Web Tools.

For the Web Tools assignment, there were four activities that we had to complete.  The first was creating a rubric.  The second thing we had to do was create a vocabulary set.  The vocabulary terms I chose to incorporate into this assignment fit into the frameworks of first grade life science.  The third thing we had to do for the Web Tools assignment was print a worksheet.  My four other teachers have been stressing this entire semester NOT to use worksheets, but--at some point--in education they are necessary in teaching.  Lastly, we had to create a crossword puzzle with our prior vocabulary terms.  I enjoyed this assignment.    Unfortunately, for me, I was absent the day that the class went over how to do the rubric, but I figured it out on my own, eventually.  It was very self explanatory and even had all of the options available to you in drop-down boxes.  By going to quizlet.com, we were able to create a digital set of our vocabulary words and use all sorts of awesome tools; some examples of these tools were flashcards, tests, glossaries, and tables.  I, definitely, see myself using this website in the future many times to come.  When choosing a worksheet, the website abcteach.com had many, many great worksheets to choose from.  Getting to the best part of the assignment, though, the crossword puzzle was a lot of fun to make.  Basically, all that was asked of the person creating it was to type in the terms and their clues.  The Eclipse Crossword program did all of the rest.  These are some very great and neat tools that I will be coming back to in my future teachings.

Turnitin.

Assignment number two was to write a report describing concerns pertaining to social, ethical, legal, and human issues of technology.  We were asked to include the answers to five questions including:  1) What is the definition of gender bias?  2) Is there evidence that a technology gender gap and gender bias exist?  3) Why are girls in their adolescent years losing interest in computers?  4) What are the differences and similarities between how males and females perceive and use technology?  5) What role do parents, educators, and manufacturers have in encouraging technology use among females?  I would say that this assignment could fall into any grade level in the MS Frameworks.  All of these questions are relevant when it comes to gender bias in technology.  I agree that these issues very well do exist and I also believe that they will begin to deteriorate sooner or later.  Technology is becoming such a constant and normal thing in every person's life now that software programs will not be made with strictly male aspects including: the rewards in games, the characters taking on the form of males, and only males being talked about in the technological world.  Completing this Turnitin assignment also helped me to realize how big of a problem plagiarism is in education and every day life today.  When I copied and pasted the information from the resources, my similarity percentage on the website was 97%.  However, when I revised my paper and, basically, rewrote it in my own words, I got the similarity percentage down to 6%.  One thing that I've learned over the years is that it is okay to quote from resources; just make sure that you cite your source!

https://www.turnitin.com

Concept Map.

     For my Concept Map assignment, I have chosen the parts of sentence structure from the MS Frameworks of first grade language arts.  I have been assigned concept maps in past assignments, but this was--by far--the most fun project I have ever had to do with one.  Being able to use the Kidspiration software and being exposed to such teaching through technology really opens my mind up to what can be possible in the classroom.  I know that technology in the classroom is only going to grow from this point on and I am excited to be a part of the generation that gets to experience this.  This is a great key in teaching children because it is animated and colorful.  There is so much that can be done with this program and we have only skimmed the top.  In my opinion, visual learning is extremely important.  I know that I learned best visually in elementary school.  On the rubric for our concept map, we had to be able to change the color of the hyperlinks; this was one thing that I had difficulty with and could not get it to work.  By delving deeper into the tutorial for Kidspiration, I could have figured out what I was doing wrong.  In such case, I will be downloading this program for future reference once I begin teaching.  I enjoyed this assignment very much!