Website Evaluations

Name: Shanika Thomas                        Date: February 10, 2012                         Instructor: Sharon Peterson                  Course:   EDT 3470 Mondays 10:30am                     Evaluating Internet Resources URL of Web site: http://www.childrensrecipes.com/ Name of Web site:          Cooking With Kids Primary use:     students             teachers             others:         (mark all that apply)          This site can be utilized by students, teachers, parents, and caregivers What is the purpose or goal of this Web site?           The purpose of this website is to assist you in getting children involved with cooking.           In doing this, you are keeping children busy while spending quality time with them. What organization created this site?          Belinda J. Mooney is the creator of this site. Do they have a built-in bias towards the information?           There is no built-in bias toward the information What other references are cited for the information presented?             Parenting Magazine What other types of organizations link to this site?               N/A Who is the author of the page and does that person have valid credentials to present this information?               The author of this page is Belinda J. Mooney. She does have valid Credentials to present this information. Her   articles have been published in Parenting magazine in the U.S. Her articles have also been published in Canada. Is there a way to provide feedback on the Web site and create an exchange with the author or Web site manager?           There is a way to provide feedback on the website, and also a way to create an exchange with the author. How old is the material on the Web site? Is it current or outdated?           The site was created in 2010 and the material is still up to date. Describe how this Web site might be used in your Unit.             Because My unit is on Kitchen and Catering, this site would fit perfectly. There are lots of kid-friendly recipes to try with students as young as preschool. There is a way for children to give feedback on recipes and tell which recipe is their favorite.  This is a great way to make it personal for the children. Reviewing your answers above, is this a good site to use for your Unit?     yes     no        This is a good website to use for my Kitchen and Catering Unit. This questionnaire used by permission from INTEL Teach to the Future.

Name: Shanika Thomas                                  Date: February 10, 2012                      Instructor:  Sharon Peterson                           Course: EDT 3470 Mondays 10:30am                       Evaluating Internet Resources URL of Web site:  http://kidshealth.org/kid/recipes/index.html Name of Web site:       Kids Health is the name of this website. Primary use:     students             teachers             others:         (mark all that apply)      This website is directed toward kids, parents, and teens. What is the purpose or goal of this Web site?        The purpose of this site is to provide information of children’s health. As a part of that   goal, the site provides healthy recipes for children. What organization created this site?         This site was created by Nemours. Nemours is a nonprofit organization devoted to children's health. Do they have a built-in towards the information?          Because Nemours is an organization dedicated to children’s health, there is a built-in bias toward the information. What other references are cited for the information presented?         N/A           What other types of organizations link to this site?           There are many organizations linked to this site, some of those organizations being:  Akron Children's Hospital, American Family Children's Hospital, Arkansas Children's Hospital, and  The Barbara Bush Children's Hospital Who is the author of the page and does that person have valid credentials to present this information?        The author of this page is Neil Izenberg, MD. Being a doctor he has valid credentials to present this information. Is there a way to provide feedback on the Web site and create an exchange with the author or Web site manager?      There is a way to provide feedback on the website, however the website states that there will be no response to any feedback that is provided.  How old is the material on the Web site? Is it current or outdated?            The material on the web site is current. Describe how this Website might be used in your Unit.              This website could be used to focus on healthy recipe choices. This website also provides recipes for those who are diabetic, lactose intolerant, vegetarian or have Cystic fibrosis. This is valuable information for the children to learn alternate recipes and ingredients for anyone who falls in any of those categories. Reviewing your answers above, is this a good site to use for your Unit?     yes     no         Reviewing my answers above, this is a good site to use for my unit in Kitchen and Catering. This questionnaire used by permission from INTEL Teach to the Future.

Name: Shanika Thomas                     Date: February 10, 2012                         Instructor: Sharon Peterson               Course: EDT 3470 Mondays 10:30am                       Evaluating Internet Resources URL of Web site:            http://www.freshforkids.com.au/index.html Name of Web site:         The name of the website is Fresh For Kids. Primary use:     students             teachers             others:         (mark all that apply)             This website is meant to be utilized by students, teachers and parents. What is the purpose or goal of this Web site?             The purpose of this web site is to help children have healthy lifestyle and have a healthy diet. What organization created this site?             This web site was created by Sydney Markets and Brisbane Markets. Do they have a built-in bias towards the information?              There is not built-in bias towards the information. What other references are cited for the information presented?              N/A What other types of organizations link to this site?              Other organizations that link to this site are: Australian Bananas, and the NSW Chamber of Fruit and Vegetables. Who is the author of the page and does that person have valid credentials to present this information?                   This website is authored by Sydney Markets Limited, and they have valid credentials to present the information. Is there a way to provide feedback on the Web site and create an exchange with the author or Web site manager?               The web site does provide an email address to provide feedback, it does not specify whether emails will get a response. How old is the material on the Web site? Is it current or outdated?                The material on the web site is current. Describe how this Web site might be used in your Unit              This web site would be useful to my unit of Kitchen and Catering because it provides lots of  information on foods. The months in which each fruit and vegetable will most likely be available. Where the fruit or vegetable originates form. It provides information on food safety, which will be a part of my unit. Reviewing your answers above, is this a good site to use for your Unit?     yes     no              Reviewing my answers above, this is a good site to use for my unit. This questionnaire used by permission from INTEL Teach to the Future.

