Blog Post #2

Did You Know?
    My first reaction to watching this video, was wow!  To be honest I did not know any of these interesting facts.  I never knew that China will soon be the number one English speaking country in the world.  Every one of these interesting facts caught be offguard and just made me realize even more that electronics are apart of just about everyone's lives.  This video just shows how useful and how often people use electronics and how this has changed over the years.
    When looking around one can see technology has taken over.  In today's society computers are as small as a notebook, one can find their significant other, chat with people all around the world, and much much more, which is really amazing. I am sure society will be have more advancements coming in the future, which in my opinion I do not know how anything better can come along.  It just stuns me to know that people can event some pretty amazing things and makes me wonder, why didn't I think of that?



Mr. Winkle Wakes
    Mr. Winkle wakes after a hundred years and finds that technology has taken over. He is overwhelmed with all the new advancements that occured since he had been sleeping and realized he was not feeling well, so he decides to visit a hospital which in turns allows him to view even more electronic advancements. I can not imagine how I would feel if I had slept for a hundred years and woke up to find that technology was everywhere. Technology has extremely advanced over the years.
   While visiting a school Mr. Winkle finds that a electronic device (laptop) had not been used.  He then realized that one thing had remained the same. School seemed to be the same even after sleeping for a hundred years, which is really sad. I myself, believe that schools have advanced but could advance more, though sometimes it may be hard to do under certain circumstances.

Sir Ken Robinson: The Importance of Creativity
     I absolutely loved hearing all the stories that Sir Ken Robinson told. This video is all about children having creativity. He also said that creativity is something that has been taken away, so to speak by some schools. He makes a good point that Math and Language is on the top list for teaching and Arts/Music are on the bottom. He asked himself, “ Why would Arts or Creativity be on the bottom of the list?” I agree that there should be more time for creative activities, just like it use to be.
    One story that really stood out to me was the story about the little girl.  He told a story about a little girl who was drawing and the teacher ask what she was drawing and she said, a picture of God. The teacher replied, “But no one knows what God looks like.” The little girl replied, “They will in a minute.” I absolutely loved that. Basically he is just telling everyone through this video how each child has creativity. He also mentioned that as children, they are not afraid of making mistakes and as age progresses, creativity is lost.

Cecelia Gault (Young Student in Finland) Interviews Sir Ken Robinson
     First of all, I see a child, but without looking, one would think she was an adult. She was very well educated and she had some very good questions. This was a great interview especially for a young child. When I become a teacher, I hope to have well educated students' just like Cecilia Grant from Finland. I really found the article above the video very interesting. It included that Finland has shorter school days and a lower percent dropout rate. That just amazes me, seeing such a young girl so educated and still not having to go to school as long as students' here in the U.S.   Something great must be going on in Finland that the U.S needs to catch up on.
     As far as me being the teacher, in order for my students' to be as well educated as Cecilia Grant, I would defintiely keep an up to date cirriculum. What I mean by that is, technology is growing and each child should be well educated about how to use a computer, etc.  I would also include creativity in my classroom as well as keeping the students' parents involved. I feel like students' parents should be up to date on what is going on in the classroom. This in turn may help a child if he or she has a problem outside of school, the parent will know what is going on and will not be left in the dark.

Vicki Davis: Harness Your Students' Digital Smarts

     I like the way Mrs. Vicki Davis teaches her students about technology and how to use it.  She allows them to communicate with children their own age all around the world which in turn can allow them to learn what technology is being used there. I certainly like how she makes the students explore and think instead of her having to teach them.  By putting the children in groups and allowing the groups to teach the other classmates is a great idea as well.   I really admire her honesty when she says that she did not know how to do a terraform and her students taught her. I like their student/teacher relationship. I also suggest that other classes should be more like Mrs. Davis’s class due to technology becoming more advance in today’s society.