Friday 30 March 2012

Khan Academy and Visual Learning Reflection

             The video presented on the blog explaining the properties of "Red Shift" is an extremely intelligent form of teaching. Similar to "Flip Teaching", the video is used to stimulate curiosity and interest. One could watch said video with no previous knowledge of the science of physics, and still learn a large amount of information.

 
             The classroom environment may not provide enough stimulus for all students. Some students are almost strictly visual learners, while others cannot pay attention if there is no interest in content. One way to fight such problems would be to use the Khan Academy and other video sources to help provide visual instructions for course content. 

 
Common Problems within Classrooms:


#1 Defiance, Rowdiness, and Distraction:

Many classrooms have students which are defiant and cause distraction to others. This problem is usually caused by a lack of interest in the teaching method. A way to fix this would be to change the teaching style from perhaps simple oral lectures to visual and physical demonstrations.

#2 Personality Clashes:

Teachers will never have a perfect classroom. There is always one or two students who retain the defiant mentality and will never listen to what an authoritative person has to say. This can be possibly remedied by using a Khan Academy video and allowing for someone rather than yourself explain a subject to students.

 
#3 Unmotivated Visual Learners:

Some students will only be interested with visuals alongside work or as a main teaching aspect. Visual displays of any sort that catch the eye will easily tame these students into learning. One could make use of the Khan Academy videos to the fullest extent with a classroom populated with such pupils.

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             Quite simply, video demonstrations are an extremely efficient tool to use within the classroom. The use of online technology in schools is also ever increasing in usage, alongside a growth in technological advancements. The job as a teacher is to spur interest within students about the subject they are currently studying, therefore if one can use multiple methods of teaching in order to maintain a strong interest from students, the choice is very simple. Technology is the way of the future.


Saturday 24 March 2012

Shakespeare Post Three

For the twitter discussion over what is the difficulty of Shakespeare, I completely agree with the following things: "Shakespeare is difficult due to the fact that language is changing everyday, whether beneficial or not, it is constantly changing" "Shakespeare isn't enjoyed because of the writing style and time period it was written in" "Analysis of every colour and symbol is an absolute deal breaker" "The Shakespearean setting is one of the least relative settings to our current life"

Things that I did not agree with are: "Shakespearean language is bad" "Reading Shakespeare out loud in class is difficult"

Study Strategy For Things I Have A Prejudice Against: I will always attempt to relate things I disagree with to agreeable points, or I will look at what or why I don't agree with a fact, causing me to memorize the information. Most of the time I just buckle down and learn even though it is against my beliefs or lack of. Having a prejudice does not mean I cannot learn it, I in lament terms "man up".

How can a student overcome a disliking of a subject or teacher: My strongest advice towards overcoming a personal struggle with a subject or teacher would be to teach the subject to yourself or try to learn from fellow peers. Usually, if one does not enjoy a subject, it is because they don't enjoy the way it is being taught.

Therefore, one should always try to search for other outputs of information such as: peers, videos, tutors, or other teachers of the same subject. As for disliking Shakespeare, one must look towards the reason of a disconnection. Shakespeare was not meant to be read, therefore the most common problem is the inability to interpret and visualize the language. To solve this, a student can always look towards movies or theatrical presentations of the play they are having difficulty with. Quite simply, one must always understand motives and mindsets of characters.

Wednesday 21 March 2012

Ten Things I Do And Do Not Know



Things I Know:

Proper Internet Searching- Google is my friend and I know how to manipulate the search terms

Self Learning for Technology - I have learned how to program and build computers on my own, as well as use a phone as a multipurpose device, therefore I am under the belief I know how to learn about technology on my own.

Typing: Though I don't use all of my fingers to type, I do type quickly and am very comfortable with the feel of a keyboard. I know where all the keys are without looking at them. But I challenge you to tell me what the F6 button is ever used for. (Challenge Accepted?)

Safety and Security: Very adept at this one, I've learned to work with anti-viruses and have also worked with viruses, furthermore I have a fairly strong knowledge of spyware as well.

Hardware Basics and Troubleshooting: I have done this a multitude of times. Working with hardware is fairly normal for me now that I've built and upgraded a computer for five years, only recently replacing the entire frame and motherboard.

Finding Apps: As a avid iPhone user, I have a strong understanding of navigating the app store both from my phone and from iTunes directly making this skill one that I don't need to improve much.


Things I Need To Work On:

Social Media Skills: I do not enjoy using twitter nor facebook, therefore I have a fairly basic knowledge of their usages. So, I need to improve upon that.

Office Suite Skills - I know how to use Microsoft Office fairly adeptly, but the other programs are still quite troublesome for me at times.

Netiquette: Internet/Email/Social Media Etiquette: This one is also a area of improvement, this is because I could use a brush up upon proper formatting of emails and responses to workplace emails.

Backup Data: As you have already noticed (essay lost on me twice) I really need to work on my data security by backing up files online and perhaps to external drives.


Learn How To Use Things That I Don't Understand?


 Video On File Backup