Reading Reflection Three

1. Discussion on what should be considered in finding “the Big Idea” for a project.

Identifying the core concepts and processes are at the heart of the subjects we teach and is the first step in project planning. All subject areas focus on big ideas and so do lessons in the real world so after identifying concepts and processes that the students should understand we also have to reflect on why the concepts are important. In finding the big idea we should consider how the idea will apply in the real world, what is the relevance to the students’ lives, who cares about the idea, and who will it affect. One of the most important aspects to take into consideration is the real-world contexts that go along with the idea. When students know that their projects offer value for their community, they become more invested in learning.

2. Discussion on the 2lst Century skills.

All well designed projects allow students to stretch their intellectual muscles in ways that traditional activities cannot. One way to do this is to plan activities that are associated with Bloom’s Taxonomy of Educational Objectives. The objectives are to remember, understand, apply, analyze, evaluate, and create. All of these objectives are important when doing an assignment but for project-based learning the last three objectives are especially important.

3. Discussion on the 21st Century literacies.

In the 21^st century literacy has to go beyond just reading and writing. The definition of literacy is the ability to identify, understand, interpret, create, communicate, and compute using materials of varying contexts. Literacy involves learning to be independent, aware, and productive citizens. Digital age literacy includes inventive thinking, effective communication, and high productivity. Students and teachers need these skills to learn and live in an increasingly digital world.

4. Discussion on each of the essential learning functions.

In this chapter there are eight essential learning functions.

1.     Ubiquity: Learning Inside and Outside the classroom, and All the Time: Tools that support project learning by giving students the opportunity to learn anytime and anywhere. Teachers should look for tools that support project-based learning such as hand held devices and web applications.

2.     Deep Learning: Teachers should help students to go beyond information created by others and help them to make sense of the raw information on the web. Students learn more when they have to navigate, sort, organize, analyze, and make graphical representations in order to express their learning.

3.     Making Things Visible and Discussable: The first step in getting conversation going in the classroom is to make thoughts and ideas visible and sharable to the class. With digital tools teachers are able to show rather than tell, see things not normally seen with a naked eye, and express ideas through multimedia.

4.     Expressing Ourselves, Sharing Ideas, Building Community: The web is in a current transition from an information medium into a social medium. Students are living in a digital age where they are continually exposed to these mediums so it will be easy for teachers to incorporate it in their classroom to express their ideas and build a society around shared interests.

5.     Collaboration-Teaching and Learning with Others: Current technology and tools around us encourage students to learn together and that is useful in projects that include collaboration.

6.     Research: Most of the projects students will be doing involve research and much of that research will be done on the internet. For this reason teachers should learn about quality directories, search engines and internet filtering.

7.     Project Management: Planning and Organization: Management helps students to manage their time, work, sources, feedback, drafts, and products during projects. One thing teachers can do is to create a web home page for their class so students can post, share, and organize their project.

8.     Reflection and Iteration: Students learn more when they are able to examine their ideas from all points of view. The easiest way for students to reexamine their work and to get feedback is to create a blog. Students can post drafts and get feedback so that they can learn and improve their project before the final draft.

5. Discussion on how concepts in this chapter relate to your topic/project.

All of the information provided is important for future teachers to know and is relevant to our project-based learning assignment. The assignment requires the students to do much research about their topics so it is important for me to know how to filter the internet to find appropriate sites for them to view. The students also need to know how to navigate the internet so once they are on the site they can dig for further meaning and discover useful information.  We are in the age of technology and this chapter showed me how to utilize many resources so that my students can learn about the big idea of their project through many tools. This chapter showed me how students can utilize many of the tools that they already use in their personal lives and use them in their education so that they can merge the two worlds to learn more.

Google Maps

For our project-based learning assignment we decided to split our classroom into groups of four. Each group will be studying a different country or region and they will be looking at how the culture affects their food choices. The maps we chose were of restaurants in Kalamazoo that represent each area of study. There are four maps that show Chinese, Mexican, Italian and Southern food in our area. The students will be looking into these restaurants and comparing what food they serve to traditional food of that region that they learn about from their pen pal. Their job is to then compare and contrast the traditional types of food to what we see in our community.  We could have their Pen Pals do the same thing if possible in the towns they are from.

