In regard to technology I don’t plan on it being a big part of my classroom. I want to teach kindergarten through third grade so my students will be fairly young. However, I still want to incorporate technology into my classroom and I would like to be competent in computer technology. My plan is to use the computer for basic things like attendence and grading. I would also like to set up a website that my students and their parents could visit. At this site they could look at announcements, projects that we would be doing in the classroom, information about field trips or future activities. I could also post due dates for assignments, extra curricular activities, school events, and the lunch menu. In order to be able to successfully create a useful and well organized site I would want to take a course that would specifically teach me how to do this. I would take this course after I gaduate with my bachelor’s degree. I would take it at Davenport University because it is close to my home and they offer many computer courses. I would take it after graduation because then it would be fresh in my head and I could start using it immediately and concentrate more directly on that course. I would also use the internet as my sourse to look up ideas and activities to use in the classroom. Trackstar and Webquest will hopefully be used often. There are so many ideas and worksheets off of the internet that could be used in the classroom.

In the future, I would like to continue my education in computer technology. ED 205 is my first college computer class so I still feel weak in all areas of computer technology. I would like to take a least two more classes in computers before I would feel confident and comfortable using them in a classroom. One thing I think I really have become to like is powerpoint. I know that in my classroom I will use powerpoint to present information or give examples. I can also incorporate links during my presentations to be more involved.

There was no author identified on the MLK site I visited. There were no credentials. What I can tell you about the group that made this site is they all have white pride and they are extremely racist. The website address did not have any affiliation to professional organization, school, or governement. The content is definitely not appropriate for use in schools. The content of the site is bias. They are coming from a racial viewpoint. I don’t trust their sources. It seems that they base all of their information on FBI bugs, that have never even been released, not to say they actually even exist. The audience of the site is not suitable for students. Most students would be able to read it but probably wouldn’t understand some of it. The design of the site is horrible. Yes it does load fast and they use graphics appropriately. However, a lot of the links did not even work. I could not see a couple of the flyers and the educational video could not be found.

Kids can learn to be less trusting of information on the internet by having them look up sites similar to this but not so graphic (talking about sex and f**k word) and racist. Kids should be taught about looking for the author of the website and who the site is affiliated with. They can do this simply by looking at the address.

When I searched google for MLK the site came up fourth on the list. The reason it is so high on the list is because their web address only says martinlutherking.org and there are a lot of matches for people using those keywords.

After visiting this website: http://cie.asu.edu/volume8/number10/, I deicided it would definitely be appropriate to use constructivism in my classroom in which I would be teaching special education. In the website it stated, “Children with learning disabilities will benefit from this approach because of their difficulty in generalizing from the classroom to other settings. With the realistic examples built in to the instruction, the students have specific practice with generalization.” Students with learning disabilities or other emotional or physical impairments have a difficult time grasping and comprehending concepts and new information as it is. I think the constuctivist approach would help to bring in real life situations so they can relate new information to previous knowledge and experience. One exapmle I found was in a regular approach to teach children about money they would talk about it and do worksheets. The constuctivist theory would emphasis using real money that the students could count and use in the school store or a pretend store set up in the classroom. The experience with money would be hands on and a meaningful expeience to the individual student. Lesson plans would be introduced with information the students already know (base knowledge) and then new information would be extended off of that. This will help students with learning disabilities because of their low self-esteem and repeated failure experiences. It will also help to increase their confidence level and not overwhelm them. Other techniques that could be used to help students with LD is brainstorming, mapping, use of graphic orginizers, and self-monitoring. Another important approch to the construcivist approach is to introduce key concepts and ideas that relate to them. Instead of telling all the liitle tidbits of information it is more valuable to teach the big ideas and the relationship it has to other themes. Students would be active learners which is proven to help students to learn and retain information. The constuctivism theory would absolutely be beneficial in my classroom.

Constuctivism relates to technology in it’s large amount of available information and in delivering of it because it promotes the student as a self-directed learner. It allows the student to be independent, individualized, interactive, interdisciplinary, and intuitive. This however creates a problem for students with learning diabilities who need specific directions and behavior modification.