Smart Boards, what's so great about them?

Image by: Muncie Public Library via www.flickr.com

Smart boards.  What's there to say about them?  Teachers use them for their classrooms and students like them. Big deal, right?  Wrong!  They are a big deal!  More and more schools are buying them for their classrooms.  Teachers love using them because it keeps their students attention on the material instead of doodling, sleeping, texting, etc.  When I was a junior in high school my math class got a smart board and at first I thought it wouldn't work and I didn't think much of it, but there was one day in class where we just sat and listened to our teacher talk about the different things it does.  You can do simple math, write, draw, bring up websites and draw on the websites.  The one we had actually saved whatever work the teacher had done on it on the computer in the back of the room, so if the teacher wanted to talk about it to a different class all they had to do was bring it up on the computer and project it on the board.
I found a website where it has 13 reasons on how the smart board has improved teaching and learning in the classroom. If you would like to view it click on the link.  The one I found most interesting is, "The board can accommodate different learning styles" is because I didn't think boards could fluctuate depending on the different learning styles.  When we first got one in my math class, I heard a lot of parents say that they didn't know if it was a good idea to put those in the classrooms because they weren't sure if every student could operate it because of the new technology.  The only time we got to use it was when/if the teacher called on you to do a math problem on the board.  My whole class loved it by the end of the semester!  The only downfall to it was it wouldn't do your homework for you... :) 

Should Facebook be allowed in school?

My Facebook profile. Screen capture.

Facebook? School? Allowed? What? You might be thinking to yourself, what is she thinking?! There are some people who think Facebook should be allowed in school because they think it would be beneficial for them. How could it be beneficial for teenagers to be on Facebook during class? Well to start off students are on Facebook all the time, so why not make a Facebook site for the class? It could give the students opportunities to talk about assignments, due dates, tests, projects, etc. over their favorite social networking site. And if anyone has a question about an assignment or project or test they can post it on the wall and someone would more than likely answer within minutes. There's a few classes I'm in that have made a Facebook page for the class. (Like this one!) The teachers mainly post useful information and reminders, which is nice.
Obviously there are some downfalls to it too. Students can easily get distracted by someone chatting to them on Facebook chat, they could be visiting someone's profile, looking up different things to "like" and so on. If there would be a way for the teacher to monitor that then I think it would make a huge difference. The teacher could have some rules about it, such as; log off of the chat, consequences for wandering off, etc. Facebook has become the most popular social networking site, as of now, and I think teachers should be able to incorporate that into their lesson somehow. So, should Facebook be allowed in school? I think so. What do you think?

Article about why schools should learn to use Facebook instead of banning them.

Computer Usage in Elementary School

Image by: SIAcademy via www.flickr.com

        There are some people who think elementary children shouldn't have internet access because there are a lot of inappropriate things online and they're worried they will come across it not knowing what it is. Teachers are saying they are monitoring them as well as they can, but the same people are saying it's hard for teachers to monitor all of their students at once to make sure they're not doing anything inappropriate. Internet is a big part of everyday life nowadays. Surveys have shown that out of 21 million teens who are online about 78%, or 16 million students, of them use the internet at school.
        I know some parents who think the Internet is not necessary for school work because they didn’t have computers when they were in school and they did just fine. That’s not necessarily true because everything is going computerized anymore; encyclopedias are online, there are tons of websites that students can go to for their information, instead of using dictionaries students go online to find what a word means or to Microsoft Word. Parents always don’t understand why their children “need” computers and they try to explain it, but the parents won’t always listen.
        Technology in schools has become a major part in teaching. Every classroom has at least one computer for the teacher to check their e-mail, put grades in, and sometimes look things up real quick. Some schools even have the smart boards that the teachers use. If smart boards are something you have never heard of they’re really cool! Smart boards are a device that you stick up on the white board and it has a little stylist that has many different functions. It can be hooked up to the projector and if there’s a website up that a teacher is talking about and if they need to circle something they can do so with the stylist. You can almost do anything with it, except homework. Smart boards are becoming very popular throughout the United States. The school I went to got one to try out and now they’re in almost every classroom throughout the high school.
        Technology in schools has become a must these days. Teachers and students use them so often that we don’t even realize how much we use them until they’re gone. Teachers rely on the computers in their classrooms to put grades in and most teachers either won’t remember or don’t know how to put them in an actual grade book if the system is down. Students rely on computers for research. Many of the younger students don’t know how to use an encyclopedia because it’s all online now. When I was in elementary school we would have lessons on how to find research material in the library, but with computers they don’t need to know how to do that. With computers all you have to do is get online and type into Google “encyclopedia”.
        In my opinion, technology in schools should stay because it is a part of our everyday life and knowing how to run a computer, run a certain website, know how to write papers on the computer will become very useful in the future. Technology has become a big part of my life in school. How else would I be able to create this blog?
This link provided me with the statistics above.

1:1 Program, is it good or bad?

Image by: www.flickr.com/creativecommons/ via connectedclass

Some of you might be wondering what a 1:1 program is. Well, it's a program where every student gets his/her own laptop for any and every class. You might be saying that sounds like a good idea, but they're giving them to elementary students as well as older students. I'm not sure if an elementary student is responsible enough to handle a laptop, especially if they're Macs. Sometimes I even get confused with Macs so I don't know how the students are learning how to run them. Then again, they were born in the 21st century. They do have to take a class on proper laptop use when they're at home and in school.
A lot of middle school and high school students like the 1:1 program because they feel they'll have a head start to learning, so the Youtube video below interviews middle school students stating their opinion.


While it's important for the students to learn how to run the laptops, it's also important for the teachers to know what they're suppose to be doing with them. Most older teachers aren't sure how to run a regular computer let alone a laptop. According to a website I found it says the 1:1 programs that are successful are because the teachers know what they're doing. If a teacher(s) doesn't know what he/she are doing then chances are they won't be able to teach their students as well as if they didn't have to use the laptop. If schools want to go to the 1:1 program by all means go for it, but at least give the teachers a class on it too. I wouldn't want to put my future child in a class where the teacher doesn't know how to use the program efficiently.

Article on 1:1 computer programs.