Week 14 Using Games for Teaching and Learning

We learned this week about gaming and the impact it is having on education and learning. We learned of the different ways and types of games being introduced to more educational. Since games are so violent and have no educational value introducing educational games may be a solution to this problem.With video games become more and more popular it is only wise to introduce educational games so parents do not feel as guilty allow their children to play these games. However even with the large amount of these games being introduced it still takes away from a child wanting to learn without the help of video games. This is beneficial because of how much kids in this generation wants to play video games.

Educational games can be extremely beneficial with teaching children with special needs because they can use visuals and interactions of the software to learn better. These children learn better with visual hands on tools and having them do computer games can help them benefit more from what they learn. Also this would be a good way to allow them to try and learn on their own instead of me sitting by them and helping them out. It is a great way for them learn more affectedly. They will also look at it as a reward for good behavior to be able to go on the computer and play educational games.

This video talks about the advantages of educational gaming. It says that this can benefit children in the long term because of the style of learning. He also talks about different types of educational gaming from math to English games that a child can use to help improve their test scores. It is a good way to study for an exam or to just refresh your memory

Week 13 Distance Education and Virtual Schooling

During this week we learned what distance education and virtual schooling is. They both provide a way to still be educated even if you do not have time to attend classes at a university. Distance education is a certain class that you can take online while you are still attending other classes at a University. While virtual schooling is for people that do not have time to attend a university and they will take all of their classes online through a school that provides. These people that do virtual schooling have the same option to earn a degree of their choice. We also learned the pros and cons of these two ways of going to school and taking classes. The pros are that if is an easier way for someone to go to school if they do not have the time for example single moms and people in he military. The cons are that you can cheat on exams/quizzes and some places may not hire someone with an online degree.

This would be helpful in my major because if I do not have time to take a class or I have a conflict with one I can simply just take it online through a distance education course. I believe that this is a good options to a point. Teachers need to be able to do an internship in a classroom to see how they would interact with students and if you have to do an internship online that might defeat the purpose.


This is a commercial for Phoenix online schools. It shows people still being active in their everyday lives but being able to earn a degree at the same time. This is a good alternative to schooling and they show this in their video. They show a mother with a baby and others trying to raise a family still wanting to go to school and make a better life for them. Phoenix's commercial introduces people to a way to go to school and still live the life they have so they feel like they have the same chance to succeed as everyone else.

Week 11-Open Source Software

During week 11 we learned about the advantages to having technology with open source software. We learned that there are many different programs out in the world wide web that you can download for free. These programs range from a free version of photoshop to many different Microsoft document tools. More examples of open source software include Audacity, SourceForge, and Open Office.org are good ways of using the wide variety of free software available to anyone willing to find it.

This is an excellent tool to use as an education major because it offers free software for me to use in the many different classes I am taking. As a college student I find it hard to balance my money and when an emergency comes up that I have to pay for it is good to know that I can have some free document tools that I can use instead of paying for them.

This video is about how open source software is beneficial and widely used. He goes into detail about how to use it and what risks are involved in using it. If someone did not know much about open source software they could watch this video and learn all the information they needed. It is a great way to learn about this software because it not only talks about the benefits but also discusses the risks of using this software. Like many types of virus that could potentially enter your computer.

Week 12-Teaching a professional web presence

I learned how to make a web page using google sites. We were introduced to google sites to help us make a professional web page for potential employers to see. In today's society many employers will now either look at your facebook, myspace, or live journal, so it is good to have a professional alternative for employers to look at.

This will be extremely beneficial to me when I become a teachers because when I go to interview for a job at a school the principal can look at my web page to see all of my accomplishments, and experiences in education. I feel that they will be impressed with a web page because it will show that I am serious about a career and it will stray away from them looking at my facebook. Also I can show my students how to make one so when they go for a job or apply for a program they can show this instead and make a good impression on that specific person.

This is a tutorial on how to use google sites. He shows you how to set up a google site step by step and uses images. This is extremely helpful incase you forget how to do a step and need a small reminder or you are using google sites for the first time. This was a very helpful how to video.

Week 10 Tech tools for Critical Thinking

During week 10 I learned how to make a graphic organizing tool, which can help me organize my ideas in a more effective way. These tools are used to have a main idea or bubble and branch out off of the main idea into more detail. I learned a great new way to stay organized, that is free and fun to use.

This would help me in my major greatly. It can help me be more organized, I can have a separate graphic organizer for each class. For instance, for my math class I can have a main bubble that says math and under it have a section for quizzes, exams, and home work assignments. Than under each of the categories I can put what is due or when an exam is. Since it is a more visual tool I can also change the colors of items that are more important. I do not think this can only benefit me but is a great organizing tool for anyone in college.

Thia video is a tutorial on how to use bubbl.us. Bubble.us is a great way to use these visual organizing tools. It shows you step by step how to set up one and the cool tricks you can use to make it look outstanding. He also gives an example of one of the bubbl.us he has made to show what the final outcome will look like.

Bubbl.us graphic organizer

Pod Cast

Check out my podcast that I made.

It is a mix of me playing the drums and piano on garage band. They are both done in the pop genre and are really fun and will make you want to dance. I can use this in education as a fun way to add to a presentation in a PowerPoint. As a teacher I could use this to help the kids learn in a fun way with adding music to back ground of a lesson being taught and even record my voice to teach them.

Week 4 Copyright, Plagiarism, and Ethical Issues

During week 4 we were introduced to copy right laws and how you can obey them on the internet. With so many different resouces and peices of information it is easy to just copy and paste something without even thinking about it. However you can not do that because that is someones work that you are taking and trying to make your own. You need to make sure that you site any information that you use in a project or on a website.

I can definitely use this in the college of education. I have to write many papers and do research so this would be very beneficial to me, so that I do not accidentally break a copy right law. It is always a good skill to know how to be able to site information correctly because you will have to use it through out your entire life.

In this video kengr discusses the great YouTube debate, whether it is ok to make YouTube videos with already existing information, and whether it is ok to download shows and movies from YouTube to your account. This is related to what I learned because he discusses the laws and why it is against the law to post these videos and download shows and movies.

Week 8 The Sound of....Podcasting

For the week of October 12th-16th we learned about how to make a podcast of our own. We were taught the many different programs that you could use to make one and where you can find random sounds to add to it from different sites, such as Freesound.org. A program that we learned about was garage band and how simple it is to make and start your own podcast. You are given sounds, music, and pictures to use to play around with and add to your podcast. Than you can upload it to imeem.com and embed it into a blog. Audacity is another way you can make a podcast, it is a free program that you can download to a mac or windows and record your voice and add sounds.

As a special education teacher using anything with sound can make learning fun and more interesting. Children with certain learning disabilities learn better through visuals and sounds so providing this for them would be a more efficient way to learn. They can even make one of their own for the assignment that we are learning that week or day.

I choose the video Using Garage Band to make a Podcast as my visual it takes you through step by step and shows you how make a podcast on garage band. This relates to what I learned that week because it is shows you in depth how to make a podcast and in case I forgot some step in making one I can go back and review it on this video.

Week 2 Educational Technology

Web Technology was very interesting, I have always thought web technology was just simply the Internet and anything to do with a computer. However I did not realize how much other aspects there are dealing with the web, and how much it impacts our everyday. When my mom was in school they did not use any form of technology as learning tools, in fact she used a type writer to type up her reports. Now in schools technology is just as much of the lesson plan as pencil is to paper. Students today are known as the new generation of learners. YouTube is a common thing used in classrooms and for projects, it is a prime learning tool. Students these days can find and learn anything online with simply searching on google or one of the many other search options.

Being an education major allows me to always using and being introduced to new technologies. I am always asked to do PowerPoint presentations in most of my education classes. Teachers are always being shown and given new technologies to teach their students. In special education there is always a large amount of technology to help the students speak, write, and learn new concepts. When I become a special education teacher I would love to have a smart board to help with the learning process.

This YouTube video shows the impact technology has on students today. We learned about how technology has changed significantly over the years and this video shows you in depth how extreme those changes are. Some of the facts may never have thought could ever be true.

Week 7 Digital Story Telling

The digital story telling lesson was a lot of fun to learn about. I enjoyed being introduced to new websites and programs that could help make a movie. I have never known how to do this so being able to learn and find out all of these different websites was a great learning experience. With this lesson I learned how to make movies with videos and pictures, by using new techniques. These movie makers take your pictures and allows them to transition as if it was a movie.I learned also how to make cartoons on goanimate.com, which allows you to have fun and make a wide range of differnt cartoons. I have had a Mac for years and never knew how to work iMovie, with this lesson I was able to finally learn how to use it, by adding pictures, aranging them into a story, and add music to it. On animoto.com I can make a movie there as well, they provide you with pictures and music but you can always add your own too.

This is extremely beneficial as an education major. In the education college there are many projects that have to be done, mostly visiual, and being able to do something other than a power point would be very impressive to a professor. As a teacher iMovie would help out with introducing a new lesson or studying vocab words. I want to work with elementary special education children, and I feel that they would get the most benefit from goanimate.com, the site where you can make cartoons. These are fun and more appealing to younger children. When you add fun in with the learning the students will not ever realize they are actually learning something. The cartoon movies would help me teach these children with a more fun approach.


This is a video on a goanimate.com tutorial. It shows you have to make a goanimate and some of the cool features that they offer on the website. We learned how to make a goanimate in class but if for some reason I was not sure on a step or forgot where to find a certain effect I could refer back to this video and it would remind me where to find it.

Week 5 Media and Information Literacy

I very much enjoyed when we learned about Photoshop I have always wanted to learn how to use it. I learned how to use almost every aspect of this program. We learned how to make layers, each one being a different element added to your photo. We used pictures of different types of shoes and added a background, and text to make it look like these shoes were in a grassy field. We saw that not only can photo shop be used to help enhance pictures but it can also take aspects away and added to a picture. An example of this are pictures photo shopped from the time of the civil war and the most famous pictures of today. People were either taken out or some were randomly added.

Photoshop is a very influential learning tool that I could use as an education major. Not only can I use it for different visual projects in the college of education, but also when I start teaching I can use it in the classroom. I am hoping to teach children with special needs so any kind of visual learning tool would benefit them greatly. I could Photoshop many different pictures and show my students a fun way to learn about colors and show them different forms of weather. Also by writing text on my Photoshopped pictures I can have them look at pictures and learn the word easier. Visual learning is a very important tool when working with children with special needs and Photoshop can have so many different benefits for them.

Photoshop can also be a way to have fun with your pictures. You can make items invisible, add some very interesting objects, and make someone look like a totally different person. The video I chose for my blog took out important objects in each photo, which not only changed the photo completely but made it funny. It relates to what I learned because it shows different ways that you can edit a picture and how drastically a picture can change with just one object being taken out.

Disney Copy Right Video

In the Disney Copy Right Law Youtube video they used a more creative way to define describe and inform the veiwer about what copy rights really are and where they can be used. They set it up into chapters each one explaining something new. Chapter 1 defined what a copy right law is while chapter 2 said where copy rights are found. Like in movies, TV, music, and plays. In chapters 3 and 4 they talked about how long you can have a copy right for and that it use to be 14 years and now it is up to 100 years. Also they talked about fair use and public domain. In chapter 5 they talked about why they used Disney characters to explain copy right and it was because the Disney company is intimidating and have strict copy right laws.