What happened to textbooks?

School textbooks like reading books might one day be considered a thing of the past. Books have slowly progressed from paper to audio and now Kindle. Textbooks will be doing the same since some companies already offer a CD-ROM version as mentioned by David Warwick in his article "Textbooks of the Future". This might be a good thing since the new generation of Digital Natives are accustomed to having everything at the touch of their fingers and quickly. One of the benefits of digital textbooks are the accommodations that can be made for students with learning difficulties-"audio delivery for the auditory learners, translating text for ESL students, and presenting more pictures, graphs, and video for visual learners." On the other hand, students used to read a chapter and answer the questions at the end. With digital textbooks students would be able to copy and paste their answers to these questions. The end result: What does the student learn? and Are digital textbooks really better?

Web Site Evaluation Criteria

Web site evaluation has become important to us as we explore the internet and all that it has to offer. Whenever possible teachers might try to use this knowledge in the classroom. Two good sites to help students become aware of what to look for when trying to find a good site are TUTOR: Evaluating Web Sites and ABCs of Web Literacy. TUTOR would be best used in a elementary school setting. It is easier for the students to look at and learn. It could be presented as a hands on experience for the class by allowing each student the opportunity to engage in the work. By assigning each student a question or element and sharing their information with the class could make the learning more fun. ABCs might be better for a middle school setting. Since it is an interactive site, the students could be broken into groups and be asked to write an essay on their experiences to get an idea of their understanding of the topic and then have them review a website that they enjoy using.

A Digital Native In Hiding

After reading "Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants" by Marc Prensky, it is obvious that I am a digital immigrant. I remember when computers were first coming out and we had to use MSDOS (I think that was the name of the program at the time). I would have thought that would make me a Digital Native, but it does not. If you didn't know the commands to enter you were out of luck. Thank goodness systems have come a long way since then. The term Digital Natives almost seems appropriate for this generation as each generation seems to have their own way of being referenced. This probably goes back to the Baby Boomers, but I do not recall the name for my generation. "And a language learned later in life, scientists tell us, goes into a different part of the brain." I believe this to be true for anything we learn as we get older. We tend to be set in our ways and way of thinking. For us Digital Immigrants we learned from reading, writing, and studying from books. There was nothing wrong with that then and there is still nothing wrong with that now. Yes, there are more resources available to us digitally, but are they all true or just opinions of others? Sometimes a combination of methods is better. I am a definite immigrant because I need to print out a document to edit or sometimes just to read. Maybe because I didn't grow up digitally I have more problems, but honestly looking at a computer that long just gives me a headache. Being digitally inclined or a native is certainly a benefit to have with the large world competition. Without it one would be lost. Does a person really need to have everything at the tip of their fingers and receive information so quickly? Some Digital Natives say they get bored in school because it is too slow for them; however give them a cell phone, computer, or ipod and they are a happy cucumber. There needs to be a combination of the two ways of learning for everyone to get along in this new world and a lot of patience. Some of us are slower than others. My only complaint is that I heard at one time that script/cursive handwriting was going to be eliminated because today's learners can only read print since that is all that is available with this technology and because they lack poor writing skills. How does this make someone more of an individual? Do we really need to change everything to accomodate these Natives? Until recently, I used my computer for email, papers, and minimal research. Now I am doing a blog, website, and a wiki. I use my cell phone only when I need to and almost never IM. I also don't like to text. Texting is another thing that drives me crazy. As a result people do not know how to spell and everything is in text lingo. Why? Hopefully one day there will be a happy and constructive balance of these two worlds.

Blogging Ethics

Who knew there were actually ethics to blogging? Blogging is a new experience for me. I am still trying to figure out the ropes so to speak. After reading the article on Blogging Ethics I agree with the author that quotes, whether in blogs or in another form of writing, give a reader the knowledge and understanding of where the author is coming from. I feel that quotes are an option in writing or blogging, but if done correctly will only add to the point. I also agree with the author that it is "a great opportunity to talk about the issues of plagiarism and fair use and copyright" (no pun on the topic). Having links and being able to bring the reader to other worlds is what this is all about. Since technology is increasing and books are slowly being included in this expansion it is even more important to be able to hold onto these other links, even if it is by using quotes.

del.icio.us or diigo-Which bookmark is better?

After opening a new account in both del.icio.us and diigo I have found them both to be interesting ways of boolmarking websites that are of interest and great use. I have watched the YouTube videos for both sights and there are certainly benefits to each one. Even though I have to play with them a little more I think the diigo site is more interesting. I like the idea that you can put sticky notes and highlight text in a sight as you are reading. We all know how handy that can be. I don't have the time to use this capability right now but do plan to use it in the future as I compile a list of websites to use in my future classroom.

Ancient Egypt Mind Map

This ancient Egypt Mind Map was made in Inspiration. I have used Inspiration for a few other projects and have learned to get around and really enjoy it. There are still a few things I need to learn how to manuever. I did ancient Egypt because I had done a unit plan on it previously and thought it would be fun and interesting to create a different mind map on the topic. It was fun creating hyperlinks and notes. I enjoyed it so much that I purchased a license agreement so I can continue to use it whenever I want.

Here is my mind map!

I created this mind map about myself and some of the things I enjoy. This was done using Mind42. After playing with it for a while it became sort of fun. I wish I could move the links around the center better rather than adding another node. Guess it will take more practice.