Curriculum Area and Technology

As I started creating my curriculum goals sheet there were many things that came to mind. I wanted to find a topic that aligned with the states standards, could apply to many real life situations, help my students in future classes and careers, and most importantly, be easy to access with many engaging activities used in the internet. I think that technology is growing faster and faster which ist is why it is important for these young students to understand how to use it. Especially in math the use of technology will be really helpful to my students. Making this curriculum web will allow my students to connect the internet to learning, as well as use more intelligences while learning math.

In chapter 3, there were many things touched upon in planning a curriculum web. You must consider your teaching points you want your students to master, what your students want and need, engaging activities. and the content specific topics before creating your curriculum web. All of these I took into great consideration while planning out my curriculum goals.

I think that also a major purpose of this curriculum web is to enhance the students learning. This curriculum web could be used in and outside of class. It could be used as an extra spin on a lesson that will keep students engaged as well as present information in a different way. It also could be used at home as a homework assignment or chapter review. Finding specific online activities is a way of teaching on a new level, creating new experiences to your students. It also teaches the students another lesson in using technology.

Website Evaluation

In class yesterday we learned about website evaluation. To be very honest this was very informative because there are many websites out there that are not valid websites. As a teacher it is very important to educate my children sbout these "fraudulant" websites. Many times I will have my students search the web to find out inofrmation for a topic I am teaching in class. Most of my students will believe whatever they come accross, especially if it only took them a second to find it. Most of my students would like to lake as little time as possible to complete an assignment. Educationg them on the whether or not a site is useful might take them a little more time to find, but a lot less time then having to redo their work based off of a faulty site.

One thing I will teach my students are the 5 w's. These are who, what, where, when, and why. If these questions can be answered then most likely it is a valid site. Also do a biography check on the author. Researching the author says a lot about the website.

Finally I would like to add that learning about website evaluation was very helpful for my own research. I must admit that I am a victom of trusting any website I came accross. This mostly had to do with the fact that I hate spending time searching around the web. Now as an educator I know I have to be a good model for my students. This means I must do what I expect from my students. So now I am a new person when it involves searching the web.

Copyright laws

Although its very complicated, it is very good to know about the copyright laws. For me as a teacher I never really knew if information I found on the web was fair for me to use. Eventhough I didn't know if I could use it, I did anyway. Now at least I have a little bit more knowledge so I know what I am allowed to use ans what I am not.

Lucky for me, there is something called "fair use" which allows me to use copywritten material for educational use. From what I can gather there are certain time frames and amounts of material that I can use that I must abide by. I also learned that California has some crazy rules for "fair use" and copywritten material. I still don't know everything about copywritten vs fair use, but at least now I have a little more knowlegde.