Week 14-Using Games for Teaching and Learning

Games have been used in education to give students an opportunity to learn in new ways. Many students need to feel engaged or take a break from traditional classroom learning. Games can be used to "sneak in" learning while taking pressure off students. I remember playing Oregon Trail and Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego as a child. At the time, I thought I was getting time off, but I can now see the benefit I received from playing these games. Gaming can be used as an addition to classroom learning but should not replace it entirely. It does provide motivation to learn, though, and can absolutely provide a lot of tangible benefits to students.

As a future teacher, it is important that I have a great awareness of educational games and how they can be used in the classroom. I can use games in the classroom to keep children focused while letting them "relax" with a fun game. I need to know the benefits that the games provide and the types of students that can and should use them. If I can master all of this, then games can only become a tool in my teaching arsenal.



This video demonstrates someone playing the Mario Teaches Typing game. It shows that a game can seem to just be a fun game, but can really teach valuable skills. In this case, the game teaches the user to be a better, faster typist while playing a fun game. I remember playing games like this and thoroughly enjoying myself.

Week 13-Distance Education and Virtual Schooling

With the popularity of the internet increasing, students are looking to it as a source of education. Students can use virtual schooling and distance education to receive classroom instruction right on their computer screen. There are programs that range in level from kindergarten to Masters level that are available online. Many colleges offer degrees entirely online. This has allowed students to study more subjects than just in the classroom and work at their own pace while feeling like they are getting one on one attention.

This is very important in my field, as I would like to one day become an educator. I can use virtual schooling and distance education to teach students, even if I choose to teach even the youngest children. The resources are endless. I can also use virtual schooling to give opportunities to students who may have to stay home from school for a day, which is common in young children. I could also teach while myself utilizing distance education to obtain another degree.



This video is a commercial for a school OTEN that offers a ton of online classes to Australian students. The commercial is a funny look at online education. It is engaging and lighthearted and shows a benefit of taking online classes over attending an actual classroom.

Week 12-Professional Web Presence

Nowadays, it is becoming more and more important to have a web presence. Having a web presence means that you have some sort of presence on the web, whether it be just within social networks, or having accounts on professional resume-sharing websites. For this week, we had to create our own professional web presence. Most students only have a presence in social networks, so this was new for almost all of us. Someone can use their professional web presence to help find a job or any other networking opportunities. This makes their credentials viewable by many more people and can help them immensely.

When I graduate, I hope to work in another state or maybe even abroad. I can use my professional web presence to contact people from far away and hopefully stand out by using samples of my work and embedding them on my site. I could also use this professional blog to demonstrate my skills in technology and education. This can be very helpful in getting to know people that are very far away and give me many new opportunities.



This video I have embedded is a 9 minute clip that shows an interview with a woman named Rebecca Cruz. She talks about the importance of a small business maintaining a web presence. She stresses how it can affect the success of your business in great ways and how completely necessary it is to have a presence. She says that the internet is more popular than the yellow pages for finding information about businesses.

Week 11-Open Source Software

Open Source Software is a new type of technology that is being used by people in the technological community. The source code is made available for people to modify the program and improve how it is used. It allows for collaboration on programming and makes it available to all. Firefox is an example of open source software. If something is not open source, then people have to constantly pay for updates and other resources to ensure their programs are running smoothly.

When I graduate, I hope to use as much open source software as possible because it is free and allows for so much innovation. I can use different software to prepare lesson plans or programs for my students. There is software that is good for office work, such as preparing documents, but there are also programs that allow me to publish podcasts and other resources for my students. This will be especially helpful when I do not have a lot of money to spend on software.



This video gives a description of a few open source software programs that are free and a description about them. It shows how you can save money and gives a basic description of open source software and how it can be used. The video is from Youtube. It is pretty much a beginners guide to open source software.