Last Word: iPods are a cult

Obviously this statement is full on opinion, I have come to the consensus that iPods are the first step to the mac cult. I read tons on blogs about people who have been ulled in by the whole appeal of the ipod and how they switch over to macs. I just find it fascinating how one music player/temporary disk storage can change the complete view of a person. One of the blogs that i read was talking about how he just bought an ipod and it was everything and more of what he expected. Reading all the information makes me want to experience the ipod phenom myself and see if it is all it cracks up to. To bad i don't have 200-300 dollars lying around someplace to buy one.

The teacherweb sites that we created are really exciting. They give you an illusion of having your own classroom and what you would put on your site if students/ parents would actually use. It was interesting to figure out all the different features that are available with in the website like making up quizzes and exams. I also thought it was cool how we implemented the slate on the web. It is a good way for students to email messages or pictures that the want to create and send to their favorite teacher.

Teaching Today.

I thought today was a good day, everyone did great on their teaching with powerpoint lessons. I was really happy that we all got to see each others' lessons too, even though i voted to stay in groups. It was exciting to see the different ways people taught. I thought my lesson went as well as it could. I know that i rushed the students when making the collages. I also feel bad that i could really adapt my activity to the whole class. Something i will have to think about in the future because you never do know the exact number of students you are going to have in the classroom or activity. The teacher websites were really insteresting. I've never seen it before so it was nice.

iPods
After looking at one site about my research topic about iPods, I'm not so sure i want to go and buy one now. according to this website http://www.newstarget.com/iPods.html, iPods are bad for you. Apparently, it will make you go deaf. Listening to music over 90 decibels for an hour may cause tinnitus or permant hearing loss. 90 decibels on an iPod is only about 2/3 up the volume dial. Also on this website i saw another article about iPods causing crime sprees in New York city. That is about all i was able to look up for now.

Class Epiphanies

Today was the first time that i have ever created my own rubric that was quite in depth and actually had specifications on it that were on different levels rather than "did i have that" type rubric. It was a lot harder than i thought te think about all the specifications that need to be thought about when you create a rubric. One of my group members was telling us about some website where you can just type in the components you want to evaluate and then it creates the rest of it. Although, i think creating your own rubric gives you a better grasp on what you are evaluating on your own standards, not the computers. I also learned how to use the web browsers more effectively by using tabs. I had no previous knowledge about them so it was nice to learn about that function. As for my research on iPods, I have still not started, such a procrastinator sometimes.

Virtual Tours and Topics

http://dl.caeph.tulane.edu/demos/VirtualCampus.html
This is a site to Tulane University. It is not the best tour because it takes a lot of hyperlinks to get to the actual tour on the site. There was another site called Whitehousekids.com. I thought this site was pretty good a showing the fabulous side of the white house. It also had a lot of good information involved with the pictures that were taken. I thought this would be good at the elementary level because it has very general inforamtion and good graphics.

I was thinking of looking up the whole phenom about iPods and their comparison to others. I think it is fascinating about how it got so poplular so i'm interested about why they are better than most and why people prefer them. i also think that it is interesting how the PC seemed to be the top computer and now the MAC is coming back. What is better about either one and which type would you buy if you had a choice?

So, I'm kind of scared about all the things that i didn't know from the pre-assessment. On the other hand I'm excited to start learning about all the web making programs because i haven't worked with any of the software. I know this class is going to take some time on the computer but i like how Helen said that we should just start the assignment instead of waiting because i have a tendency to wait because i like to have things done as perfect as possible. So, it was a relief to hear that things can be done badly and we can redo it of needed. I also think that it is going to be hard for me to think of technology as a tool cause in some of my classes we talk about how we could add technology to the lesson we have come up with.