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Web Evaluation

Here are the web sites that I did my evaluations on:
 

http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1626519_1373664,00.html http://www.foodbycountry.com http://thinkquest.org/pls/html/think.library

Assignment IV

Brittney Cox

Reflection 2

                Working as a team is important for teacher to learn how to do.  It is hard to implement change at times, but it is possible.  We may be the person in our schools that is willing to incorporate change by using technology based learning.  I can’t imagine getting hired into a school and then telling the principal “yeah, I don’t want to do anything your way.  This is what I am going to do instead.”  I do not think our contracts would be renewed.  This is why it is important to have that team mentality and introduce ideas in a professional, logical way.

                I have always taken criticism well.  I know people who get tremendously offended if anyone even suggests there might be a better way to do something.  We must get passed our egos and allow ourselves to learn from all of the people around us.  This “learning organization” mentality will not only make us better educators, it will also help our students learn.

                I really liked how Ms. Crane introduced her project to a group of teachers before she had her students look at it.  This gave her a chance to get opinions on things that may work well and things that could be improved.  It also helped her to be aware of potential questions and problems the students may have.  It is like “fixing the car before it even breaks.” 

                Once we have understood and put in place our teachers’ “learning organization,” we should then switch our focus to helping students create their own “learning organization.”  There are many tools already in place that we could take advantage of.  Or if we’d prefer, we could make our own.  Blogging is a great way to communicate with people from our school, other schools in the district, or possible schools from around the world.  Regardless of which community we’d choose, teamwork and learning is the main emphasis. 

Reading Reflection 2

1. Discussion on the focus of Learning Communities.

 Professional learning communities focus on three big student-centered ideas which are to ensure that students learn, create a culture of collaboration for school improvement, and focus on the results. The difference between other ways of collaborating together is that you are not focused on what you teach but on what the students learn. The focus of learning communities is to have students and teachers engage in ongoing collaborative problem solving focused on making the students better. In this process the teachers individually and as a team expand their capacity to create the results they desire for their students. Students and teachers alike learn new patterns of thinking, they learn how capitalize on the group’s goal and they learn how to learn together, which is the goal of a community of learners.

2. Discussion on the benefits of Learning Communities.

Learning communities offer many benefits to not only the students but the teachers as well. Among professional learning communities some of the benefits are decreased teacher isolation, increased commitment to the mission, shared responsibility, more powerful learning, and a higher likelihood of fundamental, systematic change. A project-based learning collaboration among students is similar to professional learning communities among teachers. The learning is relevant and rigorous, and the students learn to learn together. As well as learning strategies needed in the classroom, the teachers and students also learn skills for the real world like communication, problem solving, project management, motivation, and persistence.

3. Discussion on how Learning Communities affect teachers.

Learning communities are a new context for learning that allows teachers the opportunity to work together and overcome the traditional isolation of the profession. The traditional circumstances of schools don’t foster a collaborative effort by the students or the teachers. Normally teachers may spend several hours together each week but most of their time is spent addressing scheduling, program coordination, handling individual student issues, planning school events and other “housekeeping” issues. Little time is available to actually talk about teaching but this is all changed when implementing learning communities. In learning communities teachers are encouraged to work together and collaborate on a regular basis.

4. Discussion on how Learning Communities affect students.

Students are also affected by learning communities but not as directly as the teachers. Since teachers are always collaborating and bouncing ideas off of each other it gives them an opportunity to present lessons to other teachers multiple times before they actually teach it to their students. When teachers work together they get a better idea of what level their students should be at and this affects the students because they get more work that is fit for their abilities. As well as the teachers collaborate they begin to share their ideas and learning strategies so the students will then be exposed to many types of learning. Students also participate in their own types of learning communities in the form of project-based learning. In this manner students learn through working with their peers on a project that allows the students to learn from doing hands on assignments that relate to their lives.

5. Discussion on the components for shared vision in Learning Communities.

In learning communities when collaborating with colleagues teachers need to start out with an open mind and respect for their peers. Teachers need to be able to be honest with one another and to do this they have to have trust and appreciate who they will be working with. Teachers in a learning community should share a passion for one critical element and focus a lot of their collaboration around this common goal. Even if the other teachers you collaborate with don’t have the same type of teaching style as you there is always one connecting factor, your goal is to teach children and have them learn. In order for the community to be effective the teachers must come in with an open mind and be willing to share their ideas together and be able to agree on a learning style that would best work for their students. Teachers should share a common end goal and keep this in mind throughout the process. 

6. Discussion on how concepts in this chapter relate to your topic/project.

The topic for my project is kitchen and catering. Being a part of a group for this project I must learn to work with my group members and even if we have different styles or attitudes we need to be open with each other to come up with a common goal or outcome. For our project we’re teaching students what project-based learning is by actually doing a project. In order for us to reach this goal we have to be able to discuss different ideas with each other and we have to have respect for everyone in the group and take into consideration the ideas that they come up with. We are creating are own learning community by doing this project so we also have to have a common goal, in this case what the children will learn is our common factor.