspirations in education are to inspire students to enjoy history, and enjoy my technological method of teaching.

This blog will serve a purpose someday, I promise Mr. Smith. For now this is just to submit this blogging assignment and to possibly use for other assignments in the future? Only you would know! Maybe not this blog, probably a different one with a name that coincides with where I teach and what I teach - who knows? The future is unwritten for this young upcoming teacher. I will say that I will have an education blog at some point - but for today it is simply to please your grading scale Mr Smith.

This is Mr. Smiths blog I suggest those who read this take a look at his - I mean he is teaching me how to blog after all so he probably has a pretty nice one (he does)

http://balddaddieteach.edublogs.org/

This is Mr. Cummings, signing off for now!