SMART Board Group Demonstration

We were assigned to work in groups to organize a demonstration on SMART Board usage and how it could be effective in the classroom.  My group consisted of myself, Chelsea Krail, and Christina Dunnam, and our topic was Books vs. Movies: The Importance of Reading.  We also were paired with another group that we shared our survey with and we watched each others' presentations.  The subject of theirs was a Social Studies Presentation on our first president, George Washington, with features like interactive trivia and patriotic music.

This is a summary of the responses we received:

3 responses

Summary See complete responses

How many reading assignments have you had that you watched the movie instead?
	None 1 33% 1-5 2 67% 5+ 0 0% All 0 0%

Why watch the movie instead of reading?
	The book was too long. 1 33% The book was boring. 0 0% I don't like reading. 1 33% I'm more of a visual person. 1 33% I didn't have time. 2 67% I read the books. 1 33% People may select more than one checkbox, so percentages may add up to more than 100%.

Choose a movie from the list below that you read the book first.
	The Lovely Bones 1 33% Twilight 1 33% Alice in Wonderland 1 33% Gulliver's Travels 0 0% Harry Potter 0 0% The Notebook 0 0% Journey to the Center of the Earth 0 0%

After reading a book and watching the movie on a scale of 1 to 5. Did the movie fulfill expectations of the book?
Poorly Satisfactory	1 - Poorly 0 0% 2 2 67% 3 0 0% 4 0 0% 5 - Satisfactory 1 33%

When comparing the book versus the movie, were important parts you wanted to see on screen left out of the movie?
	yes 1 33% no 2 67%

Have you ever preferred the movie to the book?
	yes 2 67% no 1 33%

If yes to the previous question, please list the title of the book.

Havent read many books in general. James and the giant peach.The Count of Monte Cristo

In opinion, how important is reading the book verus watching the movie?
Not Important Extremely Important	1 - Not Important 0 0% 2 0 0% 3 2 67% 4 0 0% 5 - Extremely Important 1 33%

Have you ever watched the movie but not read the book for an assignment and suffered for it?
	yes 3 100% no 0 0%

Did you find this lesson effective in demonstrating the importance of reading books?
	yes 3 100% no 0 0%

Do you feel information needs to be added in order to strengthen the purpose?
	yes 0 0% no 2 67% It is strong but could be stronger 1 33%

Please give suggestions to improve this lesson.

There is nothing that I can think of other than the issues that arose with the SmartBoard and the pen

Number of daily responses

Here is the video of our presentation:

Blog Post #7

Randy Paush's Last Lecture: Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams

Carnegie Mellon University Professor Randy Pausch gives one last lecture, beginning with addressing "the elephant in the room": his pancreatic cancer. He was an instructor of computer science, human - computer interaction and design, and creator of the "Alice" interactive computer program for students that teaches them computer programming.  He also worked as an Imagineer for Disney for sometime.   He says "you cannot change the cards you are dealt, just how you play the hand."
His lecture starts to form around his childhood dreams, the lessons he learned in his attempts to achieve them, the dreams of others, and how he enabled the dreams of others. Looking back on the things he most wanted to accomplish as a child, he relives the happy and imaginative days that brought him to this point.  He looks back on his unfulfilled dream of making it to the NFL, and says that "experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted."
Attaining his childhood dreams did not exactly come easy.   Just like everyone else, he had to work to achieve them.  He mentions the "brick walls" or difficulties he was met with in trying to make things happen for himself, and that these "brick walls" are there to test how much you want something, and they are also there to show your dedication.  If you really want to become an imagineer, like he did, or even a teacher like most of us in EDM310, you keep going even though it may take a lot of effort, hard work, and determination to get to where you want to be.
He tells the stories of how he made the dreams of others come true as an educator and that what he accomplished might not have been possible anywhere else, besides Carnegie Mellon University. He and a collleague worked on the Entertainment Technology Center, and their work was made simpler by the format of the program because they had no deans to report to, used project-based curriculum and field trips and were given expllicit instructions to "break the mold".  These ETC's are being implemented worldwide in countries like Australia and Singapore.
Close to the conclusion of his speech he cites the things he finds important, and some of them I definitely agree with: Having fun, never losing your childlike sense of wonder, loyalty, helping others, never giving up, and showing gratitude.
I liked the quote he used from baseball player Jackie Robinson who said: "Don't complain, just work harder."
The video was made in September of 2007, and Randy Pausch lost his battle to pancreatic cancer on July of 2008, but his legacy remains.  What will our legacies be as educators, dreamers, achievers..students, even?

My Personal Learning Network (PLN)

So far, all I can say about my PLN is.... Symbaloo! You might remember this program from the video about the 7th Grader's Personal Learning Network Video from my last blog post.
I am very picky when it comes to organization.  I just am.  I know it sounds weird, but it has to look right, it has to be easy to use, and it cannot be annoying.  Google Reader for instance, and its layout, is annoying.  It just is.
But, Symbaloo, on the other hand, is cute. I like color and creativeness and visual interest or I completely lose focus.  I have added my blog, Facebook, Twitter, Gmail, the EDM310 Class Blog and Alumni Blog, my university account, university email, Yahoo, YouTube Account, Diingo, Evernote, Vimeo, and more all in one place, arranged neatly and cutely, with no confusion or wasting of time.  In this class we have so many websites to visit and comment on, videos to watch, sites to sign up for, it just makes it so very simple.  I cannot tell you the time I am saving by having Symbaloo.
AND, it gets me excited because I can see just how much I am learning because it's all assembled together on one screen.  I am a very visual person so I like images.  I don't have a screen shot of what my PLN looks like (yet), but here is what one might look like, just to pique your interest: